'AITA for yelling at my brother’s GF for trying to get rid of me?' UPDATED 4X

"AITA for yelling at my brother’s GF for trying to get rid of me?"

As the title says, I (15f) think my brother's girlfriend (Julie, 24f) is trying to get rid of me. I live with my brother, because after my parents divorced none of them wanted me. So my brother took me (he was 18 I was 8). We lived alone together until a year ago, he got a girlfriend. She doesn’t live with us but she is at our apartment a lot.

I don’t really like her but I already know he kind of has some resentment toward me because he had to take care of me even when my parents were still together and he couldn’t have a life cause he was always busy with me. I think they want to get married and I’m scared about where I will go. My mom doesn’t live in the country (she went back to Korea after the divorce) and my dad is busy with his new family.

Anyways, after school I wanted to use my brother's phone to watch something. I saw a notification come up at the top and it was from my mom. I was really curious because I don’t talk to my mom like ever and I didn’t think he did either. Long story short, he wants to send me to live with my mom in Korea because Julie wants to move in and start a family.

She said that when they start their family they don’t want to be looking after a teenager as well. I didn’t tell him anything and just put the phone back. I went to sleep really scared and now today I went to my cousin's house and told him what my brother was planning to do and he told his mom. I didn’t do anything wrong, I'm always nice to her I don’t know why she doesn’t like me.

I really don’t want to move I have friends here and everything. I thought he loved me and wouldn’t make me go back to her. My cousin's mom ended up asking him why he was going to send me to live with my mom and he asked her how she knew. She said that I told my cousin and he told her. My brother took me back home because he didn’t want to cause a scene at my aunt's house.

When we got back, he asked me how I knew and I told him I saw his texts to our mom about how he was sending me away. I was really mad and I was yelling at him. He just tried to hug me and sat down on the couch with his head down, not talking. Then like 10 minutes later Julie came. When she came in the living room she asked what happened and my brother said she knows.

Then Julie tried to talk to me and I stood up and started yelling that I don’t know why she has a problem with me but I'm his sister so I'm not leaving. I also called her some names because I was really angry. Then, to my surprise, my brother pushed my shoulder and told me to go to my room. I asked why, and he yelled at me to go to my room. Julie was crying at this point. I went to my room and cried.

I still think he is going to send me away. I don’t know why she doesn’t like me I didn’t do anything to her. AITA got yelling at my brother's girlfriend? I told my friends about this and they said i shouldn’t have yelled because she probably has her reasons to want me with my mother.

The internet jumped on with their thoughts.

Starrynight764 wrote:

OP, I’m going to start off by saying what your parents have done to you AND your brother isn’t okay. They abandoned you and him and have done what is called parentification. This means your brother was forced to be the parent. It’s not okay at all. Your brother had to put his own life on hold because of you (at no fault of your own).

Lil_fire_girl wrote:

Sadly OP, I was going to say the same thing. Unfortunately, you have 3 more years until you can make your own choices. Hear your brother out. Maybe talk to your aunt and him together with Julie. See if there are other options that haven’t been considered.

I feel for you and your brother because no one should be pushed away by their parents. And no one should be forced to be a parent of a child who isn’t theirs at 18. Give your brother some grace because he has given it his best for 7 years.

throwawtphone wrote:

You forgot to mention OP's dad. He doesn't get a free pass on this. Mom is in another country. The dad isn't apparently from the post. He just got remarried and had a "new" family. O{ if anything should stay in the country they currently live in and should live with father if she is not going to reside with her brother.

The parents are horrible human beings, and OP and brother have been done dirty. The brother should never have been parentified. Emotionally, he is the parent, though, to OP. Edit to add. Why not stay with the aunt?

roseofjuly wrote:

I agree with the first paragraph but disagree with the second. OP is his sister. There is no "moving on with their lives." The fact that a strange woman thinks she can come in and kick out her boyfriend's sister, a child who feels alone and unloved, just so they can have her picture perfect idea of a family tells you about Julie's character.

OP soon jumped on with an update:

So I went home to talk to my brother and I wrote a letter to give to him like some of you suggested as i didn’t think i could talk without breaking down. the letter basically says:

“I'm sorry for yelling at you and Julie, I was just scared. There are many things I don’t know about my parents and how you have felt about the last 7 (maybe even 15) years. But I do not want to go back to my mother. and I don’t want to move country.”

I gave him the letter after school and he didn’t read it in front of me. I came out of my room a few hours after giving it to him and saw him crying in the kitchen.

When he saw me he hugged me and told me he was sorry and loved me and didn’t know what to do because Julie wanted to move in and she didn’t want to be taking care of me because she’s only 24 and wants to live her life. Julie also came over and I apologised to her properly. I’m writing this in my notes and waiting for another update to put all the info from today in one update.

So it’s been a few hours since then and he sat me down to talk again. With Julie for some reason. anyway he told me that he was just exploring options because I can’t live with him forever. Obviously I knew that, but why doesn’t he want me now, what did I do?

He also told me that he’s booked a ticket for me and him to go to Korea to see my mother, her husband and house. I’m fine with that because if he’s there with me then he can’t leave me there without me knowing. But he told me he is leaving a little earlier than I am because he has work. I believe that, but I'm also a little suspicious that he is going to leave me there and not take me back.

I leave for Korea in two days and I'm staying for two (?) weeks, he is staying for one. So that’s all I have for now is that im going to Korea soon to see my mother for the first time in 7 years. I don’t feel happy or sad, I just feel nothing. I feel like I wanna d*e.

And here’s some clarification because people keep asking the same questions.

I can’t stay with my aunt as she has 4 kids already and can’t take care of me.

I believe my brother has guardianship of me but I do not know because he doesn’t tell me anything.

Julie has done many things to me along with the leaving me at school thing, she’s fat-shamed me, made fun of me, is always trying to get me out of the house and always ignores me whenever my brother tries to get us to hang out together.

When Julie was trying to talk to me after I found out, she was saying things like “please try to understand” and “it’s what we think is best for your and our futures” and “your brother and i want to move forward and i don’t think we can do it with you.” (they’ve only been dating for a year and she’s saying all this but whatever.)

I know my parents both send money to my brother to help with me but I do not know if it is formal child support.

I don’t have any friends to stay with.

If my brother didn’t take me in, I would have either gone into a foster home or my mother would have taken care of me, although she didn’t want to, which is why she wasn’t the first choice for who would take me.

My father is in another state with his new wife and family.

I am half-Japanese and half-Korean do going to Korea would be hard for me, considering the history. I also have a Japanese name so it's not like I could hide it.

I barely speak Korean, and moving would mess up my whole education. I’m smart in English, not in Korean.

iI you have anymore questions just ask. I’m going to talk to my school counselor soon but it might not be before I leave. I still really love my brother and I don’t want him to go to j*il or go no contact with him.

Soon after, she shared another update:

Hi again. It’s been a few days since my last update and I hope I didn’t worry anyone too much. On Friday last week I, against what many people advised, got on the plane to Korea. I don’t know if it was because I was too scared to ask for help or speak up, or because I had a large amount of trust in my brother.

We arrived on Saturday in Jeju, a Korean island, which is where my mom lives, and met her, her husband and her stepson. Her husband is nice and so is my stepbrother. I talked to my mother about everything.

It’s a long story but after my parents divorce she wanted to keep me, but my father told her that taking me to Korea and away from him would be a big mistake and she felt scared to go against him. I don’t know why he would say that and then abandon me as well. I didn’t know this, but my dad was kind of ab#sive, not physically though.

The reason there was conversation of me going to Korea was because, obviously, what my brother and Julie thought, but also because my mother wanted to see me again. She wanted me to have a place in her family and she wanted my life to be like a normal 15-year-old's, with a parent and a brother who acts like a brother.

The ticket is a return ticket but honestly I don’t know if I want to go back to the usa. I don’t want to be where I'm not wanted, aka my house if Julie moves in. I go to a Korean language class everyday so I can improve my Korean if I decide to go to school here. And I think I might.

My mom's husband says he will tutor me and they talked to the school and they said they would adjust some things so i can fit into the school nicely and take exams. My stepbrother helps me with my Korean homework and we go to the beach together even though he barely speaks English and I barely speak Korean.

Jeju is nice but they live in a small town so I barely get Wifi, which is part of the reason it has taken so long for me to update. My brother is still here with me but is leaving on Friday. His plan now is to come back to Korea to take me back to America so that I know he isn’t leaving me here. His plan changed because I told him I was scared he was going to abandon me too.

I told him this on the flight and he got a bit emotional again and told me he would never do that. I want to thank everyone for all the suggestions and advice but I would rather be here than emancipated or even in America. i don’t want to be reminded of my brother if i don’t get to stay with him. As for Julie, I haven’t spoken to her since I apologised. I don’t care what she does anymore.

The sad thing is I could’ve stayed in america if I fought hard enough but I'm just so tired. I'm tired of feeling like this and im tired of no one wanting me. I wish I was better, then maybe they would have kept me. I wish my brother never did this, I don’t know why he is abandoning me like this.

Anyways, learning Korean is easier than I thought, and staying here is quite fun honestly, I just wish the circumstances weren’t my brother not wanting me anymore. I’m sorry to everyone that I disappointed you by not being strong enough to stand my ground and stay in the USA, but I believe that if i stayed it would have just gotten worse.

Lots of people said that I should show that I can help a lot with the baby, and I could, but if one day I'm too tired or just don’t want to help, they could just send me right back to Korea. why would I want to live my life pandering to people who didn’t want me in the first place? I'm clearly very disposable to them.

This won't be my last update, my last one will probably be telling you all if I do stay in Korea. I just want to say once more thank you all for your help. Also IDK if Julie is pregnant. and please stop saying that I should give them alone time to bang, I don’t want to think about that ever 🙏. BYE ✌️

The comments kept coming:

TiredinNB wrote:

INFO: Are your parents giving your brother money to help support you?

OP responded:

I think my mom does because she gets money from my dad to give to my brother and she also gives her own money but for the most part my brother takes care of me with his own money.

DrunkonweedASD wrote:

Your parents are ev*l g*rbage. Your brother could have been more considerate, but he should have never been put in this situation either

Your parents are just straight ev(l and deserve the absolute worst for this.

blue-bumblebee9 wrote:

I just don't get all these people saying that the brother and the gf are not at fault. Going to a different country to a so-called-mother that abandoned you 7 years ago and you don't talk to is a huge change. A trauma even. There are middle ways, not just the atomic option of sending her away. She is a human being not a parcel to be passed around. NTA.

gezeitenspinne wrote:

This! I get it if the brother is feeling resentful. That's fair, even though that's not OP's fault. But apparently only talking to the mother instead of any other family member? Talking to OP herself? Trying to figure out ANYTHING else?! That's so horrible...

PotatoPotato76 wrote:

I feel bad for the kid. First her parents want nothing to do with her. Now her brother doesn't want her either. From her perspective, she's been abandoned by everyone she loved. And she's still a kid. Old enough to see that writing on the wall, but not old enough to fend for herself. That's gotta take a toll.

Goochimus wrote:

Probably going to get wrecked for this one but I think your brother is a major asshole. Not nearly as much as your parents but still an AH. He did a really good thing raising you and taking you in. But now that things are inconvenient for him he wants you to go? That’s not what you do to family.

He made a commitment and is obligated to follow through on his responsibilities that he put on himself. You don’t just stop because you want to move on with your life. Besides in 3 years you will be an adult, that’s not a long time. It would be dumb to try and restart in Korea.

A month later, OP shared another update:

So, it’s been almost a month since I posted on here. If you read my original post and read all the updates you can see that I am in Korea right now, and this is where I will probably stay for the rest of my life. I would have updated sooner but I couldn’t bring myself to do anything, I always feel tired and if I try to do anything I just end up crying. My brother went back to the USA and I told him not to come back.

So many people told me that it was his turn to live his life so I let him go. He doesn’t have to deal with me anymore. The day he got back he facetimed my mom to try and talk to me as well but I didn’t want to. I couldn’t even look at him or listen to his voice without feeling like crying.

I’m fixing the relationship with my mom slowly, we go out together and talk. My stepdad is nice too, he always buys me stuff and helps with my Korean homework, so does my stepbrother. I play video games with him and we play in Korean so I can get better at it. I really miss my brother, if I could go back in time I would have done anything and everything to make him want to keep me, but I guess he never will.

I don’t know if i can or will ever see him again. I miss my cousins and my family in the USA. I don’t care about Julie anymore, she got what she wanted, she has him all to herself for their family. I hope they have one, a really happy one and I hope they never abandon their own kids like they abandoned me.

Lots of people were calling me spoiled, snotty, and a brat. You can think these things, I don’t care but I really didn’t do anything to deserve this I think. Korean is a lot more easy to learn than I thought, I don’t think I'll struggle too much. As for my dad, I don’t think I'll ever even talk to him in my life, but it’s not like I want to.

Also Julie isn’t pregnant, I asked my brother and I don’t know if he was lying or whatever, but he said she isn’t and they were just thinking about the future. I don’t even care anymore, they can literally never talk to me again and I don’t know if I'll care in like a year. Hopefully I can move past this but I feel like ill just be f#$ked up like this forever.

I just wish my life was normal yk. Some people thought I was lying, I wish I was, but I guess my life really is this weird. There’s nothing wrong with me either, so i don’t know why for more than half of my life, nobody has wanted me. I have some friends here too, that I met in the Korean school.

My brother was a very nice man and I hope life is very nice to him, he didn’t deserve it, I wish I never burdened him. Maybe he’ll see this so, I really love you Yukio ❤️ Wish you could’ve been my brother instead of my dad for most of my life. Some were worried about b*%$ying cause I'm Japanese but we’ll see once I go to school.

The internet shared their thoughts.

AkumaKater wrote:

I'm so incredibly sorry for you, my heart breaks. It's very good that you can learn the language, it's very good that you get along with your step sibling, and it's very good that you don't search for the fault in yourself. You really got dealt a bad hand in life. And please stay strong. Life gets better.

I didn't believe it myself, at times I don't believe it still, but I'm at a point in life where I can choose the people that are in my life, and it's so much better than it ever was. You will meet the people who would rather d*e then live without you, so make sure you're still here when they find you. I wish you all the best.

LucyPevensy wrote

Thank you for the update! I personally am not a fan of your brother and think what he has done is beyond sh#$ty and unforgivable, but it's been done. The best thing you can do is keep moving forward, and you're doing that, so that's amazing! Keep going at your Korean, do your best in school and keep enjoying the little things. You're strong!

The best thing in life to learn is that you're on your own. Even when people love you (or appear to love you), in the end, you alone are responsible for making the best of things. This was such a valuable lesson; this will probably never happen again. You KNOW you can survive this kind of stuff. I'm proud of you!

Ten days later, OP shared another update:

I actually talked to my brother a few days ago and it wasn’t very eventful. He asked how I was and if Jeju was nice. I told him I was fine, and Jeu was pretty. I talk to him like I barely know him, as if didn’t live with him since I was 8, so that made me sad.

Him and Julie are still together, but I really don’t gaf about julie anymore. I guess that’s a step in the right direction. People were suggesting therapy but it’s hard to find a therapist that speaks fluent English. I can’t express myself in Korean like i can in English so going to any random one and using the basic Korean I know just won’t really do me any good I think.

Some people had random questions that I thought I would answer. My step brother is 16 almost 17. I don’t really feel that bad toward my mom cause she was never bad to me, the only bad thing she did was leave me, and I didn’t really care that she did before cause I had my brother and she really is trying her best now.

She was really depressed in her relationship with my father which explains the way she acted. jejuan is different (kind of) to Korean but I’ve found that like nobody speaks it here I think it’s an endangered language. If I ever talk to my brother again is something i don’t know about right now. Whenever I think about him, I get really mad instead of sad now.

I wish I never forgave him. I want him to know that I am really mad at him. But I feel like my emotions are something I can’t talk to him about anymore.

The way we talk is like he’s a really distant family member that your parents force you to talk to on the phone whenever they call and they’re like “i used to change your diapers!!” but you have no memory of them ever. It’s like that. Kind of sad cause he’s my brother, but I guess it’s his fault.

Also, this next part is kinda sensitive so I guess I'll put a TW for s**cide/s**cidal thoughts. I was walking home from school last week after I went to the beach by myself just to sit there for a little. And to get home from the beach, I walk near this cliff (idk if it's really a cliff but its high and steep).

I was really sad that day and I kept thinking about home and my brother. I was also feeling really worthless and like nobody wanted me that day. I just felt this really weird urge (?) to go to the cliff and jump. Like literally just jump off of it. So I walked towards the edge then just stood there. I don’t even know why, I just did.

I was genuinely about to jump off and then i just didn’t. Don’t know what stopped me but I'm glad it did because that would’ve been really stupid. I hope I don’t feel like that again cause what if i actually do it? Like that just scared me really bad idk. This won’t be my last update I guess. It probably won’t be cause after that last paragraph I wouldn’t wanna worry any of you with me not updating.

Some days I'm fine with this, and some days I lay in bed and wish everything was just a dream and I could go back to how it was just a few months ago with my brother. I always wonder how my life and health would be like if this had never happened. Another thing that scares me is that I don’t know if I can ever go back to my normal self.

When I was 8, I was completely fine when my parents left. But when this happened I feel like I went crazy for a little. Some days I wish I wasn’t alive, and I never used to think like that. I’m always tired and I haven’t slept more than 5 hours in like 2 months. I feel like my brain is different ever since this happened its insane. Like I genuinely think I'm a different person now. Is that weird? lol.

Commenters had a lot to say:

greymoria wrote:

I had a pit in my stomach the entire read. This is awful! I work with a lot of kids that moved to my country recently, and her comment about being smart in English, not in Korean really resonated with me. I can see my students struggling since they are unfamiliar with the new language and they have to be held back in school since it's such a barrier to overcome not being able to express yourself clearly.

My students adapt and reason a lot like her, trying to find a way to cope with adult people's decisions. I wish that the adults in her life took some kind of responsibility for what was done to her. I'm really heartbroken about this post.

sowinglavender wrote:

The horrific depression is just what happens when you're in a terrible, unjust situation with no escape and nobody to turn to. as humans and especially when we're children, without love and care, we languish. This one was really disappointing and enraging. I'm gonna go hug my baby sister.

TheKittenPatrol wrote:

Well, my heart broke when I read “I wish I was better, then maybe they would have kept me.” It’s also just so so so extremely clear she’s very depressed. Not just the s**cidal part (though that's a big part) but the always being tired was one of the biggest signs for me. I hope she can eventually find a therapist or get on meds.

Also, wtf was up with the commenters she was replying to? She’s a 15 year old effectively being kicked out of the home of the man that’s taken care of her since she was 8 because his girlfriend is more important to him. Of course she’s scared, and of course she’s emotional.

I dearly hope that in the long run being with her mom and a family that seems to want her (and the revelation that her mom always wanted her but at the time couldn’t manage it) will help heal some of the harm and also be healthy for her.

Cause wow, this poor girl deserves so much better than a brother who lets his girlfriend fat shame and make fun of his sister, and who picks his sister up late from school in order to spend more time with said girlfriend. And seriously, if you aren’t willing to have a teenager around who you have to help take care of (or at least let live with you) don’t date someone taking care of a teenager!

TinySydneh wrote:

All the people telling OP she needs to let him go because he has his own life are just... ghoulish. That's her whole family at this point, basically. It's not fair to him, holy s**t, have some compassion. Giving her more sh** than they're giving their s**t-tier parents, I swear.