'AITA for giving my sister a reality check about raising a child?' 'My husband thinks I was overly harsh.'
"AITA for giving my sister a reality check about raising a child?"
My sister is 23-year-old and she moved in with us for college. She moved out after she graduated. (Edit: She has a job and her own place) Two weeks ago, She visited us and she told us that she is pregnant. We didn't even know she was seeing someone.
She has practically moved in with us and she wants to keep the child and I told her I would support her. It was not planned at all and she said there was almost zero chance she would get pregnant.
I have been helping her plan for her life now. I told her that I would help her with money, but it was going to be very tough to raise her kid on her own. A week ago, I asked her if she was informing the father of the child and she brushed it away and said the child has no father.
I thought it was probably a guy she didn't want in her child's life and from what she had talked about him, it seems that is not the case and she clearly likes him and thinks highly of him.
She keeps asking me if It is the right thing to do and I honestly don't know. I have never met this guy and she thinks highly of him but also doesn't want the guy around. I don't want to prod, but she keeps changing her mind.
I had a very stressful day yesterday and she kept asking me about this and I sorta snapped at her and told her that she was going to be her mother and she needed to do what was the best for the child and not for the parents and she shouldn't be deciding based on what is comfortable for her or the father.
She started to cry and was silent for a while, she then said she really needed my help and begged me to not stop helping her and I said I wouldn't abandon her. My husband thinks I was overly harsh on a 23 year old freaking about major life changes and I should have taken a softer approach.
She has not really talked to me since then and has been avoiding any attempt at small talk. The reason I feel like an ahole was mostly the way she talked to me the tone she use is seared into my brain when told me she needed my support.
Here's what top commenters had to say about this one:
confusedquokka said:
ESH in so many ways. Everyone involved seems to have a child’s impression of how parenthood will be. your boyfriend is mad that you’re telling her what she needs to hear???? She needed a good dose of reality and you gave it to her.
She needs to suck it up and tell the father if she’s going to keep the kid. Although she doesn’t sound like she’s mature enough to be a parent and should consider aborting.
YTA for basically just saying yes I’ll help raise it when it’s not your job. it is incredibly hard to be a single parent. Are you ready to commit to putting your own dreams aside for your sisters half assed plan to have a kid?
Your financial, marital, career plans will have to be second if you commit to helping her raise this kid. Everyone is in la la land. You all need to get a reality check with your sister’s half baked plan.
DrukMeMa said:
NTA and don’t financially support her. You’re enabling her not telling the father and not dealing with life.
RazzleDazzle722 said:
YTA. Your number one mistake was offering unspecified “support” to your sister. From what it appears, you’re offering money, housing and emotional support. The thing about “support”, whether it’s monetary or emotional, is that it must be given without any expectation in return...
YTA not because you told your sister the truth but because you made her a promise your may not be able to keep. Your sister has a lot of figuring out to do. Clearly tell your sister in what capacity you’re able to help her. You can stay with me x amount of weeks/months. I can offer you x amount of money until…
The rest is for your sister to figure out based on the help and support she has. It probably will be messy. You need to set clear boundaries to protect your well being as well as your sister’s, even if those boundaries hurt your sister’s feelings.
time-watertraveler said:
YTA. You are enabling and infantilizing your sister. You are not helping her by footing her bills, you are not letting her grow up and figure out her life. It feels like you want her to carry to term and then raise that child as your own while your sister carries on making a mess of her life.
Both of you need to bucket up and face this head on. Either you fully adopt the child and she gets out of the way, or she moves out and figures it out on her own. She's not involving the "father" because she's afraid she's gonna get dumped and because she knows that if he steps up she can't keep living off of you. And also consider terminating the pregnancy, neither of you sound ready to be a parent.
ConfidentSun9592 said:
NTA. She's chosen to keep this child and to depend on you financially to do so. You definitely get to give your opinion here.
Authentic_Jester said:
NTA. You were not being harsh at all. I'm so tired of this weird crusade to infantilize people in high stakes situations. You want to have a baby? that means you don't get to be the baby anymore, them's the rules. Also, unless the guy is abusive or bad in some way he DEFINITELY deserves to know! How is that even in question?
Later, OP edited the post to include:
I talked to her last night and we cleared things up. It seems she has been dating a trans woman. She has informed her partner and they are going to raise the child together.
I don't it get it, but this feels like a much better outcome than her raising a married guy's kid own her on. Our parents will freak out when they learn about thi, but that is for another. She told me expected me to react badly this and that is why she was freaking out.