As if the uncertainty we're all facing around this worldwide health crisis wasn't bad enough, many people are also having to contend with the questions that come with the company of relatives who behave badly. Case in point: An expectant mom took to Reddit to share that she had told her parents, who had been quarantining with her and and her family, to leave her house. The woman felt she had no choice after her mother told her stepdaughter that the mom-to-be would abandon her once the newborn arrives.
In the Am I the A--hole subreddit, the OP explained that when she met her husband, he was a single dad to a 1-year-old, who she refers to as Ella.
Ella is now 7 and with her bio-mom not in the picture, the OP says she's always been Ella's "mom." "To me, she's my daughter who I love more than anyone else," noted the Redditor. "Ella has been glued to my side ever since and I honestly love being a mom."
The OP is also six months pregnant and has been quarantining at a beach house with her husband, Ella, and her parents.
"My parents aren't that close to Ella yet so DH and I thought this could be a opportunity for them to bond with her," wrote the OP.
The situation was "OK" for a few months, according to the mom-to-be. But while her dad "slowly started playing with Ella," her mom "hasn't really tried and instead fixates" on her pregnancy. And it "all came to a head a few days ago."
According to the OP, Ella ran down to the beach where she was reading. She was "crying hysterically."
The 7-year-old held onto the OP tightly and begged her not to leave. "I was confused and asked her what was wrong," she wrote. "She said Grandma told her that once the baby was born, I'd love the baby a lot more than her and that I'd slowly abandon her cause she was just my stepchild and not really mine."
The OP was furious. "I saw red," she wrote. "Once Ella started to calm down, I left her with DH, who took a break from work no questions asked (God this guy is amazing), and I proceeded to rip my mom a new one. I called her every name I could think of. She then accused my 'stepdaughter' of lying about the whole thing and that was it for me. I told them to f— off and to pack their bags."
The OP said her father understood while her mom "just cried and begged" her to "think about it."
"They've since left and I've got a ton of messages from them, my siblings, and aunts and uncles," noted the OP. "I blocked them all."
After the incident, the OP focused on comforting her daughter and being comforted by her husband. She wrote once she had calmed down, she unblocked her sister with whom she's close. "While she understood where I was coming from, it was still an a–hole move to kick my parents out in the middle of a pandemic," explained the OP. "My daughter is my priority though, so I feel like I made the right choice, but was I the a–hole for kicking my parents out?"
The mom's fellow Redditors agreed that she was well within her right to kick her folks out.
One commenter wrote, "Your mother is an absolute a–hole. To tell a small child something so horrible and untrue is psychopathic behavior. I wouldn't let this woman within screaming distance of my children ever again."
Another shared, "I'm seeing red too. Your mom had literally no reason to say such a cruel thing to Ella."
A third applauded the OP, writing: "Good for you for putting your daughter first and not allowing your mother to get away with that. You sound like a wonderful mom." She added, "I would've kicked her out too. The fact that your mother refused to take any responsibility, doesn't seem to feel any shame … and then trying to turn your family against you to force you into capitulation tells me that she has a long history of saying horrible, scarring things. To be clear, her behavior was not only unacceptable, it was disgusting and damaging. You may want to go low or no contact, you may want to set up stringent rules and boundaries."
Later on in the thread, the OP added that, at this point, she is considering a "no contact" policy.
"I'm honestly considering going NC if it's what's best for Ella," she shared. "And yeah, I absolutely won't let her feel left out. I'm always over the top with affection for her cause I know she needs the extra assurance that I'm really her mom and here to stay."
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
