Family therapy is supposed to heal wounds, but for one teen, it only reopens them more painfully.

After being sent to therapy with her newly blended family, each session leaves her feeling more alienated and branded as a liar.

All this no matter how many times she speaks her truth.

Read on for this twisty tale of family therapy gone wrong.

AITA for wasting everyone’s time in therapy because I was accused of lying?

My mom, her husband, and I (16f) are in group therapy with each other.

We started therapy a few weeks after Father’s Day, because that was the final straw for them to insist we all needed therapy to work on why I won’t let us be the family they want.

The teen and her mom found themselves at odds with each other.

We started at the end of July, and by the end of August, my mom accused me of lying.

She laid out this really big sob story about how much it hurt to have me lie to her and do everything in my power to destroy her marriage.

It ticked me off so bad.

I didn’t lie at any point of this.

The therapist tried to probe deeper, but her mom made things difficult.

I said as much in the follow-up session, and the therapist asked me to outline my side and how I felt having mom call me a liar.

My mom kept trying to interrupt me, she told the therapist to shut up, and she accused me of being a vicious liar then.

It all started when her mom got remarried after her dad’s passing.

To give some explanation about the situation: My mom and her husband got married three years ago.

They moved in together two months before.

Before moving in, they sat me down and asked me if I was okay with us moving in together and making a family of three again.

Mom brought up how we’d have a man around the house again (my dad passed), and how good it would be for her to have a husband and for me to have a dad.

Her stepfather was quite intent on filling the father-shaped void in her life.

He said he couldn’t wait to be my dad and that he always wanted to be a dad.

He even said he already had plans for us for Father’s Day.

This was February of three years ago.

But that’s not what this teen wanted at all.

I told them I wasn’t okay with that stuff.

I told them I didn’t want another dad, wouldn’t let him be my dad, and was not about to spend Father’s Day celebrating someone who isn’t dad.

They started laughing and proceeded as normal, but Father’s Day became a struggle because I have not spent the day with him the last three years.

Both he and my mom have tried, but I meant what I said.

I never called him dad or let him fill that role in my life.

Finally, the stepfather was fed up with the teen’s reticence.

This year, he snapped and had a temper tantrum, saying I was supposed to be with him on Father’s Day and not spending the day alone, and he didn’t sign up to be nothing to me.

And her mom started blaming her too.

My mom called me a liar because she said I promised to develop a close relationship with her husband and that I said yes to wanting what they asked.

She said I had promised to give him Father’s Day and that I lied and have not followed through on any of it.

She claimed I made them think I would be a willing participant and that I wanted us to be a family.

But the teen never agreed to this, and even the therapist couldn’t make her parents change their minds.

It ticks me off because I never said what she claims, and I even repeated what I had said back then.

The therapist couldn’t get my mom to apologize, and she has no control over the sessions where my mom and her husband dominate.

So she started checking out.

So I’m totally silent and zone out.

They only realized this two weeks ago.

They called me on it, and I spoke up again after more than a month of not talking in therapy to confirm I wasn’t listening.

It came up last week, and I said I was done engaging because I was owed an apology for being called a liar.

Now her parents feel therapy is a waste of time if she won’t play by their rules.

My mom and her husband are ticked that I’m wasting everyone’s time letting therapy happen.

AITA?

Therapy hasn’t exactly turned out to be the healing space they all hoped for.

What did Reddit think?

One thing is for sure here: These parents aren’t in therapy for the right reasons.

The proof is pretty much in the pudding.

Deep familial bonds don’t just form overnight.

This commenter encourages the teen to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

For this teen, therapy became more about people pleasing and keeping quiet than it was about finding peace.

One thing is for sure: Her parents need the therapy way more than she does.

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.