'AITA for calling out my dad’s home wrecking wife in front of their daughter?' UPDATED

"AITA for telling my dad’s wife she screwed her kid out of grandparents?"

So my (20f) dad is with his affair partner Lara. He and Lara have a kid, Lucy (13f). Lucy was conceived after my dad and Lara were already together a while, her birth wasn’t the reason my parents split in case anyone is wondering.

But obviously my dad’s family knew about the affair once my parents split, and they banned Lara from ever attending family events. To this day the only people on that side of the family that have met her are me and my one cousin who came to stay with me at my dad’s for a few days one time.

My grandparents told Dad they’d happily be active in Lucy’s life but it would have to be Dad that facilitated the relationship meaning he’d have to bring her to see them alone. Lara said no. I guess she thought eventually she’d force herself into the family through Lucy but all it did was mean no one ever met Lucy.

My dad would take me to my grandparents’ or aunts’ place without Lara and Lucy and that was just how it went. Well, it recently came up that my grandparents were giving me money towards buying an apartment when I graduate, which set Lara off. She’s always been bitter that my grandparents financed my schooling but my dad paid for university.

She’s was passive aggressively grumbling at the dinner table that this is why she felt we could have asked them to pay for my university and that it would be nice if Lucy got to have grandparents but “some people are petty and cruel”. I looked at my dad like, are we really playing that game? But he didn’t say anything.

Then Lara turns to Lucy and goes “you should know none of this is your fault, life isn’t fair and you got the short end of the stick with certain family members”. So I just said yeah the short end of the stick family member is you, Lara. Lucy could have had the same relationship with my grandparents that I do but you were so selfish that you screwed your own kid out of that."

Lara argued that no one who hated her could have a relationship with her daughter so I was like “well what are you mad about then? That your principles ended up sabotaging your kid? Maybe that’s on you”. At this point my dad was giving me a death stare so I just went back to my food.

Lara sent me a text later that night about how much she didn’t appreciate me saying that in front of her child and that it was her prerogative how she managed that relationship. She also said my dad’s family are cruel and vindictive. I didn’t reply and honestly the only reason I don’t have her blocked is in case my dad is taken ill suddenly.

But now my dad is saying it’s caused issues at home because Lucy is finally grasping that Lara is the one who wouldn’t allow her to have a relationship with Dad’s side and is now apparently pretty mad about it. He’s saying the way I went at Lara was inappropriate in front of a child and that Lucy shouldn’t have heard all that but I think she only heard it because her mother was retconning reality.

I didn’t mean to cause an issue between Lucy and Lara but honestly I do feel like Lara was asking for it by acting like an idiot in front of someone who knew the whole story.

Edit for clarification:

1.) No my dad’s family didn’t immediately forgive him. For a long time they only invited him to things if he brought me during his custody time. But time heals most things.

They all still think he’s a prick but honestly I’m sure they thought that before. No they haven’t totally cut him out because we’re just not that kind of family. But Lara was never family to start with, so it’s way easier to never make her acquaintance than to cut out your blood relative that you’ve known for 40 years. I think that’s fairly obvious?

2.) I am not mad that Lara set the boundary she did, and I’m not mad my parents got divorced. I got mad that Lara set a totally fair boundary (that my dad went along with, not saying he’s blameless he’s just not the one actively complaining) and then tried to pretend that the consequences of said boundary shouldn’t have happened?

If you don’t want your kid around people who don’t like you (understandable) why are you whining that they’re not around for your kid?

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

TheRoadkillRapunzel said:

NTA. I sincerely hope Lucy starts asking to go see them without her controlling, homewrecking, selfish mom.

ETA: OBVIOUSLY the dad has the most blame here for the affair and wrecking the family.

I had no idea a quick response would raise an army of people thinking I’m a massive misogynist because I didn’t include something so obvious. Lara is trying to use a relationship with her daughter as her way to legitimize the relationship and weasel her way into acceptance by her husband’s family. That didn’t work.

She is actively screwing her daughter out of financial support because she’s mad her plot didn’t work. If dad hadn’t been so spineless, he would have told Lara that instead of letting his daughter think her bio grandparents hate her and then hefting mad at OP when she dissolved the illusion.

Beneficial-Sort4795 said:

NTA. She’s 13 and it’s better she knows her mom was the issue and not her child self. I wouldn’t be surprised if she starts asking you for hard truths going forward because her mom spins sh!t so she’s always the victim.

I assume Lucy knows her mom was an affair partner initially? Can’t imagine the fantasy her mom spun about them being ‘destined and nothing, not even a wedding ring could stop their love’ 🙄. It sucks the rest of the family cut her loose to avoid her mother. She’s innocent and too many kids end up ostracized with this kind of thing when they should’ve just saved the rage and freeze out for the actual guilty parties.

Consistent_Hour9978 said:

NTA you told her the truth and she is now dealing with the fallout of her actions. Your grandparents are allowed to have a boundary about who they want at their house or around them. And your stepmom is allowed to not like it and keep her kid away from them. But she isn't allowed to rewrite reality to fit her narrative.

Your dad is also a problem, he should have shut her down when she started talking about his parents in front of his children but didn't. You standing up for your grandparents when she is bad-mouthing them is understandable.

I feel bad for your sister because of her mom she doesn't know a lot of her family. Hopefully, her finally knowing WHY she doesn't know them she will be able to talk her dad into taking her to see them without her mom.

OP responded:

Yeah this is how I feel. I don’t begrudge Lara her boundary, a lot of mothers have that boundary I think. But it has to be a boundary and not an attempt at blackmail. They just took her at her word.

Zestyclose-Height-36 said:

Lara doesn’t like the consequences of having an affair. too bad. you only told your half sister the truth, her mom blocked a relationship to leverage herself where she was not wanted.

And DopedWookiee said:

Well, well, well....the consequences have come home to roost. Your dad's a cheater, Lara sounds like a nightmare and you and your half sister are stuck in the middle. If she hadn't been openly talking about it at dinner you wouldn't of responded. FAFO and NTA.

Two weeks later, she shared this update:

First thing that happened - Lara would not stop texting me. Not like constantly, but once or twice a day about her feelings or demanding a response/conversation. This middle aged woman having a crash out via WhatsApp was not on my bingo card but eventually I just had to tell her I don’t want to block her because I do want to be there for my dad in an emergency but I was going to if she didn’t stop bothering me.

More crash out material. I called my dad and told him to get his household under control because this was getting crazy, I wasn’t going to apologise to her and in my whole life I’ve never had as much contact with this woman as I had in the past week and I wouldn’t allow it to continue.

My dad was kind of getting that it was an actual issue now and I pushed him a bit and the dam broke. So the wider context I was not aware of is that Lucy is only now putting the pieces together of how Dad and Lara got together.

She vaguely knew about the affair but I guess she’s finally getting what that means now that she’s older and how much damage it did, and she’s been asking a lot of hard questions about it and has been really down about it. That’s probably why Lara was so triggered by the mention of my grandparents and in a rush to put her spin on it.

But since the dinner Lucy has really been raking Lara over the coals for it apparently, because she knows my dad would have let her see the extended family were it not for Lara. My dad also shared that Lara basically feels like she’s spent a large chunk of her life being punished for the affair and it’s weighing on her because of how hard Lucy is taking it .

Side note - a lot of people were rightly roasting my dad for the affair, but if the above should prove anything, it’s how much he is definition of a cockroach. The way this man manages to get away with diabolical behaviour relatively unscathed is shocking.

The second thing that my dad said, and uncharacteristically admitted was a screw up, was telling Lara that “probably” part of the reason no one ever eased up on meeting her was because they all knew I can’t stand her.

And I hold my hands up because I did a lotttt of badmouthing Lara back in the day to my grandparents and aunts because, well, I don’t like her and when you’re a teenager you think that needs to be everyone’s problem. I don’t think this is as big a reason they still won’t meet her as my dad probably made it seem, but he did admit he threw me under the bus for it ages ago and Lara has never forgotten it.

She thinks me poisoning the well is the whole problem. So that’s probably got a lot to do with her complaining at me specifically. My dad did acknowledge that it was a mistake to tell her what was said and while I wouldn’t go around talking bad about Lara now, I don’t feel bad about sharing my feelings with my family at the time.

I did ask my dad if Lucy was going to be allowed contact with the grandparents but Lara is still saying no, but he said she’s close to cracking just because of how much of a hard time Lucy is giving her, so he’s going to wait it out.

In the meantime, I haven’t heard from Lara in a couple of days now which is what I mainly wanted from the situation. Idk what else to put in this update, if anyone had any lingering questions feel free to ask but if not, thanks for the advice!