Unless you’ve had a falling out with a sibling, it’s safe to say that most people would want to go to their brother or sister’s wedding.

The problem is how expensive it can be to go to a wedding that is far away from your home.

Travel expenses add up fast!

In today’s story, one woman can barely afford to travel to her sister’s wedding, and she’s not sure if it’s worth the sacrifice.

Let’s find out all the details…

AITAH – Not Attending Sisters Wedding

Back story. My sister and I are about 13 years apart.

She was around 4 or 5 when I moved out of our parents house on my own.

We’ve never really had a close relationship because of our age difference but she’s my sister and I love her regardless.

She’s not very close to her sister.

Since she became an adult she has had little to nothing to do with me or my children.

She doesn’t invite us to anything, doesn’t call me to talk, doesn’t text.

She’s more like a distant relative and that’s understandable because, again, we have such a big age difference.

We are in completely different places in life.

Her sister is engaged.

A year ago she got engaged to her boyfriend.

I’ve met him a handful of times and he seems like a good guy.

They decided they wanted to get married in a different state on New Year’s Eve.

Covid was really tough financially.

During COVID, my family was practically homeless.

We weren’t always sure where food was coming from.

It wasn’t a great time for us and we went into pretty big debt just to survive.

As things have turned around and we’ve started taking care of that I’m sure it looks good to anyone outside my family.

She was determined to find a cost effective way to get to the wedding.

When my sister announced the wedding will be so far away I was determined to make it work.

Your baby sister only gets married once after all (hopefully).

I didn’t immediately rsvp as I was still trying to figure out if I’d fly, drive, or both.

Trying to figure out the most cost effective way to get my family to and from the wedding.

It’s a good 24 hour drive so would need broken into at least 2 days each way.

Her mom called to ask why she hadn’t RSVPd yet.

My sister apparently told my mom she was upset that no one had rsvp for her wedding on her side of the family.

My mom called me.

It became a thing.

So I let my mom know I’d be there.

Here’s what going to the wedding will look like…

I’m currently working two jobs as we are working to chip away the Covid debt, and my husband was laid off this past summer.

Taking 2 days off to drive there, a day for the wedding, then 2 days off to drive back is at least 5 days of missed work.

5 days before New Years Eve is December 26th, so we’d be driving on Christmas to ensure some buffer time.

There won’t be any Christmas presents this year.

My dilemma – in order to make this work my kids (one of which has seen my sister twice in the last year and the other not at all) won’t get Christmas.

All the money we’ve saved up for Christmas will be spent on gas, the rest of the Airbnb, and food for the trip.

We won’t have money to do fun things while gone, we won’t be able to buy Christmas presents.

It would strictly be drive 24 hours to the wedding, watch wedding, drive back.

She’s considering not going to the wedding.

Adding extra to this, my sister asked my nephew to be part of the wedding as a ring bearer.

My kids have been an afterthought.

No one has asked them to be any part of the wedding at all.

So AITAH if I don’t spend my kids Christmas money to go to this wedding?

Maybe she could talk it out with her mom and be honest about the financial situation.

Perhaps they could share a hotel room or Airbnb with another family going to the wedding to save money and buy a few small gifts.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story…

Maybe she could go by herself.

Here’s another vote for going solo.

Christmas is a bad time to plan a destination wedding.

There will probably be a lot of other people who can’t travel at Christmas.

She has very good reasons not to go.

If she can’t afford to go, she shouldn’t go.

It’s too bad, but money doesn’t lie.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.