Woman Believes Sister Intentionally Planned Engagement Party While She Was Out of Town to Paint Her as ‘Unsupportive’

A bride turned to the Reddit community for support after finding herself at the center of a painful family conflict during what was supposed to be the happiest week of her life. 

She and her husband had traveled to her home country in Latin America for their destination wedding, staying for a week and a half alongside her sister Sarah and Sarah’s fiancé at a family property. 

After their nuptials, she told her mom that they would “be away Monday–Thursday” for their short honeymoon, adding that if her sister decided to plan her own engagement party on Thursday, they “will absolutely be there. If it is on Wednesday, we cannot make it.”

The newlyweds had planned a quiet mini-honeymoon a few hours away, but the trip was far from simple. The bride described the drive as winding mountain roads that “quickly gave me a headache and motion sickness,” making the commute exhausting.

She explained in her post that they had booked a cabin, but “since Monday and Thursday were travel days,” they really only had two days to enjoy time alone together.

The issue began when Sarah decided to throw a last-minute engagement party at the family home while the couple was on their honeymoon. 

The bride noted that she and Sarah had a strained relationship, explaining that they “used to be extremely close and that changed very recently due to her fiancé.” Because of the tension, she coordinated directly with her mother and made the schedule clear, yet the event was scheduled on the day she was out of town.

When the poster learned that the engagement party was scheduled for Wednesday, she felt blindsided. She told her family she wouldn’t be attending, saying she wasn’t willing to “endure that winding drive twice in 24 hours, lose our non-refundable reservation, or cut our already short honeymoon in half.”

Before she left for the trip, her mother confronted her about her decision. The bride recounted how her mother pulled her aside and told her she needed to be “more flexible” for the sake of the family. 

Hearing that she was being viewed as “selfish” devastated her, especially after all the effort she had put into planning an international wedding while accommodating her husband’s family. She shared that she “cried for an hour” while packing, feeling guilty even though she believed her request was reasonable.

According to the bride, Sarah’s reaction afterward was noticeably cold. She said her sister wasn’t explicitly giving her the silent treatment, but communication became “essentially non-existent,” and Sarah was already avoiding making holiday plans with her. The bride suspected there was more beneath the surface, especially given their prior falling-out over co-owning a home in the United States.

The bride explained that before the engagement, Sarah had wanted to move in with her boyfriend to help cover his mortgage while renting out her room.

“She wanted to rent out her room in our shared house and keep 100% of the rent money to subsidize his bills,” the bride wrote. She disagreed, pointing out that as equal owners, any rental income needed to be shared. Sarah felt she was being unsupportive, and the bride felt her sister was prioritizing her boyfriend over their partnership.

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Given that history, the bride couldn’t shake the feeling that the engagement party date was intentional. She said that because her sister knew exactly when she would be gone, she believed Sarah set the date so she wouldn’t be able to attend. “I suspect she chose Wednesday on purpose so I wouldn’t be there,” she wrote, adding that it allowed Sarah to “paint me as the unsupportive sister.”

Commenters on Reddit quickly rallied behind the bride, with one saying it was “tacky of your sister to purposely plan an engagement party during your destination wedding and honeymoon.” 

The bride responded with grace, clarifying that she didn’t blame her sister for wanting to celebrate during the visit, explaining, “There WAS time for it to not interfere with my wedding/honeymoon but she chose the day I couldn’t make it.”

She also revealed that friends suspected the same motive, sharing that her sister had told them she was “uncomfortable being at my wedding.”