Reddit Stories - Family Ties and Secrets Unraveled A Confession ( Over 3 Hour Compilation ) - Episode 5

Episode Date: February 5, 2026

#redditstories #askreddit #aita #familydrama #secrets #confession #relationships #emotionalSummary: In Episode 5 of "Family Ties and Secrets Unraveled," deep-seated family issues surface as confessions reveal hidden betrayals and emotional turmoil. The characters confront their pasts, leading to unexpected revelations that challenge their bonds and reshape their relationships, ultimately exploring the complexities of love and loyalty within families.Tags: redditstories, askreddit, reddit, aita, betrayal, familysecrets, emotionalconflict, relationshipadvice, familydynamics, personalstories, confessions, drama, storytelling, podcast, familyissues, lifeadvice, truth, healing, reconciliation, narrativeBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/reddit-stories--6816713/support.This episode includes AI-generated content.

Relax and enjoy the following compilation of stories. I hope you enjoy this story. Spouse provided me with separation documents and alleged that I was unfaithful to him, presenting proof to support his claim. However, it was all orchestrated by my colleague who caused the end of my marital relationship and tried to steal my ex's money. So, I, 25F, got divorced from my husband, Zach, 27M, this year over some false allegations. I always suspected his mother was involved, but my suspicions were proven true due to one mistake of hers six months ago.

I thought Zach had received that information about her too, but to my surprise, he only found out now and is in a big fix. Zach and I had known each other since childhood as we lived in the same neighborhood. Our neighborhood was infamous because many low-income families found shelter there. My parents were facing tough times due to losing their jobs, so to cut costs, they moved there with me and my younger sister. Zach's family had lived there for a long time. His mother was into substances and hence stayed at her parents' house, leaving Zach in their care, with his biological father nowhere to be found. Zach was a senior to me at school and an

extremely bright student. So he helped me and my sister in return for me helping him with his chores. This is how our parents got to know about our friendship, which soon turned into a relationship. A few years later, Zach graduated and moved out for college. He got some funds from his grandparents and covered the rest with a scholarship. His mother, who nobody knew what she did for work, was always away and didn't even bid him farewell. Zach used to FaceTime me every now and then from college, explaining how things worked on the other side of the city, but the call started to decrease over time. I made a lot of efforts to stay in touch, but realizing there were none from his side, I backed

off. Soon after, I got a text from him, and he dumped me via text. Dealing with the breakup of such a long relationship was hard, but I bounced back and worked extremely hard at school. My parents, on the other hand, had started doing well with their jobs getting permanent, and it was now a matter of a year or two before we moved out of that place. Zach's mom had been bad-mouthing us all around the neighborhood, accusing us of getting money from doing illegal stuff. After a few altercations with her, my parents decided to expedite the moving process. Three years later, my college organized a talk with a rising young entrepreneur whose business was booming, and I was asked to moderate the session.

When I read the guest list, I realized it was none other than Zach. We attended the talk and went for coffee to catch up. He told me about everything, including how his mother had married an extremely rich man at work, who adopted him and funded his business. I told him about my portfolio, and he offered me a job. Considering it too awkward, I declined the offer at first but later decided to join after his repeated insistence. Things were going extremely well for me workwise, and over the next six months, Zach and I grew closer. One night when everyone except Zach and I had left, he proposed to me, saying that he regretted breaking up with me and didn't want to risk it again by just dating. I was high on emotions and said yes. The next day, we informed everyone, but his

mother wasn't particularly pleased. He arranged a lunch for us to get to know each other, which ended up being a disaster. His mother was sweet in front of him but made mean remarks at me when we were alone, calling my family and me gold diggers. I reminded her that we left the neighborhood by working hard and not choosing the easy way out by marrying a rich man. I told Zach about his mother's comments later, which he asked me to ignore. Over the next few months, Ma and Zach's relationships soured because of his mother filling his ears and him believing much of it. I asked him to trust me if he wanted us to stay together, and after a lot of ups and downs, we eloped and got married. His mother was not happy about

missing the wedding but kept up the facade at the reception. Zach and I bought a house and began our married life there. One Sunday, I got a call from my sister asking for some seed funding for her startup. I told her I'd think about it and cut the call. Zach heard me talking and asked what it was regarding. I told him I was going to give my sister some money for my savings for her startup. He offered to pay the amount in full, no questions asked, because we were a family now. I was touched by his gesture and agreed. Over the next few months, my sister's business hit and Zach started to worry about his investment in her project. His frustration was shown in his distant and rude behavior with me at home. The fights over small issues increased to the point where

we stopped talking to avoid tension. The stressful state of our marriage peaked when he forgot our first anniversary, and I decided to stay with my parents for a while. Zach and I had planned a small get-together post-our anniversary for our family and had already planned and paid for everything, so we decided to act as perfect hosts. I got a call from Zach's mother during this, asking me to pack my bags because she had found the perfect girl for her son. I didn't entertain her and asked her to get a reality check. She obviously didn't like it and cut the call. I returned to my house to set up for the gathering and talked to Zach about his mother. Zach was drunk and didn't respond to anything I said. The next day, the tension between

Zach and me was so clear that even my distant cousins asked if anything was wrong. I tried to talk to Zach, but he shrugged my hand and left. He came back with an envelope, saying it had proof of me cheating on him. I was shocked and decided to open the envelope. It had divorce papers and some inappropriate pictures of me with another man. I couldn't think of how this was possible but still tried to explain to Zach that it wasn't true. He didn't listen and asked me to leave, adding that he should have listened to his mother and not married into a family of gold diggers.

I couldn't comprehend at all, so my sister decided to take me and we left. I went back to my parents' house and cried, showing them the pictures and trying to explain that I hadn't been cheating on Zach and had no idea what these pictures were. They consoled me, and my sister, after looking at the pictures, told us that they were clearly doctored. Everything made sense, and we decided to talk to Zach the next day. The next day, before my sister and I could leave, Zach knocked on the door. I thought he must have felt something fishy too, but instead, he was there to ask me to sign the papers as soon as possible. We both sat down, and I explained to him that I didn't cheat and that the images seemed fake because even my face wasn't clearly visible.

He listened and then replied that since he had seen the photos, he had lost all trust in me and wanted a divorce. I was taken aback and tried to convince him, but he asked me to sign the papers or he'd file a fraud case against my sister for stealing his money since we hadn't drafted a contract. I could hear my heart beat in my head and asked him to please sort it out instead of ending our relationship, but he was adamant about ending our association and left. I was shattered but didn't wish to mess with him because of his status, so I didn't read the papers and sign the divorce documents. I also realized I was two months pregnant during this, and my lawyer decided to ask for child support from Zach, on top of the alimony he was giving me, which I was unaware of. When we came out of the courtroom, Zach came to me and instead of congratulating me on the child, said he was glad we were ending the relationship because we were gold diggers.

I was heartbroken by his behavior, so I didn't respond. Over time, Zach and I got civil with each other and decided on shared custody of the child, which Zach was okay with, while his mother started demanding full custody and return for more money. I was done with her, so I emailed both her and Zach that my child wasn't for sale and I would press harassment charges on her if she tried anything again. Zach, reading this, sternly told his mother to stay out of it. I knew the inappropriate pictures were fake, but had no idea who could have created or planted them until I heard from a friend of Zach that his mother was trying to convince him to get

married to a girl in her circle. Zach was pretty bummed out about the divorce and ignored his mother, but now everyone knew how desperate she was because she showed up at his office daily for the past two to three weeks. On hearing this, I put two and two together and realized it must be my mother-in-law who created those images to create a rift between me and her son. On one hand, I was infuriated by her and wanted to get even, but on the other hand, I wanted to not let it bother me for the sake of my child, so I decided to let it pass until the right moment. Six months into our divorce proceedings, I received an email from my mother-in-law.

It was sent to the girl my mother-in-law was trying to get Zach to marry and she accidentally added my email. The email was a plan to get all of Zach's money, with instructions to this new girl on how to woo him because my mother-in-law was on the verge of her. of divorce from her husband and knew Zach wouldn't finance her extravagant lifestyle. She signed off with her number, so I called her and asked why she would do something so cruel to her child. It took her some time to catch up, but she wasn't scared, saying I could tell Zach whatever I wanted and he still wouldn't believe me over her. She had a point, so I dropped the call and forwarded the email to Zach. I even tried calling him, but he didn't pick up, so I assumed he must have read it and just didn't wish to talk to me.

In the next few months, the divorce proceedings continued and I gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Zach was extremely supportive from afar and set up a trust fund in her name. He hadn't married the girl, and I didn't hear much from my mother-in-law, so I considered it a sign that she was finally out of his life. Time passed, and it was now a year, finally confirming our divorce. I had moved out of my parents' house to a new place and decided to leave the city and start a fresh life after my daughter was a little older. One day, I had an unexpected visitor at my door, Zach. We hadn't talked since the divorce, so it was surprising.

His clothes were wet with sweat, and it looked like he had been running. I let him in and asked why he was there. He told me he was sorry for what had happened and regretted our divorce because he now knew the reason. I was confused, but he continued, saying he was visiting his mother's house when things were bad between her and his stepdad. He was going through her closet to find a towel and saw the pictures of me cheating. He was surprised as he had never shared those pictures with anyone but me, so he sneakily brought them home. Then he remembered my accusation that the

pictures were doctored and got them checked by a photographer friend a few days later, who proved my assumptions to be true. That's when he realized it was his mother's doing and came running to apologize. I began to cry, not because I pitted him, but because he because I was finally proven innocent. I told him he should have trusted me from the start and that I was amazed when he didn't respond to the email I sent him six months ago about his mother. He asked, what email? I showed it to him on my laptop and his jaw dropped. He explained that this was the first time he had seen this email and was currently engaged to the girl his mother wanted him to marry. We both sat in silence, thinking about what to do next. Ultimately,

after not talking for an hour, he suggested we could meet once we gathered our thoughts and left. Update 1, Zach and I planned to meet at my house the next day. He told me he hadn't read the email earlier because it was marked as spam in his inbox. He read it in detail and realized his mother had actually gotten some papers signed by him, telling him it was to ensure she would have some share saved for our daughter. He thought it was weird but signed to avoid his mother pestering him to marry that girl again. He added that he got engaged to the girl once his mother separated from his stepdad and asked him to marry the girl in a drunken state at the hospital because she had gotten alcohol

poisoning. Later, when things got better, she got another set of papers signed from him, telling him they were vendor contracts related to his engagement. He read the contracts, and on the face of it, they didn't seem fishy, so he signed. He said he had no idea what those papers were about and was now scared. We both decided it was best to contact his lawyer as soon as possible. Zach's lawyer, who was his stepdad's brother, was amazed at my mother-in-law's audacity to pull off such an elaborate stunt. He sympathized with us but wanted us to know the truth.

This wasn't enough evidence against her. I mentioned the email, and he said she could find a hundred ways to prove it wasn't hers. The only way to get the papers back legally was a confession from her. Zach and I thanked him for his time and left for our respective houses to think about it and keep it a secret from everyone for now. Update 2. This update is for the next full month. I knew Zach's mother didn't like me much, so I thought maybe getting under her skin could lead to her confessing her whole plan. I got Zach's approval and called my mother-in-law the next day, with a call recorder on. She didn't pick up until the third time and was very rude, asking why I was bothering her.

I told her I'd get straight to the point as I didn't enjoy talking to her either and asked why she broke my and Zach's marriage. She was frazzled and didn't know what to say. I continued, saying I knew she had something to do with it because she was planning to take all Zach's wealth, and I just wanted to know why marriage was crucial. After a few failed attempts to lie, she finally spoke the truth. She said there was no way Zach would consider anything she said while I was in his life. She said he trusted me the most, and breaking his trust in me made him weak and vulnerable, allowing her to get to him. She admitted to getting the images doctored from a friend and sending them to Zach's office. I was sad to hear this but tried to get more details about the email from her, but she didn't say a word, so I cut the call. I sent Zach the audio, and he listened to it and told me about

his plan to get some information from his current fiancé. The next day, Zach asked her to meet him at a fancy restaurant. Since they hadn't been on any dates before the engagement, he started by asking her questions about her family. She couldn't answer the most basic questions about her parents, and Zach got frustrated. He asked her to tell the truth before it was too late, considering how quickly his mother was moving with her plan. She broke and told him she wasn't actually the daughter of his mother's friend but a college

girl who met her at yoga class. She said she confided in his mother about her financial struggles. mother offered a solution, pretend to be from a rich family and marry Zach to eventually get his money. She said his mother talked badly about him, claiming she was the victim whose fortune was stolen by him, which motivated her to get it back. Zach got emotional and offered the girl money for her education if she chose to side with him in exposing his mother. She said she'd think about it and left. Zach dropped by my house after this and told me everything about his new fiancé. right then, he got a call from her, saying she was ready to work with him because she didn't

feel okay cheating someone like his mother was cheating him. Zach thanked her and told her he would contact her with the plan soon. Update 3. I told my sister about all this in hopes of getting some suggestions, and she came up with a plan to catch my mother-in-law confessing her plans to steal Zach's fortune. I took Zach on a call while my sister described the plan. She said since we had access to Zach's fiancé, who was also his mother's accomplice, we could ask her to set up a private meeting with Zach's mom, asking her to either tell her the details of the plan or get it all revealed in front of Zach.

If Zach's mom agreed to talk to her, she could set up secret cameras at her place, recording the conversation and catching her in the act. Zach was on board and asked his fiancé if she was willing to do it. She agreed, and we proceeded with the plan. She, will call her Stacy, called Zach's mom and asked to meet up to discuss the plan further but faced objection, asking why she was so interested. Stacey said she wasn't sure of Zach's mom's intentions and wanted to be part of the complete plan to avoid being scammed.

Zach's mom hesitated but agreed to meet her at her house the next day. They set up cameras behind vases and paintings and waited for Zach's mom. Zach's mom came and sat down before Stacy could offer anything. Stacey took the hint and asked about the documents Zach's mom got signed. She asked how Stacy knew about it, and Stacy told her Zach had informed her. Zach's mom replied that the documents were of Zach's property and his bank savings. Stacy asked if that wasn't enough. Zach's mom said to maintain her lifestyle, they needed to do a lot more.

She added that her next plan was to get Stacy and Zach married, make Stacy the nominee for Zach's company, and then get Zach killed in an accident so she would get the money automatically. Stacey was shocked but continued, asking if such extreme measures were necessary. Zach's mom justified planning his murder by telling lies about Zach. Stacey didn't say much to avoid blowing her cover and simply agreed. She asked for the plan ahead, and Zach's mom replied, we'll think about it soon. As soon as she left, Stacey called us and showed us the footage. Everyone, including my sister and me, had tears in our eyes thinking of how terrible my ex-mother-in-law was and how hard it must be for Zach to witness this firsthand. Zach stayed strong and said he had another plan to catch his

mother red-handed. Update 4, Zach, after seeing the video, was sure it was enough to get her caught but wanted to show her true colors to everyone before handing her over to the police. He said since his mother was after his company, he would pretend to give it to her after he died. This way, Stacy wouldn't have to marry him, and he could catch his mother red-handed in front of everyone. We all agreed because it was his revenge for everything he had gone through. The next day, we showed the video to his lawyer and told him about the plan. He was fine with it as long as no one got hurt. According to his plan, Zach called his mother to his house, stating it was urgent. His mother came, and he told her how empty his life had become after

divorcing me. He told her he wished to leave the business and everything to live a quiet life in the mountains. His mother tried to change his mind, but Zach said his decision was final and he was going to make her the nominee for his wealth once he passed. Zach's mom was surprised but happy. He said he wanted her to sign some papers before he could start the process and would throw a farewell party to meet everyone one last time after his will was in place, to which his mother agreed. The papers he got signed were those she got signed before, and he got access to them via Stacey. Soon after her meeting with Zach, his mom called Stacey to kick her out of the plan. She said she would pay Stacey once she got the money. Stacey asked what her plan was for

Zach, and in excitement, she blurted out how she planned on pushing him down the terrace at his farewell party, thereby owning all the wealth. Stacy informed Zach over text. Zach did all the He got the papers signed by her, made his fake will, and planned the whole party for the next month. He set up a light show for his farewell party, just to throw the spotlight on his mother when she pushed him. His plan was to cut the lights while he and his mom were on the terrace, then replace himself with a dummy, which she would push. He also had night cameras installed for proof later. Everything went as planned. Zach greeted everyone and declared his intentions. His mother followed with a very emotional speech about losing her son.

I was invited with my daughter, and Zach's mom didn't miss a chance to make me feel less than her, but I ignored her. By the end of the night, she started looking for Zach to talk privately on the terrace. Zach was conveniently already there, so she followed him. She started with how he was the love of her life and how hard it was to let him go, then switched to money-focused themes about maintaining her lifestyle. Once we cut the lights, she considered it her perfect chance to push Zach down the ledge. Zach quickly replaced himself with a dummy, and we heard a thud.

Zach clapped, and the spotlight was thrown on his mom, hanging over the ledge to see if it was Zach who fell. Lights came back and seeing the dummy on the floor, everyone looked up at her. She was flabbergasted and attempted to run, but Zach caught her and presented her to everyone. He gave a speech explaining everything while his mother continued to throw a tantrum. I called 911, and Zach's mom was finally taken into custody. Update 5, this will be the last update on this saga. After the party, nobody bailed out Zach's mom, including her husband and her parents. She was presented in court soon after, and on the basis of the petition against her from Zach,

was charged with attempted murder and financial fraud, to which she pleaded not guilty. Zach's lawyer told him that even though she claimed to be not guilty, with the evidence they had, there was nothing to worry about. Zach's stepdad also finally filed for divorce from her. Zach gave Stacy the money for college and decided to take care of her education financially. He also came back to my house and asked if I wanted to give our relationship another chance. I said no for the time being, since he had been through a lot, but assured him he would always have my support. Zach agreed and left. My sister's business had started to flourish, so she returned the money she had

taken from Zach. Zach decided to take a few months off from work and went to stay at his cabin in the mountains. I, on the other hand, have started working with my daughter being old enough, and am planning to move to another place for better opportunities. I hope you enjoy this story. Father transferred his company to my sibling during his retirement celebration rather than me because I had failed to meet expectations. A couple of years ago, my father stepped down as the chief executive officer. Of the lab equipment business that he had established. He had promised me, for almost seven years, that I, 30M, would be the next CEO,

but on the day of his retirement party, he announced that my brother-in-law was going to be the next CEO. It came as a huge shock to me because I was the one who had organized that party and I had absolutely no idea that this was going to happen. I clapped along with everyone else at the party when he made that announcement, but later on, when I confronted him, he told me that he had his reasons for letting me down. Apparently, my brother-in-law, Zach, 34M, was more of a son to him than me since I was just a disappointment. Let me just tell you guys that Zach had only been involved in the business for about a year at the time whereas I had given seven years of my life

to the company. We had known Zach for a long time, since he and my sister, 33F, had been together for almost five years and had been married for two back when my dad retired. I had worked with him and he was a good guy, from whatever I had gathered, but I still couldn't come to terms with the fact that my dad thought this guy was more of a son to him than his biological son. When I asked him to elaborate how exactly I had disappointed him, he said the most asinine thing that I could imagine and it was then that I lost all respect that I had for my father. He told me that it was a very difficult decision for him to make, but eventually, he would have to do what was good for the company.

And somebody as mentally weak as I would never be able to be a good leader, which is why he had passed me over to choose Zach to take his place since my dad believed that Zach had more qualities like my father than I did. By calling me mentally weak, he was referring to the fact that I had been diagnosed with a general anxiety disorder and I had made the mistake of telling my family about it a couple of of months before my dad retired. While I was having dinner with my parents one night, I accidentally dropped a small container of anti-anxiety pills that had been prescribed and then, I had to explain it all to my parents. My mother was quite fine with it, but my father is not exactly a huge

believer of the importance of mental health. He thinks that being tough is the solution for everything and after I told him that I had anxiety, he started having less faith in me. I feel like I should mention that my anxiety had never affected my quality of work and I had never allowed it to get to a stage where it would make me less capable of being able to lead a company.

And I'm pretty sure that a lot of people in upper management positions probably do deal with anxiety. It can't just be me and I'm sure that they are able to deal with their anxiety without letting it get in the way of their work. But my dad told me that I had disciplined, disappointed him by making excuses for my weakness and even resorting to pills for all of this nonsense.

And so, after a lot of deliberation, he had decided that Zach would be the perfect candidate to take over the company instead of me. He told me that if I wanted to leave, I was free to do so but because he couldn't trust me to lead the company like he had since I had already shown him that I was not strong enough, he was not willing to hand over the reins to me. It was not only what he had said, it was also the fact that he had led me to believe that I would be the next CEO, even though he had made up his mind about it well before the retirement party. It was really hurtful in that night, I left the party early and never spoke to my dad again because he had really hurt me. At the end of the day, it was his company, so he could choose whoever he thought

was the best choice, and if he thought that my anxiety was going to get in the way, then I had to respect his choice. But I didn't have to stick around and tolerate this kind of disrespect, so I resigned, and within a couple of weeks, I started working elsewhere. The only person from the family that I have kept in touch with was my mother after my sister found out that I was resigning because I was pissed that my father had made Zach the CEO instead of me, she chose to take that as a personal attack instead of trying to understand where I was coming from. She called me later on to come to my dad's defense, and we got into a fight, after which we stopped talking. For the past two years, I have not spoken to my father or my sister and obviously, I have had

no contact with Zach. Occasionally, I do speak to my mother and check up on how she's doing. We try to meet at least once a month and every time we meet, she tries to tell me to make things right with my father, but I'm just not interested. And about a week ago, my mother called me and she was quite frantic. She told me that apparently Zach had been caught up in some fraudulent activities, tax fraud essentially, and had been arrested and now, even my dad was under investigation because of his previous association with the company. I thought that was very upsetting, but I didn't know what exactly she expected me to do about it. So she told me that she wanted me to speak to my father, sort things out with him and testify for him in court, if it came down to it since I had worked

with the company earlier. But I was very clear with my mother, and I told her that I was not going to get involved at all in any capacity. I was pretty sure that if my dad was getting investigated, all the other higher-ups involved with the company were going to get investigated at some point. If Zach had committed fraud, then it was quite a serious charge, and I don't want to get into the details of it, but all I know is that the farther I stay from this mess, the better off I am. So I told my mother very clearly that I was not going to stick out my neck for my father

and they were going to have to deal with this on their own because I don't want any trouble. Besides, if my dad even really wanted my help, he should have spoken to me himself. He's the one who needs me, why should I be the one to contact him first? My mother then started telling me that I was being childish and that instead of still being petty, I needed to talk to my father and clear the air with him because this was not going to be easy for the family and right now, we needed to stick together. I thought that my mother was being unreasonable and I told her that my decision was final, I was not going to be reaching out to my father at any cost. So she then got mad at me and said that I was selfish and heartless because even when the family was going through so much,

all I cared about was what had happened two years ago. And I think that was a really insensitive thing to say to me because if she had been in my position, she would have felt exactly how betrayed I had and she also wouldn't have been able to move on from that so quickly. She would not have been able to forgive my father if she had been in my position, getting passed over for a position that you had worked so hard for almost seven years for something that was completely out of your control. It's ridiculous to expect me to forgive him especially when my father has never even pretended to be apologetic for what he had done to me. I don't think anybody can forgive a person who is not even sorry in the first place, so my mother and I just

kept arguing for a while. Eventually, I just told her that this is probably karma for screwing me over and whatever is happening with Zach and my father right now, they completely deserve it. Then, my mother went silent and after a while, she hung up. I felt bad for saying it so I was going to call her back a couple of hours later, but then, I realized that she had blocked me. And now, I feel super guilty about what I said. So I'd have for saying that my dad was probably facing his karma because he had passed me over to be the CEO? Update 1. Hey, everybody, it has been one week since my mother blocked me and I haven't been able to get to her so far.

I'm trying not to feel bad about it, but honestly, there's not much that I can do. She was the only person who was still in touch with me for the past two years and without her, I feel really lost and alone. Obviously, I do have my friends to fall back on, and they are all here for me, but she was the only person from my family who was looking out for me and now, I don't even have her. It's quite difficult coming to terms with this, and I really want to reach out to her, but I'm still going to maintain that I have not done anything wrong. I don't think that I said anything out of line because I really do think that this might be karma for kicking me out of the company over something that I had absolutely no control over.

Yes, I do have an anxiety disorder, but like I said, it's not crippling. It does not affect my leadership qualities, it does not affect my ability to work as well as everyone else, and it certainly did not make me a disappointment like my father said. Whether people like it or not, words carry meaning and what he had said to me on the night of his retirement party has stuck with me for the past two years. His primitive attitude towards mental health and its importance seriously messed up my self-esteem for a good couple of months, and I kept doubting myself, rethinking every decision that I had made so far and I felt like an imposter even in my new workplace. It took me a lot of

time to get over that and even now, I'm currently in therapy because there are a lot of unresolved issues that I'm dealing with. However, it has never once affected my ability to work and I'm one of the best employees at my workplace, something my bosses keep reminding me of since they plan on promoting me pretty soon. So I really do think that my dad messed up big time and if my mother can't see that, it's not my fault. It just sucks that she's choosing to take my dad's side on this instead of telling him to suck it up and apologize to me. I can't understand why she thinks that I should be the one to make amends first, but one thing is for sure, I'm not doing jack for the family until they tell me that they are sorry for everything. And they have to say it

like they mean it. I'm not going to be used again for their personal game. Update 2, my sister came by to visit me today and it was very tense because she was hysterical, she just wanted me to help her out since her husband was in huge trouble, but honestly, I don't even know what they expect me to help them out with. My hands are tied here, this is a federal crime and I don't think I can do anything to help them out. She looked like she was in a terrible state, which is why I had invited her in and I tried to be kind to her to the best of my abilities because I'm not heartless, I can't just slam the door when somebody is suffering so much. Anyway, she just kept crying on my shoulder and kept telling me that she had no idea

that any of this was happening, and if she had, she would have put an end to it immediately. She told me that she's really worried about what's going to happen with him and she wants me to use my connections to bail him out, but I told her that unfortunately, I don't have any such connections that would prove to be useful, but she then told me that our father had said that in the company I'm working in currently. One of my bosses is married to a federal judge and he was hoping that maybe I could speak to my boss and do something for them. She even suggested that they would be ready to pay whatever amount it took, but they just wanted me to put them in touch with my boss and by extension, his wife. I thought that was pretty out of order, even for her

to ask, let alone expect me to do that. I instantly said no, and I told her that I would appreciate it if she left me alone because I thought she had come by because she wanted my emotional support, but this was something that I was not going to encourage or even entertain. And I was saying no for multiple reasons. The main one being I did not want to bring this up with my bosses and have them associate me with a family of frauds. More importantly, I had my personal code of morals and as well and I did not wish anything bad for my sister, but if Zach had actually committed tax fraud, then I didn't want to be caught up in a scenario where I was trying to help him out and influence the situation in his favor. At this point, it was not even anything personal against him,

it was just that I did not want to get involved and the most that I could do for them was be there emotionally, but apart from that, it was crazy to expect me to go to such lengths. When I said no, and asked her to leave, my sister started sulking and said that she couldn't believe that I was still holding a grudge against her husband for something that was not even his fault. I tried to explain to her that this was not about that and as a matter of fact, I had never really blamed him for what had happened with my father. It was my father's decision to give him the position instead of me and allow him to take over the company, and if I was in his place, I probably would have accepted that position as well

without thinking about who actually deserved it. So yeah, maybe I resented him a little bit, but I didn't hold it against him and I definitely did not hold a grudge against him. He was just simply not important enough for that and I tried to say that to my sister, but she just refused to even hear me out and said that our mother had been right, it was pointless to try and talk to me because I was still extremely petty and selfish. So we ended up fighting once again and I told her to leave my house because she couldn't just waltz in and insult me after everything that happened,

especially after I had tried to comfort her, though she had never extended that same courtesy to me when I was going through a tough time, and in fact, she had actually fought with me back then because she took it as a personal attack. Two years later, she was still doing the same thing, so if anybody was being petty and selfish, it was my family. And that comment that she had made, about our mother being right about me, made me feel really bad because throughout the past two years, she had been the only one who was

there for me and now it felt like she had never actually been there for me at all, and it was all for show. I was already very hurt and my sister refused to leave, she just kept standing there and said one hurtful thing after the other so it eventually came to a point where both of us started screaming so loudly at each other that I couldn't even make out what she was saying. We ended up cursing at each other, but then, she finally left and I feel terrible about everything that's going on, but at the same time, I feel like they deserve every bad thing that's happening to them. I honestly feel like even keeping in touch with my mother for the past two years have been a huge mistake and I should have just cut my entire family off when I had the

chance. Even now, I regret trying to be there for my sister because she was acting hysterical. They are definitely not worthy of my time or energy anymore, and they keep proving it to me again and again, but for some reason, I just keep finding it incredibly difficult to cut them out of my life entirely. I keep thinking about our childhood, how close we used to be and my heart hurts to even talk about it now. All of this just genuinely sucks, I just wish for it all to be over soon. Update 3, hey, so it's been four days since my sister visited and we got into that fight, and after that, nobody spoke to me for the next four days. I almost start to my first. I almost start to started thinking that they were going to leave me alone now, but today, my parents finally

showed up in this time, I had made up my mind that I was not going to let them in. I had already made the mistake of letting my sister in last time and then we all know how that ended, so I was not going to repeat my mistake. They were standing outside the door and I told them to leave because I really didn't think that I had anything to discuss with them and they couldn't possibly have anything new to say to me that they hadn't already said, so we could just not waste each other's time and let this be. But my dad said that he was not here to ask me for any sort of help, but he was actually here to apologize to me because, after a really long time, he had realized

that he had done the wrong thing. He told me that he had screwed up in the worst possible way and he knew that nothing that he said at this point was ever going to make it better, but the least he could do was at least try to talk to me and let me know that he was really sorry for all of this. And I have got to tell you guys, that really took me by shes. That really took me by shock because I really was expecting him to show up and start yelling at me or something. We haven't spoken to each other after the night of his retirement party and I still remember that he had called me a disappointment. I don't think I'll ever forget. That was all that I was thinking about while he was apologizing and he was done talking. I told him that I was really

thankful that he had come all the way here to apologize to me but it isn't that easy for me to forgive him. He can't just apologize and expect everything to be fine just like that, especially when we haven't even interacted with each other in the past two years and he has never made an effort to talk to me either. So I told him that I needed my time and even then, I wasn't sure if I would ever be able to bring myself to forgive him. It wasn't even the fact that he had screwed me over two years back that was bothering me even now, but the fact that it took him two years and so much trouble to realized that he had not done the right thing and to finally come and talk to me, that's what made me feel really sad. Even after that, I was just waiting for him to get mad at me and start yelling,

but he just said that he was ready to wait for me to come around, and even if I decided never to speak to him again and did not forgive him, he would be fine with that as well. He said that two years back, he had made a very stupid decision and it was not that he hadn't taken my mental health seriously, it was that he had taken it a little too far. He explained to me that his father and all the men in his family had always been really rough and tumble and he had been raised the same way. He had been raised to believe that what we had to do to get through life was just a fight and everybody who claimed they had anxiety or depression or whatever, they were just weak and they were making excuses for themselves and their weakness. And so, when he found out that

I was taking anti-anxiety pills, he started thinking that maybe I was not. not up to the task of leading the company and he had built this business from scratch so he couldn't afford to let that go to waste. It was his fear and paranoia that got to him, and he made the worst decision that he could have possibly made which has led him to this situation. He then told me that after we stopped speaking, he was really mad at me and resented me for a couple of months, but then he started second-guessing himself and started reading more and more about anxiety and how it functions. And a couple of months ago, he started to do that. He started to do that feeling like he might have some symptoms himself as well and he was planning on reaching out to me

to try and make things right, but then this fiasco with Zach came into light and he was not able to do that. After he told me all of this, I felt really weird about the situation and I still don't know how to feel about any of this, but at the very least, he has apologized to me. I know that after two years, it's not much, but to me, it means a lot. I don't know if I will be forgiving him any time soon and I really don't know if this apology was real or not, but I'm willing to at least think about it and give it a chance. For now, I just told him to go back home and I would contact him if I felt like it. And he respected that and went back after that.

As for my mom, we didn't really get the opportunity to speak much today. She did apologize to me in the beginning for her behavior as well, along with my father. Towards the end of my conversation with my father, she told me that she was ready to to wait for me to forgive her. She said that she might have reacted a little too quickly and a little too harshly instead of trying to understand what I was going through. She also said that she had spoken to my sister and she also wanted to apologize to me on her behalf because she also thinks that she has treated me really badly in the past, but I don't think I will be counting that as a real apology. My sister is an adult, she's a grown-up and she can speak

to herself if she wants to. If she wants to apologize, she She's going to have to come to do it herself, and I can understand that she's just trying to deal with everything to do with Zach right now, but that's still not an excuse to behave with me the way that she did the last time that she visited. Anyway, the point is that most of my family members have apologized to me and now it's up to me whether I want to accept the apology or not. I'm not going to lie, it's going to be a very difficult decision to make. I have spent two whole years of my life without any contact with any of these people, from

my mother, of course. And even with her, things are pretty dicey right now. On one hand, I really want to forgive all of them and move on with my life because I don't think resentment is going to take me ahead. If I don't forgive them, these things are just going to keep running in my mind endlessly like it has been for the past couple of years and I really don't want that. On the other hand, I don't know if forgiving them and letting all of this stay in the past is the right thing to do. I'm just really confused about what to do right now if I'm being honest. I miss my family terribly and all of this is messing with my head. I know a lot of you might be thinking that they are only doing this because they are in trouble

right now, but I've already made it very clear that I cannot help them and even if I could, I wouldn't. It's a matter of principles for me and I'm not going to change that for anyone, no matter what. So if that's what they are hoping is going to happen, they have already set themselves up for failure. And in case that's not on their minds, and they are genuinely trying to apologize to me and repair our broken relationships, then that just complicates things even more. I guess I'm just going to have to sleep on it for a couple of days and then I'll think about what I want to do. I'll keep you guys updated. Update 4. Hey, everyone. I was able to log in here

after almost four months since I got really busy in the middle. Why that happened, I'll come that later. Anyway, the last time that I posted an update, my parents and my sister had just apologized to me. My parents had apologized to me in person, but my sister, I guess she was too caught up with the situation with Zach and that's why she had told our mother to apologize to me on her behalf. She visited me a couple of weeks after that and apologized to me in person as well. And I told her the same thing that I had told my parents, that I would think about it and let her know what I wanted to do about this. And I did think about it. I took my own sweet time. And last month, I told them that I would like to rebuild my relationship with them, but it had

to be at my own pace. I told him that I would be willing to have dinner with them once a month from now onwards and see where it goes because I'm still not sure if rebuilding a relationship with them is a good idea or not, but they were thrilled and said that they were okay with it as long as I was happy. So that's where it's at right now. And we had dinner together a couple of weeks ago this month. It was sufficiently awkward, but I could see that they were really trying to make up for the past by being extra nice to me. Zach was not present at this dinner since my sister filed for a divorce from him two months ago and he had already been fired from the company. My dad offered to make me the CEO, but I declined. I think I need some more time. So,

my dad is handling things at the company right now and he is still waiting for an answer from me. I'm going to think about it for a couple of more months and then, I don't know, I might accept. For now, I'm just trying to make time for the things that I love. And that includes my girlfriend. She is a really old friend of mine who I started dating a couple of months ago and that's what has kept me so busy for so long because now, there is more to my life than just work and family drama. In fact, she is the one who convinced me to forgive my family and give them a second chance. I'm really happy that we are together because so far, I have never asked her out even though I have liked her for a really long time, because I didn't want to get rejected and then end up

ruining our friendship. But I'm glad that she took the first step. Now, we are together and I'm as happy as can be. So things are going pretty well for me right now. I hope you enjoy this. I'm story. Spouse utterly changed her attitude towards our son when he prepared supper independently, and I praised him excessively, resulting in her now favoring our daughter and neglecting him entirely. My partner has always been the one to cook around the house, and as an Italian, it's one of the reasons I fell so hard for her. I've offered to help out in the kitchen or even cook for her sometimes, but she's always firmly, yet politely, told me no and I can't really blame her because I did not get either of my parents' good cooking jeans. Because of this I've

always been sure to thank her for every meal and I've taught my children to do the same. For the past year or so my son has been watching a ton of cooking videos and he's really been wanting to try his hand at cooking. My wife was happy to teach him and at least twice a week the two of them will go out to the store by ingredients for a meal he found and come home and make it. It's been awesome seeing them bonding more since they haven't really had much over. overlap in interests before this. About a month ago after dinner, my son asked his mom if he could try making us all a meal on his own. I said it sounded like a great idea, and she hemmed and hawed for a little while before agreeing. So that Saturday she took him to the store to get his ingredients

and then he got to work. She supervised here and there, but he insisted that she didn't need to so eventually she came to the living room and sat with my daughter and I looking a little bit dejected, so I reassured her that I was sure he'll still want to cook with her. He just wanted to try it out on his own. That seemed to help out a little, but she still seemed a little off. When he finished and we all sat down to eat, I was honestly surprised at just how good he managed to do on his own. I feel bad saying it, but even after a year or so of cooking with his mother, I expected him to mess up more than he did. I wanted to encourage this interest of his so I was sure to let him know while I was eating how good he did, and gently bring up the few mistakes he had

made. I did it a lot more than I usually would with my wife's cooking, and in hindsight I can see that that's what started all of this. His sister, being his little sister, was not as supportive as I was, and quite rudely insulted his cooking. I was going to tell her to mind her manners and be thankful that he cooked for us when my wife made a sound and pushed her plate away, before agreeing in saying that it was too salty and overcooked. This took me a back, and I could tell my son took it hard too, as his mood visibly dropped. I didn't say anything at the time, since my wife and I never argue in front of the kids. And I just kept up the praise of my son's cooking as his mother picked at the plate for a little while longer before she took her and our daughter's plates to the

kitchen. A little while later, I had went to check on my son, and I could tell that he had been crying, so I comforted him, told him I was sure his mother loved the food and that she was probably just having a bad day, not to take it personally. Then later, once the kids were asleep, I confronted her about it, and she tried to just brush it off, but I pushed and she got mad and said that I complimented his cooking far more than I ever complimented hers. This caught me off guard, since I didn't expect my wife to be jealous of our son, and I unfortunately let out an involuntary scoff at this. She blew up at me for laughing, and we ended up arguing for a while before eventually I managed to explain that I was complimenting him so much because I wanted to encourage him to keep cooking, and she even admitted that she shouldn't have been so harsh about it. She said she would apologize to him and I figured that everything was settled. That Monday, when I was driving my son to school, I noticed he wasn't acting normal and looking out the window, trying to hide his face from me. I asked him what was wrong, and he told me he was fine, but I could tell he was fighting back tears

so I asked him again and he broke and told me that after I had left to get the car started, she told him that she was going to be cooking alone again from now on. I was furious about this, but kept my cool and told him I would talk to her about it. Bought him a snack from the store before dropping him off at school. I left work early so I could get home before the kids and talk to my wife. I'll admit I didn't have. handle it as well as I could have and we ended up in a shouting match where I was calling her childish for being so vindictive towards our son because she was upset with me, and she called

him a baby and said he shouldn't be so sad about not being allowed to cook since it wasn't a man's job to do so anyway. We ended up leaving each other alone to cool down, and when our kids got home, my wife took our daughter out and came back later with a load of toys and clothes for her. I knew immediately what she was trying to do, and that night I told her that I would not let her use the money I make for our family to punish my son. She didn't take this well and we ended up arguing again. I slept in the guest room and have been up to this point. For this past month my wife has kept up this vindictive showering of our daughter with attention and gifts, while almost entirely ignoring my son. I've been talking to my parents and brother about this, and while they agree that she's wrong,

they also don't see it as that big of a problem and think it'll sort itself out. At this point, with how she's been treating our son, I'm starting to fall out of love with her, but I also don't want to just jump to divorce if there's something that I can do to fix this whole situation. I can honestly say that we've never had a fight this big. Sure, we bicker every now and then, but she's never taken that out on my son in the past. I feel responsible and guilty about what happened, and I've been trying to do nice things for my son when I can, but I also don't want to mirror my wife's behavior so I've also been taking my daughter with us about half the time we go places. But whenever we do, she's been very

rude and always talks about all the stuff her mother does for her lately, because she knows it bothers her brother. Seeing the way my wife has been treating our son has made me second-guess our marriage, but I don't want to just jump straight to divorce either. Any advice on what I should do, or how to best bring up the topic of therapy would be appreciated. Update, obligatory, but genuine, thank you for all of the support, even the comments that got a bit nasty. That kind of pushback helped me to see that things were a lot worse than I realized. Some of you could do with being a bit nicer, but the advice is appreciated all the same. Short recap, my wife and son cooked dinner together most nights for about a year.

My son wanted to try cooking dinner on his own, which my wife accepted, but started acting funny. She ended up rudely criticizing his meal, then the next day she told him that she would do the cooking on her own from then on, and after I confronted her about this, she started neglecting slash emotionally abusing him while shoveling positivity onto our daughter. The first thing I did after making my previous post was take my son to my parents' house to tell them what was happening from his mouth. I figured they may be more receptive to seeing the pain their grandson was going through and not just write it off like they had with me. They ended up understanding and supportive of my next move, which was kicking my wife out till she worked through whatever problem she was going through.

Next I went to a lawyer and consulted with him. He told me it would be best to have the papers ready to go, even if I wasn't sure I wanted the divorce yet because it's better to get it done as quick as possible if I decided to go through with it because in Canada you, you have to either have to separate for a year, or prove abuse or adultery. I took the kids to my folks' house the next Saturday and came back with my mother. I let her talk with my wife first, then when they were done I told her that I needed her to leave the house until she sorted out whatever was causing her to act this way to our son. She, surprisingly, agreed to this. I'm guessing hearing things from my mother knocked some sense into her, as they were always

quite close. I told her that my parents were willing to let her stay there during the time because her parents lived too far away, or I could put her up in a nearby motel. I would also pay for her to see a therapist every week, which I told her was mandatory for fixing things. Our kids spent the night with my parents and we moved her out the next day, we both sat with the kids and told them what was happening. Our son understood, but our daughter didn't and was quite upset, but eventually we calmed her down. Things went well for the first month or so. She went to all of the weekly appointments, and I met her for dinner a few nights a week

with the kids and she seemed to be treating our son properly again. I was really hopeful that she had been making progress. Then the Friday after her fifth therapy appointment she sent me a wall of text messages about how I was an asshole, and I was trying to steal her children from her, and how I was probably fucking someone on the side. I tried calling her to see what she was talking about, but I think she shut her phone off. I called my mother and she told me that my wife had left the house earlier that day

with all of her stuff without saying anything to my mom. I'm not 100% sure what happened next, since my wife has refuses to tell me most details, and I can't get in contact with the friends she was with. The best I can piece together was that she had told her best friend about what was happening, and that friend started telling her all about how I was just trying to kick her out and steal her kids. She then moved in with her friend, and went on a week-long bender of clubbing and drinking in drugs. When we were younger, we did our fair share of stupid shit together, so while this was surprising,

it was most likely her dumb-ass friends convincing her to relive the good old days. I hadn't heard anything for about a week, then I got a text from her friend, telling me I was a loser, that my wife was too good for me, and that she was so good for me, and that she was fucking a younger guy. I tried to demand she give my wife the phone so I could talk with her, but I never got a reply. I screenshotted the text for evidence if I needed it. I ended up getting a call from the hospital at like three in the morning that Sunday. My wife had overdosed on something and was dropped off at the ER by someone who didn't stick around.

Since I was her emergency contact, they reached out to me. I called my mom to come watch the kids and headed over there. They managed to get her stabilized and were treating her. I stuck around for a few hours and she was in and out of consciousness, and when she was she wasn't very talkative. When she properly woke up, she started apologizing for everything, and that's when I found out the few details I know about her friend in the Bender. I asked her if she had been fucking someone else like her friend said,

and she didn't reply, which was as much of an answer as I needed. She kept trying to apologize and I just kept my cool and told her this wasn't the time or place for this. We ended up leaving at about 8 a.m. the next day. I got her back to my parents' place, got her into bed, and just before I left, I put the papers on the table beside the bed and told her that I expected her to sign them within a week and that I had proved she cheated on me during her bender. I had told my parents I was planning on doing this on the phone, so I wasn't just dumping this drama on them without warning. The kids are both doing fine. They don't know anything of what happened with their mother or the divorce. All they know is that my wife is still moved out, and that she's busy getting better so we're not going to be seeing her as much.

I'll probably tell them in a couple weeks whenever school lets out for the summer so it doesn't affect their learning. Over the next couple weeks I've gotten countless calls from her, ranging from begging for a second chance, to screaming at me that she hated me and was going to make my life hell, going back and forth every other day. I've also been getting vitriolic texts from her family and friends calling my all sorts of names and threatening me that if I don't drop the divorce I'll regret it, all of which have been screenshoted. My parents agree that divorce is for the best, but they're questioning my timing and wondering if I shouldn't have picked a better time to do this than when you're. she was fresh out of the hospital. I'm 100% sure I want her out of my life, and I plan on going for full custody of my children as I don't want them around my wife

if this behavior is what she's willing to stoop to. And while I do want it done as soon as possible, I'm wondering if I should take back the papers and tell her I've changed my mind, at least until she's a bit more stable. Next story, Sister got my dad a DNA test for Christmas and now we found his birth parents after 56 years, while learning about their incredible love story.

My dad, M-56, was adopted at birth. He was raised in Eastern Canada and never really searched for his birth parents. The people who raised him are his parents to him and he loves them very much. They have always been amazing grandparents to my sister, F-19, and I, M-22. All he had from his birth parents was a letter which told him he was born out of love, but they could not support him when he was born. So when my sister decided to get him a genetic test for Christmas, it was purely with the intention to find out what ethnicity we all are

and the thought of finding his birth parents didn't even cross our minds. Eventually, when we got his results, we were surprised to find the names of two people with perfect genetic matches to my dad. He had the option to reach out to them, so he wrote them each an email and just waited for their responses. Almost immediately, his biological dad, who I'll call Jim, not his real name, responded. He said how excited and happy he was to have found my dad and how he was looking for him for so long. My dad, who is usually an emotionally reserved man, was curled up on the couch grinning as he was

texting Jim for the first time. I was still in shock from the news, but was so happy to see my dad even happier than when I graduated uni. Soon thereafter, he also received a message from his biological mom, Debbie, not her real name. By talking to them both, my dad learned the story of his birth and I think that it's absolutely wild. Debbie is the daughter of an Australian mining engineer and they all moved to Canada for his work when she was in high school. Later on, they moved to the Midwest where she met Jim at the age of 17. They were high school sweethearts and were thinking of marriage after they graduate. but then Debbie got pregnant. This being the 60s, this was a huge deal. Her dad was furious and sent

her back to Canada to give birth and arranged a private adoption as he knew of a couple who were trying to have a kid, my grandparents. Once she gave birth, she was able to let Jim know that she was being sent back to Australia. They never saw each again for the next 40 years. Jim apparently was only able to move on once he received a letter over five years later from Debbie, saying that she got married. Eventually, he got married too, and they moved to the West Coast, but his wife got into a terrible car crash and lost the use of both legs in one arm, so they were never able to have kids. Debbie had three daughters in Australia, the oldest of which is seven years younger than my dad. They saw each other for the first time around 12 years ago, as they

reconnected on Facebook and Debbie happened to be taking a trip to the West Coast of America. Both Jim and Debbie had always wanted to keep my dad, and so they tried for decades to find him. But my province apparently is one of the hardest places in the world to find adoption information, especially since my dad only received his birth certificate at his baptism, so their names were not on it. Jim had essentially given up trying to find my dad until genetic tests became popular. He asked Debbie to take every single one, and he did the same, about five years ago, in the hopes that one day my dad would take one. When he received my dad's message, he immediately wrote to Debbie, I found him.

Since then, we have had several calls with Jim and his wife and they are absolutely lovely. We are their only family since they don't have kids and I couldn't be happier. At the end of the month, we'll be flying to the West Coast to meet them. It has been harder to talk to Debbie as Australia is so many hours ahead of us, but she also is so kind and an absolute joy to talk to. I haven't met my three new aunts yet, but apparently one lives in London. It's crazy to think that I might have been within a few kilometers of her the few times I've visited. I also have five new younger cousins.

A couple of them are huge fans of Japanese culture, so they're ecstatic to hear that they have half Japanese cousins. My mom is Japanese Canadian, so my sister and I are both half. We hope to visit them one day in Australia, but we might all meet up in Japan next year. I don't know how to end this, I am still processing everything. It's absolutely incredible to have my family grow so much, but also a little overwhelming. I'm so happy for my dad, for Jim, and for Debbie, and am so excited to get to know them better. I hope I get to meet my new cousin soon too. I feel so incredibly lucky that this happened, seemingly against all odds.

My dad was initially raised Francophone, so it's a miracle that they even speak the same language. Anyways, thank you so much for taking the time to read through this, and my apologies for how long this post ended up being. I might post an update after I meet Jim and his wife. I hope you all have a wonderful day. Update, first of all, thank you so much to everyone. who left such kind and heartfelt comments on my first post. It's incredible of your stories. To those who were concerned that we would abandon my grandparents that I grew up with,

that is most definitely not the case. They were the people I grew up with and I absolutely love them to bits, although only my grandmother is still with us. All the incredible times I've had with her growing up are so much more important than blood and I can't comprehend the stories I read where people forget about their adoptive parents or grandparents when they find their biological ones. I won't recap my previous post here because I'm lazy, huh? So, we just got back from visiting Jim and his wife, who I'll call Mary, not her real name,

on the West Coast and it was one of the best experiences of my life. We spent a week in their city and got to experience so much with them. Our first time meeting them in person was very emotional and felt very surreal. We spent the whole day looking through my dads and our old friends. photos, basically catching Jim up on everything that he has missed over the past 56 years. We also got to see so many of his and Mary's old photos too, which was very cool. We went to a park near their house and on the walk, I heard Jim whisper my son with a massive smile across his face. Throughout the week, we explored their city and saw so many cool

sights and tried so much delicious food. Mary knows her city so well and it was great to see her favorite spots all around the city from food carts to gardens to museums. We all went to an incredible Japanese American Museum and Jim and Mary absolutely loved it. They were very keen to learn about the internment during World War II and said that they knew a bit about it before, but now it feels so personal. We went on two hikes with Jim, Mary wasn't able to come because she is in a wheelchair. It's so cool to have such an active and outdoors a grandfather who is able to go on such long hikes. He taught us some foraging tips and told us stories from when he used to camp for years on end. Both he and Mary are very spiritual, so he also told us great stories for meditation

retreats they've done. He's even tried psychedelics, so he's definitely the cool grandpa. I won't go into precise details of places we went, but it was great exploring such a cool part of the world with amazing people. We were all very sad when the trip was over and we had to leave. I've gained two new grandparents on the West Coast and I couldn't be happier. And they said that they've gained two grandchildren, I'm so glad that they see us as such. Mary told me her greatest regret in life was not being able to have children and grandchildren, but now she does. This has been such a transformative time in our lives and I think it's incredible just how many people are so much happier now because my sister just happened to get my dad a DNA test. This is

just the beginning of our relationship with our new grandparents and I am so excited. Now we have to figure out a way to go to Australia to meet Debbie. Whenever that happens, maybe I'll make another update. Until then, I hope you all have a lovely day and thank you so much for taking the time to read our story. I hope you enjoy this story. My sibling referred to my foster child as an error during her pre-wedding celebration. Later, I discovered that she has been covertly harassing her and warning her that we will desert her once we have authentic obligations. Kids.

Hi, guys. I, F-32, Deanna, am the eldest of five siblings, and I've taken on the role of the family caretaker for as long as I can remember. I helped our parents until they're passing, and, frankly, it's exhausting. Dad died of brain cancer three years ago. and it was heartbreaking to watch him deteriorate over time, and mom passed peacefully overnight after a long hard battle with breast cancer earlier this year. So as the oldest, I just sort of became the de facto parent. I don't mind as I love my siblings, and it's kind of my thing to big sister friends and family a lot.

I'm sort of ships counselor, and I financially help out my family. I don't mind, as I work in tech, have a side gig doing art, an inherited land and money from mom and dad all that to say it's no real loss. A few years ago, I adopted my cousin's Charlie M. 45 child who I will just use her nickname Decker. My baby loves kickboxing. After my cousin went to prison for murdering the Decker's mother in an alcohol and drug-fueled rage, which is too long a story to add here. It was a chaotic year of morning, paperwork and court hearings, but the adoption was finalized when the Decker was 5. Now, she's a happy, healthy 13-year-old who calls me mom. She's in therapy, and has been since I legally could send her as she witnessed her mother's death, and I couldn't be prouder of how

resilient she is. She's my girl, my rock star, my whole heart and I call her that, literally my heart. Fast forward to my sisters, Clara F-30, upcoming wedding. I was thrilled for her at first, and she asked me to be M.O. I cried in her. enjoy and offered for my wife Honey, because we like the incredible LOL-F-40 and I to pay for it. Don't worry, I asked Honey first. But during a bachelorette dinner I set up, she made a hurtful comment about my daughter, calling her a mistake and saying I shouldn't have taken her in. I stared at her and asked her what she meant and she said it wasn't like I was supposed to even have kids, as I am married to another woman, then said no hate or anything and laughed,

but then she doubled down that Decker is likely damaged and a handful. Guys, Decker is the sweetest child alive. I mean she is a teen so yeah, sometimes she can get challenging or rebellious here or there, but when I say she is my whole heart, I mean it. She made us a family, and made our house a home. She smiles easy, cries openly and has the emotional intelligence I wish I had myself. She always asks, how are you doing? And she really means it, willing to live.

listened to people. But she's a damaged mistake. I felt like a character in a dark, twisted episode of a sci-fi show, defending my choice to adopt felt like fighting the Borg, like I just wouldn't assimilate. I didn't laugh it off with my sister and her friends. I just stared at her in pure disbelief. I think she knew I was hurt because she quickly changed the subject. I said I better get home, paid for everything in three more rounds and went home to my family. My sister came over the next day to yell at me for leaving and cutting them off after the three rounds I paid for. She said I owe her a do-over for ruining the whole weekend because I can't take a joke.

Honey, who I of course told what happened, asked my sister to repeat exactly what she said about our daughter. My sister refused and kept calling Decker Charlie's child and I just was holding back so many tears. I told my sister that I wouldn't be contributing a dime to her wedding expenses, that I won't stop helping her pay her rent up until she moves in with her husband, but I won't be in or pay for the wedding of a person who sees my child as a mistake. Honestly, I was ready to go full-on Jedi and sever that connection, but Honey helped me temper myself. My sister lost it, through the can

of soda water we gave her at me, screamed how am I supposed to pay for this? And I said, you have over a year, you can save up. So left, showing Honey out of the way in the process and blew up our sibling group chat. My other siblings are split. Some think I'm overreacting with cutting off funds for the wedding, while others agree that my sister crossed a line and needed the wake-up call. Now, I feel bad for my sister, I do love her and she is distressed by this, but I can't shake the feeling that standing up for my daughter is more important. I'd offer refusing to pay for her wedding after that. Edit, I've been working on my work project at a local brewery and have been silently sobbing and reading the comments. Also, wow so many comments. I was trying to reply to

everyone but I honestly ran out of steam. I sent this post to my wife and also just bracing myself to talk to Decker tonight. We want to ask her if her aunt has done or said anything cruel to or about her. I am wishing hard that she's just confused by our questions and remain oblivious of this shitstorm. I love my heart. I want her to always remain the bright. fun, loving, encouraging person she is. I don't want her to know anything about what her aunt has said. I texted my sister if she meant this, if she really sees me, my wife, and our daughter that way or was she just drunk and stupid and doubled down an embarrassment. That said, I don't want her near Decker any time soon. I feel so lost. I wasn't planning on ever being a parent

and there is no fucking manual for this. What the fuck do I even do? Wish me luck for tonight. I will need it because if Decker tells us her aunt has been cruel to her face, I will have to hold my wife back from swinging on my sister. Update 1, September 29th, 2024. I am trying to keep this short. Honey and I took Decker out to the local Oktoberfest celebrations. She had a blast, did crafts, dance to music, had beer,

it was not beer, in a pint glass, and generally had a great time. On the ride home my wife broached the long-awaited topic. We asked her how she felt about Grandma's passing then went into how everyone handles things differently. We asked if Mama, me or Mommy, Honey, ever was hurtful and she named a couple moments we'd been snappy or wouldn't let her do things, like a party at 2 a.m.? But no nothing else. We asked about Clara and she got quiet.

Honey just looked at me but I was driving. So I just said you can tell us any. anything, Goober, you know that and she clammed up. I got my girls home and hugged my heart slash Decker and went to the den. About two hours later my wife came downstairs to me and said Decker is in bed but Noah's sleep and I should talk to her. I asked why and she simply said that Decker is willing to talk about it. I went up. Decker was ready for bed in her PJ's reading. I just sat down on the side of the bed and asked her how she was. She just said, mom told you, huh? I told her I didn't know anything and Decker then said that Clara makes her

uncomfortable and said hurtful things. When my wife and I weren't around, Clara would call her the lost puppy or the stray and once Decker remembers her to have told her to her face you're not real family and that once honey and I get a real child we will dump her. I can't explain the rage. The absolute, total and complete red I saw as my daughter broke down telling me that she behaves so well and is so obsessed with grades so she can prove she is worth loving, worth keeping. After calling my wife, we sat her down and told her that she is the best thing that ever happened to us and that even if we do have more children, she is our firstborn and our love. I cried and held her telling her she was my whole heart and that nothing will ever change that.

She saved us, and I am so proud of her and us and all we've grown to become. I can't ever stop loving her. Neither can her mom. We love her more than air. That will never change. Then I explained that Annie was wrong for this. Andy is jealous of her. Jealous of how much we love her. Auntie needs help but we can't give that help so she won't be around for a while.

Decker asked us to stop talking to her like a child, so I was blunt. She's my sister and I love her. You're my daughter and I love you more. I told her my sister was wrong and hateful. I'm sorry that she didn't feel she could come to her mom or I, but she can. Every time. Any time. We will choose her. Always. Decker asked me if it's her fault I hate Clara and I just hold her hate as a choice and I don't hate Clara. I do love her. But sometimes loving a person means you correct them.

Actions have consequences. My daughter got quiet and handed me her phone and Clara had been texting her awful things since she left my home. I can't even type them because I want to throw things, but it's when I read my fucking sister texting my teenage daughter, go tell your so-called mom like a snitch and prove me right I took a screenshot and texted it to myself. Decker fell asleep around midnight and my wife and I went to bed.

I texted my sister the screenshot and said, You come into my home as my sister and treat my child like this? No. Mom and dad would be ashamed of you. This is not how you treat any child. let alone your own niece. I have loved you since as long as I can remember. I know you were not raised to treat children so terribly.

But as of now, you are not accepted in my home. You will not speak to or contact me, my wife, or my child. I will give you the money for October, Clara, but November on? That's your responsibility. I am no longer going to help. I'm sorry. This breaks my heart. But you crossed a serious and unforgivable line.

Decker is my daughter. I am her mom. Do not doubt me here, and I want to be clear, if you ever come sideways at my family again, or contact my daughter at all, I will take legal recourse. From today on, we are low contact. If you try to make this into a bigger issue, it will be no contact. If you don't understand, here are resources to help spell it out. I Love You, D, Update 2, October 2, 2024.

I kept my promise to my wife to wait before reacting. She knows me best and knew I was prepared to go nuclear. Turns out, I needn't have bothered. Let me clear up a couple of small details and misconceptions I've read. 1. I am the eldest of the siblings. Mom and dad have been sick for years on and off. So to those who think I've just started to do.

had taken over as some weird power trip or something, no. I've managed their finances, maintained their properties, and taken care of all their affairs before either of them passed. Dad simply wasn't mentally able after a while and mom never had a head for that sort of thing. Two, yes, I was mostly left in charge of my siblings growing up. Both my parents had businesses and worked often seven-day weeks. I cooked dinner and helped with homework and whatnot. I'm aware that's not very normal, and I already know some of you will call my parents terrible for this, but they simply didn't know better. I won't hate them for any of it and as much as it caused me some negative effects. It also made my siblings feel safe. I'm proud of being able to protect them and

be there for them when they were young so they didn't feel how I felt. And yes, I am also in therapy. Three, I was the sole caretaker of my parents when they passed. The reasons are complicated but the short of it is, Dad got verbally abusive towards the end and mom got severely depressed and blunt. They were a challenge to deal with on the best of days. I hold no ill will towards them, but there it is. My siblings didn't want to be around them. Dad was hurt and changed his will. Mom followed suit. Four. For those telling me I am rewarding Clara by paying for literally this month, and that I'm not a real mom or a bad mom by loving my daughter's tormentor, I'm envious your world is so black and white. Rent is literally due today and the money was

already in transfer to her via auto banking. And Clara isn't getting rewarded, she is remaining housed. But from now on, she's on her own. Five, Clara and I used to be pretty close, but she did get distant around the time Decker was adopted. I didn't know exactly why, just that the new dynamic was a challenge for her. I know she hates Charlie and considers him evil and irredeemable. She had a really hard time losing our cousin-in-law, Decker's biological mother, as they were very close so I assume her issues stem from this. Six, I inherited the majority of everything though my siblings got sizable sums, three got all but one of the businesses my parents owned, and everyone got trusts. Clara spiraled after Mom passed and had a mental health crisis.

Before we got her help, she traveled, drank, and gambled away her entire inheritance. Long story for another time. I didn't have a moment to cool down and wait until today to give myself a chance to make a level-headed decision regarding my sister. Clara has spun the tale that I am jealous she found a loving man and am withholding mom and dad's money from her. She gave the perception that I was the one abusing Decker, putting her down, and telling her she isn't my real daughter. That shut down when I sent my text a couple days ago. Yesterday, Clara was on my doorstep. She was crying and begging for me to let her in,

but my wife and her friends were inside and I made it clear I don't want her near my family as she emotionally abused my daughter and physically harmed my wife. I told her to leave where I would call the police to have her removed. I was going to call the police anyway because I told her never to come to our home again and there she was. There's a reason I said this in text. so I could in an event like this show them clear as day that she would know she is welcome. Clara started to beg saying she will apologize to Decker and she was drunk and upset and made mistakes.

I could tell she was drunk. Or hi. Or something. I told her it's not a simple mistake to bully a traumatized teen girl and make her feel unloved and unwanted by her own family and to text her that she is worthless and expendable. What the fuck? I got angry and just started to raise my voice. I don't know when I started to yell but I did.

I just, lost it. She's a cold-hearted, awful, self-serving brat. Spoiled beyond belief to being so delusional that this all would just go away, that she's entitled to the money my wife and I make, that our parents gave us after all she did. She needs fucking help and I am done being the giving tree here. You don't ever hurt my child. She's lucky I have a head to keep my hands to myself and lucky are still honey.

isn't out here because she certainly would not so go the fuck home. Clara slapped me across the face and called me a bitch and a traitor that I choose that demon spawn of a child over her. That I loved Decker more than my own real family and turn my back on her this way. Honey must have been right by the door because before I could make a very bad choice she had yanked me inside. Told my sister that she had 60 seconds to fuck off and slammed the door closed. Clara left quickly but we still called the police and handed over the footage from

our property cameras of what happened, as well as the texts from our phones. Clara went ballistic over text telling me awful things ending with her hoping I'd take my own life and she would celebrate. Absolutely unhinged awful shit like that. I blocked her, sent every piece of footage in a Google drive and dropped the link in the sibling group chat and sent it to Kevin her fiancé. I then sat down and cried myself into a fit before Decker came home from practice. I put on my mom face for her and made sure she did her homework then I went to the den and called my aunt, Decker's biological grandmother, and told her what happened. My aunt told me that Clara is renewing her conspiracy that I harming Decker and that I need to be careful because she suspects Clara is having

some sort of mental break and might do something crazy. Honey and I have spent this whole day working on a request for a protective order from her. Making sure Decker's school knows no one is to pick her up but us. And get a lawyer because I think legal action is needed here. I told my eldest of the brothers that Clara needs help and asked if he could check on her because she might be as much a danger to herself as she is now presenting to be to me and my family. He got quiet and said, Can't you handle this? And said this drama was too much and he's busy. I was so stunned I just blurted out, are you fucking kidding me right now?

Before I just hung up. My other sister is now over, helping me deal with this. My other brother has gone to see after Clara, but says he will only make sure. she hasn't hurt herself but beyond that she can get wrecked for what she's done. Kevin called me and said he went through the Google Drive and begged me not to call the police on Clara. He said that she has been having a really bad time and has struggled with drinking and has been stealing his medications and he's trying to get her help. But if she gets arrested, he doesn't have the funds for bail PR and illegal help. I told him it's too late.

The police have been called and he needs to get her into some sort of rehab or something. He asked for our help to pay for a facility he was thinking of and I told him to keep her away from me and my family. He started to cry and told me I'm him awful sister. That I don't care about Clara and her struggles and that she's just lost and he's underwater trying to keep her from going off a deep end. I didn't reply after that and have just been sitting around the house waiting for the police to call back, trying to get my crying out for the way before Decker comes home from school. I feel wretched and terrible because not matter what I do now. It will just never feel right.

I was to look after them all and now my sister is this lunatic hellbent on burning my life down and my brother is alarmingly just indifferent to it all. I am used to being the one that holds the family together and handle things. But I don't feel like I can handle anything anymore. WTF is my life? Comments where Op has replied, Peaches 728, you are in a tough situation. Someone will have hurt feelings no matter what choice you make.

At the end of the day you must do what is best for your family, wife and child. It's hard letting go of family when you know they will flounder but you don't want to sink with them. I bet your parents wouldn't want you to either. Oop, oh, my mother would be furious with me right now. I can almost hear her berating me in the back of my skull telling me Kevin is right and I am supposed to take care of them not turn my back on any of them and to forgive because we are family and that's what family does. It's killing me, but it helps watch it.

Decker. She's out back in the pool now that her homework is done, and she's chatting away with honey while I work on dinner. I've been staring at Bell Peppers for like 15 minutes battling my mom in my head with, but look at her, she's safe and happy, wouldn't you want that? Even spoonier, sounds like you're doing the right thing, but yikes. I'm not sure that helping pay for rehab is a bad idea, as long as it's an inpatient facility and there's a court order in place that will help govern when she can leave. The most important thing is keeping her away from your family. This would accomplish that while also allowing you to say that she needs help and you're helping her get it. And who knows? Maybe she'll actually get the help she needs.

Oop, I really hope she does get help, but right now, I am focused on my daughter WND wife. She was off the rails enough to strike me. It's not a full-on attack, but if she's capable of all of this, I don't know what she might do to my family and right now she's hyper fixated on us and Decker in particular. She has my other siblings and her fiancé, so I will let them handle this for now. I am more concerned for the safety of my home. I know that sounds terrible and maybe I am, but I just don't have the extra space in my mind to deal with this. I hope you enjoy this story. Delivered twins and put on weight, my friend kept making remarks and gifted me a scale on my birthday. I misplaced it and went off with the infants. Presently, my husband wants me to

apologize. Recently, I gave birth to twins, and obviously, that has led to a bit of weight gain. I've spoken to the professionals and they have assured me that this is completely natural and normal after a pregnancy, especially after twins. And soon enough, with a proper diet and regular exercise, I'll be able to come back to my original size. To be honest, I'm not even very concerned about that, since I used to be really thin earlier and I think putting on a bit of weight has been good for me. Besides, right now, my primary goal is to be a good mother to my children, no matter what weight I am at. But I don't think my mother-in-law agrees with it since she has made it very clear that she doesn't want me at this size right now.

Agnes, my mother-in-law, used to be a model so she's pretty conscious about her appearance and that's great. I find it wonderful that even at her age, she always takes great care of. of herself. But for her to expect the same of me, especially after I have given birth to twins, I think that's a bit unrealistic and I was really upset for the past couple of weeks because she kept insisting that I needed to lose weight. I was getting annoyed by my husband's family anyway because they kept visiting every other day and my mother-in-law had practically made a home in our house. So this meant that I barely got any alone time and I was forced to entertain guests all day long for the past three weeks. I tried to be polite about it.

but my husband felt that it was normal for his family to want to come over all the time since his family loved him and they couldn't believe that he was a father now, so they wanted to meet the baby as soon as possible as well. I could understand that his family was excited, but I feel like it shouldn't be the norm to keep visiting a woman who has just given birth since I'm honestly just exhausted right now. Anyway, I was pretty annoyed by the fact that Agnes was visiting every day already, and instead of helping me out, she would expect me to do everything around the house and she thought that she was doing me a favor by looking after the kids instead. I thought it was kind of unfair since I was the one who was their mother, so if she really wanted to help me she should

have taken care of the other chores and let me look after my babies. That was bad enough as it is and on top of that, she just kept taking pout chats at me about my weight. The rest of my husband's family found it funny but I did not and neither did my parents, who told me that I had to stand up to the people and make sure that they didn't behave this way with me. The problem with me is that, by nature, I'm a really non-confrontational person and I find it very difficult to talk about what's bothering me, but after my parents visited me, I decided to tell my husband that I was not fine with his mother making an issue of my weight so publicly and neither was I fine with her or his family visiting us every day. That led to an argument since he believed that I was being

unreasonable. He said that I'm not very close to my family, which is why they didn't visit. that often and it was kind of true, but another reason that they didn't visit that often was because I had been very clear that I needed some time to myself with the babies before I was ready to entertain guests. I tried to explain to him that these frequent visits from his family were making me irritable and I was exhausted from dealing with them, but he turned around on me and made it sound like I was being selfish. And I am not really in a condition to keep fighting and arguing, so I let that one go and drop the argument, even though I shouldn't have. Because I guess that's what led to this incident that took place a couple of days back on my birthday.

I had specifically told my husband that I did not want a birthday party, I just wanted to spend the day alone with him and the kids. And I thought that since it was my birthday, he would respect it, but unfortunately, that's not how the situation played out. I spent the morning at my parents' place since they had invited me for birthday lunch and that's a ritual that we follow every year. Usually, my husband also accompanies me, but this year, He said that he was feeling a bit under the weather and that he wanted to stay home. Around the evening, when I finally came back home, my husband had invited his entire family and a bunch of our friends to the house to surprise me.

This was exactly what I didn't want, but since they were already here, I decided to put on a happy face and pretend that I had the energy to deal with this. I was really tired and I just wanted to nap, but after I had cut the cake, Agnes told me that it was time to unwrap the presents and even though I told her that I wanted to get some rest, she insisted that I do it and I opened hers first. I was too tired to put up a fight, so I did what she asked just to get it over with and I completely flipped out when I unwrapped her present to me and realized that she had given me a weighing machine. For the past couple of weeks, ever since I had given birth, I had found my husband and his family increasingly more annoying to deal with, but this was

just the last straw for me. Agnes had been the worst of all, constantly bringing up how much weight I had put on, and that I had to shed it off all quickly and this was what finally tipped me over the edge. I started freaking out at her, and I really gave her a peace of my mind. I had stayed quiet for long enough, but once I started yelling at her, I just couldn't bring myself to stop and let it all out. I told her that she had no business talking about my body, especially after I had given birth to the grandchildren that she constantly came over to see, without even bothering to ask if I would be okay with it. Then I yelled at her for a bit about how she had become an absolute nuisance to deal with since she never helped me out whenever she

came over and expected me to do all the menial tasks, while she got to play with the kids that I had carried for nine months. I said a lot of other things as well before I asked her to get out of my house and kicked her out of the party, and I also told my husband's family that after this party, I did not want them visiting me at all until I'd specifically invited them. I was absolutely furious and I did not care in the slightest about what they thought of me, I just wanted them all to leave me alone with my babies. After yelling at them, I didn't even bother speaking to my husband and just went to the bedroom with the babies and went to sleep. I did wake up quite a few times after that, but my husband was nowhere to be found. I was kind of worried, but I was also really

upset, so I did not even call him. It wasn't until the next morning that I finally saw him again, and when I asked him where he had been, he told me that he had spent the night at a friend's place because, after my outburst, he did not feel like staying with me. He seemed upset and I felt a little bad about my behavior as well since I had really insulted him and his family the night before. But I had been pushed to the edge, so I couldn't say that it was all my fault. Anyway, I thought that we could discuss it and talk it out, but instead, he told me that his mother was really upset about everything. And the worst part was that now, both he and Agnes expected me to apologize to her for my behavior because she was an elderly woman, and she had never been humiliated like that before.

They also felt like I had overreacted since she was only trying to look out for my health. So here's a couple of things about Agnes, she's just 54. That doesn't count as elderly at all, at least not in my books. And she has always been very weird about people's appearances, very judgmental and snarky. In fact, sometimes I feel like the only reason she was so nice to me before I got pregnant was because I fit her idea of what an attractive woman should look like. Like I said, I was really naturally skinny and she had complimented me on that several times. If I'm being honest, it feels like she's obsessed with being thin and maybe that has something to do with the fact that

she used to be a model in her early 20s before she became a mother. But I'm not a model and neither am I planning on becoming one anytime soon. So I don't understand why I have to be that thin as well. Also, if she really was concerned about my health and well-being, then she wouldn't have put me in a position where I had to entertain guests all the time without any help and do all the work around the house while she just played with the kids. She would have actually done something to make sure that I wasn't under a lot of stress and would have at least helped me out around the house. In fact, even with the kids, she would literally just play with them. But when it came to feeding them or changing the diapers, she would call for me. So I wasn't.

buying the fact that she was only looking out for my health. Since then, she would have actually done something to help and not just nitpick at my weight. And if my doctor thinks that I'm at a healthy weight, then I don't understand why she thinks that her opinion matters more. So when my husband told me that I had to apologize to Agnes, because she was really upset, it really rubbed me the wrong way. He had already screwed up after I had given birth by never bothering to think about what I was going through, and forcing me to constantly put up with his family. But I had done it all with a smile on my face because I wanted to make it work with him. After the party, though, I had realized where his priorities were and it was a bit of a reality

check for me, that I desperately needed. It was evident that for him, his family came first and I came second and I wasn't ready to deal with that anymore. So I didn't even fight with him when he said that he wanted me to apologize to Agnes. I just quietly got up and went to my bedroom and started packing my stuff. He didn't bother to follow me, he stayed in the living room, and after a while, when I was done packing, I decided to take the kids with me and go live with my parents. I could have left without saying goodbye, but I decided to tell him exactly where I was going,

and I said that if he wanted to be a mama's boy then he was free to do so, but it was unfair of him to expect me to put up with his family. I told him that he had been really disrespectful towards me and what I wanted and the fact that after the party, he had just left and the kids on our own showed us exactly how little he cared for us. So now, I wanted him to contact me only when he was serious about his family, and I meant the family that he had chosen, not the one he was born in. He didn't say much to me, only that he would expect me to let him come visit the kids whenever he wanted, but unless I apologize to Agnes and the rest of the family, he had no intention of making things right with me. So I could live

with my parents for as long as I wanted to, but he was not going to tolerate this kind of behavior. And then, I left and for the past three days, I've been staying with my parents. They know the situation and they think that I should think about getting a divorce, but right now, I'm not really sure what to do. Because he has been a common occurrence with my husband, I wouldn't have thought twice before leaving. But that's the catch, we have been together for almost six years and married for three and he has never behaved like this. He has always been very attached to his family, especially his mother since his father was always too busy for him. And their relationship had only become stronger after my father-in-law passed away last year. That had never been an issue for me,

though, since he had always treated me well. This change in his behavior that has taken place after he became a father, that's what I don't understand. It feels like he doesn't care about me at all, even though during my pregnancy, he had treated me like I was the Queen of England. And this is what I'm constantly bumping up against because even if I want to leave him for his behavior right now, I can't stop thinking about the fact that he never used to be like this before and it might be crazy, but I've been considering the fact that maybe I'm actually the one at fault here. I've heard about plenty of cases of postpartum depression where women become increasingly irritable and have bouts of anxiety and stuff. So maybe I can't see that I'm being unreasonable,

but he can and maybe he's right. But at the same time, given the circumstances, I hardly think that my anger is unjustified. If I speak to my friends or my parents about this, I'm sure that they are going to be on my side. So that's going to be a little pointless. And so I've come to Reddit to ask for help so I can make sure that I'm not being selfish

and unreasonable like my husband believes, and that I actually do have caused to be mad. So I'd have for kicking my mother-in-law out for talking about my weight and telling my husband's family that I don't want them visiting me right now? Update 1. Hi, everyone. So it has been two days since I posted and I've been really conflicted about what to do because most people in the comments said that I shouldn't reach back out to him and that I should

speak to a lawyer immediately. And I told my parents about it. They suggested the same thing as well and put me in touch with an attorney. But it just didn't feel right for me to file for a divorce before at least giving him one last chance to at least explain himself. I was about to contact him, but, thankfully, he came to me himself. Now, we were not exactly able to make up, but at least we had a discussion. Last evening, he came by to see the kids and it was very awkward, but the babies seemed happy enough to see him. He played with them for a while and then he started talking to me since I had

stayed in the room. My parents had the good sense to go to their bedroom and leave us alone as soon as came over, in case we wanted to discuss anything. Anyway, both of us were much calmer yesterday and were able to actually have a dignified and civil discussion rather than just one of us walking away angrily. I told him that his recent behavior had made me feel very confused because so far, he had always shown great care for my feelings but right now, it felt like it didn't matter to him. It felt like he only cared about his family and nothing else, not even me. It was very difficult for me to take it because I was the mother of his kids, I felt like that demanded a certain amount of respect and care. I also told him that the way Agnes had behaved with me and the way she had

been pushing me to lose weight just three weeks after I had given birth to twins, was ridiculous, and he should have taken a stand for me instead of defending it. He was silent for a couple of minutes, and then he said that he wanted to apologize for not taking a stand for me when it came to Agnes. He was just very confused, but he had to come to the realization that his mother had been wrong for constantly pushing me to lose weight. Apparently, the night that I had kicked her out of my party, she had called him later on, and she had been sobbing on the phone, which is why he had felt so terrible about the way I had behaved with his mother and thought that I should apologize to her. But then, he had thought about it for a while and realized that Agnes actually had been

quite pushy about the weight thing and she had brought it upon herself. So maybe I didn't need to apologize for it and he had to tell me that he had spoken to Agnes, and she was mad so she wouldn't be saying to me any time soon, but he wanted to say that he was sorry. He also told me that he was sorry for not realizing this earlier. He had genuinely thought that Agnes only cared about my health and that's why she wanted me to lose weight, but giving me a weighing machine and forcing me to open it in front of that many people was humiliating and she shouldn't have done that.

So I was glad that at least he had come to his senses regarding his mother and was apologizing for it. But that was not all that I wanted to talk about. We also needed to talk about the fact that he had not treated me as well as I deserve to be lately. And by that, I meant the fact that he had continued to constantly force his family's presence on me, even though I had made it very clear that I wanted to be on my own for a while with just him and the kids since I was exhausted, and that meant both emotionally and physically. I guess I had mentioned in my original post that I had brought it up with him earlier as well, and he had argued with me, calling me selfish for wanting to keep him and our kids away from his family. I didn't want to drag out that fight,

so I dropped it, but since it had become a bit of an issue in our relationship, I brought it up once again. This time, I had no intention of dropping it until it was sorted out. He had apologized about the thing with Agnes, but here, he told me that he did not think he was wrong. Apparently, his family was really excited that he had become a father and it was a huge deal for everyone. That's not very surprising because right from his childhood, he has kind of been the darling of his family, and that is meant that I have also been showered with a lot of love and affection by them. But whenever they would come over in the past three weeks, it would only be me who would have to sacrifice time with my babies to entertain them and occasionally cook for them,

and even though it might not have seemed like a lot of work to him, it took a toll on me. And I told him that it was not fair, since neither he nor his mother had been of any help to me. even though he had started working from home, he barely did any of the household chores anymore because he was always busy with the kids, and that responsibility fell on me. As for Agnes, I have already said that she never did anything around the house, and one came over to play with the kids, and didn't even help me out with changing them and stuff. So I was pretty upset about that as well. Here, though, he said that he could understand that it had become a lot of work for me,

but it was unfair of me to expect him to tell his family that they were not allowed to come over at all. All of them were very excited and he did not want to squash, which is why he had argued with me. And I'm not very close with my family, apart from my parents, so my relatives had only video called me to congratulate me and see the babies, but hadn't visited so far. Part of the reason for that was that I had specifically instructed them not to come over right now and that I would tell them when I was ready to have visitors. I tried to explain to my husband that no matter how much they loved us,

it was very important to have boundaries as well, but he refused to understand what I was getting at. He just kept insisting that his family was doing this out of love, not just for him, but also for me and the babies. And I couldn't overlook that, since that would be disrespectful. They were a very close-knit family and since I had always known it, he didn't understand why I was making a big deal of it right now. After one point, it started feeling like we were just talking in circles, so I told him that

there was clearly no point in discussing this further. We hadn't been able to come to a conclusion about this problem that we were facing, since he strongly believed that he was right and I think that I am right. So I told him that I needed some more time to think about what I wanted to do right now and that until then, I would be staying with my parents. As of now, I have put each and every thought of getting a divorce on hold. I really want to do right by my kids and at this moment, I'm not sure what that would mean. A divorce is a big deal and once I get involved, I can never go back. So whatever I have to do,

I have to think about it very carefully and I don't want to make a mistake. This is why I have decided that I'm going to take my time and talk about this to my husband, a couple of times more, and if we are still not able to come to a conclusion that works for both of us, then I might but I'm treating that as a last option right now. Update 2. Hey, so two days ago, my husband visited me and I'm still thinking about what I want to do. But a couple of hours ago, I did receive a text from Agnes, and that was quite surprising because she was actually apologizing to me. Of course, the tone was very passive-aggressive, and it was very obvious to me that she

didn't really want to apologize, but she still did. Even if it was just for the sake of maintaining a civil relationship, she did. She told me that she had heard from her son that I had left home with the kids and she knew that she was part of the reason that I had done this, so she felt like it was her responsibility to try and make this right. Personally, I don't agree with her, this is between me and my husband and maybe she was a part of the reason why we had a fight in the first place, but she can't exactly help us sort this out. Anyway, she said that she really didn't want us to separate because that might not be the best

move for the kids. Again, I can't agree with that because I think if we separate right now, it might be better for them in the long run because they'll never have known us as a couple in the first place. I think that's a better alternative than sticking together, being toxic for a couple of years, and then traumatizing both our children before we eventually part ways. Anyway, I'm not thinking about a divorce right now, so that doesn't actually apply. Regardless of that, Agnes apologized and said that if this helped the situation, she would be glad to say that she was sorry about how she treated me. Even though she is still going to

maintain that she was only trying to look out for my health and make sure that I didn't compromise my well-being. She claimed that he came from an era where being skinny was considered the healthiest and maybe she was mistaken, but that's what she had been raised to believe, and she had been imposing on me, which was wrong. If I'm being frank, her apology was all over the place and it was kind of contradictory in itself, but hey, at least I received one and that's something to think about. I'm not sure if my husband had put her up to this or not, but it doesn't matter. Like I said, my relationship with my husband does not depend on her apology. I replied to Agnes and told her that it was fine, that I forgive her and I'm still thinking about what I want

to do about the situation with my husband, but I'm thankful that she took the initiative to apologize to me. But yes, I still have no idea what to do so some advice would be greatly welcome. Update 3. Hey, it has been two weeks since I left home and for the past two weeks, my husband and I have been talking about everything back and forth. At first, he would only visit to see the kids and ask me if I had changed my mind and I would say no. And then, we would have another argument about who was being selfish. But both of us got pretty exasperated after one point. It got really annoying so I just told him that maybe it would be for the best to just end it and move on with our lives since we were obviously never going to be able to work this out.

I think that was about ten days ago and when I said that, he got really quiet and asked me if that was really what I wanted. And that forced me to really think about the situation, whether that was what I wanted or not, and honestly, I didn't. What I really wanted was for him to understand me, to apologize to me, and to make everything right again. That was what I really wanted and that's what I told him. That day, he told me that he wanted the same thing as well because, at the end of the day, we really loved each other. We had been together for six years, we had kids together now and I don't know, but this seems like something worth fighting for. That day, he told me that he was going to come back the next day after work with a clearer head and we would try to

sort things out. Because obviously, if both of us wanted to make it for each other, there was no reason for us to get a divorce. And I decided to do the same, to think about everything with a clearer head and keep an open mind. To try and understand him instead of trying to defeat him, just so that we would be able to make this work. After that, he started visiting every day and there was a lot of explaining, a lot of listening, some arguing, some apologizing, and a lot of reassurance. Two days ago, we felt like we had finally been able to sort things out and it was really relieving because I did not want to leave him. He promised me that he would tell his family and especially Agnes, that right now, it was not the perfect time to visit us so frequently and that

we needed our own space. And I would apologize to the rest of his family for my outburst the other day at my party. We have also promised each other that from now on, it's going to be us against the problem and not us versus each other since that's clearly not going to lead us anywhere and it's only going to hurt each other. We don't want that and we definitely don't want to hurt the kids, so we're going to try and be better partners so we can eventually be better parents. I'm going back home with him tomorrow and my parents are also pretty happy about the way we were able to deal with this. So I guess all's well that ends well.

Thank you so much for all the advice. I hope you enjoy this story. My new mother falsely accused me of taking her valuables, causing my father to transfer my educational savings to her. As a result, my entire household turned their backs on me. However, upon discovering the truth, they now seek reconciliation with me. Back. Five years ago, I, 23F, was accused of theft by my stepmom Chloe and because of that,

literally my entire family ostracized me. And they didn't just cut me off, my dad even took away my education fund to give it to that liar, so I had to start working instead. So the backstory is that Chloe already didn't like me, and then, a couple of days after she got married to my dad, she accused me of stealing her jewelry box and selling everything. She planted some evidence here and there as well, like a few of the missing items in my room at my dad's house, then a couple of receipts in my purse and stuff like that. It was very well thought out and executed and definitely not a spur of the moment decision.

And I know for a fact that she herself had sold her jewelry just to frame me, but nobody believed me. I tried to explain to my family that I hadn't done anything and that she was lying, but there was just no point. They cut me off, humiliated me completely, and pretty much just ruined my mental health with their accusations. They haven't spoken to me in the past five years, but all of a sudden, now that they know the truth, they want to mend their way and want me to give them a second chance. Even my biological mother who had literally raised me for the most part since after her divorce, my dad, who had become my primary custodial parent didn't believe me. She had also cut me off back then, and now she wants to talk to me, but I don't want to speak to them.

I don't want to interact with any of them right now, and I've been very clear about it. I feel like I'm finally doing well for myself, I have a stable career and I'm not depressed anymore like I was for the past couple of years. So the last thing that I want is my family back in my life. But my mom has told me that back then, because of all the evidence that was there against me, they had no option, but to believe Chloe. So I can't hold that against them and I need to forgive them so we can reconcile as a family. I don't feel the same way about the situation, though, so I'd offer not wanting to reconcile

with my family. Edit, hey, I'm sorry guys, but I really don't know how they figured out the truth all of a sudden. I haven't even asked him about it because I know that it's going to require me to actually talk to them so I can get to the bottom of this. and I don't think that I'm in the right space of mind for that right now, I just want to focus on my work and myself and that's it. I don't want to do anything to do with my family, at least not at the moment. Update 1, hi, so I reached back out to my mom, and I told her that my decision was final. I did not want to speak to her right now, nor did I want to speak to anybody else from the

family so all of them need to stop contacting me. So far, they had been texting and calling me, and just because I was a bit confused about whether I was doing the right thing or not, I hadn't blocked them. But now that I was sure that I didn't have to talk to them if I didn't want to, I just went ahead and blocked them. It really feels like a huge headache has gone away because lately, I've been feeling really guilty about not wanting to talk to them. I kept thinking about what my mom had said,

the fact that given the circumstances of my strained relationship with Chloe, combined with the so-called evidence that they had found, it felt like she must have been telling the truth. And I thought about things from the point of view and I don't know why, I started to think that maybe if I had been in their place, I wouldn't have believed myself either. But then, they knew me as a person, they had literally raised me and known me from when I was a child.

So as my family, they should have believed me, they should have known better. I was torn between these two perspectives, but at the end of the day, I'll do what I want to do. If I don't want to speak with them right now, I'm not obliged to do so, just because they feel bad about whatever happened in the past. They had five years to figure out stuff for themselves, but they didn't. They didn't even try and even now, they wouldn't have found out about the truth, had my father not stumbled upon it completely by accident.

So yes, I finally did end up asking my mom how they found out the truth before I blocked her because I was really curious. And she told me that a couple of days before the same. they all reached out to me, my dad had been using Chloe's laptop for some work since his own wasn't working and he had to give it up for repair. While working, he accidentally opened her email instead of his but before switching accounts. He noticed that she had a new email talking about some unsold jewelry curiosity got the better of him and he decided to check that email and unfortunately, for Chloe, it was an email from the guy that she had actually sold all her jewelry.

Apparently, there was this last item, a pair of gold earrings that he had purchased from her but since they were really pretty, he hadn't had the heart to have them melted and made into anything else because the craftsmanship on that pair was excellent. But now, five years had passed, and neither had he sold those earrings, nor had he done anything with it. He was retiring, so he was going to be closing shop, and he wanted to know if Chloe wanted to buy those earrings back. He had even attached a picture of those earrings, and my dad recognized them because, of course, she had made such a hue and cry about all the jewelry that apparently I had stolen and sold, that my family was bound to remember every single one of them. Then, it was not that difficult

for my dad to put two and two together, and then he confronted Chloe. She tried to deny everything at first, but then, she started crying about how I had always hated her, and she knew that if I had continued to be a part of their life, I would have definitely tried to ruin their marriage at some point. She told my dad that she recognized me for what I really was, I bought a vampire for my dad's money, and she didn't want me to ruin his life so she decided to drive me away. She tried to make it sound like it was something that she had done for my dad's own good, but now that the truth was out, there was no fooling him anymore. He kicked her out of the house because even if we humored whatever she had said in her defense, that she thought I was constantly trying to get my dad to spend money on me,

it still didn't make sense for her to accept my education fund. Also, it was a pretty stupid defense to try and make me look like a gold digger when I'm literally my dad's only daughter. And I didn't even ask him for more money than he already paid for in-child support. The only thing that I had ever really expected from my dad was for him to cover my college tuition because I planned on going to college out of state and I knew that it was going to be expensive. I didn't want to work alongside college because it would get too hectic and stressful and the degree that I was aiming for was quite hard anyway. I knew that my dad made enough money, so it would not be a big deal for him, and I didn't want to rely on my mom because at the time, she was planning

on starting her own business. I don't understand how any of this was going to make me look like a gold digger, especially when the person who was accusing me of being a gold digger was actually the biggest gold digger herself. Chloe literally quit her job a week after she got engaged to my dad. Then she framed me for stealing all her jewelry and selling it, even though I know for a fact that she herself had done it, and she already had the money from that, which must have been quite a lot because from what I know, it had all been her mom's jewelry and not only was it beautiful, it was all expensive-looking stuff as well. Then, after the whole fiasco with me, I know for a fact that she accepted my education fund money from my dad, which she decided to use

to apologize for my behavior. What she eventually ended up doing, with all that money, I don't know, but the fact of the matter is that if you're talking about who is a gold digger in the true sense of the world, I don't think I can beat Chloe. Anyway, her defense made no sense and my dad was able to see through it. So he kicked her out of the house, and from what I have been told by my mom, she is staying with her dad right now and begging my father to take her back every day, but he has already filed for a divorce. My problem is that they had five years to look into this, but they believed Chloe blindly. Even my own mom, who knew exactly what kind of problems I had with Chloe,

didn't take my side when it was time. She, of all people, should have known that I was not a thief. So all these apologies really don't mean anything to me anymore. The bottom line is that they gave away my college fund to a liar and even now, they wouldn't have found out about the truth if my dad hadn't accidentally opened her emails. They were so trusting of her that they didn't even think this was worth looking into or investigating at a deeper level, they just took her word for it and kicked me out of the family. After that, they never even bothered to check up on me. I had to look out for myself, and I was completely on my own. And let me just tell you, even though what 18 people do consider you an adult, I was inexperienced and young and broke. So I felt just as lost as I would

have if I had been any younger. It was one of the most difficult times for me, and I don't think I would have survived by myself had it not been for my friends. They couldn't afford to pay for me to go to college, even though I did get into my top choice because it would be very expensive and their parents were already funding their education. And I didn't want to rely on them like that or burden them by asking them to co-sign student loans for me either, especially when I was already sleeping on their couches. But, thankfully, one of my friends had already decided to take a gap year and work for his dad, so he got me in as well, and I started earning, and soon as enough, I had saved up enough money to rent an apartment and start living on my own.

Since then, I have continued to work really hard and diligently and I'm even in talks for yet another promotion in a couple of months. I accomplished all of this on my own without any help or moral support from my family, so I don't think that I owe it to them to talk to them just because they have finally realized that they were wrong. If they had just believed me back then, I wouldn't even have been in this position right now. I probably would have been doing way better, I would have been able to go to the college of my choice and work in companies of my choice. I'm not saying that I'm not grateful for what I have right now, but knowing that this is not my full potential, that just hurts. I don't think that I'll ever be able to bring myself to forgive them for

what they did, and I don't think that I have to forgive them either. Just because they are sorry now, doesn't mean that I'm obliged to let everything go all of a sudden. Now, if at any point of time, I do feel like I want to forgive them, then I might, if I don't. then I won't. And I refuse to feel bad for it either. My mom has no right to make me feel guilty for not wanting to reconcile with them, especially when she herself didn't feel guilty for cutting me off so abruptly. She knew that I didn't get along with Chloe. She knew that Chloe had every reason to frame me, but even then, she chose to believe that woman over me. I'm not even kidding, for years after getting kicked out, I kept trying to figure out why exactly these people

believed her over me, especially when I had never lied in my life. All my life, I had always tried to be a good kid and a good daughter to my parents and yet, that hadn't been enough. But it came down to it, they believed some random loser woman who just happened to be married to my dad over me. And yes, even if I think about the fact that there was some evidence against me that Chloe had very cleverly arranged, they still didn't have enough reason to believe her. After all, the proof that she had arranged it would have been very easy for her to frame me, especially when I was not even aware of what she was trying to do behind my back, and I was not on alert. If I'm going to be using language, all the evidence was circumstantial,

and if Chloe had actually been so short of the fact that I had stolen and sold everything, then she should have gone to the cops. I had suggested it a couple of times myself back when everything was happening, but it was my family who had stopped that from taking place, probably because they were too worried about the family reputation just in case I did turn out to be a thief. That's how low their confidence in me actually was, and the more that I think about this situation, the angrier I feel. So whatever, I don't think that they messed up, and now they're just going to have to live with it.

Update 2, hey, so I blocked my family a couple of days ago. For the record, they had already been blocked for a really long time. They had just managed to find out my new contact info from other people. I don't know who exactly gave it out, I'm guessing some cousins or maybe friends. But regardless of the situation, they decided to contact me again and this time, they wrote me an email, collectively, saying that they were all really sorry for their behavior for the past five years and that they should have believed me instead of kicking me out like that. They told me that they really wanted to meet me and set things right again.

And even if we don't end up reconciling immediately, they think it's worth it to at least give it a chance. I don't know what to say to them, so I just ignored that email. I have spoken to a couple of my close friends about this and they think that I don't have to speak to them if I don't want to, just like everyone else, especially given that it's taking me a really long time to get over whatever has happened. Like I had mentioned in my last update, I had been depressed for a very long time. And now, I'm finally doing better after a lot of therapy and working on myself.

I don't want to ruin all that hard work, so I really want to stay away from them. But at the same time, I really also want to give them a peace of my mind because it's been five years, and I feel tempted to let them know exactly how I feel about them. I can still deal with the fact that my dad and my paternal grandparents are delusional enough to believe that they still have a chance, but it's my mom that I'm really upset about. Even back when everything was going wrong, I had expected her to be in my corner, but she had also turned her back on me. So more than anybody else, I want to let her know that she really let me down. She should have stood up for me, I really want to tell her that, but then, that's going to mean that I have to talk to them.

In my past few interactions with them recently, I have been polite enough, but now, they're beginning to get on my nerves and I feel like if they continue bothering me like this, I'm going to snap eventually. And I really don't want to do that. It's taking me a really long time to get to where I am today, be it emotionally or financially, and I don't want them to ruin it for me. but I think that if they send another email after this, then I might definitely snap at them now. Also, now that that's out of the way, I feel like I really mentioned why I didn't get along with Chloe. A lot of people have been asking me how our relationship actually began, and how did it ever even come to a point like that? So I feel like I have to say that, even though our relationship had never been good in the first place, I never expected her to do something like that because that's

actually insane. Anyway, when my father started dating her, I already didn't like her much because I found her to be very pretentious and I don't know. Her vibes were just very weird. From the beginning, I just tried to avoid her and she would do the same for me, so it's not like we had much of a relationship in the beginning. But then, slowly, as her relationship with my dad got serious, she started trying to boss me around. She started trying to control me, and I wouldn't listen to her, because I really didn't feel like I had to, she would manipulate my dad into trying to get me to follow her ways. And they were little things, but it still felt pretty bad because she was trying to control the way that I dressed, the things that I ate, and even the

times when I went out. At one point, it got too much for me, so I told her that I knew what she was trying to do. I knew that she was trying to act like she was my mother, but at the end of the day, the fact remains that she's really not my mother. I actually have a mom, I don't need her to be a second one, so I would really appreciate it if she stopped interfering in my life. She could marry my dad if she wanted to, I didn't have a problem with that, but I don't have to tell the same way that I treat my mom and I really don't have to be obedient to her. I didn't fight with her or anything, just put her in her place, and since then, she started disliking me. She never told my father about it, but I guess she was just gearing up for this one big move

after her marriage, and she was successful in fooling my family. Now that I think back on it, I'm pretty sure that there was something very wrong with her because I can't imagine a grown woman having such full-blown beef with a teenager and then actually doing something so horrible to them just to get back at them for putting them in their place. Anyway, that's the kind of person that my family chose to believe over me. And it's not like I didn't bring this up with them in my defense. I did try to tell them that she had it in for me right from the first instance and that she was probably trying to frame me, but they didn't believe me. They thought that I was crazy and I was just trying to shift the blame onto her because I was too ashamed of myself. Actually, I'm too

ashamed of my family because I have to be associated with idiots. Now, I really hope that they don't contact me anymore and just take the hint. Update 3. So, unfortunately, my mom decided to to show up at my house today. She told me that one of my cousins told her the address, which I think is really out of line because she was a person I actually trusted in the past five years, and she knew that I didn't want my mom to show up. So this was a huge breach of my privacy, but I'll deal with that later. Right now, I feel like I just have to talk about what went down with my mom. When she showed up a couple of hours ago in the evening, I was very tired from a long day at work, so I told her to go away because I really didn't want to talk to her. But she stood

her ground, and she told me that she was not going anywhere until she spoke to me because five years had already passed since she had made that huge mistake, and she was not making another one by leaving right now because she had been trying to talk to me for a long time now, and it was about time that I heard her out. I didn't want to create drama, so I just let her in because I thought that I could get it over with. When she was inside, she hugged me, she started crying, and told me that she was really sorry about everything that she had done. She said that she had just been very taken aback by everything that Chloe had accused me of and because of all the evidence, she had actually started to believe that maybe Chloe was

telling us the truth. Then, she told me that I had been kicked out of the family. She had thought about getting in touch with me several times, but then, she thought that I needed to learn my lesson and start being disciplined. Only now, after she had found out the truth, did she realize that she had made a huge mistake and she just wanted to make up for it because I was her only daughter. She didn't think she could afford to lose me and she said that she knew that deep down, I felt the same way about her, that I didn't want to lose her either. So I told her that in the beginning, maybe I did feel the same way, that I didn't want to lose my mom, but in the past five years, I've learned to live without my family and now,

it really makes no difference to me anymore. Then, she started crying, telling me that she knew that I was, I was only saying this out of anger, and I had every right to be angry because, after all, she had really let me down, but then, she knew that it was not the truth. She continued to hug me and kept crying, but I told her that now that I had given her an opportunity to talk to me, I really needed her to leave because I wanted to relax after work. Then, she started getting upset. She told me that it had taken her a lot of convincing for my cousin to give out my contact info and my address, and she knew that I was upset with her,

but there was still no reason to be so rude to her. At that point, I finally just lost it, and I told her that she and her ex-husband had pretty much ruined my entire life. If she had just stood by my side and told my dad that I was telling the truth, then there might have been a proper investigation into the whole thing, and they would have found out that Chloe had been lying all along.

That way, I would have been able to go to college, and I would have been able to have the life that I wanted for myself without having to struggle so much. So just because of her decision, not to believe me, my entire life had been turned upside down. Whether she liked it or not, I did not want to talk to her anymore, at least not at the moment, and if I did want to reconcile with them at any point, I would come to them myself. But for now, she would just have to deal with the fact that I didn't want to see her and just get out of my house.

I was very upset so I yelled at her and she seemed shocked, but then, she recovered, and she told me that she could understand that I was very upset and she would come back later but I had really hurt her. I couldn't care less about that, though, I just told her that I wanted her to leave, and eventually, she did go away. To be very honest, at this point, their apologies don't really mean anything to me. Whatever damage had to be done, it's already been done, and then saying sorry is not going to take it back. I just want to move on with my life, I already have moved on with my life halfway. What I needed was some closure and I think that I've received that as well. So right now, I just really want to be done with this whole thing and I hope that she doesn't

come back anytime soon because I feel like I've already had a lot of stress and anxiety to deal with the past couple of days. I don't need any more of that anymore. Update 4, hi, so it's been three weeks since my last update and since then, my family hasn't gotten in touch with me except for sending me an email around last week. Yet again, it's It was a collective email from my parents and my paternal grandparents telling me that they were really sorry about everything that had happened and they would continue to be sorry for the rest of their lives if that's what it takes for me to forgive them. They had heard about my interaction with my mom and they know that I don't want to write now,

so they will stay away from me, but they really hope that at some point in time, I'll be able to forgive them and I will try to reconcile with them myself. They also told me that my father, even though he didn't show themselves, is more apologetic than anybody else because he thinks that all of this could have been avoided if he had just trusted me instead of his wife. He also apologized to me for screwing up my chances at college and told me that he was willing to write me a check so that at least now, I can go to college. But I don't feel like taking money from him right now, so I have decided to pass up on that, at least for now. In the future, I might forgive them, but I might not. I don't really know

because I haven't made up my mind since this is a very complicated situation. However, for now, I'm very content with my life as it is, so I don't want to bring about any new changes. I hope you enjoy this story. Guardians called off my betrothal celebration due to my sibling's separation, causing me distress. However, my relative supported me and presented me with a gift that brought joy to my entire family. Furious at me. Two weeks ago, my boyfriend of five years Caleb, 27M, proposed to me, 27F, and I said yes. When we told our families about it, they were obviously overjoyed, and my parents told me that they were going to throw an engagement party for us. But a few days ago, they just canceled the party without even consulting me first

because my sister, Penelope, 25F, was going through a breakup. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't have had any issues paying for my own engagement party and hosting it myself, but my parents had promised something to me and they ended up not delivering on those promises and that's why I was upset. If they had at least spoken to me before canceling everything, would have been more understanding, but what they did was just weird. They just called me up and informed me that Penelope and her boyfriend had broken up a day before my parents had decided that it would be best to avoid even talking about the wedding in front of her until she was in a relationship again because she was pretty much devastated. And so, hosting an engagement party for us was out of the question.

The party was supposed to be happening yesterday and the invitations had already gone out a week ago, but none of that ended up happening because my parents had already cancelled everything without even speaking to me and I was very upset with them. It might have been insensitive of me if Penelope had been with her boyfriend for a really long time, but they had only been dating for eight months and she was kind of serious about him, but I don't think it's my fault that he wasn't. And the crazy thing was that the reason they had broken up was because Penelope had asked married to her any time soon. After learning that I was engaged, that would have been a bit too much for any guy to handle

and I really can't even blame him for making a run for it because Penelope was taking things a little too fast for his taste and he had asked her to slow down several times but she just didn't seem ready to listen to him. So I can't say that the breakup was his fault. Penelope should have used her common sense as well and it seemed unfair for our parents to cancel my engagement party because of something stupid like this. I had told them that what they had done was not fair and I had even referred to their reasons as stupid and petty,

which made all of them pretty mad and we got into a fight and since then, we haven't been on speaking terms. I had provided a guest list to my parents for the invitations, but I ended up having to email them all myself and tell them that the party had been postponed indefinitely because I knew that I was definitely going to have that party. I just didn't know when since now I would have to plan it all over again by myself. However, there was one person that all of us missed since neither of my parents invited them

and nor did I and actually happen to be quite lucky for me because now, my family is regretting everything. The person that we missed was actually my aunt, my dad's older sister, since she pretty much lives off the grid. She has no social media and she only uses her email for official or formal work, never for personal use. So if somebody has to reach her, they have to call her like in old times, and even when we had to send her an invitation, we had to mail it to her physically and then call to confirm.

But after we got into a fight and stuff, both my parents and I forgot to disinvite her and she ended up showing up at my parents' house yesterday. And that was not good news for my parents because she's quite strict and most importantly, she has a huge inheritance that my dad had been hoping to get his hands on. My father, 51M, is the youngest of three siblings, my aunt being the oldest, 62F, and I had an uncle in the middle, but he passed away a couple of years back. My aunt used to dote on my father because he was the youngest and also because by the time he was born, my grandparents were in their late 30s and let's just say that my dad was not exactly an unexpected pregnancy, so his parents were not able to give him the kind of attention that he

required. That's where my aunt stepped in and she was the one person who had always been there for ever since he was little. After they grew up, she never got married or had a family of her own, but she had made a lot of money while she had been working, and even now, she was running her own business. So my dad had been hoping to inherit all of that when she passed away. It was something that my aunt had even discussed with my dad and he knew that if she had to name somebody as her heir, it would be him. But now, all of that's been thrown into jeopardy and that's because they decided to be honest with her about why the party had been canceled when she showed her. up at the house last evening. My parents had obviously expected everyone to believe that what

they had done was quite reasonable and understandable, but like most normal people, my aunt called them out and told them that she couldn't believe that they would treat me like this. Then, she decided to come over to my place and I obviously welcomed her with open arms because she and I get along really well, and even though we don't really get to speak often, we only talk whenever I call her up to check up on her. It's always great to talk to her. When she came over, I hadn't actually planned on telling her anything about the fallout that I had with my parents, but she was the one who brought it up and she told me that what had happened, I shouldn't invite them to any of my wedding events since they clearly don't respect me.

I was a little shocked by that because all my life, I had only seen her getting along great with my dad, but last night, she seemed very upset. Then I asked her what was going on since it felt like there was something much deeper than the issue at hand. So she told me that being the older sibling, she had had to sacrifice a lot and her parents had never appreciated it because they believed that as the older sibling, it was her duty to make sure that she put her brothers before herself. And that's what she had believed her entire life but now, she regrets not taking out enough time for herself because she realized that most of the time, it's only her trying to talk to my dad, but he never reaches out to her by himself unless he needs her help for something.

She has tried to comfort herself by telling herself that he has a family to care for, so he can't obviously take out as much time for her as she can take out for him, but even then, it still feels bad. And I totally understand where she's coming from because I think that my dad doesn't speak to her or visit her as often as he should. Also, both my sister and I are grown-ups now and I don't think he can use his family as an excuse because we are doing pretty well on our own.

My aunt also told me that when she was younger, and when her parents were still around, even they had a favorite golden child and it was not her or my dad, it was the middle child. Her younger brother was their favorite because he was a boy and it could have just as easily been my father too, but he was too young at the time. All her life, she has felt like she's been dealt the short end of the straw by both her parents and her siblings and now, she felt like it was her duty to tell me that I shouldn't make the same mistakes and I shouldn't take the same kind of disrespect like she did. Because once I start forgiving people just because

their family, they start to take advantage of it, and eventually, it reaches a point where you can't go back from. And while she was talking about all of this, I really felt it because that's what I had been about to do as well. But after that conversation with her, I decided to take her advice. All cards on the table, I'd actually thought that by the time that my wedding actually came around, I would have been able to make it right with my family again. I didn't know how, I guess I'd just assumed that they would apologize to me and if they didn't, I would just let it go because I really wanted them to be present at my wedding. But after speaking to my aunt, that I wasn't fine with what they had done and I needed them to acknowledge and apologize for it.

Until that happened, I wasn't interested in having them be a part of my life. And I definitely did not want to end up as a doormat for my family, and invite them to my wedding, regardless of how they had behaved with me. So after my aunt's visit last night, I decided to send a message to my parents in Penelope and tell them that until they acknowledged and apologized for their behavior, I was not interested in having them be a part of my wedding in any capacity and I would appreciate it if they stayed away. This morning, after I sent that message, I told my aunt that I had set a boundary and she told me that she really was proud of me and hoped that I would be able to fix the situation

with my family eventually. But until then, I need to stand my ground and not let them walk all over me. She had spent the night here, since she lives quite far away, and I didn't want her driving back home last evening. So this morning, when we spoke, it was in person and after that, she had spent. She left and she also told me how disappointed she was that after she had scolded her brother last night. He didn't even bother to call her to make amends with her and I could really understand that both

of us were very upset with our families. And then, a few hours back, my dad showed up at my door to ask me if my aunt was still here or not and I had to tell him that she had already left in the morning and she had been very disappointed that he hadn't even bothered to call to talk to her and try to mend things after fighting with her last night. All of a sudden, when I said that, he flared up. and he started screaming at me from outside the door and told me that this was all my fault and that he was sure that I was the one who had instigated my aunt against him because just now,

she had called him and told him that given his recent behavior. She had changed her mind about including him in her will and had decided that she was going to leave everything to me instead. It was a huge deal because, as I said, the inheritance that she was going to be leaving is pretty massive and my dad had always expected that it would come to him, but now, he was being disappointed because of his own behavior with her. I lost my phone at him as well, and I told him that he had no right to yell at me, especially when it was his own behavior with her that had led to this situation. If he had just had the decency to at least try and speak to his sister after she left his

house last night, then maybe this wouldn't have happened at all. I didn't even tell him that he had to apologize to me, all he had to do was talk to my aunt. But he couldn't even be bothered to do that much. Even today, the only reason he had come all the way to my house was because my aunt had sent him a message saying that she would disown him and not because he actually cared about her as a person. I told him that he deserved this and for the past many years, everyone had noticed that it was always she who had tried to keep in touch with him, and he had barely cared about her so now he has no right to complain. And he also didn't have any right to try and make me the bad guy here,

especially after what my parents had done with the whole cancellation of the engagement party and stuff. I told him that I didn't have to say anything to my aunt to turn her against them. She was already pretty upset with them when she came by and in fact, it was she who told me not to have any ties with them until they apologized. So, I didn't really have to try and badmouth them to make them look like the bad guys to my aunt. They had done that job well enough themselves. My father seemed quite surprised when I told him about all of this, and his initial instinct was obviously to accuse me of lying because it was just impossible for him to believe that

his dear sister would ever say anything against him, but he had screwed things. up for himself, but his behavior, so I had nothing else to say to him. I told him to leave, but instead of just going away, he started crying on my doorstep and told me that I had turned the only family he had against him. He seemed genuinely upset, and he told me that what he had done with regards to cancelling the party and stuff was not even as bad as what I had done and told me that if my aunt seemed upset with him, the least I could have done was tried to contact him and told him to come over so we could all sort things out as a family. I had never heard my father crying the way that he was this morning and I haven't been able to get it out of my head,

even though he left after a couple of minutes. And now I feel guilty because I feel like a lot of problems would have just been solved if I contacted him last evening, and we all sat together as a family and tried to clear the air, but instead, I just vented to my aunt I cheated the same. I guess that made us more bitter or something but again, I don't really see anything wrong with what I did, but I still feel guilty. My fiancé doesn't think that we did anything wrong, but I still want to be. want to get a second opinion. So I'd offer not calling my father over so he could sort things out

with my aunt and I? Edit, so my parents haven't always had a favorite and honestly, they were very different up until a few years back. The reason that I had even bothered to have a relationship with my parents for so long is because growing up, they were very different, and right now, they're very different. Growing up, my sister and I were always treated equally and Penelope did not get preferential treatment just because she was younger. It's only recently that things have started changing and I was scared of giving up on my parents so quickly because after all, family is all that you have and I was under the impression that is just a phase and they are going to go back to treating us normally again. Now, obviously, that seems a bit unlikely. But yes, my relationship with my parents earlier had been

pretty normal and that's why I'd even agreed to let them host an engagement party for me. As for why they have started treating us differently now, for the The past couple of years, I don't really know. If I had to pinpoint it, I guess it started around the time that Penelope graduated from college. But because COVID hit, she was unable to get a job and she was pretty depressed for a whole year and there were days when she wasn't even able to get out of bed. At the time, she had been living with our parents, and I had been staying with my boyfriend. And because of the quarantine and everything, we couldn't even see each other that often and

had to stick to video calls. But I guess that made my parents a little softer towards Penelope because she's obviously a lot more fragile than I am but I think they forgot that they have two daughters and both of us need them equally to be there for us. It's not just her that has to be taken care of. It's a bit disappointing, but it's not like I can help the situation. And even my relationship with Penelope has been affected because of this because I guess she has started to think of herself as more important than me, just because our parents treat her like

that. Earlier, we used to have a normal sibling relationship, and yes, we did have a certain degree of sibling rivalry, but it was nothing out of hand. Recently, though, she has started becoming a lot more of a brat and it's just upsetting. I had managed to ignore this change for the past couple of years but now, I don't think I can do that. Update 1, so thank you so much for reaching out to me with all the comments and advice, I have decided that I don't have to get in touch with my dad or apologize to him or whatever. I don't know why he thought that I owed it to him to contact him and try to say things right with him when my aunt came over to speak to me because he had the opportunity to do it himself because before she came over to my place,

she had been there with them. And he could have just acknowledged the fact that he had made a mistake and apologized to me and cleared with her, but he chose not to do that and stuck to his decision of acting as if whatever he had done was perfectly justified. So for him to try and blame me for the situation right now is just ridiculous. And it's been a couple of days now, but earlier, it had only been my father who had shown up at my door and had been blaming me for whatever had happened. But now, both my parents and Penelope are accusing me of sabotaging his relationship with his sister on purpose and brainwashing her against him. Luckily, they haven't shown up at my doorstep yet, but I don't think there's anything

stopping them for long. It's also very upsetting because my dad knows the truth and my dad knows that I didn't say anything to turn my aunt against them. She was already quite miffed with them when she came over. She herself had said to him on the phone call that it was his behavior that had upset her, and I didn't have anything to do with it. But still, they're trying to make this all about me and make me look like the bad guy who is out for revenge. It's just petty and I know that they are doing this to get on my nerves and they are succeeding. I have even blocked them, but even then, they have found ways to annoy me by using burner phones and social media accounts. At this point, I don't even know what they want from me because I don't

think an apology is what they need. I have spoken to Caleb about it, and he thinks that my parents want me to speak to my aunt and try and make things right with them and until that happens, they're just going to try and keep getting on my nerves. And I think he's right, but there is no way that I'm going to contact my aunt and tell her to speak to these people because I don't want to do it myself so why would I want her in that position? I guess I'm just going to have to tough it out and deal with it until they give up. And I'm fine with it, as long as they stay away from me and don't show up in person now. Update 2. So since harassing me on social media wasn't going to cut it, my family decided that they were going to go public with their hate against me

and started recruiting people. Apparently, from what I have learned from a couple of relatives, they have been sending messages to and telling them that I invite them to any event in the future, they must hateful and petty person and I have brainwashed my aunt against them by feeding her a bunch of lies. They have been telling people that my parents had kindly and politely requested me to postpone the engagement party because my sister had just been through a terrible breakup, but instead of respecting their wishes, I decided to go through with the party anyway, but since my parents did not want that. They had decided to tell me that if I wanted to have the party, then I would have to fund it myself. And apparently, I threw a hissy fit over that and then I called my aunt to come over and

then I started brainwashing her against my dad and now, not even my aunt is willing to speak to him anymore. Obviously that paints me in a very bad light, especially given the fact that they were making it seem like I had asked them to pay for my engagement party in the first place, but I hadn't, they are the ones who had offered it. So I spent the last couple of days clarifying and telling everyone the truth. every time somebody was reaching out to me to confirm the story. It got tiring after a while, so I decided to put out a statement on my social media account as well

because I didn't want to have to constantly clear the air with other people. And so far, I had been trying to avoid contacting my aunt and telling her about any of this because she doesn't really have any social media and I know that she likes staying away from all of this. But I felt like things were getting to a point where it was becoming too much for me to handle. So I had to reach out to her and I had to tell her what was going on. So she could take a stand for me as well and tell people that I hadn't done any brainwashing. It was her own decision to cut my dad out of her life because he was the one who did not respect her. After speaking to my aunt and letting her know what was going on, she told me that she was going

to speak to my father and tell him that what he was doing was just going to make her push him even farther away. She also told me not to worry, and that she would make a profile on Facebook specifically for this purpose if that's what it took. But she was going to make sure that everyone in the family knew that it was not me who had created the situation, but it had been my father. That made me feel loads better and she stayed true to her word and created an account on Facebook specifically so she could upload a video talking about what had happened and everyone in the family saw that. After watching that, people started reaching out to me and telling me that they were definitely on my side here and were going to cut my father out of their lives because whatever was going on

with him was not nice or acceptable. Having issues with me was one thing but publicizing them and trying to make it seem like I was the bad guy here was another and nobody in the family was going to stand for it and I'm pretty happy that I have a family like this, who have a spine and are ready to take stand for me when it is necessary. My dad had always been well-liked by everyone, so I had actually initially been very skeptical if people would even be willing to believe my side of the story. But I'm glad that people are willing to stand by what's right. My family has had nothing to say about any of this and a couple of hours ago. I started hearing from people that all of them had deactivated their accounts,

probably because they thought that being active on any social media would make them answerable to their family. I don't care about any of it. I'm just happy that my side of the story is out and nobody can accuse me of being the villain anymore. And even if people want to do so even now, it's their problem and not mine. I have said whatever I had to say and now, I'm not willing to say. to deal with this anymore because I have a wedding to plan and I'm not going to waste my energy on petty stuff like this. Caleb and I have had a discussion about this and in a couple of days, we are going to take down

all the posts that we had put up in relation to this because now that everything's out important to us anymore. My aunt has also told me that she's going to delete the account that she has created in a couple of days because this really isn't that important and all of us want the negativity out of our lives now. She told me that after this, even if my family tried to get back in touch with me, whether to fight or to apologize, I should just let it go and not speak to them, and it would be for the best. And I couldn't agree more. Update 3, hi, guys. So I'm getting married in a couple of weeks and I recently sent out the invitations to my wedding. Obviously, my parents and my sister did not receive one because after we had our falling out, they never bothered to

reach out to me to try and make things right, and honestly, even if they had tried. I don't think I would have been open to it because they had tried to spread some nasty rumors about me in the family to make me look like the bad guy and all that drama had happened. After that, pretty much everyone in the family had stopped speaking to my parents and Penelope and they reactivated their accounts a couple of days after everything had died down and even tried to start the hate campaign against me, but nobody was falling for it anymore. Since that, things have mostly stayed quiet and I'm very glad about it because I've been very busy planning my wedding. To be honest, I hadn't even been thinking about my family for the past couple of months, and it only occurred to me that I haven't

spoken to them for so long because the invitations were sent out recently, and I realized that I hadn't sent any to my parents or Penelope and it felt weird but there's nothing that I can do. Over the past couple of months, my aunt and I have become a lot closer and I decided to speak to her about how I was feeling and she told me that it was perfectly normal for me to feel like I was missing out on something because I actually was. I was going to miss out on the experience of having my family beside me while I was getting married and it was perfectly fine for me to feel bad about it. But the only thing that I needed to remember was that my family had not exactly treated me well and that's why they were not going to be there at the wedding and it was quite effective for me

to think of that way. So I wouldn't say that I don't care that my family is not going to be there on my wedding day. I do care but it's not like I can help this situation so the only thing that I can do is just deal with it. And regardless of that, I'm still going to have a lot of people by my side, who actually care about me, like Caleb and my aunt and other family members. So I know that no matter what, it's going to be a success. I hope you enjoy this story. Allow my spouse to maintain a friendship with her former partner for an extended period despite my intuition. However, upon witnessing them engaging in intimate behavior, I have decided to ask her to leave our residence. Business. Hi everyone. So we have been living together for almost 10 years,

married for three. She, my wife who I'll call her Hannah, dated a guy who I'll call him Patrick, ages 18 to 20, and then on and off for another year. We started dating when she was still seeing him-ish, but I was aware of him. And then I sort of gave her an ultimatum saying that I wanted to make things serious and she cut him off. He ended up moving up north for work and it stayed there for a number of years. We are 32. He's 41. This is going to be a long one.

We are inseparable, both in our personal and professional lives running a thriving small business together. Our friends often tease us about how perfect we are together and how we hardly fight, despite this one issue. We have an incredibly happy and successful relationship in business. We work well together. We see eye to eye. For the last ten years, we've spent nearly every day together. Every now and then, she would run into Patrick, whether it was on special occasions like birthdays and holidays, or just by chance every few months. She stayed friends with him and I was aware of this. I never felt threatened by him. She was very much done with him. Or so she claimed to me. They would usually meet up for dinner or coffee for an hour or two to catch up.

Oddly enough, I never saw him during these encounters. He made sure to keep his time with my wife private, concealing it from his own family. However, there have been times in all these years where we'd meet for a double date or my wife and I would meet him for dinner, lunch, or breakfast together. He acted buddy with me. He asked me questions about business. We had some of the same hobbies in common. Honestly, it just felt like we had to be friendly to each other for the sake of Hannah. It has always puzzled me why my wife continued to keep in touch with him, even after he

repeatedly cheated on her while they were dating. From what she told me, he was a posse to her. He'd actually back out of plans we'd all make together, he'd say he was coming over for a barbecue at our place but would cancel last minute. This happened quite a few times. She showed incredible dedication and care when she helped him recover from a serious motorcycle accident, feeding him in bed for months, taking care of him, bathing him, watching over his house. I didn't think much of it at first, and I trusted my wife's judgment, even though I strongly

disagreed with her decision to stay connected with someone who had hurt her multiple times. She'd always be quick to say about any friends who did the same to me. She'd want me to cut them off, but then I'd simply remind her of how she treated Patrick and then she'd kind of shut up. I should say that this Patrick fellow also comes across as a fuckboy. He's always coming up with these dirty stories that seem inappropriate to say, especially to someone's wife, but Hannah always laughs and says that's just Patrick. Ike. I'm not about it. One day I noticed her phone light up on the coffee table and saw that he had sent her.

a super sexual joke, like something that sort of crossed the line. It was something along the lines of basically asking her to be a third for him and his G.F. at the time, and I say G.F., but it was just a woman he'd hook up with every now and again. I was immediately taken aback and brought it up to her, explaining how inappropriate it was. She assured me she would talk to him and that it would never happen again. She tried to tell me again that it was just him and he was harmless and didn't mean anything by it. I chalked it up to him being a sleaze bag. However, a few months later,

I caught him doing the same thing again and I was beyond freaked out. I couldn't shake off the feeling that something was just not right. So when she fell asleep, I went through her texts, as uncomfortable and disgusting as it was, I needed to know.

What I found were more sexual jokes and even some texts criticizing me. In a fit of rage, I immediately woke her up, was scrolling through the messages with her, and basically forbid her from seeing him ever again if this behavior continued. I said it's totally inappropriate for him to messaging her this no matter how close of friends they were. I said no other male friends sent her things like this and he's totally disrespecting me

and our relationship. She stopped seeing him and messaging for several months after that incident. After a year or so, she manages to convince me to be okay with a once again. Maybe it was because he needed some real estate advice and we happened to work in the field or maybe I was just worn down after a year. Either way, I agreed to meet him for coffee with Hannah. It seemed fine and normal for some time, but I couldn't shake off the unease and continued reading their texts, which disgusted me. Eventually, I found more inappropriate jokes from him. I reached my breaking point and firmly declared that this would be the last time this happens,

or I'd be leaving. I said if this happens again, she's clearly disrespecting me. She tried to say that he's always been like this and it's pretty harmless, it's just his sense of humor. I say no, I'm not having it. I'm serious, Hannah. I'm not going to let another man talk to my wife like that. From then on, she promised not to engage in conversations like that with him and would only communicate about work-related matters. Now a year later, somehow once again, dumb at SS me, I come around to allowing them to hang out, but I am not happy about it and I told hold back from telling her so,

and it becomes our sole problem in our relationship, it becomes all we fight about. Ifengi hate him, but I love her so much, so I let her. And it's only every couple months or so, so whatever. Anyway, fast forward to the last couple months. I notice they are talking way more often. She's going into a different room if he calls, her voice totally changes, lots of phone calls, and texts. She's laughing after reading whatever it is he sends.

Yeah. We have access to each other's locations because we are married and I came home late from work a few times and took my time coming back from a men's hockey league on more than one occasion and she had a fit. So she insisted on sharing our locations together. Sure. I'm not guilty of anything other than being a little late. Well, Patrick ends up finding a job in the city near us and moves back. I never thought to check in on her. But now I can't help myself.

Every time she goes out, I'm checking her location. She's not home one day. She seemed a bit skittish telling me that she was going to a friend's place to help her organize her closet. I'm like, hmm, okay. She's never been one to organize anything in her life. I didn't believe a word she said, but I hoped I was wrong in assuming she was with Patrick. I look. I see that she was at an unfamiliar address.

Curious, I give her a call and ask what she's up to. Her voice sounds strange, and she tells me she's at a friend's house. I'm like what friend she says Danica's. I'm like Danica. Doesn't she live on the south side? And she's like, yeah, why? And I'm like, I know where Danica lives and it's not the location that you're currently at. Say hello to Patrick for me.

She tries to say something, but I cut her off and hang up the phone. She tries to call me, but I don't answer. She hurries home, terrified that she has been caught spending time with him and telling a lie. The thought of getting caught makes her so anxious that she starts throwing up. We get in this huge fight and I tell her that I'm leaving, I've packed a bag. She's on the ground dry heaving and hyperventilating. We're supposed to meet with one of these big clients for work the next day, but I tell her to not bother coming into work or I'll have her arrested for trespassing.

She's literally sobbing at my feet as I'm leaving the house. The next day, she doesn't show up to work. My mind is racing. I'm trying to deal with one of our biggest clients yet, but my mind isn't all there. It's torture. She texts me and it's full of apologizes for lying about where she was and for the fight that night, but insists that nothing happened with Patrick. She said she only lied because she didn't want me to get mad because she knew I wouldn't be happy with her going to his house by herself. She said he needed a hand unpacking the last of his stuff.

I try to keep my cool and focus on the task at hand, but my thoughts are consumed by the truth behind. her words and my own insecurities. Despite his sporadic presence in her life over the years, I can't stop my mind from wandering to thoughts of him and comparing myself to him. He's incredibly wealthy, and I'm certainly not despite our prosperous business. And yeah, Patrick is a pretty good-looking guy. He knows how to dress himself. He takes care of himself. He likes the finer things in life. These thoughts haunt me, even when we're together intimately. I try to brush them off, but they persist. I don't trust my wife with him.

And that's what it boils down to. I stayed that night at work. I text her and tell her not to come in again tomorrow. I decide that I'll go home the next day at lunch to talk to her. Like a psycho, for the last few days, I've gone in and checked her location, but she's been at home the whole time. I'm thinking, K, maybe this is all in my head. I'm thinking maybe I'm the bad guy for treating her like this. Maybe I'm overreacting.

The next day, I check her location before I leave work and she's at home. I decide not to let her know I'm on my way, and instead I was going to surprise her. Well, I get there. Her car is in the driveway. Her phone is on the counter, but she's nowhere to be seen. I'm thinking maybe she went for a walk so I wait. Nothing. Her purse is gone.

Her running shoes are in the closet. But her keys to lock up are gone. Someone must have come to pick her up. She left her phone at home so Elle wouldn't know her location. So I had a hunch. I remember the address of his house and I think before I head back to work, I'm going to drive by just to see what I find. I park down the street from the house and decide I'm going to walk up to it. If I anything, I'll walk up to the door and pop in just to say hi.

I get up to the house and there's a big bay window. And as my eyes adjust, I can see into the window just enough to see Hannah and Patrick sitting on the couch. She's on his lap kissing him and her arms are wrapped around him. I pause for a few seconds in shock. Then I pull out my phone and start taking it. photos and videos. I walk right up to the window and they're too enthralled with each other to notice I'm there. Then I bang on the glass and suddenly they jump up and see me. I'm like smile for the camera. I make it back to work and think of all the times they must have been together.

Out of the dozens and dozens of times I have let them get together. It can't just be the one time, right? My trust in her is completely shattered. I can't believe that. I can't believe that. I'm those were the only two times they met up. Despite all the suggestive and sexual texts between them, she expects me to believe that they only made out for a short time. We are adults, for God's sake. Who just makes out these days? And even if that was the truth, it doesn't change the fact that I have expressed my discomfort with their relationship for years. She always brushed it off and tried to convince me it was nothing, even though she knew it bothered me deeply. Even her own friends and family have scolded her for seeing him after how he hurt her before.

How could she do this to our relationship? Was anything ever real? And I'm partially to blame. I should have stopped things from the start. I should have walked away earlier. But I wanted to trust her. I wanted to believe so badly that he was nothing but a friend who didn't know how to stay within the boundaries. He was clearly never threatened by me.

He knew exactly what he was doing. Do you think she never moved on from him? Maybe she convinced herself that their relationship was just a friendship, and now she'll do anything to get his attention. Has anyone else experienced this? What should I do? I hate that I have to share this. I don't want our mutual friends to find out. Update 1. All right.

It's been three months and I've talked to a divorce attorney about separation and divorce. And that's been messy because we own a business together. I was a nervous wreck for a few weeks after sending her the formal notification. She tried to deny everything and even tried to countersue me for defamation and emotional distress. But I had all the evidence, and she knew it. I had to include any in all relevant communications, such as texts, photos, videos, that confirmed her actions. So that was also fun. The funny thing about that is she was in breach of a partnership agreement that we signed when

we started the business. I was able to formally notify Hannah in writing that she was in breach of the partnership agreement due to her infidelity. This notification clearly outlined the specific provision of the agreement that she had violated and the consequences of her breach. Thus, she's about to no longer be a co-owner or a business partner. Sucks to suck. Guess she should have thought of this when she was suck.

face with Patrick. All of this means that she's going to be transferring her ownership shares to me. At the same time, the house was under my name and my father had co-signed for us at the time. So she's been out of the house. She went to stay with her cousin and then eventually moved in with Patrick. My heartbreaking conversations with some of our mutual friends confirmed what I'd feared. She never moved on from Patrick. She would talk about him constantly with him. some of our mutual friends and they always thought it was suspicious. One of our friends, Linz, even said that she told Hannah that if she mentions him one more time to her, that she'd tell me everything she said.

Linz apologized for not telling me sooner. I've sought therapy to help me cope with the emotional turmoil and I've learned to forgive myself for the mistakes I made in our relationship. I've sought solace in new friends and hobbies and I'm slowly gaining back my sense of self. I know it's hard to believe, but it's a relief in a way, right. I've been carrying this weight of doubt and mistrust. And now, I finally have the proof confirming what I feared all along. Some of our friends didn't see it coming.

They thought all was sunny in Coolsville. Signing off. Update 2. It's been 10 months now since I filed for divorce. The business is officially mine. What a relief. Lins told me that Hannah called her up recently to stay with her as she uncovered that Patrick was seeing someone behind her back, so she moved out and she's back at her cousins.

Ironic, isn't it? She still doesn't have a job. She's been trying to start up her own thing though she faces the challenge of building it from the ground up since I retained all the clientele. Consequently, she was unable to transfer any existing business. I believe I contributed the majority of the business acumen to our endeavors. As I continue to rebuild my life, I find myself wondering what it was about me that made me so blind to the truth. It's unsettling to think that I could have been so wrong about someone I loved. Our mutual friends have been incredibly supportive throughout this entire ordeal, even though some of them were taken aback by the revelation. They've offered to help with the business or to just be there for me as I navigate this new chapter in my

life. I appreciate them more than words can express. I decided to take my friends' advice and dip my toes back into the dating world. It was nerve-wracking at first, but meeting new people helped me realize that there was more to life than dwelling on the past. I went on a few dates, some good and some not so good, but each one taught me something about myself and what I was looking for in a partner. She's pretty great so far, but we're just having fun and getting to know each other. Life is moving forward. I've learned my lesson about trust and communication, and I'm no longer willing to compromise on those things in a relationship. I'm grateful for the lessons I've learned and the relationships I've built throughout this journey.

It's been a difficult road, but I've come out stronger and wiser. I'm excited to see what the future holds and to continue moving forward in life. Now on to the next story. Story 2. Discovered my wife of 11 years has been cheating on me with my best man for months. Now her dad has cut her off completely and she's lost our house, car and everything. My wife, 35 female, and I, 38 male, were married for 11 years. Her father and I worked together for even longer than that, which is how my wife and I met.

I went to his house for a work party, and his daughter was there, like a prize to be won. When I started talking to her, we hit it off before I knew she was my boss's daughter. I stayed late into the night talking with her, until I knew I had to ask her on a date before leaving that night. She accepted. We dated properly, without consummating our relationship until we were both clearly serious about each other. Neither of us were talking to other people, neither of us were talking to other people, neither of us had those toxic social media accounts, and our families knew we belonged together. It was a beautiful relationship, and I felt like I was living life to the fullest with my loyal, honorable woman. Our wedding was a huge, wonderful event, and I wasn't nervous at all.

I knew how serious she was about me, and I really felt like we were meant to last forever. Fast forward ten years. Her father was forced to sell his business. He made a conceit. He made a considerable amount of money from the sale, and since I was laid off, he gave me a large sum of money. It was enough for my wife and I to live off of for years, so I took my time looking for another job. I actually contemplated retirement or starting my own business from home. After spending all my days at home, I could tell my wife started to get distant and anxious. She wanted to know when I planned on getting out of the house. I asked if there was something she wanted us to do, and she said no. It didn't seem like she wanted to go on a trip with me or get out of the house together.

It just seemed like she wanted me to leave for a while. I didn't really get it, because we loved each other's company, and the house was big enough that for some of the day, we didn't see each other. We each had some alone time, but I also made sure I paid her adequate attention and spoke her love language. One day, I was reading in the living room when I got a naughty image of my wife airdrop to me from her phone. It made my heart race, but not in a good way. Every bit of this felt wrong, like this picture wasn't intended for me. When she entered the room, I just looked at her and showed her the picture on my phone, waiting to gauge her response. She just smiled and played it off like it was intended to be a pleasant surprise for me. I suggested that next time she

come stand in front of me and start stripping. She just smirked and left the room. I made it my personal mission to check her phone at the next opportunity. So while she was cooking and had her back turned, I grabbed it. I found the same picture I saw, except this one was sent to none other than my former best man. The closest friend I had in this world, the man I asked to be in our wedding. I took screenshots of their flirty conversation, which included comments about how how I wouldn't leave the house, and they were both desperate to hook up.

Again. My whole world came crumbling down within an hour. I threw her phone at a head-level cabinet beside her, smashing it to bits. She screamed, so I rage screamed. Her eyes were as big as an owl, and she was as still as one too. I told her she cheated on me, and she was speechless. She didn't want to admit it, but she knew she couldn't deny it either. With her standing there, I sent the screenshots to her father and said I wondered how she was going to get through life without me or her daddy to save her.

Her face started to crumble until she was a sobbing heap on the floor. I turned off the stove and told her to start packing her stuff because I was filing for divorce. She turned so white, her skin looked slightly green. She begged me for forgiveness with all the strength she had left. She grabbed my pants and I pulled away. I told her I didn't deserve this heartbreak and disrespect, and that I wouldn't find it in my next wife, no matter how long she committed to me. Marriage is supposed to be beautiful and blissful, not what she turned ours into. She wailed breathless sobs, as I pulled her out onto the porch, surrounded by piles of her belongings.

She asked me who was coming to get her, and I said I didn't know, that was up to her to figure out. My former best man was married, so it was just two hours later that his wife discovered the truth. He was kicked out, and so my wife actually tried to ask him to come get her from my porch, and he cussed her out before blocking her. It was so dramatic and heartbreaking to experience this, I felt like my life became a horrible reality show that I did not relate to. I suddenly despised the woman I loved for so long. She tried calling her father.

As soon as he answered she sounded like a whiny little girl when she called him Daddy and tried to paint me as the monster to blame. He scolded her so loudly that I could hear it from the doorway. She tried to interject, but he wouldn't have it. He told her she did not behave like the lady he and her mother raised her to be, and he couldn't fathom how she had the gall and heartlessness to cheat on me, who he called an honorable. respectable man that didn't deserve this devastation and betrayal. He ended the phone call after telling her he would not be coming to save her from facing the consequences of her actions. It was a friend that my wife barely considered a friend that came to her rescue and said she could stay in her spare bedroom.

Dotem Y wife had always bragged to this woman about how lucky she was to have me in the house we lived in. Her dad was the one paying for her car, so she only kept that until he told her to take over the payments. She couldn't afford them, so he took the car back. My ex had it all until her actions reduced her to nothing. I can only wish her luck recovering from such a stupid and unnecessary decision that changed our lives forever. I hope you enjoy this story. Father departed during my adolescence and ceased communication. Discovered later on that he was utilizing an alias to communicate with my step-siblings on a matchmaking application.

I, 29F, have been living with my step-sister, 36F, for the past nine weeks because her house is much closer to my new workplace and the commute is much easier. I was going to look for an apartment there, but my step-sister herself suggested that I move in with her because she could do with some company. My step-sister is a really sweet person and recently got divorced from her husband of four years after she found out that he'd been cheating on her. The divorce came through about a year ago and since then, she's been living by herself so she invited me to move in. My mother, 47F, got married to my stepfather, 60M, about six years ago, after two years of dating, and that's how my step-sister and I became friends. We've always been close, even while our parents were dating. We'd even made a pact that even if they didn't end up together, we'd still keep in touch because we'd really taken a liking to each other. I'm referring to her as my step-sister for the sake of the post, but honestly, we've always felt

connected to one another like we were real sisters all along. It sounds dramatic, but it's true and we've even had discussions about it in the past, so I know that even she felt the same way about me and considered me her little sister. So moving in with her seemed like a good idea to both of us and it was quite fun while it lasted. I'd also noticed that for the last three weeks or so, my step-sister had been using her phone a lot and refused to go anywhere without it which was weird because she hadn't been this obsessed before. I'd also occasionally find her smiling or even giggling at her phone while she texted away

so I knew that she must have been talking to someone. I wanted to ask her about it, but I found myself to be a little too busy initially since I just started working at my new office and they'd already given me a pretty big client to handle so with work, I didn't have the time to sit and gossip with my step-sister. It'd be straight to work, then back home after which I'd just have dinner and then crash. But two weeks ago, I had a really bad cold and decided to take a day off to recover at home. Coincidentally, my step-sister had also been feeling a little under the weather that day and decided to come back home early.

We ordered soup and decided to watch some movies and while we were on the couch, her phone vibrated again and she picked it up to start chatting again. I took that opportunity to finally ask her about her special guy and she seemed surprised that I knew it was a guy without her even telling me about it but of course, she'd been smiling and giggling like crazy so it just had to be someone she was interested in. After a few minutes of teasing and her hesitating, she finally confessed that she downloaded a dating app a couple of months ago. She hadn't had much luck on the app for the first few weeks, but then, she matched with this older man who was just the perfect guy for her. She gushed about this mystery man of hers for a while and then told me that she'd been dying

to tell me but didn't because she was skeptical of what I'd think of her if she told me that she was on a dating app even less than a year after her divorce. In fact, not just me, but she hadn't told anyone at all because she was afraid people wouldn't like it. So I instantly switched to my supportive mode and tried to make her feel less embarrassed of her decision. because, after all, she deserved to be happy. Her ex-husband had remarried already so it didn't feel fair that she still had to be embarrassed about trying to move on. I told her that all she should have cared about was her own happiness and peace of mind

and to screw what everyone else thought and that seemed to help. It was all going so well until she showed me the picture of the guy she'd been talking to. The picture of the guy she showed me was a spitting image of my estranged father who'd cut us all off and left to live in Europe about a decade ago. It was the same face and same eyes, just a little older now than he was back then, but I could still recognize his features. He'd listed his age as 45 on the app, but I knew that he must be around 50 and I could just feel it in my heart that this must be him. There was no way my step-sister could have known that she'd matched with my father because we never had any photos of him at our house, thanks to my

mother's orders. She loathed his very existence and had collected all the photos that he was in, put them in a box, and either threw them out or kept them somewhere I'd never be able to find them. Neither of my parents was very keen on social media either, so there were hardly any pictures of my dad online anyway. After he left, he became completely untraceable online and I never posted any pictures with my dad on social media because I was a teenager and it'd just be too uncool for me. So eventually, we ended up with zero pictures of him and my stepdad and step-sister only knew him by name but not his face. And that's why my step-sister couldn't recognize my dad. He hadn't even told my stepsister about his past and was pretending to be someone else altogether,

fake names in the works. My parents got divorced when I was just nine years old, but they shared joint custody of me. They'd had me when they were really very young and inexperienced and decided to get married only out of obligation but had no real love for one another. To them, this was just a college fling that went on a little too long but despite that, they put up with each other for my sake. Unfortunately, they'd fight literally every single day over petty things and irrelevant topics and I found myself wishing that they were divorced instead because that's how bad those fights were. It kind of put me off of marriage for the rest of my life, if I'm being really honest. When they did decide to file for divorce, I was relieved that they were finally separating.

The next couple of years went by pretty easily because I'd alternate between living with my parents. I'd say I was equally close to both of them and even though they hated each other, they made sure not to speak badly of one another when they were around me and never attempted to use me against the other. Ten years passed this way and then a couple of months before my 19th birthday, I think, my dad suddenly told me that he'd received an offer to work in Venice and it would require him to travel a lot. It also paid well and he decided to go for it because now I was older and he didn't feel the need to stick around for my sake anymore. I wasn't too thrilled about it but I said that I'd be okay with it nevertheless. He moved to Europe a couple of weeks

later and I was there to see him off at the airport along with my grandparents where he promised to come back home at least once every year to meet me but as you guys all know by now, that never happened. He moved and then cut me off entirely. No calls, no texts, and no social media contact either. He probably either blocked me or deactivated his already pretty inactive accounts on social media and even stopped his friends and family back here from speaking to me. So everyone he knew cut me and my mother off and we never found out what happened to him after he moved to Europe. I was miserable about it for almost a year because I'd never seen this coming and I had no idea what would make him do such a thing to his own daughter and that's

when my mother stepped up as a parent and did her very best to bring me. Out of my depression. She'd never had a cross word to say about my father earlier, but when she realized how upset I was, she went into her mama bear mode and decided to erase every trace every trace there was of my father so I'd find it easier to forget about what he did and how betrayed I'd felt. It did kind of help me, but I wouldn't recommend this to everyone trying to deal with an estranged parent. I don't think it's the healthiest way, but at least it helped me get over things. And now, another ten years later, my father had finally found his way back into my life unintentionally through my step-sister, of all people.

I was horrified when she showed me the guy she was talking to and it got even worse when she told me that they were actually planning to hook up within the next couple of weeks. They'd already been talking for a long time now, but he'd had to travel out of state for work a few days after they matched. He'd be back soon and that's when the two of them would finally meet and that was quite a relief for me to hear because at least the two of them hadn't met yet. I knew that I had to do something about this situation and without thinking much, I asked her what his name was because I was pretty sure he was going by a different name now. Sure enough, my dad had started using his middle name along with his mother's maiden name online

so it had been practically impossible for me to find him even in the recent past. And even after changing his name, the first thing he must have done after creating a social media account would have been to block me, my mother, and anyone else who was related to us. But now that I knew exactly how to find him, nothing was stopping me from reaching out to him once more and I knew that I absolutely had to do that for the sake of closure. He didn't want to talk to me or keep in touch with me and I knew that very well, but I couldn't just let this nag at me for the rest of my life. So after I got to know about his social media details for my step-sister, I waited two days and contemplated what to do next. I was struggling to think of what to say to him

now that I finally could contact him. His profile didn't show up when I searched for him while using my original account, but when I made a fake profile, it came up instantly which meant that he had indeed blocked me to make sure I wouldn't be able to find him. He had a private account so I couldn't see anything apart from his profile picture, which was him, smiling from year to year while carrying a cat. He'd always told me he hated cat so I was never allowed to have one even after the divorce because he said he wouldn't be able to stand the dander, and I don't know why but seeing the cat is what aggravated me. So finally, after two days of thinking about what exactly I could say to him, I came up with the following message to send to him. Hey, Dad, I see you have a cat now which is funny

because as far as I remember, you wouldn't have been able to stand the dander, right? I wonder how many other lies you've told me over the years. But honestly, don't bother telling me now because I get that you're just a dishonest and disappointing man. First, you let my mind. You let my mom down by being a sorry excuse of a husband, and then, you let me down by being a pathetic father. And you're about to let my stepsister down by lying to her about your past and even your age. Yeah, the woman you've been speaking to for the past couple of weeks is my step-sister. So I'm sorry but your plan to keep running away from me for the rest of your life has failed miserably. I hope you're never, ever happy again because you don't deserve it. You deserve all the

pain you caused me, multiplied twice. And now, you can disrespectfully, go to hell. Goodbye. I sent that message through and when I did, I finally felt so relieved because I felt like I'd been holding it all in for ages and now, I could finally let it all go. I felt relieved, I felt satisfied with what I said and most importantly, I felt really light and good about what I'd done because this had finally given me some sense of closure. But now, I think I really messed up by going ahead and talking to him without even speaking to my mother or my step-sister first. I really, really wished I would have spoken to her before I said anything to him, but I truly didn't know how to bring this up with her at all.

It just felt so awkward that I went back to work the very next day so that I wouldn't have to talk to her and spent most of my day at work because I had no idea how I could even talk to her about any of this without breaking her heart. She'd been talking about how much she liked this guy already and how she'd been looking forward to their first date for ages now. It was just so awkward and horrifying for me. I believe that my dad would just back off, and my step-sister never would get to know.

I don't think the concept of ghosting is acceptable in most cases, but here, I think it would have been the best way for my step-sister to be let down now, but instead, my dad decided to confront my step-sister and told her all about what I'd said to him and even admitted the truth about his past to her in the process of doing so. I believe that if my step-sister got to know the truth, she'd be shattered and would hate him for it, but instead, things turned out a little differently. The day that I sent my dad that text, I came back home from work early just to clear my head because I hadn't received

a response from my dad, but I knew that he'd seen the message. As soon as I stepped into the house, though, my step-sister started screaming and shouting at me about what I'd done. For a second, I didn't even understand what exactly she was screaming about and it took me a while to realize that my father had told her everything. Instead of being mad at him, though, she was pissed off with me and was telling me that, before going to him, I should have told her the truth and now I'd messed everything up for her. Before I could even explain myself, she told me that she didn't want me around anymore and couldn't even bear to look at me so I had to leave that very instant. I tried to speak to her,

but she just wouldn't have it and told me that she just didn't want to talk to me at all and asked me to get the hell out several times so I finally gave up trying to explain because she was definitely not in the mood to listen at the time. I packed all my things up and I was out within an hour. I lived at a hotel for the next couple of days and then moved to a friend's house to stay with her instead until I found an apartment which wouldn't be possible at such short notice. I haven't exactly been in touch with my step-sister since that last conversation and she's blocked me everywhere so I couldn't reach out to her online either. I did hear from my mother a couple of days back, but even she thinks that what I did was messed up and that I should have talked to them before just going ahead and doing whatever I wanted to. She sounded disappointed in me and I feel like crap because of what happened, but I honestly think they're not even thinking about what I went through.

I understand my step-sister went through a lot with her divorce because her husband cheated on her and when she finally seemed to be connecting well with a guy she liked, he turned out to be her stepmom's ex-husband. That can't be easy, but I don't think it's fair to take it all out on me instead either. My mother is also keeping her distance from me because she needs time to process the fact that her ex-husband had been talking to her stepdaughter and I'm the one who's somehow being cast aside and it feels unfair to me. I don't mean to sound like I'm whining, but it's been several days and I've been trying my very best to get both of them to talk to me again. My mother hasn't blocked me yet, but she hasn't been responding to me either and my

stepsister blocked my original account but hasn't blocked the other ones I made specifically to talk to her. It's a little stalkerish, but I just wanted them to forgive me because I was afraid that if I gave them space, then I'd never hear from them again. Two days back, I tried to text my stepsister and even used a different number for it. I apologized to her yet again for everything that had happened and asked her to talk to me just once so I could explain my side of the story and she finally did respond to me, but it wasn't what I thought she'd say. She told me that I was selfish to the very core and that she should have known that I wasn't capable of thinking of

anyone apart from myself. She even brought up what I'd said to her back when she'd first told me about her being on a dating app, how I'd said that she shouldn't care about anyone but herself and put her own happiness first. Apparently, she believes that I'm always going to take that advice and apply it to my own life, which makes me incapable of being considerate. She then told me that I needed to stay away because I ruined everything that I touched. I'll admit, I was really hurt by what she said and haven't been able to come to terms with it. It keeps bothering me and I just can't understand why exactly I'm the bad guy here when it should have been my father instead. I'd offer confronting my estranged father after he left me 10 years ago when I realized that

he'd been talking to my step-sister without consulting with my mom and step-sister. Update 1. My mother just asked me to visit her today. It's been three days since I originally posted here and I have no idea what she wants to talk to me about. I agreed to see her, but I don't know what to expect at all. I haven't heard back from anyone else, not my step-sister and obviously not my father, so I'm kind of stressed out about this meeting. I did go through the comments on my original post and I now feel like both of us were in the wrong. Of course, I should have talked to my step-sister and my mother before I went ahead and confronted my dad, but they should have also tried to understand where I was coming from instead of overreacting the way they did and putting all the blame on me.

That wasn't fair at all, in my opinion. And I can see that some of you guys think so as well. I've gone above and beyond while trying to apologize to them but haven't seen the same efforts from their side and that's really unfair to me because I'm not the bad guy here. My father is, but he's just getting off completely scot-free. I'm still going to talk to my mother because I want to know what she has to say about this, but if they don't think that they did anything wrong then I might not speak to them after

this. Wish me luck, you guys. Update 2, so I just came back home from my mother's place about three hours ago. It was a tense meeting and my stepsister was there as well, but on the bright side. At least they did apologize to me for behaving the way they did and completely ostracizing me. I know I deserved a little flack for going straight to my father and giving him an earful just for the sake of my own closure without speaking to my mother or my step-sister, but they shouldn't have acted like I was the only one who messed up here. What my step-sister said and did wasn't right either

because I'd only hoped that my dad would have the decency to just leave without causing drama, which he didn't. So both of them apologized to me as did I, but things were still really cold and awkward between us. My step-sister told me that she dumped him the very next day and he hadn't tried to get in touch with her after that either. But he had reached out to my mother and given her a lot of crap about what I'd said to him. He told her that he wasn't going to talk to me because he despised

me and didn't want to think about the fact that he was related to me and my mother. He told her that apparently he'd always hated being a part of our lives and so he escaped as soon as I was an adult and he didn't have to be responsible for me anymore. So now I had no right to question him about his life anymore because we were not related now. That's not really how biology or even society works, but I guess he's a sorry excuse of a man so his excuses will always be nothing short of miserable. He told my mother that neither she, nor I was ever supposed to contact him ever again or he'd report us to the cops and my mother blocked him without a response. It was awful that he'd said so many horrible things about us, but I'd learned not to expect

much when it came to my father. He was a terrible human being and would always remain one and I'd accepted that. As for my relationship with my mother and step-sister and even my stepdad, to a certain extent, we've all decided that we need to give each other some space and work things out on our own before we try to go back to normal. Because there is no way to go back to normalcy after this, at least I don't think there is. I really wish my dad never would have come back at all because honestly, he ruined everything. I really do love my stepdad and step-sister and of course, my mom.

mother and my new family have been my comfort zone for the past couple of years now, but unfortunately, that's going to be put on hold for a while now, all thanks to my father. Update 3. Hello, everyone. It's been almost three months since my last update. My family and I have decided to go to therapy both individually and as a family and have been attending therapy sessions for the past couple of weeks. It was all my mother's idea and it actually has been helping, as far as I'm concerned, so I really think that our relationships are going to get better moving forward. The first couple of weeks after my last update were difficult because we were all barely speaking to one another and everything felt way too

tense and awkward, but things did get better with time. I wouldn't say it's all back to normal and we're all a happy family once more because it takes time to heal and we're taking that time out for ourselves now. I just hope that sometime in the future, I can come back here and say that things have gone back to normal again and hopefully that day won't be too far off. Big, thanks to you guys for all the lovely advice, comments, and support. I hope you enjoy this story. Unemployed sibling came to stay with us, but she engaged in a relationship with my spouse and became pregnant. However, she now insisted that I vacate my own residence because she believed my husband was rich. I, 34F, let my sister Julie, 28F, move in with me a couple of months ago since she was in a really bad

condition financially. Julie and I are not particularly close, but she had lost her job due to her company closing down and within two weeks of that, she fell seriously sick due to the West Nile virus and after talking to my parents, I decided to have her move in with me for a couple of weeks so we could keep an eye on her, monitor her progress, and make sure that she was able to save up on rent since evidently, she wouldn't be able to go back to work for a few weeks. She was probably at her worst at this time, and I was the one who had helped her out since our parents don't live around here and she doesn't exactly have a lot of friends who were in a position to help. I didn't even look at it as a favor. I thought that this was just the right thing to do,

especially since I could afford it. But she repaid me by having an affair with my husband. And on top of that, she actually had the audacity to tell me that I was the one who needed to leave the house so they could play happy family together because she was pregnant now. This happened a couple of days ago. Julie asked both me and my husband to sit in the living room so she could speak to us about something very important. I thought that she was finally moving out because she had recovered quite well in the past couple of weeks and I thought she was going to tell us that she was finally rejoining work and was going to be out of our hair. Instead, she told me that she and my husband had been having an affair for the past couple of weeks, and right now, she's pregnant.

When I looked at my husband, I saw that he was just as shocked as I was. So clearly this was not something she had discussed with him before telling me about it, which explains a lot of things. Anyway, after she told me that she was pregnant with my husband's baby, she told me that she could understand that this was probably a shock for me, and she was really sorry that this even happened. But at the end of the day, what's done was done and now, she would really appreciate it if I vacated the house

because she would find it really weird to be around me the whole day in her current condition. I was furious, but I didn't let it show. I just quietly told her that I was not going to vacate the house because this is my property. And if anybody had to leave, it would be her and my husband. And they could play happy family wherever they wanted because I was going to be filing for a divorce and I didn't even want to see them anymore. I spoke to her as calmly as possible, kept my anger under control, and tried to deal with the situation in a dignified manner.

Because they had already caught me off guard so I was not going to let them have the satisfaction of watching me freak out at them. Anyway, after I told her that this was my property and I would not be leaving, she told me that I would have two, and apparently, she thought that I was kidding. But then, my husband told her that I was indeed not joking,

and told her that he was a stay-at-home husband, always had been, and he had apparently lied to her about everything that he had told her in the beginning. For context, my husband and I have been together for the past eight years. We've been married for the past five years and a couple of months after our marriage, I decided to take the leap and started my own business. With the grace of God, I've been doing very well for myself and so, my husband and I decided

that he could stay back home and he could work on his writing career. For the past four years, he's been staying at home, working on his big novel, and taking care of the household chores. We don't have any kids, so he doesn't have a lot to do. But all the property and everything, it belongs to me because technically, I purchased it and both of us thought that it was only fair for me to own everything. I bet he's regretting it now, though, because after he told Julie that he didn't actually own anything, and he had been lying about everything, she started freaking out at him and

claimed that she had been conned. She started yelling at my husband, calling him a scammer, and a liar, and entertaining as it was to watch her lose her mind at him. I wasn't interested in any of that at that point in time. I just wanted both of them out of my house, so I had to intervene, get them to stop yelling and tell them to get the heck out of my house that very instant. I was not even willing to give them any time, I just wanted them out of my sight. My husband is relatively smart.

He knew that there was no way he was going to get out of this one since there is nothing more important to me than my self-respect and dignity and I was never going to take back a cheater. So he quietly went into the bedroom and started packing, but Julie decided to start begging on her knees, telling me that she was going to do anything it took to fix whatever had happened, but she just needed a place to stay and since we were family, I couldn't just kick out a pregnant woman. Her bringing up the fact that we were family, that's what really ticked me off, so I grabbed her by the arm, got her to stand up and walked her to the door, then pushed her out. Physically, I was very rough with her, but I didn't care. I was furious at the

fact that she had had the audacity to say that we were family, and I couldn't kick her out, it really got to me. Once she was outside, she started begging me not to do this, but I slammed the door shut, and then I went to the guest room, started stuffing all her things in her bags and in a couple of minutes, I threw those bags outside with her and told her to get lost or else I would call the cops on her. She kept crying, but I just shut the door and went back inside and a few minutes later, my husband walked out with his bags, telling me that he was really sorry about this, but I

pretended not to hear him. Julie kept crying and begging on the porch for about an hour after he left, but I just put my headphones on and blocked her out. After a certain point of time, I couldn't hear her crying on the porch any longer, and I realized that she was finally gone. That very night, I spoke to my lawyer, told him everything that happened, and said that I wanted to file for divorce. I thought that I would tell my friends and family later, but the very next day, I received a call from my parents, telling me that what I had done was really unreasonable and that my behavior was heartless. I found that very strange because so far, my parents have always treated me and Julie equally. It's not like she's the golden child or whatever,

but the fact that they were actually defending her, didn't sit right with me. They told me that it was heartless of me to kick her out when she was pregnant, especially when I knew for a fact that she was in between jobs right now, and was recovering from a serious illness, so it would take her time to get back on her feet. On top of that, she didn't have anybody here who could take care of her as well as I could. All her friends were in the same boat financially and had their own work and family to worry about rather than taking care of her. So as her sister, the least I could do was forgive her for her stupidity and be there for her. Instead, I kicked her out and they thought that I was being really insensitive, especially considering the fact that she was pregnant.

And to top it all off, it was my husband who had scammed her, and they said it as if it was my fault somehow. Apparently, my husband had been telling her that he owned everything and that he handled the financial situation at home because he was a really successful ghostwriter for novels and even film scripts, but since he didn't want the fame that came along with this, he kept himself anonymous. And my idiot sister actually believed all that. She started to fail to that maybe he was a hot shot, which is why she ended up seducing him and since he was on a power trip, my husband never said anything about the truth either. Then, when she got pregnant, Julie figured that it was finally time to let me know that she had been having an affair with

my husband so the two of them could kick me out. Unfortunately, that plan backfired, especially since she hadn't even discussed anything with my husband before confronting me with the truth, and essentially, she screwed everything up for herself and my husband. Anyway, I really, I really don't understand how any of this is my fault. She brought this on to herself, and my parents' decision to pretend like she was the victim in the situation, that she herself had created, was absolutely mind-boggling. So I fought for myself, I defended my decision to throw her out because she was the one who decided to have an affair with my husband, and regardless of whether he played a part in it or not, it was clear that she played an equal part. Both of them had teamed

up and betrayed me together, so it didn't make sense for me to kick my husband out and then let her stay as if nothing had happened. And it didn't make a difference to me whether she was pregnant or not, whether she could work right now or not because I had taken all that into consideration before and let her stay with me for months, but she had thanked me by having an affair with my husband while staying under my roof. Besides, it wasn't even as though she was heavily pregnant and couldn't deal with anything, she was probably just a few weeks along, and I'm sure she could handle it. and even if she had been nine months along, I still would have kicked her out because what she did was disgusting. After all, she was ready to kick me out when she thought that our house belonged to my husband,

so why would I worry about her? But my parents just kept talking about that one point over and over again, especially highlighting how rough I had been with her until I just got tired of them and I hung up. It was clear that they were not going to move on from that and since we haven't spoken to each other, but now I'm beginning to think that maybe I didn't do the right thing. Ida for kicking my pregnant sister out of the house because the baby belongs to my husband? Hey, thank you so much, everyone, for all the support and the comments. I really needed that, since I had seriously started to doubt myself, but I really don't need to.

I blocked my parents yesterday, I really don't need that sort of negative energy in my life. Especially right now, since I'm already dealing with a lot of stuff. I can't stop going to work to recover from what's been going on in my personal life. I'm the boss, I'm just going to have to put on a strong front and deal with it. So at work, it's been business as usual, but as soon as I come back home, I just crash because emotionally, I'm just devastated. I didn't let any of the cracks show for the past couple of days, but now, it's really starting to hurt. My lawyer and I filed for divorce a couple of days ago and soon enough, I think my husband will be served. I know he's not going to contest the divorce,

knows me well enough to know that if he does, I'm going to make sure that he pays for it. But at the end of the day, it still hurts. Winning the divorce is not going to make the situation better for me automatically. I just can't imagine why, after eight years of being together, he had to have that affair with Julie. I really believe that we were in love, I genuinely thought that we were going to be together forever and grow old together. But now, I'm doubting everything that we have had in the past couple of years.

This is not even the person that he cheated on me, maybe this is just the first time that he got caught. And even the thought of that makes my heart hurt, but there's not much that I can do about it apart from just accept it and try to move on. He is the only person who hasn't tried to contact me after he got kicked out, my parents have and so has Julie. But that's different because I know that they only want me to take her back in so she can continue staying here for free.

It's really shocking that even after she has done so much damage, she still has the audacity to expect me to help her out. And it's actually even more insane that my parents are siding with her right now. In my post, I spoke about how my parents had never had a favorite child. They had always treated me and Julie equally but right now, I honestly don't know what to think about this. I don't have any expectations from Julie herself. I had already said that we were never very close and the only reason I had helped her out was because I knew that financially, it was not going to be a big deal for me and we already had a spare room at home, so why not? And that's what my parents had wanted as well, so I didn't see a problem with helping her out

since that's what family does. But I never really expected anything great in return, from Julie, at least. However, with my parents, it's a different story. Given how they've always been reasonable and fair, I expected them to be upset with Julie. And I'm not saying they aren't. From the conversation that we had earlier, it was clear that they were not happy about how Julie had chosen to go about the situation. But they kept insisting that the damage had already been done. And now, the only thing that we could do was just accept whatever had happened and tried to move on with it. But accept how? How am I supposed to accept the fact that my sister, who I supported at my worst, decided to have an affair with my husband who has been with me for almost a decade and on top of that, actually expected me to

leave my own house. It's bizarre to even say out loud. And I'm somehow supposed to accept it and help her out even now? I honestly don't know what's gotten into my parents, but they have seriously disappointed me with their behavior. I think I've lost all respect that I had for them. And I don't think that I can ever regain it because the situation right now, it's really bad. Emotionally, I'm just done and mentally, I'm only focused on my work but everything in my personal life has pretty much fallen apart. I haven't even spoken to my friends about it, but I know at some point I'm going to have to let people know that this is happening. After all, my husband and I have a lot of common friends together, and I would rather that they

found out about the situation for me than him because I don't know what he would tell them. At this point, I don't know what to expect from anyone anymore. Anyway, now, I'm only trying to focus on a couple of things for a while. First, of course, my work shouldn't suffer, because of this, and I'm going to make sure of it. Secondly, I also have to worry about the divorce proceedings because even though I'm 90% sure that he's not going to contest terms since I've decided to be pretty fair and reasonable. There is still a small chance and uncertainty about what he might do because right now, it's anybody's guess.

So I'm keeping all the documentation prepared and stuff, just in case, but other than that, I'm trying to keep my head as blank as possible, because I really don't want to over-exert myself and end up spiraling. That's the last thing that I need right now. The venting about my feelings here has been really helpful, and I really, really appreciate the fact that so many of you have reached out to me, commented on my post, and been so supportive. It means the world to me, it really does. Update 2, hey, so just as I had expected, after he was served, my husband decided to hit me up and tell me that he was not going to be contesting the divorce, and he found the terms of the divorce to be very fair. He sent me a text saying all this, and then in the next one, he told me that

in the past he had been thinking of ways to apologize to me, but he just couldn't come up with anything. Because everything that he thought he could say just seemed really flimsy and insincere and so, he just decided to get it out of the way by telling me that he was really sorry by text. He told me that he had lied to Julie just to impress her because he had been feeling very weird lately, about the fact that he didn't own and had to rely on his wife for his finance. We don't even have a kid, so he couldn't even have the dignity of being a stay-at-home dad. He just felt useless and since his novel was not coming along that well either, he felt like he had wasted four years of his life him on something that was going to take him nowhere and

he had been feeling particularly depressed about it. But he couldn't even acknowledge it to himself, let alone talk to me about it. So he was feeling really bad about himself, and then when Julie came along before he could even think about the depravity of what he was doing, he was lying to her about everything. trying to impress her, and soon enough, they were sleeping together. He thought that it was just going to be a fling, and he felt really guilty about it, but he just couldn't control himself. He needed a way to distract himself from everything that was going on and that was his way. But then, she got pregnant and we had that horrible conversation two weeks ago,

after which everything pretty much went to absolute crap. And he told me that he really regrets everything that he did, he screwed everything up for us, but he promised me that this was the first and last time that he had ever cheated on me. This had never happened before and he really needed me to trust him on that and maybe, sometime in the future, if I could, then he wanted me to forgive him for everything that he had done wrong. That was the message and after I was done reading, I ended up crying, because it was just another reminder of everything that I had lost. I thought that I had this man who I loved and who loved me, but within a span of one day, I lost all of that. And trust me, it's not easy to deal with.

with it. I know that every person who has ever gone through a divorce or been cheated on, they'll probably know exactly what I'm talking about. I can say a bunch of horrible stuff about him and make myself hate him for now, but at the end of the day, it still hurts. I hated myself for crying over that text but at least after I was done crying, I got the strength to block him without replying. Because to be honest, even though I was very upset about everything, he did not deserve a reply. And I was not going to forgive him, especially not right now when everything is just so fresh. After a while, I actually started feeling a bit annoyed with everything that he had said, because all he had to do was just talk to me. I, for one, had never ever made him feel bad

that he was choosing to stay at home and work on his novel. I'm not a very creative person myself, I've never been one for writing and stuff, apart from right now since I really have to get these things off my chest, but I respected his creative side and I didn't see anything wrong with him staying at home. I could understand that his fragile male ego couldn't handle it. Maybe other people had made comments and stuff and maybe he just became bitter but the least he could have done, after eight years of being with me, was at least let me know what he was going through and then maybe we could have worked it out together. But he chose not to, he chose to let himself suffocate without letting me know anything and then, he chose to distract himself by entertaining Julie

and her advances. The more that I think about it, the more disgusting and pathetic I find it. The fact that he lied to her about so many things just to make himself seem bigger and better. I loved him the way he was, but that was not enough for him. He had to go out of his way to make himself seem more impressive with a bunch of lies and then cheat on me with my sister. This is just never going to make any sense to me, at least with Julie, I could understand her motive. She wanted to live my life and get ready without putting in any work and she thought that she could do that by getting pregnant and moving in with my husband, the supposedly rich guy. But with him, I just don't know why he did it and ended up ruining everything that he had.

And I think that that's punishment enough, who he is bad enough. I don't have to punish him more so I can just choose to ignore his existence now. In a few months, I'll be done with the divorce and then I'll just never have to see him or think of him again. Update 3, hey, so it's been a couple of days since my last update and I was having a quiet but then today, in the morning, my parents showed up at my house. I found it strange because in the past few years, after they moved back to my dad's hometown to run the family business with my uncle, they would hardly ever visit and it was mostly Julie and I who would have to go see them. So the fact that they had taken a flight and came to visit me was a big deal in itself,

but I knew that they were only here to talk about Julie. And that's why, when I opened the door, I told them that if they were here to talk about her, then I really didn't want to entertain them. After all, there's only one Sunday every week, and I really didn't want to waste mind by going over the same things again. I had said whatever I had to, and so had they, and right now, we had nothing more to discuss with regard to that situation. And I also made it very clear to them that I would only let them in if they apologized to me

for everything first because I believed that the way they had behaved with me, the way they had tried to constantly guilt-trip me into believing that I had treated Julie badly when it was she who had screwed up everything. It was not right. So they could either apologize to me right now, or they could leave. I made my boundaries very clear, but my parents told me that they had come specifically to talk to me about Julie and I couldn't just weasel my way out of it by pretending that I was too busy. They told me that we had to discuss this because as a family, we couldn't treat each other like this. Once again, they were bringing up the whole family thing, and just like with Julie, I lost my temper with them as well. Because this is not how families treat each other, at least as far as I'm

concerned. Even though I'm not very close to Julie, she was family, so I helped her out. But instead of respecting that and being grateful to me, she literally had an affair with my husband. Is that seriously how a family is supposed to treat one another? And if she can do that to me, why am I supposed to be kind to her even after that? She destroyed my marital life and I know that my husband had an equal part in it, but so did she, and I don't have to forgive her just because she's family. She didn't think about me before doing what she did. So why exactly am I supposed to do that?

At least I had valid reasons and explanations, she didn't. I totally put my parents on blast, and they kept trying to fumble and come up with arguments, but I didn't even let them speak. I just steamrolled all over their arguments and after I was done, my mom had literally been reduced to tears, and she just kept repeating that I couldn't talk to them like that. But they were on my turf, I could speak to them however I wanted to,

especially because they had decided to get on my nerves this morning, even though they already knew that there was no need to discuss this since my personal life was already pretty bad. I didn't need them adding fuel to the fire. I had already warned them, when they showed up, that I was not interested in talking about this, but they had still decided to test me. So they really had no right to pretend that they were very hurt by whatever had happened. They should have been expecting exactly this sort of outburst.

Anyway, after I was done yelling at them, my mom was sobbing so hard that my dad just told me that he never wanted to speak to me again because clearly, I had lost it, and then he walked away. But I don't care, they can believe that I'm crazy, I know that I'm not and that's enough for me. If anything, they are the ones acting crazy right now, and that is all that I need to know. Update 4, hi, so it's been a month since my last update and I haven't been in touch with anybody from my family, not Julie, and definitely not my parents. I'm guessing that now, they are funding her, so good for her, I guess. As for my soon-to-be ex-husband, I heard from a couple of people that he is living with his parents now, and after this has been finalized, he's going to be moving

out of state. By now, pretty much all our friends know exactly what happened, and they have started cutting him out of their lives. Most of them, at least, some of them don't want to get involved and remain neutral, but I don't really care. All I know is that my life is slowly but steadily getting back on track, and I'll do anything to protect my peace now. I'm not exactly happy, but at least I'm content, which is an improvement from last month. And slowly, I know that I am going to be happy again, I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I hope you enjoy this story. Spouse alleged that I was unfaithful with his sibling and requested a DNA test for our new baby, prompting me to evict him and initiate divorce proceedings. Consequently, I, a 29-year-old

woman, just gave birth about three weeks ago and my son and I are currently living with my in-laws because of a horrible fight with my husband, Michael, 32, male. Michael said that he wanted me to get a paternity test two weeks after our son was born because he suspected that the child was his brothers. For context, his brother Brian, 29, and I went to college together. Brian and I have been great friends ever since the first day of college and incidentally, it was through Brian that I met my husband, so I can't understand why he's so insecure all of a sudden. My parents live in Iowa and we went to college in Buffalo. Brian lived nearby and he once invited me home because I had been feeling very homesick in my first year. That's how I met Michael for the first time. Michael and I exchanged

numbers, but we didn't start talking until after I graduated college. We became friends and after that, we started dating after being in a relationship for almost four years. We got married three years back. And so far, everything has been perfect. We were great together and Brian and I were still really close as friends. The three of us often hung out together in a group and Michael had never had a problem with it. It was only after I entered the eighth month of my pregnancy that Michael started acting weird around us. He started distancing himself from me and spending more time at work. I chalked it up to him being nervous about the baby and tried to fix the situation by trying to tell him that he would be a great father and that he had nothing to be nervous about.

However, even that didn't seem to help so I decided to focus on my health until the baby was born. I believe that after our baby was born, he would start acting normal again, but that didn't happen. He refused to spend any time with our son and always made up some excuse not to be around us. He would spend most of his day at work and when he came back, he would tell me that he was too tired to be with the baby. I tried to put up with it, but when his behavior didn't change even after two weeks, I decided to confront him about it. One day, when he came back home from work, I sat him down and told him that I needed to talk to him about his strange behavior. He tried to convince me that he

was just tired from work and stuff and that this had nothing to do with me or the baby, but I didn't buy it. I voiced my concerns and told him that if he didn't speak up and tell me what his problem was then I wouldn't be able to stay with him anymore. Because it was really hurting me to have him ignore us like this. So then he finally told me that he didn't believe that the baby was his and he suspected that I'd been having an affair with Brian and the child was actually his so now he wanted me to get a paternity test for our son. He had no reason to accuse me of something so serious because I had never treated Brian as anything more than a good friend, so it felt like a slap on the face when he said that he wanted a paternity test. I started

screaming at him almost immediately because I had already been feeling emotionally unstable. thanks to all the post-pregnancy hormones, and that combined with his strange behavior around us had pushed me to the edge. His accusing me of having an affair with his brother was the last thing that I needed. When I started yelling at him, he told me that this was exactly what he had expected, which is why he hadn't brought it up so far and tried to walk out of the room. But that was really big and I wasn't going to let him drop a bomb on me and then walk away, so I demanded an explanation. He then told me that several weeks ago, when I had invited a few of my college friends to our house for dinner, he'd overheard a conversation between Brian and another friend who had stayed with him.

Apparently, the two of them had been talking about how everyone had expected me to end up with Brian because we seemed to get along so well and Brian had just laughed it off instead of saying something to defend Michael. I didn't even understand what he wanted Brian to defend him from because it wasn't as if saying that everyone had expected him to end up with me was an attack on Michael somehow. It isn't odd for people in college to think that friends of opposite genders might get together in the future and they were just gabbing about the past. It was harmless and fun, but ultimately, it meant nothing. Because Brian was my friend and Michael was my husband, that should have been enough for him to feel secure. But he took that too hard

and he began to believe that maybe Brian and I did have a thing going on. That's why he had been acting so strange ever since the day of the dinner party. He was suspecting me of having an affair with his brother and being disloyal to him, over a conversation that I wasn't even a part of. It was insane and I tried to explain to him that he sounded really stupid. But it didn't matter to him and he said that now that everything was out in the open, he wouldn't talk to me until I got a paternity test done and he knew for sure that the baby was his. Under normal circumstances, I never would have had an issue with a paternity test,

but this just seemed ridiculously stupid. I couldn't believe that he was accusing me of cheating on him with his brother, even after being with me for so long. I was really angry and upset, so I decided to take our son and leave the house. He didn't even try to stop me as I left, but I soon realized that I had messed up because I had nowhere to go. I didn't want to go to any friend's house, because then I would have to explain to them what happened and this was just very personal.

I would have gone to Brian's place, but that would just reinforce what Michael already believed and I didn't think that it was appropriate under these circumstances anyway. With nobody else to turn to, I decided to go to his parents' house, since I was sure that I could count on them. They seemed to like me and they were my best bet after Brian. So the day that I left, after wandering around for a bit, I headed to my in-law's house and they gladly took me in. When I explained to them why Michael and I had been fighting, they seemed really embarrassed and apologized to me on his behalf. but they also told me that it was really out of character for Michael to be so insecure, especially when it came to Brian.

Because the two of them had always been close and never had the kind of crazy sibling rivalry that others do. And I agreed, it really was out of character for Michael to be insecure about his brother. The three of us were a tight-knit group and that's how it had always been. So this sudden change in Michael's behavior made no sense to any of us. Nonetheless, his parents told me that I was free to live with them for as long as I wanted to and they would respect whatever decision I made regarding my relationship with their son. They told me that even if I decided to get divorced, they would support me, but in the meantime,

they would do their best to make Michael apologize to me and actually mean it. They kept trying to talk sense into him for a while, but on the third day, they informed me that they had decided to cut him off until he stopped acting like an idiot. This would be a problem for him because his parents were supposed to let him take over their family-owned textile business in a few months. His parents were retiring and he had been in the running to inherit their business. But if they cut him off, Brian would end up inheriting it and since he had no interest in running a business, he would probably sell it off, but then Michael would get nothing out of it.

But the truth was that my in-laws only wanted him to reconsider what he was asking of me and accusing me of scaring him into thinking that he was going to lose the business. They didn't really have any intention of letting the business go to Brian because they knew that he would sell it and they had worked hard to build a brand for themselves. They were obviously not going to throw it all away over my fight with Michael. They told me that they were just going to let Michael think that they were cutting him off for good and eventually, he would come around and apologize to me. Then we could sort things out between the two of us, be it by getting back together or getting

divorced. Their only goal was to make him apologize to me and talk things through with me and I appreciated that they were doing so much for me because I had nobody else to count on. I couldn't tell any of my friends and I definitely couldn't talk to Brian about any of this because this had a lot to do with him. So Michael's parents were the only ones keeping me sane. After his parents told him that they were going to cut him off, we expected him to reach out to me immediately to sort things out, but he waited for a day before contacting me. When he called me two days ago, I expected him to apologize to me, but as soon as I picked up the call, he started screaming at me and accusing me of trying to manipulate his parents into giving Brian control of the business so that

the two of us could benefit from it because apparently he was my lover now. I could hear his voice cracking and knew that he had been crying which made me feel terribly guilty. He told me that he knew what I was trying to do and he couldn't believe that I was cheating him out of a business as well as his baby. He called me heartless and whatnot before I finally told him that his parents were not going to give the business to Brian. They were just trying to scare him into thinking exactly that so he would contact me and talk to me. He went silent for a while after I told him that and then he said that I was just evil incarnate. He said that he couldn't believe that now I was even trying to turn his parents against him, just because he had valid concerns

about the true paternity of the baby that he was supposed to be raising for the rest of his life. It was infuriating to hear him talk about how valid his concerns were when in reality. His only concern stemmed from a stupid conversation that he had overheard. I tried to argue with him, but he told me that instead of wasting both our time by fighting, I could just do the right thing and get a paternity test. He accused me of being manipulative to get my way and told me to keep his parents out of this. I just feel helpless and have no idea what to do anymore. Ida for not wanting to get a paternity test?

Update 1, I decided not to go through with the paternity test and instead, filed for divorce. It's been one crazy week since the last update and so much has happened that I don't even know but first things first, thank you so much for all the comments and the advice. Now, coming to why I have decided to get a divorce from Michael. After that last phone call with him, I confided in his parents and told them that their plan to scare him into apologizing, sorting things out with me had backfired miserably, and now things were even worse than before. I also told them how he had accused me of manipulating them, but they reassured me that they were happy to have me because I was the mother of their grandchild and even apart

from that, they had known me for the longest time and they loved me because I was a part of their family. And since I lived away from my parents for Michael's sake, it was their duty to take care of me and look out for me when I was going through a rough patch. Hearing his parents say such nice things about me made me feel less lonely and more sure of myself. So after talking to them, I decided to tell my parents and Brian about the situation because my in-laws didn't want their opinion to be the only one that I was taking into consideration, since other people might have a better idea of how to go ahead. When I told my parents about what Michael had said, they told me that they would support me regardless of what decision I made. The only reason nobody

was telling me to leave Michael, despite how obviously wrongs. he was, was because of our son. I hate to say it about my son, but having a child with Michael is really complicated because I had to think about our kids' future before I made any decision. And then I had the most difficult conversation of them all when I spoke to Brian about what was going on. When I told Brian about what his brother had accused me of and asked him about the conversation that he had overheard, he started looking really uncomfortable and I realized that both of them knew more than what they were letting on. So I pushed Brian and forth. forced him to tell me what he knew because I was sure that he was hiding something from me and

so was Michael, since people don't just start suspecting their wife over something so petty. A lot of you in the comments had also suggested that there might be something that Michael was hiding from me because it just didn't add up. That after years of being okay with my friendship with his brother, he was suddenly not fine with it out of the blue. There had to be more to the story that he wasn't letting me know, but I had been too caught up thinking about the consequences of whatever was going on at the time, as well as looking after my son, to really consider things like this. But yes, Brian told me the truth and now I hate both brothers because I couldn't even imagine people could be capable of being this stupid and heartless.

Apparently, when Michael had overheard the conversation, he had also heard what happened after Brian laughed. Brian had said to that friend that even he had expected that the two of US would get together after college, but life had other plans and his brother got in the way. So Michael was actually mad about that, not just because Brian laughed it off. And that made a lot more sense because Michael's version seemed a little too petty and incomplete to me. And the reason I didn't find out about it until now was because Michael had promised his brother that he wasn't going to tell me what he heard that day. Brian had been discussing this with his friend in the backyard and he hadn't seen Michael standing

around, but as soon as he heard what Brian had said, Michael went up to him and confronted him about it. That friend went back into the house, but even he didn't tell me anything later on, which I can forgive because he and I are not as close as I am to the others, obviously. When Michael confronted Brian and asked him what he had meant when he said that he had expected me to get with him after college. Brian ended up confessing that he had feelings for me and had been waiting for us to graduate so he could ask me out because he knew that I had a strict no dating policy until I graduated. But I ended up getting together with Michael instead and that had been his first heartbreak, but

he dealt with it somehow and tried not to let it show because he wanted us to be happy. And I have to say, he did a pretty good job. Because for so many years I never had a clue that he had feelings for me and neither did Michael. Brian was the one who begged Michael not to tell me about it because that would ruin our friendship and he didn't want that to happen. So Michael stayed true to his word and didn't tell me about what Brian had said that day. But Michael still had second thoughts about me and my relationship with Brian and began to suspect me.

He knew that even if we did have a thing together, asking Brian would lead nowhere because he would just lie to him and get away with it. My guess is that he started getting paranoid after the day of the party, but since he had already promised Brian that he wouldn't bring it up with me, he just started distancing himself from us altogether. And over time the paranoia just got worse, which is why he started accusing me of absurd things and demanding a paternity test for no reason. I'm guessing at what happened,

but I don't know what exactly was going on in Michael's mind for the past couple of weeks, ever since he found out about Brian and his feelings towards me. Regardless of what he was thinking, it was ridiculous of him and I was not going to stand for it. It made no sense to me that he would rather cover for his brother than just talk to me and clear the air with all of us. It's actually crazy and I can't think of one rational,

logical explanation for any of this. Getting a divorce was the only option that I had because it had become very clear to me that there was no going back from here. I'm not talking to Brian anymore, but I'm still living with his parents, who have been kind enough to let me stay with them and even get me a lawyer because it's their kids who got me into this mess and they feel responsible for everything that's happening to me. They have been really supportive and helpful and I couldn't be more thankful that I have such great in-laws.

People like this are truly rare to come by. I have filed for a divorce and soon enough Michael will be served. He and I haven't spoken since that phone call where he told me that getting a paternity test is the only way out of this. I guess he hadn't counted on me to file for divorce because I hadn't brought it up, since at the time I still believe that we could work past this. But that was stupid of me, there is no way we can work this out. He is being insane right now and I don't think that's the kind of energy that I need around me as a new mom,

still struggling to adjust a life with a baby. If he would rather cover for his brother and make me the bad guy by suspecting me of cheating on him with Brian, instead of just doing the normal thing and talking about it, then I don't think he deserves to be a husband or a father. He can stick to being a good brother and a good son, I'll handle the rest since our family doesn't mean as much to him as the one he was born into.

Update 2, Hi, Guys. So Michael was served with the divorce papers today and he didn't see it coming, I have no clue why. He called me and asked me if I was really going to separate from him rather than just taking the easy way out and getting a paternity test done. So I told him that I knew exactly why he was upset because I had spoken to Brian and he had told me the truth. I told him that he was acting insane by covering for Brian

instead of being transparent with me and telling me exactly why he was suspecting me. He replied saying that he had promised Brian that he wouldn't tell me because that would ruin our friendship, and when I asked him if keeping that promise was worth ruining our marriage, he said that it was because apparently he believed that he owed this to Brian. But he couldn't just shake off the feeling that something was going on between us. He said that he couldn't talk to Brian about it since he didn't think he'd get the truth from him because the guy had been hiding his feelings from everyone for so long. It was unlikely that he would be honest now. And neither could he talk to me since he had made a promise. So he started over

thinking stuff and that's how he ended up having a total meltdown on the day that I confronted him and demanded a paternity test to confirm if the baby was his. He said that my reaction just made him feel worse and he started believing that I actually had been having an affair because if I didn't have anything to hide then I would just have got the paternity test done. I tried to explain to him that this wasn't about me wanting to hide the truth, but rather because of how insulting it was to me that he didn't trust me and was suspecting me of something so awful. Even though I had already filed for divorce, I tried to explain to him that keeping that promise to his brother and not being honest with me had cost him his marriage and the chance of having a happy family. He was also not even speaking to Brian anymore, so what was the point of all of that?

But Michael was not ready to listen to sense and kept insisting that this was somehow my fault for not getting that test done when I still had time. He said that I should have been more understanding because he was in a tough position, that I didn't even know of at the time. and he couldn't bring himself to ruin Brian's friendship with me because that was his brother. And neither could he live with the fact that there might have been something brewing between Brian and me and the child might not be even his. He said that I should have realized there was a lot going on and at least tried to alleviate his worries by getting the paternity test done instead of making such a huge deal about it. It was an extremely frustrating conversation and after a while, I gave up trying to make him see my side of things.

He was clearly too hung up on his own insane anxieties to consider that maybe even other people had feelings and he had deeply hurt mine. To him, some promise that he made to his brother was far more important than his wife and child and yet, he suspected this same brother to be the father of his kid. It didn't even make sense and even while I'm typing this out, I feel like I'm going to cry because of how ridiculous this situation is. If I'm being honest, I think there might be something wrong with Michael because I can't think of any sane human being acting out like this. If I was in his place and I suspected that Brian had feelings for me, I would never have made any promises because my family would be my number one priority. And by family, I don't mean my brother but the family that I chose for myself, my wife, and my son. And even if I did promise my brother that I wouldn't ruin his relationship

with my wife, I still wouldn't let myself go crazy and end up accusing my wife of cheating on me just because I was insecure. The fact that he wanted a paternity test only because he suspected me completely based on his feelings, with nothing to substantiate his fears, is what makes it even worse. Even today, the conversation that we had was completely based on what he was feeling at the moment and he didn't even seem to care that this marriage had two people in it. And a divorce was going to affect both of us, not just him. He also didn't ask about our son and how he was doing, which was very upsetting because when all of this is over,

my son might not have a father figure in his life, through no fault of his own. It's these two brothers who messed up and for some reason, the universe is punishing me and my son for it. It isn't fair and most of it doesn't even make sense really, but it is what it is. My parents are flying down in a couple of days to meet me because things are getting really awful. Michael's parents are still not speaking to either of their sons and they have started to consider cutting both of them off permanently because they find all of this incredibly disappointing. They're considering letting one of their employees take over the business instead of Michael. I definitely think they should cut Michael off, but I don't know about Brian. He hasn't done anything terrible. He was just

honest with Michael for once and Michael was the one who let it get to his head and messed up his marriage. That's not on Brian, but it's his parents' decision and I'm not going to interfere there. I'm just grateful that they are standing up for me. It might have something to do with the fact that they do want to see their grandson after the divorce, but regardless of everything, I still love and respect them because they have gone above and beyond in their attempts to make life easier for me right now. I don't think I would have been able to stand up for myself and file for divorce had it not been for them. It's crazy how supportive they are, even when it's their own son that they have to go up against.

Update 3, Michael isn't contesting the divorce and he also doesn't want custody of our son, regardless of paternity. So that's what's happening right now. I'm not surprised, but I'm still quite disappointed. But at least I have an explanation for his behavior now. He reached out to his parents a few days back and told them that he had been to see a psychologist a few weeks ago, around three days after I moved out. They did a complete psychological evaluation and medical examines.

and he had been diagnosed with a severe anxiety disorder very recently. It had taken several sessions with the doctors, but they had finally concluded that this is what was going on with him. It was shocking news for all of us because he had never exhibited any symptoms of mental illness before, so this had to be a very recent development. Or maybe he had and we had all just missed it. There's been a lot of revelations about Michael and Brian in the past couple of weeks so right now, I'm inclined to believe that maybe I didn't know these people as well as I thought I did. Regardless of the medical condition, I still think that I have no reason to forgive him because he hasn't apologized to me.

His mental state can be an explanation for his behavior, at best, but not an excuse to do whatever he pleases and say whatever he wants to. He didn't even have the courtesy to inform me himself he told his parents and that's how I got to know. Apparently, he has also been fired from his job for not showing up for one week straight after I left and he needs money to cover rent, which is another reason why he contacted his parents. I thought he might be lying about the anxiety disorder but he had all the legitimate medical documents to prove it, so I guess it's real and this is happening. In a way,

I think it's for the best if he doesn't get to be with me or see his son for a while, not until he's better at least. The divorce proceedings are about to begin in a couple of days. My parents are already here and were all living together in my in-law's house, who have been gracious enough to open their home, even to my parents. I just pray that everything falls into place soon and I can regain some sense of normalcy in my life now.