Family bonds can be complicated, especially when those bonds are separated across oceans.

So when a woman’s parents arranged to treat a cousin’s baby in Vietnam as the son they always wanted, they expected their daughters to accept him as a sibling.

But years later, a Facebook friend request forced her to confront the fact that maybe this was a relationship she wasn’t ready for.

Read on for the full story.

AITA for not wanting a relationship with a ‘sibling’ I’ve never met?

I am a first generation Vietnamese American in my late 20s.

15 or so years ago, my mother beat cancer but due to treatments had to get her tubes tied.

I was a child at the time, so I am unclear as to why specifically, but I remember her going into surgery with the purpose of a tubal ligation.

This means her parents weren’t able to have any more children, but soon an opportunity presented itself.

Because of this, her and my dad were never able to try for the son they’ve always wanted.

A few years later, my mother’s cousin who still lives in Vietnam ends up pregnant, but is contemplating other options because of the cost of raising a child (they already have 2 daughters).

My parents step in and offer to adopt the child if it’s a boy, and it ends up being a boy.

The two make a deal, but not everyone was sold on it.

My mother’s cousin agrees to raise the boy as their “aunt” if my parents financially support him and agree they will work on eventually getting him moved over to the States.

My sister and I were uncomfortable with the idea, but because of cultural expectations I kept my feelings and opinions to myself and never said anything to my parents.

So the deal goes forward.

Through the years pictures are sent back and forth, money is sent back, and my parents visit once every 1–2 years. The child is taught that his real parents are his aunt and uncle, and these people are his parents, so he calls them such.

My parents tell him he has two sisters that live back in the US and that someday they will come back for him. I have never spoken to him on the phone or video chatted with him, nor have I ever wanted to.

My parents do not push the issue.

The relationship is rather unorthodox.

Throughout the years, they haven’t taken any steps towards getting him moved over, they just send money and talk to him every once in a while, still having him call them mom and dad.

If I had to guess, I’d say my “brother” is around 10 years old now. I look at his pictures and I can see him resembling my mother’s cousin more as he grows older.

She worries how this relationship will impact the child once he gets older.

I can’t help but wonder when he’s going to piece it together or when his older sisters will tell him the truth. He’s recently gotten a Facebook and is trying to connect with me on it.

My sister has accepted his request, saying it’s harmless and he doesn’t want anything. That may be true, but I just don’t feel any sort of connection to him and don’t want a relationship with him.

I leave his request alone.

Over the weekend, he added my husband, who accepted because he recognized some of my family members as mutuals.

She feels very uncomfortable with this and her feelings on this “sibling” remain the same.

When he brought it up to me, I asked him to please unfriend him because I don’t want a relationship with him and I don’t want to let him into my life because I’ve never met him, don’t see him as a brother, and don’t even know where to begin to say anything to him at this point.

My husband unfriends him no questions asked. My sister was in the room when this happened, and she thinks I am being weird about the whole thing.

So Reddit, AITA for not wanting a relationship with a “sibling” I’ve never met?

It’s hard to feel close to someone you’ve never even met.

What did Reddit have to say?

It’s possible her reasons for being hesitant are completely justified.

She shouldn’t be forced to clean up a mess she never made in the first place.

Maybe it’s time to be upfront with this “sibling.”

This commenter goes against the grain a bit.

Sibling bonds are something you just can’t force.

If you liked that story, read this one about grandparents who set up a college fund for their grandkid because his parents won’t, but then his parents want to use the money to cover sibling’s medical expenses.