In today’s story, a woman places her daughter up for adoption and tells the adopted parents she doesn’t want the baby to have contact with her biological family.
Years later, the baby is all grown up and happily married, but one of her family members thinks she should get to know her birth family.
Let’s see how the story plays out…
AITA for calling my SILs husband an interfering AH and telling him to keep his judgemental comments to himself?
I’m (28m) adopted. My parents were older (50s) when they became my parents. They had fostered for many years and had known my birth mother (kinda).
My birth mother did not want children but lived with a family who was very anti-abortion and restricted her access to one when she found out she was pregnant with me. So she decided I should be adopted and wanted my parents to be the ones who raised me.
My birth mother is not someone I met, but 18 years after I was born she wrote to my parents to thank them for what they did and gave a life update to pass along to me. She had no children, never married, but lived the life she had wanted since she was a child.
She also thanked them for keeping me from her family, that she did not want them getting their claws into me (her words).
OP is now happily married.
Her family have tried reaching out to me over the years, but I always ignored them and have no intention of responding.
That’s my history and background.
I’m now married to my wonderful husband Luke (29m) and still very close to my parents, who are thankfully still with us. They’re also still as amazing as when I was a kid.
OP introduces us to Aaron and shares his reasons for not liking adoption.
My SIL (husbands sister) is married to a man called Aaron and this is who I called an AH.
Aaron has a half sibling who was placed for adoption years before he was born. His father’s child. He and his siblings have tried to make contact with this half sibling and were told he was not interested.
He then learned that his grandparents had offered to raise the half sibling but the birth mother chose to place him for adoption instead.
This has filled Aaron with some issues regarding adoption and adoptees not wanting contact.
Aaron hates that OP won’t get to know her birth family.
He knows that I’m adopted and that I do not wish to know my birth family.
This infuriates him endlessly.
He brings it up whenever we see him, and my husband has told him repeatedly to drop it and he also started spending less time with his sister and Aaron as a result.
Aaron verbally attacked OP.
We attended a family birthday party over the weekend, and Aaron approached me and shamed me for not letting “my real family” get to know me and have me in their lives.
He called me selfish, said my parents were selfish for adopting me when they were way too old and had already been unable to have kids. He said it was selfish to keep me from my real flesh and blood family.
He said he hoped my parents would rot in hell.
OP defended herself and her parents.
I cut him off as my husband was (trying) to scold him, and I say trying because Aaron talked over him.
But I called Aaron an interfering AH who needs to get help for his issues and leave the rest of us alone because he has no right to dig into other people’s business and I told him to keep those judgmental comments to himself because I won’t stand for the disrespect of my parents.
Aaron and my SIL are unhappy with all I said to him at the party.
I think what he said is worse. But AITA?
It sounds like Aaron is taking out his issues about adoption and his older brother on OP. That’s really not fair to her. The circumstances may seem similar but are probably actually quite different.
Let’s see how Reddit responded to this story…
This reader thinks OP should cut off contact with Aaron.
Another reader thinks it was good that OP stood up for herself.
Another person thinks Aaron needs to mind his own business.
This reader warns OP about the future…
It sounds like Aaron needs therapy.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.