'AITA for how I confronted my daughter over her behavior when it comes to her sister's BF?'

"AITA for how I confronted my daughter over her behavior when it comes to her sister's boyfriend?"

I (39f) have two daughters, "Sarah" (17f) and "Olivia" (14f). Their dad and I are divorced but we do co-parent fairly well. Sarah and Olivia have always been super close, even with a bit of an age gap. They do everything together; watching shows, doing each other’s hair, inside jokes that I don’t even try to understand.

When Olivia was younger, she insisted to sleep in Sarah's bed if she had a nightmare and they used to have little sleep overs in Olivia's room. Even now, I still catch them going over to each other's room late at night or so though I don't mean to snoop, I've seen silly late nights from Olivia to Sarah which she always replies to.

Sarah has always been very protective of Olivia, and Olivia absolutely adores Sarah. But recently, Olivia has gotten a boyfriend "Aidan" ( to be clear, this isn't a serious relationship; just texting, hand holding, and a couple "dates" that her dad and I supervise from a distance). Ever since, Sarah has been acting off.

At first, I thought she was just feeling weird about her little sister growing up, but then it started to feel more like outright resentment. She started making little passive-aggressive comments, like, “Oh, I guess I’m not good enough for you anymore,” or, “Why don’t you go hang out with him instead? if Olivia was going to spend time with Aidan instead of her.

Sarah was really cold and standoffish whenever Aidan came over to our house. Sometimes, she outright ignored him entirely and I saw her checking Olivia's door one time since it's supposed to remain open when Aidan is over.

Sarah even suggested that Olivia take her to her spring formal that's coming up next next month instead, one time at dinner, and was a little serious about it now that I'm thinking back, but made it a joke when Olivia was put off by it.

Olivia seemed to be laughing off Sarah's behavior off but then I noticed she was walking on eggshells when it comes to Aidan in order not to upset Sarah. I tried to repeatedly address this with Sarah and their dad but they both have brushed me off, by either making a joke of it or saying it was just weird to see her little sister growing up so fast.

With the latter argument, I suggested to Sarah that she bring it up to her therapist but I don't think she ever had and I wasn't gonna to ask her therapist about it and invade her privacy there. The breaking point was when two days ago, Olivia invited both Aidan and a couple of her friends over for a movie night, and Sarah proceeded to lock herself in her the minute they got to our house.

Sarah has left when Olivia has had friends over before but when that happened, she was pretty specific about just giving Olivia some space. This time she hadn't said a word. I guess she must've gotten hungry or just needed something from downstairs because Sarah eventually went downstairs, and a few minutes later I heard shouting.

So I came downstairs and Sarah was glaring at Aidan with the meanest expression I think I've seen her give to somebody. I asked what was going on, and Olivia told me when Aidan had tried to talk to her older sister, Sarah had snapped "What? Do you not have anything better to do than steal my sister from me?" verbatim. I asked Sarah if this was true and she gave a small nod.

After reassuring Aidan that he was welcome in our home, I went after Sarah who had snuck away while I was doing so. I told her flat out that it felt like she was being possessive over Olivia and that, while I understood this was an adjustment, Olivia was allowed and supposed to have other people in her life than Sarah who she was close to.

Sarah got upset and said I was accusing her of something terrible when she was just “missing her sister.” and if I feel that way then she's going to stay over at their dad's place. I agreed to it just to give her some space, as she started to pack a bag but when I called their dad, he jumped on me asking why I thought it was a good idea to kick Sarah out for even a little bit over not liking her sister's boyfriend.

When I asked for an explanation of what the f#$k he was talking about, he told me this; Apparently Sarah said that I kicked her out because I was tired of her not trying to spend time with Aidan and wanted her to reflect on why she was so resistant to what might be her future brother-in-law. I immediately gave my side of the story, and while my ex seemed hesitant to believe me, promised to talk to Sarah about this.

Fast forward to now. Sarah hasn't answered my calls or texts and my ex hasn't spoken to me either. I've been really stewing over this last 48 hours and while I know Sarah is wrong for lying, maybe I was too harsh or I wasn't being very understanding when I initially confronted her the other day. Any advice is immensely appreciated.

The internet had a lot of thoughts about the situation.

Quiet-Hamster6509 wrote:

Sarah needs therapy. She has developed an extremely unhealthy dependency on her sister to the point where id wager she has no friends. This jealousy is going to fester and grow, and she is going to lash out at Olivia. Their lovely relationship they had will be gone and your oldest will suffer the most because she's done nothing wrong, just living her life and having a social circle. Get her help now.

artnodiv wrote:

IMHO this is all about the younger sister having a BF before the older sister did. Or at least having a BF currently. I have two boys, and while they don't fight over girls (yet), if the younger one accomplishes something the older one hasn't or can't, the resentment comes out.

And it's hard as a parent to navigate because they have completely different maturity levels relative to their age. All we can do is the best we can do.

GardenGnomeOrgy wrote:

Sarah seems to have some sort of deeper seeded issues. Does she struggle to make friends? Has she ever had a boyfriend? It seems more like jealousy than possessiveness, it’s just coming out that way because it feels like a safe way to present it for Sarah.

While I don’t doubt her love for her sister, it seems Sarah has more than possession affecting her and the fact that she cannot be honest with her self is leading her to also lie in other ways. Like telling her father that you said things you didn’t.

The father seems pretty removed and while you mentioned you co-parent decently, it definitely seems like there is a lack of true communication and understanding, which has to be frustrating. I’m dealing with the same, while my ex and I are navigating it okay, there is a lack of true communication and fuck if it doesn’t drive me a little crazy.

I think talking with your daughters therapist would be a good idea, she needs to address her jealousy and work on moving forward in her life, she will be 18 soon and able to go off to college or what have you, but it will be hell and torture for her if she doesn’t address these problems and could cause a much more serious mental state later on.

DesperateLobster69 wrote:

NTA. But Sarah's playing you guys against each other. Your husband should've know to believe you over her!! You're the adult & have no reason to lie about what happened. Tell him that he shouldn't allow her to lie & manipulate him.

Parents need to project a united front. You're not really united co-parents if she can go back & forth between you 2 telling lies and get away with it!! She's being weird & possessive over her sister! Pretty creepy how she wanted her sister to take her to the spring formal. Definitely speak with her therapist at this point!!!