We’ve all been in a situation where a simple misunderstanding has snowballed into hurt feelings on both sides, even if no malice was meant by either person.

Especially if one of the people involved can be a bit sensitive. Some people just read way too much into things, something I’m guilty of myself.

So when this woman invited her brother’s family to a barbecue, only to be told her brother and nephew weren’t available, she assumed her sister-in-law wasn’t coming either.

But this led to her sister-in-law’s feelings being seriously hurt. Was she in the wrong, or was this all just a miscommunication?

AITA for assuming my SIL was not coming to the barbecue?

My brother Nic is married to Ruby. They have a son, Jack.

A couple days ago I texted Nic to ask him if they’d like to come round for a barbecue on Saturday. Ruby texted back the following:

Hey, it’s Ruby, Nic is working on his bike. He and Jack are at a race this weekend, so not around

And naturally, OP assumed this meant that their family would not be in attendance…

So I replied:

Ok no worries! We’ll catch you guys another time. I’ll text Jack but please tell him good luck from us!

And that was that. Except that wasn’t that because Nic called me yesterday to say Ruby is upset that she was “uninvited” from the barbecue.

But OP said she meant no malice by her response, she just assumed Ruby wouldn’t want to come without the rest of the family.

I am so confused. She said Nic and Jack weren’t around, meaning the majority of the family unit wasn’t able to come so I assumed we’d just see them another time.

Is that weird? If she had asked to come, like said “they’re at a race this weekend but do you kind if I still stop by?”

I wouldn’t have said no. But she didn’t say anything.

Ruby is a nice person, and a fantastic mother, but she can be a bit funny about stuff like this so I think this is just another overreaction from her. Did I actually mess up?

Seems like this was just a simple miscommunication that was blown out of proportion. OP assumed she wouldn’t want to come, and Ruby never came out and said she did.

Reddit agreed, saying that while they could see why Ruby thought OP was being dismissive, it obviously wasn’t OP’s intention.

Others said that from all the negatives in Ruby’s response, they would’ve assumed she wasn’t coming just like OP.

This user agreed with everyone else, and said if anything, that Ruby was being just a little bit oversensitive.

Finally, this user even thought that from Ruby’s text, she didn’t want to come in the first place.

If people knew how to effectively communicate over text, this all could have been avoided.

If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.