'AITA for going off on my SIL after she got upset over an altercation from 12 yrs ago?'

"AITA for giving my SIL a reality check about her actions after she got upset over an altercation from 12 years ago?"

My (31F) sister in law (34F) has been a thorn in my side for almost two decades. When I first met her in my middle school years, I idolized her for being older and cooler, except when I met her, she wasn’t dating my brother (33M); she was dating his best friend. My brother and I have always been extremely close and share a friend group so I was often with some of his friends and D also starting coming around frequently.

Not too long later, D had caused some chaos between the friend group, cheating on her boyfriend with my brother, cheated on my brother with the best friend, and slowly making her way around the rest of his friends, spare one. As you can probably guess, my adoration for her quickly dissipated.

Her true colors continued to show more and more. D has no filter and says very rude and inappropriate things to myself, my family, and our friends constantly. Most friends actually distanced themselves from my brother because of her. She became more insufferable as time went on. This caused my brother to get kicked out of a house he was renting with his friends. They ended up getting an apartment together, and by they, I just mean my brother.

D didn’t work, doesn’t drive or know how, and just went to school. My brother had to rearrange his work schedule to drive her to and from classes, pay for the apartment and everything that comes with it, and had to cook and clean because with school she was “too busy”. It was hard to watch and even harder to be around.

She had rules like not being able to get a glass of water if we came over because we didn’t pay rent there, and would scold my brother if he did so anyways. She would also make very rude and snide remarks anytime she was around anyone. Saying things to me specifically like “You probably shouldn’t have kids or you might pass down a lazy eye…”

(my eyes are perfectly fine by the way) or “I think your mom could have treated you worse to be honest." She also told my baby cousin who was struggling with an eating disorder that she should quit after high school so she doesn’t lose her prime years of being skinny. Needless to say I was less than a fan.

Not too long later, I get a call from my brother who is beside himself because he walked in on her cheating on him. I was relieved to be honest, but I listened and reassured him that he didn’t deserve any of it. He was heart broken for months, but in that time, we got closer than we were and his friends started coming around again.

Months later, they reconnect and I’m close enough with my brother to let him know that I don’t condone cheating or the hurt she put him through and I don’t think it’s a very smart idea. I told him I’ll support him no matter what but I don’t want to be around her. I remind him that it’s not the first time she’s done it either, seeing as how that’s how they got together in the first place.

He reassures me he will be fine. Weeks go by and my parents are out of town. I lived with my dad and step mom at the time, and my brother asked if he could come stay at my dad’s while they were gone to get some peace from his roommates. I agreed, but didn’t realize he would bring D.

I immediately, and immaturely, confronted her and yelled at her to get off my property and that she would not be staying there. Things escalated physically and they ended up leaving.

Fast forward to now. I now live out of state, and come home for holidays. This was my first Christmas home with my fiancée, and though he’s been home with me before, it was special to me because Christmas is my favorite time of the year and it’s has nothing to do with gifts but everything to do with my very big, very loving family.

Every year we go to my dad’s for Christmas Eve and open presents with our immediate family and then head out to our cousins to eat and drink and play games and spend time together. This year, I was kid free. My kiddos were with their dad, my ex husband, this year.

Even without kids, it’s a lot to plan and execute a trip because I normally only get to stay for 24-48 hours after you factor in travel time and my work schedule. I forgot my nieces presents back home.

I asked my brother if he could resend me her list so I could run to target and buy her gifts to open and I’d mail the rest. They ended up having the exact same gifts, besides one, so I got everything, wrapped them up and headed to my dad’s.

I was greeted by my younger brother (25M), my dad and step mom, and my older brother and niece showed up right after me. D was nowhere to be found, and my brother explained her parents were in town and staying at their house so she stayed behind to entertain them. My family is very welcoming and would t have minded having them, but her family is not.

At my brother and SIL wedding, her family set up two tables to split the families and then had my brother and D sit with her family in the seats that made their backs face my family. They did not speak to us the entire reception. We opened gifts, and my niece was glued to me which was great because I don’t see her often and I was missing my kids. We enjoy the rest of the night and the rest of our trip.

Six days later I receive a text from my older brother stating that I was the reason D didn’t come to Christmas. That I offended her and they no longer wanted to be around my children or have me around theirs. I was very confused because I honestly don’t care to talk to D, let alone converse about her.

He explained the my little brother’s girlfriend Lara, who I’m very close with, brought up the story of our altercation and D was embarrassed and upset. I called Lara and she explained that D was actually talking negatively about me to Lara. Lara just agreed that she knew we weren’t very friendly and explained she knew about that altercation, but she did clarify that my little brother was the one who told her.

I called my brother and explained that I was not the one who brought this up to Lara. I also didn’t appreciate that D was speaking negatively about me and is now upset because she didn’t like something said about her, but the difference was that she was talking about me in the present and our situation happens in the past. (It’s something my brother and I have already hashed out years ago.)

I told him I didn’t understand why D couldn’t just talk to me herself. We are grown adults, we have each others contact numbers, and have been pretty cordial for years now. I let him know I would apologize, but I wasn’t going to do that through a middle man. A week went by and D never contacted me.

I did send her a text stating that I’d love to talk things out but would prefer not to do it over text because it’s very impersonal. I told her if she wanted to wait until I was back in town at the end of the month, she could, or she could call me. I got no response.

Now it’s February and I get a call from another family member who had recently flown to our home state to visit. She informed me that D and my brother could do nothing but talk about me, my family (my children), and how horrible I was. My family is not very fond of her and shut it down immediately.

At this point I reached out again, reiterating that I think this is a personal matter between her and I, and I’d appreciate it if she would talk to me instead of everyone else. I get a response two days later with paragraphs upon paragraphs. The first stated how she will not bite her tongue at the disrespect and that she knows I was just hoping she would get over it because I haven’t reached out to her…..

The second paragraph tells me how immature I am and how tough I must feel. That even back then, I wasn’t protecting my brother from her and that I created the cheating narrative in my head and must be projecting, otherwise how did my marriage fail?

She said after finding out that I’m pregnant with a daughter, she hopes for her sake I don’t go through with it because I’ll end up abusive like my mother. (Which again, I have three perfectly healthy happy children that I’ve raised pretty much on my own.)

And finally that I’m a pathological liar because I never sent my nieces Christmas presents, which again, if you missed it, she opened the same exact ones Christmas Eve. Which she would have known had she been there. And I hadn’t sent the other one that the store didn’t have because I had received the text from my brother cutting me off from my niece.

But also that I’m trying to manipulate her through her daughter because I bought the most expensive gifts in her Christmas list registry. Which I do because they have one child and have to buy for my 3, so it only seems fair to spend a decent amount.

At that point, my gloves were off. I did tell her I won't be responding to half of those comments. I told her the word immature is being thrown around so ironically since she is in her mid 30s and can’t have a conversation with me about something that upsets her from 12 years ago. I let her know that I respect how supportive my brother is of his wife, but I don't care for her and only apologized out of my love for him.

I also let her know that it will be a blessing if she uses me as an excuse not to come to family functions anymore, because it won’t bother me either way. I’ll always be welcomed because it my family. And lastly I listed all the friends and family that she has pissed off and why and assured her 99% of them would agree that out of the two of us, I’m not the problem. AITAH?

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

Beautiful_mistakes said:

Read the room and stop trying. Your brothers getting exactly what he deserves. You should leave him to it. He is not going to ever take your side. So quit while you’re ahead. And stop engaging with this immature b!t@#. If your families are as supportive as you say, leave her alone because you have their support, where she doesn’t. Again leave him to his terrible wife.

Swampy_63 said:

No contact ever. Do not answer texts. Do not answer phone calls.

I hope you saved that insane text from her. It could come in handy someday.

AAP_BH said:

Your brother was actively talking bad about you and your children?? Where’s the anger for him? Why do you even associate with him or want to?

OP responded:

I am equally as angry there. Luckily he’s more adult about it, slightly, when I called him out

Southern-Interest347 said:

I think the cutoff point for me with your brother and his wife would have been when he brought in the kids and said he didn't want anything to do with your kids and he didn't want you to have anything to do with his kids. Kids should not be involved. This is the point where I would wash my hands and wish them the very best. It sounds besides this person you have a wonderful family. Good luck update me.

WirelessThingy said:

Given that your family and friend group are well aware of her character, her vitriol will say more about her than it ever will about you.

Just disengage. She isn’t worth the mental load and honestly, your ambivalence will hurt her more than your words ever could.

Smoke__Frog said:

You expect us to believe that you and your family still speak with your brother even though he married a cheater who verbally mistreated you? I don’t believe you and your family are that spineless and keep on contact with your brother because he’s “family”. Is she really that bad?

OP responded:

She is. We have a really horrible mother that none of us speak to. D actually reminds me of her…. But my therapists says that may be why he’s attracted to her oddly enough.

My dad doesn’t want to hurt his relationship with us because he worked very hard to be a great parent during our childhood despite my mother’s attempts to do harm with that relationship otherwise. It’s weird, I know. He helped me get through a lot. I love my brother a lot but he does sympathize with her for reasons I cannot understand

She then shared more info. in the comments:

I just want to clarify a few things:

Yes, I am equally as upset with my brother, though I will say, he actually has the gall to talk to me about things, hence speaking on behalf of his wife in the first place.

But here’s why it’s hard for me to just cut my brother off. We grew up in a divorced household. Our dad is awesome, but because of the custody agreement when we were children, we only saw him one day a week after school and every other weekend. Our mother, on the other hand, is a bi-polar alcoholic. I had it the worst, and I’m sure if either brother saw this post they’d attest to this.

My mom was also bad to them, don’t get me wrong, but her first born and baby were her favorites. Meanwhile she hated me for being born, due to the loss of my twin sister at birth and consistently told me I was a reminder of the loss. That is very personal, but I’ve been in therapy for a long time and no longer have contact with my mother. My older brother, being so close in age, looked out for me.

He protected me and included me and gave me the love I didn’t get from my mom, and couldn’t always get from my dad due to him not being able to be there all the time. I mentioned in a few comments that D and my mom are similar. My therapist says that may be why he’s attracted to her.

It has always been really hard for myself, my family, and our friends to understand what the appeal is with D, especially because he’s not oblivious to her behavior. That is absolutely his own fault but I’ve given up on the thought of them splitting as they’ve now been together for almost two decades at this point.

During the period of time they were broken up after she cheated when they lived together, he had a hard time dating and I believe when she came back into his life, it was comfort and familiarity that connected them back so quickly.

I do know her family. Her mother is like my mother. Her dad is okay, but I feel that he is where she gets her odd entitlement, like the glass of water example. He definitely thinks he’s better than everyone in the room.

The only member of her family that is tolerable is her brother, who grew up in the exact environment so I don’t feel like being a product of her environment is an excuse, especially because it is not for me, even in my short comings.

All of our children are collectively too young to understand, but also have no idea. They don’t see each other enough to really remember the other until they’re in front of each other. So they are not involved or being subjected to any of the drama.

I appreciate all the supportive comments. My brother is a good person, the majority of the time, but is a lost cause when it comes to my SIL. I did call him out for talking badly about me and told him it was poor taste to do it with other family members, putting them in an awkward spot, and also because it would inevitably get back to me.

I told him that he’s my OLDER brother and could use his big boy skills to communicate to me, and if they feel the need to express it elsewhere to talk to a therapist. (He could also express it anonymously online like I am) but I obviously didn’t say that.

The root of this is because her schooling that he drove her to and from for years was for a psychology degree, which she never did anything with, she can’t have a conversation with me after knowing each other for 2 decades, and though she feels disrespected because of what happened, I am done with the constant disrespect of how she behaves and is handling this situation.

I gave this enough of my energy, but had to express it in the open to feel valid and help me let it go.