'AITA for telling my sister she deserves no sympathy for being cheated on?'
"AITA for telling my sister she deserves no sympathy for being cheated on?"
I (26F) have a younger sister, "Bayla" (23F), and we've had a tense relationship for the past ten years. Back when I was six and she was three, our dad (47M) cheated on our mom (47F), which destroyed the family.
My mom was working hard in med school while also trying to parent me, and my dad was the type of man who was resentful that my mom had the audacity to find a way to continue school instead of dropping out and being a wife to him.
Instead of talking to my mom, he became passive-aggressive, would try to sabotage her, and eventually started his affair with my stepmom, "Judy" (44F)—something my mom found out about after coming home and catching them in her bed.
Bayla and I were really young, so my mom decided not to tell us the truth, and Judy used that to get in our good graces. I was always polite but distant, but Bayla was young enough for it to work, and it wasn't long before she started calling Judy "Mom," which really ticked off my mom, but Judy and my dad loved it.
I found out the truth when I was ten and became a lot colder and angrier whenever I had to go to my dad's place. My mom tried to put me into therapy, but Judy and my paternal grandma didn't think it was needed, so my dad wouldn't consent to it—something my mom had to take him to court over.
When Bayla was 13, she started getting on me about refusing to do anything for Judy on Mother's Day, as well as not helping convince our mom to share the day with Judy since "they were both our moms."
I snapped and told her the truth. She didn't believe it at first, but when Judy's brother confirmed it, she sulked about it for about a week before going back to being loving toward Judy. In her words: "It was a long time ago," "Cheating happens," "You can't stop love," and that "everything worked out in the end."
She said that frequently to our mom and started a campaign to try and force her to forgive Dad and accept Judy. She even said that our mom would be a bad mother if she hated our dad and Judy more than she loved her. To her credit, my mom did try, but Judy was such a passive-aggressive mean girl that my mom eventually washed her hands of the situation.
When it was time for Bayla's high school graduation, she gave our mom an ultimatum: either sit next to Judy for the entire ceremony and pay for her and our dad's share of the bill for dinner (my mom was willing to pay for everyone else but them) or she wouldn’t be invited to her graduation at all.
Our mom sat out the graduation and didn’t attend the dinner. Judy made a post about how evil some mothers can be for not putting their child first, which Bayla liked and shared. In response, Mom took back the car she had given Bayla—it was still in her name.
Our mom still paid for Bayla's college tuition, but she refused to pay for her room and board like she did for me, and Bayla accused her of favoritism. After that, Bayla and Mom went VLC, and that's how it's been for years.
During this time, Bayla met, dated, and got engaged to Ethan (26M). She did send Mom an invitation, but I think that was just to get some money out of it. Unfortunately, the engagement was called off because Ethan ended up cheating, and Bayla found out after going to the doctor and discovering she had caught something from him.
Bayla reached out to Mom, but all she got was an "I'm sorry you're going through this" text. Bayla was furious, but I told her that, given how she treated our mom and dismissed what Dad and Judy did, she shouldn’t expect much. Bayla, my dad, Judy, and some paternal relatives are calling me an A, but am I?
Here's what people had to say to OP:
Looking at this as between you and your sister, yta. Aged and time matter here. Your sister is unlikely to remember a time before Judy was in her life, or your parents were together. My parents separated when I was 2. I have zero memories of them together. That said I do have memories from around 4-5.
So she had 10 years of legit having 2 moms, and no recollection of otherwise. You had memories of only 1 mom. And 4 years after Judy came into your life you found out the truth.
What do you expect ? You just can’t compare the two situations.
You're right, both situations are different. My mom gave my sister more sympathy towards her situation in a single text than Bayla ever gave her in years.
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Yes, her wanting to maintain a relationship with your dad and his new wife is fine but throwing it in your mom’s face was like stabbing her heart. Her blackmailing your mom to sit next to AP and buying their meal presumably cause she makes more money, is so disgusting. I’m sorry especially to your mom.
Guess your sister learned manipulation from your dad and stepmom. NTAH. Maybe someday she will understand how they used parental alienation to destroy her relationship with you guys.
My mom definitely makes more. The kind where she was able to take 18 months off of work to be a doctor in an impoverished country for no pay without having to change her lifestyle when she got back home. My mom's also one of those women who gets better with age and arguably looks better now than she did in her 20s.
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Yes, her wanting to maintain a relationship with your dad and his new wife is fine but throwing it in your mom’s face was like stabbing her heart. Her blackmailing your mom to sit next to AP and buying their meal presumably cause she makes more money, is so disgusting.
I’m sorry especially to your mom. Guess your sister learned manipulation from your dad and stepmom. NTAH. Maybe someday she will understand how they used parental alienation to destroy her relationship with you guys.
My mom definitely makes more. The kind where she was able to take 18 months off of work to be a doctor in an impoverished country for no pay without having to change her lifestyle when she got back home. My mom's also one of those women who gets better with age and arguably looks better now than she did in her 20s.
So Bayla was three years old, huh? And didn’t know anything for the next DECADE and was then expected to just throw over the woman she called “mom” who had been there her entire life? And people are shocked that instead she strove to return to what had been normal for her entire life? Come on.
If Bayla values her fantasy more than respecting our mom's feelings and boundaries then that's her problem. My mom never told Bayla that she wasn't allowed to still have a relationship with her.
Artistic-Tough-7764 says:
NTA - the Forgiveness Bus is a ride set up by people who do awful things and don't want long term consequences.
No_Cockroach4248 says:
NTA, why is Bayla upset? If she can insist your mom should forgive your dad and Judy, she should forgive Ethan and his AP and attend their wedding and send a very expensive present or pay for their wedding dinner.
Beneficial_Test_5917 says:
Dad and his relatives, and Bayla who's been brainwashed from an early age, think you're the bad one. Everyone else without a bias rightly thinks you are NTA. Stick with Mom in this whole mess.
YTA. Bayla was a child and didn’t fully grasp what she was saying and doing. Also, it’s not a terrible thing for her to develop a healthy relationship with her step mother. It would be ideal if mom were able to embrace that but, at a minimum, she shouldn’t have been an impediment to it. Sister may be learning a hard lesson about how relationships can cause pain, but mother and sister enjoying it is outrageous
Bayla was 18 at her graduation so...?