'AITA for not letting my 'hippie spiritual' sister around my good Christian kids?'
"AITA for not letting my spiritual sister be around my kids?"
DoughnutNarrow4678 writes:
My sister (30F) and I (34F) have always been pretty close since we were kids, despite having different lifestyles. I live in the suburbs with my husband and two daughters (5 & 7), and we're both teachers.
My sister is a freelance photographer and does van life, traveling all over the West Coast. I'm Christian, and she's very spiritual—she believes in crystals, horoscopes, tarot, etc. But despite our differences, we're still close and make an effort to see each other often.
The problem began when she joined a van life group with similar beliefs to hers and started traveling with them occasionally almost two years ago. Since joining, she's developed a lot of new practices and beliefs and has become very "hippie." To clarify, I have no problem with her lifestyle or beliefs—she's happy, and that's all that matters to me.
Last October, she stayed with us for a month while her van was being repaired. Like I said, we were close at the time, and my daughters love her, so there was no problem. However, a couple of incidents occurred. The first was when she smoked weed in the garden while my kids were playing. I politely asked her not to, and she stopped.
One night, she snuck into my daughters' room and burned an incense stick without asking, which really angered me because my youngest is asthmatic. She apologized and said she was just trying to "purify" the space while they were asleep. I brushed it off as her trying to be kind, but the final straw came a week later when she did a tarot reading with my oldest.
I wasn't there, but my daughter came to me crying, saying that my sister told her she was going to be unhappy and die soon. She was really disturbed by the whole situation. I asked my sister to leave because my daughter seemed very uncomfortable around her. She ended up staying with her boyfriend for the last week of repairs.
I wanted to give her a second chance and forgive her, so she came to stay with us at Christmas since my parents' house was full for the week. One night, my husband and I went out and left her to babysit with strict instructions.
She promised not to repeat what she did before. Well, we came home early, and she had invited a bunch of her van life friends over, and they had all been drinking. I completely blew up at her and asked her to leave, which she did.
The next day, I found a bunch of sage and crystals underneath my kids' beds. My daughters told me she had told them to stop going to Sunday school because "it's all made up," and they seemed really upset by it. I was furious and called her, telling her to stay away from my kids and stop pushing her beliefs onto them.
Since then, she's been contacting me nonstop. A few weeks ago, I told her I didn't want her to have a relationship with my daughters if she was going to repeat the same behaviors. She called me discriminatory and heartless and has gotten my parents on board, telling me I'm being unfair. I'm not sure if I'm overreacting to this situation or if my reaction is justified. AITA?
Here are the top rated comments:
GothPenguin says:
NTA-Her beliefs are fine for her, but it’s not fine for her to push them on your children. Then to bring complete strangers into your home to throw a party while your kids are home is completely ridiculous. It’s unfair? No, it isn’t. Unfair is her trying to sneak her beliefs into their lives and telling them what they’re doing is wrong.
SunshineSeriesB says:
NTA. Your sister is behaving VERY inappropriately, regardless of her beliefs, by repeatedly imposing her beliefs on your children and upsetting them AFTER you asked her to stop, not doing her diligence as a caretaker for your child PLUS just being a poor houseguests.
I'm sure if she were aligned with any other spirituality/religion and did these same things it would be a problem. It's not her spirituality or her beliefs - it's HER. 100% justified. She probably sold sob story about how you're discriminating against her beliefs, but in reality, she's the danger to your childrens' physical and mental well being.
Bfan72 says:
NTA. This is just the beginning. She deliberately told your daughters things that she knew would potentially upset them. She put your daughter’s health at risk. She invited strangers over when you weren’t home. This isn’t what a loving aunt does. A loving aunt would lose her mind if someone did that to her nieces or nephews.
StrategyDouble4177 says:
People pushing their beliefs on children (ANY beliefs) that are not their own children, is inappropriate. That would be like baptizing her child if you were babysitting. No. Not ok. Seems like the problem isn’t that your kids might find out other people have other beliefs, but that your sister is a boundary stomper. NTA.