Woman doesn't tell engaged cousin her fiance is a former camp fling, cousin is furious.
To tell or not to tell, that is the question. At least, that is the question when a loved one gets involved with someone you've previously hooked up with. For some, the answer is an obvious 'tell them,' why would you keep it a secret if your loved one might get involved?
For others, the past is the past and there's no sense in potentially adding drama or complication to their lives if you're no longer involved.
The question of 'tell or not tell' came up majorly in a popular post on the AITA subreddit, where a woman asked if she was wrong for not telling her cousin that her fiance was a former camp fling.
She wrote:
AITA for not telling my cousin that her fiancé was my “summer camp fling” for 3 years?
I grew up very close to my cousin and we’ve stayed close as can be but live in different states. During my summers for several years I went to a month-long camp where the first year I was a camper, next year CIT then counselor. First year I met “Kenny” and it was instant soul-crushing love where he was literally all I thought about for a year.
Next year we actually dated (within the confines of being CIT so we were very busy) and third year we actually found a way to essentially live together and talked about coordinating colleges, getting engaged, kids names and all that kind of stuff. We drifted apart but would still text and to be honest I kind of always hope we’d find ourselves back to each other.
I did know that my cousin and Kenny went to the same school and had the same major so I wasn’t surprised when they started dating. As near as I can surmise, I knew about Kenny dating her but he did not know that she was my cousin.
So I’ve known about them for about a year but I didn’t want to interrupt her being happy and the opportunity to tell her never came up. Whole family “met” Kenny over Mother’s Day. I knew he was coming so I tried very hard to stay low-key. My mom is so obnoxious that when Kenny arrived she basically screamed “you look just like that little boy that Vivi had plastered all over wall!! Is your name Kenny?”
He said yes and he clearly wanted to crawl into a hole, as did I. We said our hellos and “nice to see you agains” but it was very awkward. Little gathering was fine and I avoided him for the most part. At about 9 the next morning my cousin called me and she was both hungover and drunk and furious at me that I didn’t tell her. I guess he spilled the beans and told her how serious we were.
She feels very betrayed by me that I “allowed her to get so invested” in a guy with whom I had a pregnancy scare (for some reason this really stuck under he skin). I tried to explain but she is having none of it. I tried to call Kenny to see what I can do and it appears he blocked me. I feel awful that she’s hurt. I made a choice about what to reveal to her but I guess I made the wrong one. AITA?
People had a lot to say in response.
DoYouHaveAnyIdea16 wrote:
NTA. Usually, by the time a couple is engaged they've shared info about previous relationships. Apparently, Kenny was too vague, shall we say. Your cousin's reaction should be directed at her betrothed and not you.
Dark_Mode_Nose_Wind wrote:
INFO - You had to know this moment was going to happen, how long were you going to let this go before finally saying something?
Do you still have feelings for Kenny?
ETA OP's response to another commenter on a similar question... 'I still have really strong feelings for him, I didn’t want to ruin her happiness and mostly I wanted to avoid the situation.'
ETA... Going with YTA for keeping this from both your cousin, and your former 'fling' who you talked marriage and kids with. Two very important people in your life... would've taken minutes, at any time over the course of a year.
'I didn’t want to interrupt her being happy'
You knew what this info would do this whole time... and you just waited. Why?
Thirsty-Boiii wrote:
Soft YTA. I don’t think you meant to be an AH. You just wanted to prevent issues and avoid conflict. But part of real life is conflict. The truth is, you never know how someone will react to info being hidden from them, but majority of people would feel hurt. If someone hid something like that from me, I would feel pretty hurt based on how serious of a relationship you are making it sound to you.
If either scenario is going to cause hurt feelings, choose the open communication and honest route instead of trying to keep things hidden. At least in the end, you give relationships more potential to move on quickly and healthily if you are upfront and own your actions.
KaleidoscopeOk767 wrote:
Honestly, it sounds very much like you thought it was a lot more serious than he did. You feel this was a three-year romance, he dated you for two months with a year in between them at camp, and never once integrated you into his real life. You have probably told the story very differently, and now your cousin doesn't know what to think.
GSD_enthusiast wrote:
YTA. Did you think Kenny would see you, dump your cousin, profess his everlasting love so you could live happily ever after? Because that it the vibe I am getting. You knew, this would happen at some point. You knew this would cause trouble. Are you hoping it will be bad enough that they separate and you finally get another chance at Kenny?
After receiving lots of responses, and the post itself taking off, OP jumped back on with an update.
Day 2 edit: This blew up even more than I can imagine. Someone even told me it’s going around TikTok (I can’t find it if so). I did get a short ban from sharing too much personal information so it’s deserved.
The update most of you are looking for is that my cousin has called off her engagement to “Kenny.” I had a very short talk with her last night and she’s going to drive home this weekend and we are going to meet and go out for drinks. She said there was a lot more that was bothering her and this was the final nail that she would never be able to get past.
I’m also so curious to talk to her because now she knows the guy who I thought was my “Mr Big” way better than ever did and maybe I can come to know more about him than “guy from camp” I’ve been utterly and hopelessly infatuated with for all of my teen years and short adult life.
Maybe I can get some closure too. I don’t think updates are allowed here so if there is a sub Reddit that allows updates post can someone point me in the right direction (if people are interested of course)?
Well, suffice it to say, this whole situation is a mess that fully exploded.