A man on Reddit wanted to do the right thing and let his adult brother know that their father died — but his timing was less than perfect. In fact, not only did he think he should let his brother enjoy his honeymoon before delivering the bad news, but he even had the funeral before his brother came home from his trip. It shouldn't be a surprise that his brother was less than pleased when he learned what happened, but the Redditor doesn't understand where things went so wrong.
Even though the incident happened a while ago, "the fallout is still hot."
As he explained on Reddit, the original poster's (OP) father had health problems for the last several years "and he recently succumbed to them."
"During this time, my brother had gotten married and was on his honeymoon," the OP wrote.
Hoping to do the right thing, the OP wanted to be the one to tell his brother the devastating news.
Their mother died years ago, "so I am the only one left in our family that's closest to him," he reasoned. He asked other family members to refrain from sharing the news until the OP could reach him.
He wasn't planning on telling him until after his brother got back from his honeymoon.
In the meantime, not only did his family get together a few times, but they also had the funeral. But even at the ceremony, people wondered why his brother wasn't there "and I explained the situation that he is on his honeymoon."
A few people agreed that his brother deserved to enjoy his moment.
A few other people thought he should have told his brother what was happening.
"So I guess that is where the divide began," the OP wrote.
A few days after the funeral, the OP texted his brother to finally fill him in that their father died.
His brother … did not take the news well.
"He almost immediately called me up and was freaking out, understandably," he recalled. "I expected he would be surprised, but he sounded flabbergasted as if our father had no health problems prior to his death. I told him that this was going to happen eventually."
Then his brother asked when the funeral was going to be.
That's when the OP admitted that they'd already had it. His brother was rightfully furious, and started screaming and cursing at him.
"I hung up on him until he could calm down," he wrote.
Now his brother refuses to answer his calls.
The fallout has indeed been swift.
"I understand he has the right to be mad but he should also understand I did it so he wouldn't be stressing over what would be a happy time in his life," the OP argued.
Unfortunately, not everyone in the comments section saw things that way.
Some people believe the OP absolutely botched this whole thing.
"Putting off telling him is one thing," one commenter wrote. "Having a funeral and not giving him the chance to attend is another. What you’ve done is terrible. You’ve taken away his only chance to say goodbye to his father. You're lucky if he ever forgives you."
"And then he TEXTED him the news …" someone else chimed in. "'Hey bro how was your honeymoon? Bring me any souvenirs? Also by the way dad died.'"
"Yeah really, btw dad died AND WE HELD HIS FUNERAL WITHOUT YOU. Awful," a third commenter agreed.
Later in the thread, the OP posted his exact text message to his brother. And … it was not great.
"It said '[Brother's Name] I wanted to wait until you got back to tell you this so you could enjoy time with [his wife's name], but dad is dead," he recalled. "He had a heart attack over a week ago and passed. I know this might be a surprise and we're all here for you. Let me know if you need to talk, thanks."
A few people thought his heart was in the right place.
"Not the [expletive]," one commenter wrote. "You did what you thought was right, out of kindness."
"He should respect the decision you took in his interest," a second person agreed. "It may or may not have been the right thing to do, but you tried to protect him. Your brother should not make a picture of you being responsible for your father's death."
Unfortunately for the OP, it doesn't really matter what the internet said. His brother's silence is message enough that he completely bungled this responsibility. Clearly, it was more important to his brother to be at the funeral than to be left to enjoy his honeymoon — so the OP might want to apologize. ASAP.
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