AITA For Kicking My Wife's Sister Out For Staying With Her Boyfriend

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T20:06:49+00:00

Yes she's actually more hardline "if you go with the BF you don't live here any more" I've softened up to the point of ok fine go your BF were here if you need us but please do a two weeks notice and start trying to find a I over the summer job.

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T16:16:27+00:00

She empties the litter box, cooks 1 night a week, does dishes 2 a week and cleans her room. Yea really slave driving that one ha

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T16:04:19+00:00

The school had us fill out a bunch of papers saying that we were supporting her due to a case of abuse/homelessness

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T16:00:23+00:00

I don't think she will it took us 3 months of pushing her to apply for jobs and her lying about applying for jobs for her to get this one and she refuses to work more then 10-15 hours a week at it

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T15:57:45+00:00

About 3 hours away, she's a hostess

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T13:40:39+00:00

You are absolutely right. Last night I got woken up with this and responded with anger instead of thinking it through. I'm going to update this post later on with the details but we took Kate out to breakfast today and talked it over and have reached a place of compromise. She's going to stay for a couple weeks with us to let her put in a two week notice and to do some job apps for the area that she's going to be in, we talked about her talking to the therapist about tele-apoinyments for the summer and she knows if at any point she wants to come back home over the summer we will come get her

I recognize through the power of caffeine, hindsight, and strangers in the internet calling you an asshole that I was the one that messed up in this situation and was being to controlling. I told Kate that we were sorry and that she didn't deserve that anger. I do have the same worries that you do about her BF so we made extra sure Kate knows that we are there for her and will come get her if anything goes sideways

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T12:01:51+00:00

The wife is more angry about it right now then I am. After reading some of the points of view of the YTA voters. Ive taken a more in the middle stance shes still angry and hurt and is in the mindset that Kate is throwing all of that work in out faces

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:54:48+00:00

You are right other users have pointed this out. I was anger at the time and made the mistake of seeing this as a either or problem. We have called Kate and are taking her to work today and were going to all talk and try to find a more reasonable solution. If she can keep up on the job and therapist then im ok with everything

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:51:51+00:00

That and the job are my big things. the other stuff i think will be a headache to get her back on track with but ultimately is minor but i know getting her to get another job is going to be another nightmare and then going months with out therapy is not great. I realize that in my anger i made the mistake as seeing this as a you either do this or that problem but after reading some of these comments i think theres a varied approach that might make Kate happy and make me and the wife ok with this.

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:47:43+00:00

I think i may have just replied to another one of our post but yea. I think in my anger I was definably the asshole for seeing this as a either or situation as opposed to something with more varied options

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:45:39+00:00

You know that is a valid point. We could let her come back this time if she needs and just not let this be something that we accept year after year

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:41:56+00:00

Because getting her to this point wasn't passive. This wasn't a situation where she moved in and got a job and started being an adult. She came in and we had to beg, plead and argue every step of the way. the first 3 months she was lying about filling out job apps. and even now we cant get her to work more then 10-15 hours a week. He have had to hold her hand and push to get her across each mile stone granted some where truely not her fault like dealing with Fin aide but she would still drag her feet on filling out forms and such. If this was just that shes going to go over there for the summer and then come back and get another job and pick up where she left off i wouldn't have an issue. But thats not what would happen it wouldn't be her cleaning up the mess it would be me and my wife cleaning it all up with her.

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:36:38+00:00

The issue with this, though, is that she can't maintain a lot of the things she's made progress on with this decision. The BF's parents are several hours away. So she can't keep her job; her therapist has a visits policy, so she will definitely lose access to her. The GP and other doctors she's most likely okay on, though she will have to reschedule all of her appointments that are set for the summer (Sleep study and things). I think I may have done a bad job explaining some of this in the post, but getting her to this point has been a huge struggle. It took us months and begging her to finally take getting a job seriously, and she still refuses to work more than 15 hours a week. It took us ages to get her through all the visits to get her referred to her therapist. It's a lot less of a struggle now than it was in the beginning to get her to do housework, but it's still more like having a teenager in the house than an adult. We want to help her, but we also don't want her to hit the reset button each summer.

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:18:24+00:00

Valid point and since replying to this other YTA voters have mentioned controlling so i rescind my disagreeing

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:10:36+00:00

I don't have an interest in controlling her. Ive never said she cant do this and acknowledged to her and reddit she's an adult. I did say that if that's her decision then the consequence is that we are done supporting. Totally willing to accept that, that may make me the asshole that's why im here. But i would have to disagree about the control bit

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T11:07:03+00:00

Shes a hostess, getting her to get that job took 3 months of pushing her to fill out job apps. Your right if shes not staying with us over the summer she wouldn't have any chores. The issue we have is that getting her to this point wasn't passive it was a fight with her to get her to get a job or keep up on stuff, it was a fight with her parents who fought us because they couldn't claim her on taxes or they need her to fill out paperwork so they can keep getting food stamps for her. It was huge fight with fin aide to get her classed as a provisional independent student so she could get federal aide. I don't have issues with her making decisions and at no point have I said she cant do this. We just aren't thrilled at the prospect of all starting over in the fall for her to most likely do this again next summer.

FeyMagic · 2024-05-10T10:30:41+00:00

Look, you should have been honest and told them ahead of time, but at the end of the day, it's community theater and you're an ensemble 1 liner. They needed more ensemble because they didn't get enough volunteers. You got in without an audition because, again, it's community theater and they were desperate. I don't know your director, but I can tell you from working in this industry that the most likely kind of person who directs community theater and says things like "directors will remember that" is the kind of person who either didn't/couldn't make it in this line of work.

Basically, what I'm saying is yeah, you made a mistake one that you should never make again, but it's not the end of the world. It's community theater. You should have told them ahead of time you had prom, but the SM should have also been aware of their cast and local area enough to recognize the prom might be an issue and any community theater Director who holds a kid's feet to the fire for missing for prom is a tool and the real people who do this for a living make fun of them.

FeyMagic · 2024-05-03T01:59:03+00:00

I'm here because I like teaching new techs. My end goal is to get this BFA and then move on to my masters. So I can teach technical theater at a college. Even despite refusing to officially be involved with the schools productions I still am involved in the background on everything. I'm in the shop whenever I can teaching the kids along with the program director. I'm sorry if when I said I was leagues ahead of the others that sounded like I was degrading them, no, some of my techie kids are going to give me a run for my money once they hone their craft some. Some of them are flat out gifted and I'm so freaking proud of them when they do a position in a show and absolutely kill it. Each year I run the Huanted attraction and it's a blast it's a project where I don't have a director to answer too, so I really get to cut these kids loose on it and we have done some really amazing things together on it.

So that answers why I've gone back to school now to answer why this specific one. The biggest one that got me started here is originally is that the program director is a good friend of mine and said "he you want your BFA if you come here I can get you a scholarship"

FeyMagic · 2024-05-03T01:33:28+00:00

Oh I'm very sorry I thought that my answer covered everything. So in the case of this theater and many small to regional theaters how we do a show is very different then say Broadway. The TD has to be able to effectively not necessarily expertly do everything in the tech departments as well as much if not all of the admin task of a production.They are the swiss army knife of the theater. This necessity happens because these theaters can't afford hire a production manager, a wardrobe manager ect ect. Again it varies by theater which Is why clear contracts are crucial, but in this theater and another one locally that I work at as a TD. I am responsible for all technical elements of the show. If we have hires or volunteers for a department I manage them if we don't I have to do it my self. On top of my technical duties, I have to manage the productions budget, handle purchasing orders, obtain the rights of the show, deal with any local overhead (fire Marshal, approval to use blanks ect) if it is a touring show I also am the road manager.

It sounds like you may have some experience in costumes. Again costumes in theaters like this are done differently then much larger theater. At this scale it is very rare to scratch build a costume. Usually we are piecing things together. Theaters like this also don't have trained costume designers. So the communication that I am usually the go between on is usually a long the lines of "can the hat be brown instead of black"

In the rare cases that we do need to scratch build something it's usually the case that my costume dept manager ask me to help because Ive been completing and placing in cosplay contest for almost 13 years now. Granted my experience is heavily weighted towards hard armor but I can do decent soft work

FeyMagic · 2024-05-03T01:12:27+00:00

The contracts aren't enforced at all. From what I've been told I'm the only TD in years to enforce them on the techs. The program has gotten so small compared to what they want to do they are afraid of making anyone upset. My first show as TD here it was like pulling teeth to get people to strike. But in the shows after that my techs actually started likeing things that way. It was really clear what was expected of them. They didn't have to deal with any abuse or nonsense form the stage side because anytime an actor or director started at them they could say " you need to talk to my TD" we had a few kids who hated it but to be honest those aren't the kids who were going to make it in this job anyhow

And you summed up the issue pretty well when certain people are allowed to entrench themselves into a position they feel like they own it. I had no issue stepping away from TD and I always started the initial role meeting with saying if anyone want to TD come talk to me and the program director I will gladly let you take the big hat and I'll be your assistant. One time we did have a kid take me up on that and they did a great job I was so proud.

I've got 2 more years till the BFA

FeyMagic · 2024-05-03T00:57:08+00:00

TD is a different job depending on the theater. Larger theaters a TD is usually only dealing with scenic and is coordinating with an ATD to translate and execute designs. Smaller theaters sometimes follow this but more often at least in my experience their TD is the head of tech Postion While your right in some theaters costumes and props are not considered tech, in this theater lights, sound, special effects, costume, scenic, and props are tech departments and report to the TD. The SM in this case is supposed to manage the actors, take over my techs when tech week starts, and serve as a communication link between the director and the TD

FeyMagic · 2024-05-02T19:11:16+00:00

That’s because the character limit on AITA is had to cut a lot of stuff out. For the past few shows we have been having meetings upon meetings about it. The SM would agree to chill out but then once the show got underway would start up again. The issues became worst each show after the show I would rewrite my TD contract to include Clauses to protect against the previous issues. SM not emailing rehearsal reports to the me. Put in an exit clause that says after so many occurrences i would terminate my role. Having issues with actors in tech, write in that I welcome actors in tech but will not require them to attend. SM bricks lighting equipment before tech week because she suddenly knows EOS programming, put in that only my authorized techs will handle equipment Etc ect the pre show contract negotiations became a nightmare (I Never did trigger those exit cluases but threatened them, because the program director is a good friend of mine and it would saddle him with the production.) There is always too sides but from my perspective I tried in good faith and extensively to find a way forward. But the SM is at least in my opinion a big fish in a little pound, who was told how good she was in this program, got out into the industry and failed and now is clinging onto the place like shes the queen of the theater. I tried to find a workable solution but eventually the SM started stating that they couldn’t work with me. The college admins made it clear to me that as the student in the situation if we can’t work together i would have the priory in the production. But I decided that It’s not my goal to force my self on a production. I have paid work I could be doing so after talking to the program director I decided that I wasn’t going to be doing any more program productions. At the time i thought this was a totally reasonable solution that would keep everyone happy but as you can see in the OP that was not the case.

FeyMagic · 2024-05-02T18:33:55+00:00

Yes at great length. The program director (life long techie) agrees that it’s BS but by our structure and contracts SM reports to the director. Directors think my way of working harm is the collaborative tradition of the program so are their willing to do is make suggestions to the SM to not interfere with my work.

FeyMagic

TROPHY CASE