My mom died when I (16m) was 7. My dad remarried a year later. I think there’s a pretty strong chance my dad and his wife were at least hooking up before my mom died but I’m not too sure. My parents weren’t like the happiest of couples so it’s possible they made it look like they were together for my sake.
One thing I wanna mention before I go into other stuff is that my dad’s family are not a part of our lives. I only ever met his mom one time but the rest of his family never and I don’t have an actual memory of meeting his mom. I just have one photo where she looks pissed off to be holding me. But my mom’s family were always a big part of my life and we spent every Christmas when mom was alive with them. They and my dad were never super close. He didn’t see them as his surrogate family and they didn’t see him as a surrogate son and brother. But they were civil.
When my dad and his wife moved in together they wanted to instead always be with her family and that was a big problem for me. I wanted my family, not someone else’s. My dad didn’t want me to be away from him for holidays and there were attempts to have me spend Christmas with his wife’s family but he used to give in when I was younger and let me be with mom’s family.
Then he started insisting that I spend some years with his wife’s family because, to quote him, they were my family too and it seemed bad if I refused to join in family celebrations for the holidays. I resisted every year and I hated it every year he made me be there but then the last couple of years I was just like fuck this, whatever in my head and I didn’t put up the same fight. It’s nothing personal against them but I want my family and not people I know just because my dad remarried.
This year dad said I was old enough to make the choice myself and he gave me the option of where I wanted to go. I chose my maternal side. My dad hadn’t expected me to choose them and when I did he got real mad and he asked me what the fuck the last two years were if it wasn’t me coming around and I said it was me being tired of the same fight. He asked me then if I hadn’t come around to the idea of them being just as much my family as my mom’s side and I said no. To me they were still just people I was forced to spend time with because he married into their family. I told him they hadn’t become family in my eyes. He then was like oh you get to make a grownup decision for the first time and you choose to keep being a child and putting blood relatives before everyone and I told him I chose the people I had the connection to. I said that’s mom’s family. And I reminded him that not all of them are blood relatives but they have always been my family.
So my dad’s mad and his wife is too but she’s avoiding dad and me because she’s mad he let me choose to begin with and she’s mad I made the choice I did.
AITAH?
My mom died when I (16m) was 7. My dad remarried a year later. I think there’s a pretty strong chance my dad and his wife were at least hooking up before my mom died but I’m not too sure. My parents weren’t like the happiest of couples so it’s possible they made it look like they were together for my sake.
One thing I wanna mention before I go into other stuff is that my dad’s family are not a part of our lives. I only ever met his mom one time but the rest of his family never and I don’t have an actual memory of meeting his mom. I just have one photo where she looks pissed off to be holding me. But my mom’s family were always a big part of my life and we spent every Christmas when mom was alive with them. They and my dad were never super close. He didn’t see them as his surrogate family and they didn’t see him as a surrogate son and brother. But they were civil.
When my dad and his wife moved in together they wanted to instead always be with her family and that was a big problem for me. I wanted my family, not someone else’s. My dad didn’t want me to be away from him for holidays and there were attempts to have me spend Christmas with his wife’s family but he used to give in when I was younger and let me be with mom’s family.
Then he started insisting that I spend some years with his wife’s family because, to quote him, they were my family too and it seemed bad if I refused to join in family celebrations for the holidays. I resisted every year and I hated it every year he made me be there but then the last couple of years I was just like fuck this, whatever in my head and I didn’t put up the same fight. It’s nothing personal against them but I want my family and not people I know just because my dad remarried.
This year dad said I was old enough to make the choice myself and he gave me the option of where I wanted to go. I chose my maternal side. My dad hadn’t expected me to choose them and when I did he got real mad and he asked me what the fuck the last two years were if it wasn’t me coming around and I said it was me being tired of the same fight. He asked me then if I hadn’t come around to the idea of them being just as much my family as my mom’s side and I said no. To me they were still just people I was forced to spend time with because he married into their family. I told him they hadn’t become family in my eyes. He then was like oh you get to make a grownup decision for the first time and you choose to keep being a child and putting blood relatives before everyone and I told him I chose the people I had the connection to. I said that’s mom’s family. And I reminded him that not all of them are blood relatives but they have always been my family.
So my dad’s mad and his wife is too but she’s avoiding dad and me because she’s mad he let me choose to begin with and she’s mad I made the choice I did.
AITAH?
