'AITA for not wanting to support my wife's family who criticized me when I was not successful?'

A man in his early 30s took to Reddit's "Am I The A**hole" (AITA) forum to share the story about his financial struggle and growth. 

In a post titled "AITA for no longer giving support to my wife's family after I became successful with my own company after they talked down about me?", the original poster (OP) asked whether he was wrong in refusing to give funds to his wife's family after they did not support him while he was struggling.

Man refuses to help wife’s family who once called him lazy despite working hard

The OP shared that despite his wife's unwavering support during his career shift into marketing, her family criticized him and called him lazy even though he worked tirelessly to support his family. 

Now that his business has grown, he has refused to fund his wife’s family’s requests, especially given their lack of support during his transition. He’s questioning whether he is in the wrong, and has turned to Reddit for answers.

A Reddit user asked if he was wrong for refusing to help his wife’s family after they mistreated him earlier despite working hard.

He began by sharing the couple's background, describing how they grew up in a "fairly poor environment." The OP highlighted his wife’s incredibly strong work ethic when they first met, and at the time, he was earning around $50K-70K a year.

He went on to explain how his career shifted.

He said, "Since then I developed a niche for a speciality marketing field and became very good at it. All my friends encouraged me to go into business for myself with a marketing company. My wife was fully supportive of this."

Though they discussed the financial struggles they might face in the first year, her family accused him of "neglecting my family, being lazy, not wanting to work, etc." They often criticized him for "not having a job" because he worked from home.

While his wife defended him, her family continued to call him lazy and a "deadbeat" for using daycare while he worked remotely. He emphasized that he was putting in effort to support the family.

He then discussed how his income grew, surpassing what he earned from trucking, and how cutting costs initially led to significant savings. "Since we cut costs back when I first started, we realized a lot of things we were paying for, we could do without or found other alternatives and we never really added those expenses back so it's like we have significantly more money now," he explained.

The OP also mentioned occasionally driving a semi for a friend who owns a truck, mainly to keep his CDL active as a fallback.

He addressed the pressure from his wife’s family, saying, "Her family has taken note, and they are constantly asking to go out to eat with us, hang out with us, etc then get mad when I never pay for the meals, the outing, the vacation, etc (aside from my part of the tab, obviously). Looking back, I understand why they never had money, they were living well beyond their means, but if it makes them happy then it is what it is."

Lastly, he clarified that he doesn’t interfere with his wife’s financial decisions. "I let my wife do whatever she wants with her money (which sometimes includes buying stuff for her family, which I support her doing with her money if that's how she wants to spend it) but I make sure that she knows I don't want a dime of my money going to her family since they were very unsupportive of what made us our money and would go as far as to talk down about me for doing what lead to our money," the OP added.

Internet backs OP as he refuses to support wife’s family after they criticized him

Redditors, who sympathized with the man's struggles, quickly pointed out that he’s not the "a**hole" for refusing to spend money on his wife’s family.

One Redditor said, "NTA. You’re not obligated to bankroll people who disrespected you while you were working hard to build something."

Another commented, "NTA... Her family sounds toxic as hell. They treated you like garbage when you were struggling, so why should you support them now that you’re successful?"

Someone else stated, "NTA. Even without the backstory of them treating you badly, it’s incredibly Not Cool for them to invite you to things to try to con you into paying for them!"

Another added, "Nta. I wouldn’t be giving a s**t about the in-laws they wouldn’t be allowed over they wouldn’t be allowed around my children."

One person remarked, "NTA Interesting that your wife still wants to engage with her family given the disrespect to you. Not criticising her but they were incredibly rude with their comments. Not something I would have let them away with personally."

Another noted, "Nta.they were nasty. They dont deserve support."

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