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A bride has missed out on a huge cash present after being rude to her grandparents because they bought her a "small gift" from the wedding list.
In a Reddit post, the grandmother, who is in her seventies, explained that this was the last of her four grandchildren to get married. With all their other grandchildren, both she and her husband chose the cheapest gift option on the list before privately gifting them a cheque for $40,000 the day before the wedding.
That's about enough to enable someone to get a mortgage on a home in America. The Zebra reported that the average house price in the U.S. is $348,079 and Bank of America states that you would need a down payment of 5 percent to 20 percent.
The grandmother goes on to explain that the granddaughter called them, "furious, she went off on us for being cheap and how she knew we had money, but that we did not love her enough to show it by getting her something more expensive."
She then threatened to uninvite them to the wedding, so they bought her a China set, but they also decided she would not be receiving the $40,000. The granddaughter is now refusing to attend Christmas and has turned family members against them.
Newsweek spoke to Ruth E. Freeman, president and founder of Peace at Home Family Solutions, about the family issue.
"Grandparents have every right to offer and give whatever gifts they want to grandchildren. These grandparents have been most generous with others and it is easy to see why they wouldn't want to be so generous with this bride in light of her behavior.
"Sadly, punishment is not going to be a positive influence here. There is abundant research that tells us that punishment or in this case, we might even call it revenge, does not inspire long term change. What we see here as the result of their decision is a breakdown in relationships which is likely the opposite of what they really want for their family. As grandparents, they probably want most to inspire this young woman to be more kind, more open hearted, and more accepting of others with less focus on money and greed. Punishment will teach none of those things.
"In this situation, it could be worth explaining the emotions experienced, "When you yelled at us for not buying something more expensive, we felt deeply hurt, sad, disappointed and maybe even angry. (Choose whichever words are authentic for you.) What we told ourselves is that you cared more about our money than about us as people. We felt terrible."
"Then listen carefully to her response. Effective communication occurs when we try to understand things from other people's perspectives, rather than simply focusing on your own feelings."
'Needed a Life Lesson'
Users were quick to criticize the ungrateful bride.
jaypaw28 said: "As someone who has always been the least favorite grandchild, I was expecting some blatant favoritism, but it's clear that she just did this to herself. She isn't furious at you, OP. She's furious at herself because she screwed herself out of 40k."
Emptydata_Enzo commented: "Exactly. Who threatens to disinvite their GRANDPARENTS over a gift. That SHE picked out, nonetheless... NTA. She needed a life lesson that her mother never taught her."
Newsweek has reached out to user rando-TA for comment.
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About the writer
Leonie Helm is a Newsweek Life Reporter and is based in London, UK. Her focus is reporting on all things ... Read more