Imagine being the oldest child in your family. Would you be willing to let your siblings pick where you go, what you eat, and what you do even if it was your turn to make that decision, or would you feel upset if you didn’t get to take your turn?

In this story, one teenage boy has been expected to skip his turn when it comes to deciding what to do so that his siblings don’t have to wait to take their turns. He’s sick of it, and he’s finally done with being a pushover.

His parents aren’t too happy about it.

Let’s read the whole story.

AITA for saying no when my parents expected me to sacrifice for someone else again and saying they take advantage of me being “mature”?

I’m (17m) a pretty laid back guy.

I was always a good kid and my parents oldest so that meant they always treated me more like a mini adult than one of the kids.

There were comments from loads of family members and family friends about me being “mature” and “so mature for my age” being the one I hear all the time even now.

For a while I didn’t mind because I loved my family and I told myself they really loved me too and that was all that mattered. But it started to hurt when they always expected me to go without or to give something up.

He doesn’t get very nice gifts.

Whenever money’s tight they spend less on me to make sure they can still spend reasonably on my siblings.

Last year I got a $5 gift card for a candy store and I was extremely limited in what I could get for that gift card.

Another year they got me sweatpants and a hoodie in the thrift store and they forgot to make sure it was okay because there were stains inside and outside on the sweats.

His parents really don’t treat him fairly.

Another money but not gift example is we eat out pretty often. My parents like to get us to take it in turns to choose where we go.

Whenever money’s tight they’ll let all my siblings have their turn and ask me to skip mine and skip eating out that way none of my siblings feel like they missed out by waiting longer to let me have my turn.

The other money thing is after school activities. If my parents wants to save money they ask me to skip for a few weeks so they don’t have to pay for me.

They never ask my siblings to do the same.

How do his parents think this is okay?

Other times they do it is when we’re running tight on time when we go somewhere and my parents will ask to skip where I wanted to go so all my siblings have their chance.

This happens when we have other kids with us too and I’m always last and first/only to sacrifice going where I wanted to go.

Other times if there’s a clash of events they’ll choose to skip mine to make time for others be it my siblings, cousins or someone else in the family.

This really had to hurt. Choosing to support a cousin over your own child is horrible.

A good example of this is when I was younger my mom insisted we should all learn an instrument, something she got over with the cost, and I was actually pretty decent at piano.

So I was in a recital and the teacher was saying how important it was.

But one of my sibling was asked to play their instrument for the choir and my cousin had a football game and this cousin invited us personally and my aunt (dad’s sister) expressed how important it was that as many show as possible.

So mom went to my siblings choir and dad went to the football game. Nobody went to my recital.

He basically never gets to do what he wants to do.

Taking turns on picking stuff happens for a few other things, like dinner on Fridays (unless it’s a birthday then the birthday kid gets the choice regardless of turns, mostly) or where we go/what we do for family bonding time.

And just like with ordering takeout my turn gets skipped if other stuff comes up.

If they have friends over. If we get busy and siblings complain about waiting for their turn too long. If they want to go somewhere really bad and whine about a different choice.

The thing is nobody ever sacrifices when there’s somewhere I really want to go.

His parents don’t seem to get it.

I told my parents after last year’s birthday that it hurt my feelings that it was always me who got less or sacrificed and nobody ever offered to do that for me. I told them it made me feel like I didn’t matter as much.

And they were like no, you’re our most giving and kindest kid and you’re a good son, brother, cousin and stuff.

And I brought it up a couple of weeks later and I was hugged and told they loved me and of course they didn’t want me to feel that way.

He has really tried to get them to understand how he feels.

Then I tried a third time after a few more weeks and my siblings whined over my choice of family time. I told my parents I was starting to think they weren’t serious about not wanting me to feel less cared for.

I think I tried three more times with no results.

I talked to my siblings too and got nowhere with them which wasn’t a huge surprise.

He finally refused to be passed over.

So last time one of those times I was expected to be passed over I said no when my parents asked if that was okay with me.

They were so sure of my yes it didn’t register with them at first and then it did and I was asked why I was being difficult. Why was it such a problem this time and to remember my siblings are younger. They said I’m so mature so they know I understand.

And I said they take advantage of that mature stuff and I’m tired of feeling hurt when they pass over me all the time.

They couldn’t believe I’d accuse them of that.

But am I wrong? Things have been tense since and by not taking back my no I ticked off my whole family (including extended family).

He has been too agreeable for far too long. Saying “no” is a start. His parents think he understands, but they don’t understand that he deserves to be treated fairly and to get to do what he wants to do instead of always doing what his siblings want to do.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel.

Here’s some more advice.

His parents need to be more understanding and fair if they don’t want to push him away forever.

Everyone agrees that the parents are the problem.

He has been easy going for far too long.

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