A 15-year-old preparing for her sweet sixteen found herself at odds with her mom over the guest list for a pricey family birthday party her parents are paying for.

While she agreed to most of her mom’s invite requests, one name sparked immediate conflict: a cousin who previously got drunk at a family gathering and verbally attacked her.

Wanting a fun, drama-free celebration, she refused to invite him, and her mom didn’t take it well.

AITA for not adhering to one of my mums invite wishes for my birthday party when she and my dad are paying a lot for it?

I (15f) and my mum have been arguing over this and i wanna know if i need to apologise or not basically.

So it’s my 16th birthday on the 13th and my party is on the 12th. My mum and dad are paying for the family party and for my friends im going to a waterpark with them. (I have a pass so they all get to go for free).

But for the family party it’s at a restaurant where you can book out a room, there’s a bar for the adults that will be there. and then a space for the balloon setup things. It’s a pretty spacious room so im saying this to say it will cost. my dad said it’s 150 an hour to rent the room and the party would go for 4 hours.

Pricy!

My mums request was that she give me a list of people she wanted there. I didn’t love the idea but i said sure. She sent me the list and it included some family members I haven’t seen in a while but I was fine with them coming.

Then one name on the list was Peter. Peter (26m) is a cousin I’ve talked to a lot of times, but we haven’t seen each other in a year because he stopped going to family functions and events.

The last time I saw this cousin it was not a pleasant experience at all. He got drunk at a family gathering and just started arguing with everyone. With me in particular he was poking at my outfit (that it was just “ugly”) and my makeup and such. He was calling me names which I won’t repeat (but take a guess and I’ll tell you if you’re warm or cold).

Wow, what a meanie.

He had to get kicked out because the stuff he was saying was really bad. This really put me off and I was glad he was skipping family events.

I told my mum no way was i inviting him to my birthday and I wanted everyone to have a good time without his drunk rants and she got very mad at this and stormed out of the room and I could hear her saying to my dad about how they’re paying for it and I’m not grateful enough to do that one thing for her.

My thing is, I want to have the bar for the adults as there’s only five family members who can’t drink at the party and I want everyone to have fun. I know it sounds weird to worry about at a sweet sixteen but there’s going to be a lot of people and I don’t want anyone to be bored.

That’s thoughtful.

My mum is saying it’s hurting her feelings that I wouldn’t even try to compromise and have atleast one person i dont like there, if she’s paying as much money and letting me even have a party.

She then said if it matters that much to not have the bar. I wasn’t that against this but I still pushed to keep the bar for other adults to have. She then said “you don’t need a bar, you’re 16, stop acting older than you are”. I just told her I don’t want to change anything and that if she invited him I would message him myself and uninvite him.

My dad agrees with me and thinks Peter would just put everyone in a bad mood. My dad also agrees I should keep the bar, and Peter will find a way to get something regardless. He said he’ll invite Peter to his birthday if it makes mt mum feel better but she’s still really upset. AITA?

Now the teen is stuck wondering whether standing her ground to protect her own birthday experience makes her ungrateful, or if setting boundaries, even when parents are footing the bill, is reasonable.

Most people say boundaries are reasonable, and she is NTA.

This person says the bar should not be this big of a concern.

This person says Mom isn’t thinking clearly.

Paying for the party doesn’t mean rewriting history, especially when the “one compromise” comes with a proven track record of ruining the fun.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.