Whether you’re best buddies with your parents or not, there’s one thing you’d hope, and that’s that in the worst of times, they’d have your back.

And for most parents that is true, through good and bad times, happy moments and arguments, they’d still be there for their kid if they needed them.

But sadly, it’s not universal – and as the woman in this story found out, some parents are really only in things for themselves.

Read on to find out how she effectively lost her parents to her ex in the divorce, and how the repercussions threatened to break her family up further.

AITA when my ex got my parents in the divorce?

I am a 35-year-old woman, and I have been divorced from my ex-husband (48, male) for nine years. We have two children together, two daughters aged 13 and 10.

Big age gap yes, and yes I had my kids young.

I had a bit of a difficult childhood. My father was very “my way or the highway” my entire child and adult life.

I was a child competitive athlete with my father as my coach, and didn’t have much time for anything else, including understanding how to function normally in society.

And this caused problems in her adult life, too.

When I became an adult (at 18) I just wanted to start a family and have my own life, probably because my childhood never felt like a childhood.

I ran into the first (and worst) arms I could to achieve my very short-sighted goals as a girl in my late teens.

Lo and behold, I actually grew up over the years and did a whole lot of maturing – and obviously, the 32 year old I married had done all the maturing he was ever going to do.

Let’s see how this changed things in their relationship.

I went back to school, got a degree, and started working at a good job. Then we had our first child and I decided to go back to school again for a better position.

I was working full time, plus overtime, going to school, taking care of one, and then two kids, as well as the house, cooking, cleaning, and doing everything else under the sun.

And then I came to find out my deadbeat of a husband was not only cheating, but he was dropping our children off at my parents’ house claiming he had to go to work early (I worked night shift), so they would be better to sleep there.

He would drop them off and drive down the street to his girlfriend’s house and stay with her.

Read on to find out how she discovered he was cheating.

I realized one day when I came home from a sixteen-hour shift and the bed was still made, pillow shams and all.

And we all know no man is ever putting shams back on the bed, and definitely not that man.

I did a little digging into phone records, and it was absolutely glaring me in the face. I confront, he admits, fast forward, we wind up divorced.

I did my best to move on. He moved in with his girlfriend, and I struggled as a single mom, ultimately needing to rely on my parents again for help.

But all this put her into a position that she never wanted.

Well, my dad sunk his claws into my children and they also became child athletes.

I did NOT want that life for them, but remember I was pretty desperately in need of help and in my head I rationalized it away.

Years go by, I become a successful professional, the divorce pain fades and my ex and I are actually friendly. We help each other out schedule wise and had a more than cordial relationship for the sake of the kids.

Over the years I had also done my best to try and cool down the intense training my father imposed on my kids. But my ex husband was oblivious and just wanted free babysitting, so he would allow it all.

Then, something major in her life changed, and really ruptured the status quo.

Finally, I met an amazing man who completes me. I moved 45 minutes away and got married.

Well, my ex husband did NOT like that. He decided to take me to court and served me with papers the day before my wedding.

My parents also did not like that I was moving “so far away.” I remind you, we are talking 45 minutes.

It got very ugly after that. My parents got involved and basically sided with my ex husband who lived down the street, so they could have full access to them 24/7 (for training purposes).

So she decided to take matters into her own hands.

I sat down with my husband and my parents at their kitchen table one day, and flat out asked them if they were on my side or his. They said “it would be better for us if the kids lived with him.” That was an absolute gut punch.

Obviously, my ex husband did not win in court. The kids primarily stayed with me, and things cooled down at least to a low simmer.

I tried to forgive my parents, but I really just couldn’t. They would still spend time with my ex husband and even went on more than one vacation with him.

I told my parents how much this was hurting me and asked them to just take a step back from him so we could work on our relationship. They refused and said they couldn’t do that because he was “family.”

Let’s see how this is affecting her life in the present.

A few years of therapy and more hurt feelings, and I eventually decided they didn’t have a place in my life anymore.

They see my daughters through my ex-husband, but my husband and I now have a child, and he does not see my parents at all.

Am I wrong for not including them in my son’s life?

AITA?

This woman really has been on a pretty awful journey through her life, but it’s great that it has ended with her married to a nice guy, with a (relatively) happy family life.

And even better, there is at least some distance between her, her ex, and her toxic parents.

It was clear from the beginning that her parents weren’t good people, and though it would be nice if they’d sided with her, it seems like being reasonable is not in their remit – so their behavior is no surprise, really.

Let’s see what folks on Reddit thought about this.

This person agreed that this is all a testament to what awful people her parents are.

While others highlighted how their behavior enabled her ex-husband to mistreat her too.

Meanwhile, this Redditor, who had a similar experience, congratulated her on being the ‘good’ one here.

No one would blame this woman for keeping her son away from his grandparents.

After all, they effectively doomed her early life, and have started her daughters down the same path, and tried to sabotage her family as an adult too.

There’s no two ways about it: she can’t trust them.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.