Man books hotel after in-laws tell him to sleep on couch; they're pissed. UPDATED

Dealing with in-laws can be a tricky emotional dynamic. On one hand, you want to make a good impression and keep the peace on behalf of your partner and yourself.

On the other hand, if you're going to be part of the family, you want to keep it real. Finding that balance between honesty about your own needs, and keeping the peace can be a hard task.

In a popular post on the AITA subreddit, a man asked if he's wrong for staying in a hotel after his wife's family insisted he stay on the couch.

He wrote:

AITA for moving to a hotel because my wife's family insisted I sleep on the couch?

My wife and I got married last summer. Her family lives across the country from us, so up until this point I had never actually visited them, but I had met them a handful of times and we've always gotten along fine.

They invited us to stay with them for a few days and we took them up on the offer. We flew in yesterday, and everything went well, her dad and I watched football while she caught up with her mom and sisters, and then we had a really nice dinner.

But things went south at the end of the night when it was made clear that they didn't want me sharing a bed with my wife while in their home, and that they expected me to sleep on the couch.

I honestly thought they were joking at first, but they insisted we sleep separately.

I had a problem with the implication that I shouldn't be allowed to sleep next to my wife, and I also have a bad back and the couch did not look the least bit comfortable (they don't have a guest room).

After arguing back and forth for a bit, I decided to leave and book a hotel. I told my wife she didn't have to come with me, she chose to stay and I said I'd come back the next day.

I went off to a Marriott about 10m away and got a good night's sleep, trying to not let the whole situation bother me. This morning, I called my wife asking when I should come by. She told me her parents want me to apologize for leaving the way I did.

I told her that I'm willing to apologize to keep the peace, but they need to acknowledge that it wasn't appropriate to insist I can't share a bed with my own wife. She said she'd talk to them and call me back.

About 10 minutes later, I hear back from her, and she tells me that not only will they not apologize for it, they are now insisting I need to come back and stay on the couch for the rest of our visit.

If I don't agree to this, I'm not welcome back in the house. I'm pretty livid at this point - I told her that there's absolutely no chance that I will do that, and I am no longer willing to offer any sort of apology.

My wife's sisters are now bothering me saying this is just the way their parents are, that my wife is very upset, and that I need to just give in and stay on the couch for the rest of the trip before this turns into some sort of family feud.

From my perspective, I don't care what they think and I'm willing to treat the rest of this trip as a solo vacation, go sightseeing and meet my wife back at the airport at the end of the week. AITA?

People gave their two cents and more.

b_digital wrote:

NTA - Your in-laws are abhorrent hosts. It's their house, their rules, and their rules are stupid. Rather than fighting a pointless battle, you set a clear and valid boundary, and they chose to take offense to it.

They want you to stay on their couch because it's a power play. You staying in a hotel takes that power away, and they can't handle it. The fact that your wife doesn't have your back on this is a giant red flag. Good luck.

virtualchoirboy wrote:

NTA. You have a wife problem just as much as you have an in-law problem. She should be defending you, not deferring to them. Do not back down on this because they are blatantly disrespecting you and disrespecting your marriage.

And if your wife can't support you in this, I would suggest some marriage counseling when you get home because you're her chosen family now. She needs to act like it.

Aeronaut91 wrote:

NTA, tell your wife you're going to book your ticket home for today. Ask her if she wants you to change her ticket to go home with you or if she wants you to cancel it because she'd rather live with her parents forever.

hannahsflora wrote:

You are totally NTA. You say they don't have a guest room - so where is your wife sleeping? What reasoning are they giving as to why they don't want you sleeping in the same room as your wife?

Are any of your wife's sisters married and if so, do they get to sleep in the same room as their spouses?

This is absolutely bizarre and honestly, if your wife doesn't come to her own senses on this and apologize to you plus set some boundaries with her parents, you two need to have some hard conversations upon your return home.

People don't get this weirdly controlling in only one area, so I suspect that this is only the tip of the iceberg with what's to come if you two don't get on the same page now.

He_Who_Is_Right_ wrote:

NTA. Die on this hill—your dignity is not up for discussion or negotiation. If that means that there will be a family feud without end, so be it.

It seems clear that not only is OP NTA, but his wife might be TA alongside her parents.

UPDATE: After the post blew up and accrued hundreds of comments and hot takes from across the world, OP jumped on with an update on the situation.

He wrote:

Wow, I didn't expect this post to blow up the way it did. I took the advice of one of the posters here to ask my wife and her sisters to meet me for dinner apart from their parents. It was interesting to say the least.

After we sat down, I leaned into them a bit about what had happened. I asked my wife if she knew her dad was going to demand we sleep separately.

She said she was surprised by it as well - she'd expect that if I were still just her boyfriend, but we're married now. I then asked them all if they thought it was OK for their parents to act the way they did. They said it wasn't, but they know their father and it's best to just let things like this go.

This led to a somewhat uncomfortable conversation about how controlling he can get, how he angers easily when he doesn't get his way, and that he was already throwing a fit over me 'disrespecting him' by leaving.

The reason they were all trying to get me to come back and apologize was because he would find some way to make them all miserable for the rest of the week if I didn't.

I told my wife I was really disappointed that she wouldn't side with her husband when I was clearly in the right, and she went sort of quiet. I then asked if they thought this was even about house rules, because it seemed more like their dad was just trying to show me who was in charge. They agreed.

Up to this point, I had really done everything I could to not escalate this situation, but I started to get really mad that they were all so afraid of how their dad would react. I decided I needed to push back a bit. I know my wife was mainly here to spend time with her sisters who she rarely gets to see.

So I told them all I was going to move to a hotel by the beach about an hour away in San Diego for the rest of the week and I'd book a second room for them if they wanted to all join. They don't get to go on trips much, so I figured they'd be excited to get a free vacation away from their parents.

They know that their dad is probably going to freak out when they leave, but I think they realized this situation had gone too far so they decided they would come and deal with the fallout afterwards.

So that's where this all stands for now. I'm about to check out of my hotel and hit the road for San Diego. My wife and her sisters are coming down in a separate car after their parents leave for work.

I fully expect their dad to throw a conniption fit when he finds out they left without telling him, but I really don't care at this point. I tried to be the bigger person at every turn, but he pushed this all way too far. Thanks again to everyone for all the insight.

As of now, there's no follow-up to the update, but a lot of people jumped on to respond.

No_Information_8973 wrote:

Oh, I can't wait until mom and dad come to visit to see the first grandchild and OP says dad has to sleep on the couch.

MadWhiskeyGrin wrote:

'How dare you disrespect me in my home?'
'I'm disrespecting you from a hotel on the beach, 'sir''

thebearofwisdom wrote:

I needed an update to this, it was driving me mad thinking about it. Because I hate being told what to do anyway but when it’s something ridiculous like this it makes me want to be a right sh*t about it. I’m glad OP just walked away and got out.

It wasn’t even about the not sharing a bed really, that wasn’t the issue behind it. Because if it was, they would have been okay with him staying elsewhere. But the dad demanded he come back and sleep on the couch.

Only the couch. What the f**k. Like that’s a bizarre power play that isn’t even related to anything like religion or whatever. It’s purely a control thing. So all in all, I’m glad the sisters have time together away from their bats**t parents.

And OP doesn’t have to sleep on a damn couch.

For now, it looks like OP got the last laugh.