AITA for telling my mother she hasn't been my mom since I was 5 and I don't owe her anything?
It hurts to feel abandoned by anyone, but it hurts far more to feel abandoned by family.
In a popular post on the AITA subreddit, a woman asked if she was wrong for telling her mom she hasn't been a mom since she was a kid. She wrote:
"AITA for telling my mother she hasn't been my mom since I was 5 and I don't owe her anything?"
When I (24F) was 5 my mother had her second child, my sister. We have different dads and neither was involved when we were kids. My sister was born prematurely and this is when my mother went from being my mom to being an almost stranger to me.
She spent all her time at the hospital with my sister and I was passed around from friends to family and even to strangers my mother and I didn't know, because an aunt would hand me over to someone in her husband's family or a family friend would pass me onto their friend. My sister was in the hospital for months and had many complications from being born so early.
So was one of the youngest preemies in the hospital's history. When she started to get strong enough to go home complications due to her stomach were found and that required more time and more treatments. My mother was in and out of the hospital with her for the next couple of years as they performed surgeries and gave treatments when she would get sick.
At that point, even when my mother was home with my sister she would keep me somewhere else normally and the times I was home with her I was left alone and her focus was my sister. Then when my sister was two she was diagnosed with leukemia and that resulted in more treatments, more hospital visits and just never ever seeing them.
By the time I was 10, my mother was okay leaving me at home while they were at the hospital so I was alone. It was around this time that my teachers started to suggest I might have dyslexia and the school reacted out to my mother but she was too focused on my sister to do anything for me. Nothing changed after my sister became cancer free and she was less sick and needed the hospital less.
My mother was so devoted to her that she didn't pay attention to me and both were strangers to me. I started staying with my girlfriend's family as a teenager and my mother didn't care. I would only go back to her house when I needed to pick up more of my clothes or stuff. And when I turned 18 I moved out officially and got my dyslexia diagnosis.
Now several years on I don't really have anything to do with my mother or my sister. I don't blame my sister for any of this. It's just no bond could form when we were younger and she's a stranger to me. My mother has started to have some health problems and turned to me for help. She told me I should be around more and doing stuff to help her because she's my mom.
She also said my sister deserves a relationship with me and accused me of punishing my sister for existing. I told her that wasn't true but we were strangers and that was because of her (my mother). I also told her she hadn't been my mom since I was 5 and she had no right to ask me to care for her when she hasn't cared for me in almost 20 years.
She called me a selfish and spoiled child who never grew up. AITA?
The internet had OP's back.
Fromasha wrote:
NTA. What you said was true. Your mom has never been around for you unfortunately. Your mom neglected you and this is the result. If your sister wants a relationship with you (which might still be possible) it will be up to her to do the leg work and you'd have to make it clear you don't want anything to do with your mom, or your mom getting involved in your relationship.
RemoteBroccoli wrote:
NTA. You had a mother, and then, you didn't. While it's not her fault she had to be in the hospital, a lot, it is her cross to bear that she didn't include you, let you have a voice, and so on. Your sister is herself a victim here, but that's not the important part.
Ask your mother where she was during the days when you where supposed to have her around as a warm and guiding mother. When she inevitably fumbles with finding words, just tell her "That's what I thought."
Proof-Ad6354 wrote:
NTA its a sucky situation. Your sister was very sick but your mother also had a duty to you. She was mother to two children not just 1 sick one. But now shes ill she suddenly remembers she has 2 children? Don't feel guilty for not having a relationship with her, that was her doing, not yours. She was your mother and its the responsibility of the mother to care for the child.
If she couldn't why not send you to someone who could care for you? Instead of playing pass the parcel with you. I would recommend some therapy though, this abandonment of you could have repercussions for you along the line.
Beneficial_Noise_691 wrote:
NTA.
"I also told her she hadn't been my mom since I was 5 and she had no right to ask me to care for her when she hasn't cared for me in almost 20 years. She called me a selfish and spoiled child who never grew up."
So, one of the most common reactions to being correctly called out on a terrible behaviour that you were unaware of is anger. Think about every video where someone gets hugely angry when a reasonable point is raised.
You mother knows, and you called her on it. The defense mechanism of be "angry and hope that your anger counters their hurt" is a real thing and you just saw it. NTA, tell her you don't blame your sister for how things worked out, it's all her fault and she needs to learn consequences, like you had to without a parent being there.
C_Majuscula wrote:
NTA. They are both strangers and you wouldn't be called selfish or spoiled for not caring for and connecting with strangers the same way you care about people you've been close to for decades. If your mother was apologetic and wanted to reconnect, it would be very generous of you to allow that. But that's not the situation.
OP is clearly NTA in any way, she simply deserves a better mom.