Woman tells aunt to get over her daughter's death. AITA?
When this woman may have taken things too far with her aunt, she asks Reddit:
"AITA for telling my aunt to get over her daughters death?"
So my cousin is turning 18 next month and she isn’t looking forward to it. She was a twin and her sister unfortunately passed a few hours after birth. This is obviously very upsetting for all members of the family and a horrible situation to be handed. However me and my cousin are extremely close and every single birthday she has had has also been about her twin sister.
Her mum will always put a little fancy background with her twins ashes and make my cousin take photos with it every birthday. She always posts “happy birthday to my 2 beautiful girls” up until my cousin was about 6 she was ok with this however since...
then she always expresses how she no longer feels like her birthdays are important anymore as it makes her mother upset due to the reminder and also because she feels everyone only talks about her twin and how they are so sorry for her loss.
She doesn’t feel like an individual person and constantly feels attached to her dead twin.Last night I asked her what she was doing for her birthday. She said her dad had wanted to take her to Spain but her mother said no because...
“I don’t think we can take the ashes overseas and it’s too risky to bring Layla (the twin who passed) in case something happens” this upset me a little as her 18th is a big birthday and she is being held back by her sister who
A. Isn’t alive and B. She doesn’t even remember. I asked her if she’s told her mum how upset she gets about her birthdays and how she doesn’t feel like she can be an individual. She said she doesn’t want to upset her mum so hasn’t told her.
Today at a family gathering my aunt was talking about how excited she is for the photographer to take pictures of my cousin and Laylas urn.
I pulled her to one side and said we all understand how she feels but that she needs to get over and accept that Layla is gone and focus on her living daughter. She was extremely offended even after I told her how my cousin feels. She has uninvited me from my cousins birthday. AITA for this?
Let's see what internet users had to say.
tastz writes:
May be unpopular, but NTA. Your aunt is hurting her living and breathing daughter because of a child that died 18 years ago. Just thinking here, i am willing to bet that her daughter will soon go low contact or exclude her mother from important events. So instead of having a child, your aunt would lose two.
baltimorebadger writes:
NTA with the caveat that you may have been harsh in your wording choice. I have a nephew in this situation, highly premature, the twin didn't make it, he did.
There is no "getting over" it, but his parents never made things about the twin besides occasional mentions at important solemn moments (like the Bar Mitzvah ceremony, but not the party). You can't obsess over the dead and ignore the living, it's not healthy and your Aunt needs therapy.
insolentpenguin writes:
May be unpopular, but NTA. Your aunt is hurting her living and breathing daughter because of a child that died 18 years ago. Just thinking here, i am willing to bet that her daughter will soon go low contact or exclude her mother from important events. So instead of having a child, your aunt would lose two.