I (32F) recently inherited a good amount of money from my mom. I keep the money in a separate account as I still haven’t decided what to do with it and I didn’t want it to go to waste.
I noticed my husband constantly bringing up the inheritance money and making countless suggestions as to how I should spend it. Another thing is that he expects me pay for nearly everything the past couple of weeks.
For NYE, My husband and I met up with his family at a restaurant to celebrate. It was going fine until I found out that I was expected to pay for everyone at the table. My husband’s mom joked about paying for dinner out of my “inheritance pocket” which made me livid but I showed no reaction. Just silently paid for my own food/drinks. Then got up and made my way out of the restaurant. They were shouting after me like a crowd and my husband tried to get me to come back but I drove home.
He got back at 3 a.m yelling at me saying I was pathetic to get up and walk out on him and his family after they relied on me to pay for their food and thought I was gracious enough to do it BUT they were wrong. He said I humiliated him and family and that what I did was an attempt to get back at them for not being able to help mom when she was sick. Not true is all I’m gonna say.
He is mad and is saying that I caused a huge rift between his family and me when it wouldn’t have hurt me to pay for the celebratory dinner.
His accusation, that I was trying to ‘get back at them for not being able to help Mom when she was sick,’ hit me like a ton of bricks. It wasn’t true at all, but it was such a specific, vicious thing to say. It made me think about how much he’s been pushing for this money… and I started remembering little things. Vague comments his family made over the years about a ‘misunderstanding’ with Mom a long time ago. A bitter remark his dad once made about ‘loans that were never repaid.’ A major falling out they had when Mom was still healthy, over [something specific related to money or something else]. It clicks: they don’t just see this inheritance as free money; they see it as money that corrects some perceived past wrong involving my mother, something they believe they were owed or unfairly denied years ago. His anger isn’t just about the dinner bill; it’s about me denying them what he fundamentally believes is theirs because of that history.
I still feel my action was necessary to set a boundary against their entitled expectation and insulting comment. But I didn’t anticipate that my refusal would touch upon a deep, simmering resentment that I hadn’t fully known the extent of, and that that was the real cause of the rift.
AITA for walking out of a NYE dinner after being expected to pay for everyone with my inheritance money, when this expectation seems rooted not just in current entitlement, but in a hidden, long-standing grievance my husband and his family have regarding my deceased mother and a perceived past wrong?