Man sends adopted niece away after she says she wants to live with other uncle.

Raising teens can mean dealing with wild hormonal fluctuations, the occasional slammed doors, and dramatic statements about what a bad caretaker you are.

As the guardian, it's your responsibility to keep your head intact while they emote at you, but there are times when fighting fire with fire feels like the only way to get through to them.

In a popular post on the AITA subreddit, a man asked if he was wrong for calling his niece's bluff on wanting to live with her other uncle.

He wrote:

AITA for sending my niece to go live with her other uncle?

My SIL passed away 12 years and my brother passed away 4 years ago. They had a daughter who is 13 years old now.

After my brother passed away, both me and my SIL's brother tried to adopt my niece but as my niece didn't have much of a relationship with her mom's family I was obviously the better option so I ended up adopting her.

Recently my niece has got this very annoying habit that whenever we have a disagreement she says she would rather go live with her other uncle. I know she doesn't mean it because 1. she barely knows her other uncle.

2. I have a high-paying job and I'm able to provide things that most people aren't able to provide so she is too spoiled to be able to live with anyone else. About a week ago it happened again, she told me she wants to live with her other uncle.

This time I told her to go pack a bag. She went to her room. An hour later I went to her room and asked her if she is ready. She said she didn't mean what she said and doesn't really want to go.

I told her that she should go anyway, she'll stay for a week and then she can tell me if she wants to stay there or come back home. She insisted that she already knows where she wants to stay but I told her to get in the car and drove her there.

After a week I called and asked if she wants to come home and she said yes however she hasn't been talking to me. My family heard what happened and now everyone is mad at me and thinks I'm an a**hole.

People jumped on the thread to share their thoughts on the scenario.

evhanne wrote:

I had this upbringing. I was ‘adopted’ by relatives who would pull this “I don’t have to keep you” sh*t any time I was a normal bratty adolescent. Now I have abandonment issues. YTA.

Mannings4head wrote:

Yep. This is sure to cause some abandonment issues down the line and is not surprising that she stopped talking to OP. This kid has been through hell on top of the normal emotions of adolescence.

She lost both of her parents at a young age and is now living with an uncle who showed her that his love is conditional. We adopted our kids and our agency warned us about our kids potentially saying things like 'I wish you never adopted me.'

Or 'You're not my real parents.' We were told that it will hurt but try not to react too strongly in the moment because the last thing you want to do is confirm their fears. OP did that.

He showed her that there are things she can say that will cause him to send her away. You don't want to do that with any child, let alone one who has a traumatic past and is at an elevated risk for attachment problems.

Boundary pushing, testing, and trying to get OP to get rid of her are normal behaviors for someone with this kind of trauma. She probably feels like she doesn't have much control and OP is going to leave her too.

When OP says, 'Fine, leave then' it confirms that there was something she could say to get him to get rid of her. I really hope this kid is in therapy.

scrubvictory wrote:

“I love you kiddo, you’re stuck with me.” She just wants reassurance that you are a constant in her life and that you want her.

Her parents both left (under unfortunate circumstances) and she needs you to be her safe place. Kids test boundaries, and now she knows if she pushes you too hard you’ll leave too. YTA.

BinkiesForLife_05 wrote:

I was a heck of a bratty teen, and there were many times I used to backchat my mum and say I'd rather live with my grandmother than my parents. So guess who stayed at nan's for a long weekend? Me!

When my parents came to pick me up after those four days I was very much grateful to go back home. Not because my grandmother was some evil, horrid person, but simply because her home comforts weren't my home comforts.

Teenagers will say really nasty things to their parents (or guardians, in this case), and sometimes they do need that time away to realize that the things they said can actually have consequences on their life.

My parents are amazing people, they love me dearly (as does my grandmother), they definitely weren't just 'pawning me off', they were teaching me not to be so flippant about what I was wishing for.

I got a cool few days to bond with my grandmother, and my parents got a few days breather away from a bratty teen. OP's niece was safe, well cared for, and the time away was well-communicated between all parties.

I don't see why so many people are saying OP was so keen to just 'pawn her off'.

Sirenaide wrote:

NTA (go ahead and downvote) You have to stop spoiling your niece because she's going to run into trouble as an adult. Your niece needs to learn how to handle not getting her way or disagreements in a healthy manner.

She can't always mess around because she will find out the hard way. Which she did when you called her bluff and actually made her stay with her other uncle.

Springloll wrote:

NAH. She's entering her teenage years, she's gonna throw an attitude, but that doesn't give her a get-out-of-jail-free card with abusing your feelings.

What you did is tough love, whether or not the timing of it was good or if you jumped to quickly, I don't know, but young teens and adults at some point need to face the reality and consequences of their own words.

Because of her past, has she been seeing a therapist? Usually, when I meet children who threaten that they will run away or go live with someone else, it usually stems from deeper issues of abandonment or trust issues.

After receiving a bevy of mixed responses, OP jumped on with an update.

Edit:

I decided to make an edit and let you know how things are going. We decided to have a conversation about it.

I asked her how they treated her and she told me while her uncle was nice, her aunt made her feel unwelcome and she didn't feel good about being there, she doesn't want to live with them.

She thinks I was a jerk for sending her even after she apologized. I apologized and told her that even if she wanted to live with them, I would still bring her back home because I love her too much and can't live without her, so she is stuck with me.

She has some conditions for forgiving me for example she continues to torture me by forcing me to binge-watch Riverdale with her.

And she wants a daddy-daughter day and I'm guessing that I'm not going to like any of her plans based on the evil grin on her face. But I'll do whatever makes her happy.

There were a lot of NTA votes. While I'm thankful I don't agree with them. I was definitely being an a**hole, she was just being a typical teenager.

It looks like everything is getting smoothed over between them, which is what matters most.