'AITA for wanting to kick out my BIL because of his inappropriate behavior?' UPDATED 2X + CONCLUDED

'AITAH for not wanting to live with BIL anymore?'

My husband (32M) and I have been married for two years. His Dad and Stepmom are going through an ugly divorce, so his half brother (17M) has moved in with us to live for a year till he starts college. My husband loves his brother, treats him like a little kid and is over protective of him. I find BIL's behavior obnoxious and we are having too many arguments over this.

He's been with us for only a month and a half and I can't stand it and I really don't think I can put up with it for a year. It started off with him making messes and throwing away leftovers. Since I do most of the cooking and cleaning, it was increasing my workload. My husband's list of chores have not increased by his presence so he was dismissive of my complaints.

Since husband wasn't saying anything I tried telling him to pick up after himself. BIL retaliated by spanking my butt. Anytime I tell him to do something he hits my butt hard and laughs. Husband told him to knock it off but he keeps doing it and husband treats it as if he's just playing around, no big deal. Not only is it very disrespectful, but its really painful.

After that he started randomly picking me up and carrying me around. I am a little over 5 ft and 120 lbs and he's a tall stocky guy. I hate it and husband just thinks he's goofing around and trying to be friends with me. I work from home and the other day when it was just him and me in the house, he picked me up and ran with me to my bedroom and threw me on the bed.

It really scared me, but he just laughed at me and left. Husband thinks I am being dramatic by being scared by this. I feel like his behavior is escalating, but my husband tells me to act like the adult and not blow up over a kid's playfulness. I am anxious everyday and I am seriously thinking of moving out though it'll be difficult to afford it. AITAH for telling my husband that I don't feel safe in our home?

What do you think? AITA? This is what top commenters had to say:

Sea-Dentist-1726 said:

NTA. Put your foot down. No. You are still nearly newly weds, and your marriage is important. Have another sterner talk to your husband about how it's impacting you. Ultimately, it's up to you, but if my husband dismissed my feelings and concerns for someone else who isn't his child, it would raise a red-flag for me.

17 years old is NOT A KID in regards to behavior. This teen is pushing you and laughing that your husband is on his side more than yours. It comes across as juvenile dominance behavior.

TarzanKitty said:

I understand the parents are divorcing but why does that mean that neither one can parent their kid? I don’t know any divorced parents who unloaded their children on a 3rd party when they divorced.

Everiscale said:

If we rephrase what is happening to "a man living with you and your husband started sexually touching you and has escalated to physically forcing you onto a bed while your husband belittles your feelings of being scared in your own home" a proper response is leave and inform the police.

Few-School-3869 said:

NTA It is completely inappropriate that a 17m is spanking his sister in law's butt and throwing you on the bed and totally messed up that your husband isn't standing up for you and finds this behavior okay. Like I would threaten to leave over this

psychknowitall1 said:

I feel like the main points have been covered but I have one more to add. (Shrink whose worked with sex offenders/offenders) Sexual and physical abuse is a social system problem. The Entitlement behind sexual violence is nearly always reinforced in the family unit first. Your husband IS reinforcing his treatment of you and is part of the problem.

Sex offenders often have counseling with the whole family system after the violence to decrease the risk of reoffending. His whole family system is an issue, and his behaviour is escalating. He has reinforced his behaviour every step of the way and no consequence has occurred that would prevent him from doing more.

I would quite honestly rate this situation as a high risk of further sexual violence and I would expect afterwards that your husband would stand behind his brother and not you as a victim. Godspeed.

Verdict: Definitely NTA. And also, most people agreed she is not in a safe environment and should get out asap.

Update:

Thank you so much for your comments and validating me. My husband had me confused and believing that I was over reacting. I am so relieved to hear from so many people that this is as dangerous and bad as I feel. I have packed a bag in my car and some important belongings and documents. I am 29F for those who asked, I forgot to put that in my post.

I called and talked to MIL early in the morning. She's always been very nice to me and at my wedding she told me she thinks of me as her daughter. My mom passed away when I was young and I don’t have any siblings so that had moved me very much. I was nervous about talking to her because I didn’t want to ruin that relationship, but she was so shocked when she heard the details.

She said she’d talk to my husband and FIL and this was unacceptable situation and told me to come stay with her till it got resolved. BIL is out with his friends till tomorrow for 4th of July, so it gives me some time to have one more detailed discussion with my husband. I am also going to show him this reddit post and hopefully his Mom's talk and these comments will be a wakeup call.

Update #2:

I am very appreciative of everyone who commented on my last post and gave me encouragement. I won’t be able to respond to all, but I appreciate it. I wasn’t able to resolve this issue with my husband and I have moved out. I am trying to come to terms with the fact that this is the end of my marriage.

My MIL was on my side and talked to my husband about this situation, but he got more annoyed with me because he saw this as me creating more drama between MIL and FIL and causing old grievances to rise. I showed him the reddit post I made and the comments and he accused me of presenting things in a lurid manner to get people on my side.

He didn’t even read all the discussions, just got enraged and closed the tab. MIL also talked to FIL who came down on BIL about his behavior. FIL told BIL to leave our house and move in with him. BIL refused saying he wants to stay with my husband. My husband came up with the solution that BIL was to stay in his room and I should stay in my bedroom, lock the door and not get out till he got home from work.

This pissed me off more. I had packed a bag and my documents thinking of leaving anyway. FIL talked to me and said that he doesn’t like that we aren’t getting along (!) and BIL will no longer stay with us. But the next day BIL came into the house with a group of his friends. I simply grabbed my laptop and left. I am so grateful to the people who had suggested that I be packed and ready to go.

I already had everything in my car and could leave with what I needed immediately. I am staying with MIL now. She is flabbergasted by my husband who’s told her that he’ll never ask a close family member to leave his house. It is clear that my husband doesn’t even like me, much less care about me at all. He hasn’t spoken to me since I left.

I am trying to figure out what I should do next. I obviously can’t stay with MIL for long, especially since I need to start the divorce process. I could move back in with my Dad, but he lives in another state and that’ll make things hard. I don’t have any savings and I am short on money.

The majority of my paycheck goes into half of the mortgage and utilities on our house. We have a combined joint account. I have been foolishly spending a lot on decorating the house instead of saving up and I suppose all that is gone now. I need to figure out my money situation so I can support myself.

FINAL UPDATE (3.5 months later):

A few of you have been messaging me asking for updates and for those who still care to know, the update is that my husband and I are getting divorced. We have been separated since I left home at that time. The house has been sold and I got the equity out of it.

I got some kitchen appliances and some decor back but for the most part I lost the money I spent on furnishings, but that's ok, it could’ve been worse. After my last post, I had separated my money out, hired a lawyer and handled utilities so I wouldn’t be paying anything. My ex was shocked by my actions. He was waiting to call my bluff and couldn’t believe I’d go so far so quickly.

He didn’t take my leaving seriously because I was staying at his Mom’s house. We had more arguments and I started realizing that he never would really hear me. He was always so focused on being right and having his way that he could twist reality to fit his needs. Looking back it was always like that in our relationship but I was in love and a pushover.

We went into marital counseling. I agreed to go because mostly I wanted an acknowledgement from him that what went on was messed up and also because my MIL really pushed me to try to make it work with him. It was all a shit show because he denied a lot of egregious things and presented the issues as minor things that I was twisting up.

He stuck to his viewpoint that BIL was simply goofing around and I got offended because I haven’t had siblings and don’t know how they mess around with each other. After a few weeks of counseling my ex agreed to have BIL move out, but he was acting as if he made this huge sacrifice for me and I didn’t believe it. I had already checked out of this relationship and knew I couldn’t trust him anymore.

MIL was very disappointed that I still wanted a divorce after her son compromised. I had moved out of MIL’s house after a month of staying with her, I stopped contributing to the mortgage payments and got my own apartment. It was a risky thing to do but I decided I’d take that hit to my credit history for my independence. I bet that it’d matter more to him and that forced his hand into selling the house.

It was sold as soon as it got on the market so that was a huge relief. All my decorating paid off in that way at least. I’ve stayed in touch with my MIL and heard from her that ex moved into a small apartment and BIL had moved back with FIL.

I also heard from some mutual friends that he’s been telling everyone that the divorce is happening because I was jealous and controlling and tried to separate him from his family, and I was a nagging harpy to his baby brother. He already has a new girlfriend who’s “more family oriented.”

I am waiting for the final divorce decree to be signed and I hope there are no problems or delays there. I know a lot of you wanted me to make a police report about BIL but I didn’t feel safe doing that. I don’t have a support system that I can rely on if things go wrong and I want to walk away from this with minimum harm.

A lot of people have chided me for not hitting back but at no point did I think I could do that and get away without taking a beating. I suppose I am not a very brave person, but I think I am looking at my chances realistically and doing what I can to keep myself reasonably safe.