Planning a vacation takes al ot of time and effort, even when you are only planning for your own family.

What would you do if you were planning a trip back to your home country, but your parents kept trying to step in and force you to change various aspects of your vacation?

That is what was happening to the couple in this story, so after a lot of arguments, he finally just shut it down and cancelled the trip, but now his parents are upset with him, and it is causing a lot of family drama.

Personally, I think he listened to his parents too much right from the beginning. He should have just made his plans, and his parents could have lived with it. Read through the full story here and see what you think.

AITAH for cancelling a family vacation after my parents tried to take over planning and exclude my wife’s family?

I (31M) am planning a trip to my home country with my wife (33F) and our three daughters.

This sounds like a great vacation to me.

The main goal of the trip is to visit family, eat good food, and take a break from work and our normal routine.

A few weeks ago, during a video call with my mom and grandmother, I mentioned that I’d like to take everyone to the beach while we were there. It wasn’t a formal plan, just something I brought up in conversation.

Planning a vacation is (almost) half the fun.

A couple weeks later, my wife and I started looking at Airbnbs. We found a beachfront place in a quiet town that we both liked.

I’ve spent a lot of time working in that country before, so I’m familiar with the area and specifically wanted to avoid the huge tourist-heavy resort city nearby.

Easy, Dad. You don’t get to make these decisions.

I sent the listing to my mom just to get her opinion.

The next day, after a long day at work, I got home and my dad immediately started telling me that the Airbnb I found was dangerous, that we weren’t staying there, and that we were staying somewhere else instead.

This makes it even weirder that Dad is trying to make plans.

He had already talked to my brother about booking a different property.

This caught me completely off guard because my dad wasn’t even part of the planning process. He’s currently staying in the US while the rest of the family is back home.

He never asked them to pay for things.

I called my mom and brother to find out what was going on. They said the place I picked was too far from a popular tourist attraction and that we’d like the other property better. They also said they wanted to pay for it as a gift.

I told them the issue wasn’t money. What bothered me was that everyone seemed to be making decisions for my family without talking to me first.

His family is really trying to take control of the trip.

Things got more complicated because my wife and I had also discussed inviting some of her family members.

At that point, my mom and brother started saying things like there wouldn’t be enough room, transportation would be difficult, and sleeping arrangements would be uncomfortable.

This would be very frustrating.

After a longer discussion, it became pretty clear that they simply didn’t want my wife’s family involved.

My wife was hurt by this because she had been trying to include everyone. I was angry because it felt like the entire trip had stopped being about spending time together and had turned into a power struggle.

It is time to stop including the family in planning decisions.

A few days later, my wife and I decided to compromise and stay at the property my family preferred. We figured it wasn’t worth fighting over.

Then my brother messaged me saying the price had gone up significantly and they didn’t want to book it anymore.

What does his family have against hers?

So we were back to square one.

We started looking at alternatives and mentioned that my wife’s sister might be able to get a few days off from university and join us. The moment that came up, the same objections started again.

Good. He should have said this from the beginning.

At that point I lost my temper and canceled the beach trip entirely.

I told my family I wasn’t interested in spending my vacation trying to manage everyone’s opinions and that I wasn’t going to exclude my wife’s family to keep them happy.

His family seems a little crazy.

Things got worse afterward. My dad called me angry because my mom had apparently told him that we weren’t speaking anymore.

During that conversation he accused me of causing unrelated family problems, including my brother dropping out of university, said I hated my brother (I don’t), and claimed that he had been planning this beach trip as a gift for us all along.

The parents do seem very controlling.

From my perspective, the beach trip only became “his gift” after I asked my mom what she thought about the Airbnb I had found.

The argument eventually came down to this: my dad said my wife’s family isn’t his family, and I said this was supposed to be my vacation with my wife and children, not something my parents got to control.

From what is listed here, this guy is spot on, and his parents are terrible.

Now my parents think I’m ungrateful and overreacted. I think they crossed a line by taking over plans that weren’t theirs to make and trying to dictate who could be included.

AITA?

Planning vacations takes a lot of work, and when you add in more people, it can become impossible to make decisions. He should just set his plans and then let both his family and hers know that they can join or not, but that the plans won’t be changing.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a middle schooler who was totally frazzled after being left to babysit alone for 3-plus hours, and swears she’s never doing it again.

Let’s see what the people in the comments think of this story.

Just book your vacation and leave them out of it.

I agree with this commenter.

While tempting, this could alienate the family, which is never good.

His parents overstepped, but he needed to put his foot down sooner.

This commenter says to have a family trip with the in-laws.

His first mistake was letting his parents think they had any say in how he planned his vacation. Regardless of whether they are paying for anything, they don’t get to set the plans.

Parents often think they are still in charge of their kids, though. If you don’t put your foot down, they will never let go the way they should.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a man whose friends say he’s privileged for wanting to eat at nicer restaurants.