Dad Confronts Father-in-Law for Constantly Teasing His Daughter & It Didn’t End Well

iStock.com/Dushyant Kumar Thakur

For some people, preparing to spend the holidays with their families means happy memories being made around the dinner table. For others, well … it means surviving their families' worst habits. Such was the case for one dad on Reddit, who wrote in the group Reddit/Parenting that his father-in-law's constant teasing of his 4-year-old daughter had not only deeply angered his child, but when confronted, caused their entire family vacation to implode.

On a throwaway account, the OP explains that while his father-in-law believes his teasing is "good natured," in actuality, it makes his daughter furious.

Reddit

The family was having dinner on their vacation together, and as the OP's father-in-law, started to taunt, tease, tickle, and frustrate his child for the "fun" of it. He felt helpless as to how to respond.

 "All the while I felt anger at being stuck in the middle and not feeling like I could say anything ," he writes, "because I know my FIL loves his grandkids and this is the main way he knows how to interact with kids."

And though the OP can be sensitive to the limitations of his FIL, the truth is there is something off about his style of bonding. "If he can find something my kids dislike, he pushes it to the point of my kids being in tears. That’s not normal, right?" he asks.

When the OP saw how agitated and distraught his daughter was, he knew he had to say something.

"I was sorry and didn’t want to say anything, but it’s hard for me to watch my daughter get increasingly upset at his actions that continue even after she says to stop," he says he told his FIL. "He barely responded to me."

And in the midst of the growing conversation about physical boundaries for children, this father is concerned about what the message would have been if he hadn't said something. "I don’t want my daughter to think that this is how someone should treat her. That thought horrifies me."

As always, the good people of Reddit were ready to lend some support to the frustrated Dad.

Most commenters agreed that the OP did the right thing, saying that putting boundaries on his FIL was important to protect his daughter.

Though, as one user notes, the chances of his FIL accepting his son-in-law's condemnation are slim.

While confronting a relative is never easy, at least his dad had the Internet to turn to for help.

Offending his father-in-law might have seemed like a risky move, but most of us would agree that his daughter's well-being was at stake — and that's more important.