22-year-old tells father's affair partner she's on her own to care for disabled father. AITA?
"AITA for telling my father's affair partner that she married him and she can take care of him now that he can no longer take care of himself?"
My father was not a very warm and caring father when my siblings and I (all in our 20s now) were young. I'm the youngest and I was only 8 when we all found out he was having an affair with a woman he worked with.
The affair only came out because the affair partner grew tired of our father staying married to mom and showed no signs of being willing to divorce mom for her. So she took measures into her own hands and confronted mom with the truth. My siblings and I were all home at the time.
It blindsided my mom significantly because, while she knew our father worked a lot, he had always been attentive as a spouse to her and he could play pretend that he was invested in his kids. My mom's marriage to him fell apart and she moved out of his house with us and we started anew.
My father fought for shared custody. I often wonder if this was to punish her or us or something because it's not like he had any role in our lives at all. But he was awarded shared custody.
His affair partner threw herself into this role of "stepmom" and she acted like she was some new person who had no bad history with us/our family. She even ignored the fact she destroyed our mom's heart right in front of us.
We did not like her and within two years she told our father she no longer wanted us around anymore because "all we did was bully her and make her feel like she was some unimportant mistake he made" and she was also bothered by the fact none of us would acknowledge her as our father's wife or our stepmom. When asked we would always say she was our father's affair partner. This wasn't something she wanted following her around or thrown in her face a lot.
So we had no contact with our father for more than a decade. I'm 22 now. Recently the affair partner made contact to inform us that our father had suffered several health complications and he is now ill and disabled. My oldest brother confirmed this is true and is aware of which hospital he's currently in.
None of us had any interest in seeing him and we expressed this, though not to her, to our father's sister. His affair partner decided my siblings would never give in but she knew a much younger me had a hope for a better relationship with my dad and she tried to say she couldn't care for him and the four young children they have under the age of 7 and that "my family needs me."
I told her clearly that they were not my family and that she married him so she was responsible for caring for him now that he cannot care for himself and I told her I would not help and did not care how tough it was for them.
Her response was full of anger but she in not so many words called me an ahole. I ignored her but she again insulted me and claimed that I was sick and cruel for my stance. AITA?
Here's what top commenters had to say:
hydrangeafrog said:
NTA, your dad made the choice to be sh%tty to your family & his affair partner chose to marry him. There's that whole "in sickness and in health" marriage thing she seems to have forgotten about.
Bananasfosterkid said:
NTA. She wanted him all to herself and now she has him. All. To. Herself.
Leopard-Recent said:
NTA and it sounds like dad and his affair partner literally f'ed around and found out. It's not the responsibility of you or your siblings to help or care about the situation they've found themselves in.
lovinglifeatmyage said:
She got what she wanted and sucks for her that it turned sour. Karma is really cool sometimes isn’t it? NTA.
Logical-Cost4571 said:
NTA nope their made their bed, they have to lay in it