My sister-in-law caused Thanksgiving DRAMA…but refused to own up to her mistakes! - r/relationships | Reddit Stories | EP2114 - ok storytime

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is Cowboy Sam and this is Eh John, And
we've last.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Showed in some amazing stories for y'all the Okay Storytime podcasts.

Speaker 1 (00:08):
But before that we got a wrangle, a quick little
two minute out break from those bucking sponsors. We bucking
love so much they paid us the bucks to help
this show stay alive.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
My sister in law caused Thanksgiving drama but refused to
own up to her mistakes.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
Why.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Some of you may remember my previous post, which I
deleted due to privacy concerns about the Thanksgiving drama. Short recap,
my husband's grandma passed away and the funeral was the
day before Thanksgiving. I helped my husband's brother's wife sister
in law, with their two kids during the funeral and
try to keep the three year old quiet, but it
didn't work. He was very disruptive. Sister in law finally

(00:46):
removed the kids from the church and then sulked in
the bedroom for the rest of the day. By the way,
this comes from Corzoral PFBJ and if you want to
submit your own stories, go to our slash. Okay story
Time severed it so later that evening, the three year
old started antagonizing our elderly dog by running at him
and yelling. They had never had any issues before this.
His dad told him no, My husband told him no,

(01:08):
and I told him no. He did it twice more,
and the last time the dog growled. We removed the
dog from the situation, and sister in law swooped in,
saying to the three year old, come on, no one
wants you here. It's just a darn dog. She then
tried to get her husband to take them to a
hotel because no one wants the kids here. Sister in
law sulked all Thanksgiving morning and refused to speak to me.

(01:30):
Then she defriended me on Facebook. My husband made some
snarky comments that I'm ninety nine percent sure sister in
law overheard. Everything came to a head at Thanksgiving dinner
when sister in law ignored her mother in law, whose
mother had just been buried the day before and in
whose house we were staying. My husband lost his temper
and yelled at her. I'm sorry that, oh, he tried

(01:51):
to keep your child quiet at a funeral. I'm sorry
that we tried to keep our dog from biting your son.
You can be mad at me, but don't take it
out on the family and especially not my mom. Good
on Ope's partner.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
I agree, although I am admittedly a little out of
the loop because I was making sure drive turkey's not racist,
and it's not. It's not.

Speaker 2 (02:10):
Sister in law got angry and yelled at him and me,
saying that we have no value because we have no children.
More yelling followed. Sister in law and her family left,
saying they were never coming back. Mother in law was
in tears, thinking she had lost both her grandchildren and
her mother within five days. She literally begged my husband
and me not to leave. Obviously we stayed. The general

(02:31):
consensus on how to proceed is don't engage. There's nothing
to apologize for. She's acting immature. My husband probably should
apologize for making snarky comments, but overall, sister in law
was the one creating drama, acting inconsiderate towards mother in
law and making a funeral about herself. Since then, it's
been completely radio silence until today. Sister in law sent

(02:52):
my husband this email, Opie's husband, you may not like
me either. Well, what happened during Thanksgiving was that wait, yes,
sister in law was a disaster, and I feel bad
that it happened. As a mother, I will not let
anything or anyone hurt my kids, and I will always
be their protector, their defender, and be there for them.
We didn't handle the situation very well regarding three year
old behavior during the funeral service or just in general

(03:14):
while being in the house, but we also have to
remember that he's three years old and doesn't know any
better when it comes to handling his own behavior, let
alone being quiet at a funeral service. And that's why you,
as the parents, I have to know better. Emotions were high,
everyone was stressed out, and things just got out of hand.
I'm reaching out to you to apologize and hopes we
can all move forward. I know it will take time,

(03:36):
but I don't want three year old to think he
doesn't have uncle, uncle or aunt Opie anymore, because he
does like being around you guys. This darm law and
there are some comments that's not a terrible one, but
also kind of not taking any responsibility for the funeral.

Speaker 1 (03:52):
Yeah, I was just worse for the real apology and
it just kept on. The quality of the apology just kept.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Going like yea down hill, Okay, but it wasn't great.
It was just kind of man. It wouldn't make me
feel better about it. I'd be like, Okay, probably share
it to everyone I knew and be like, oh my god,
look what she said to me. Her excuse of him
being three and not knowing any better is bs As
a teacher who regularly sees three year olds passing in
the lunch room or to their buses, they are one

(04:19):
hundred percent capable of knowing better. It is the way
you teach them and show them what to do. Common
to You feel weird about the apology because she's trying
to change the facts of what happened. You are upset
because in a stressful situation, she reacted with anger and
aggression and kept escalating and escalating until there was a
blow up fight. She's apologizing for her child behaving badly

(04:40):
and becoming too aggressive in his defense, you were angry
at her behavior, but she is acting like you were
unfairly angry at her young child. She is changing the
facts to make herself look better and force you to
welcome her back, which is a crap thing to do
whilst's supposedly trying to make amends. The best thing for
the whole family is probably if you all get past this, though,
But that doesn't mean you have to to pretend like

(05:00):
her apology is the truth, and feel free to bring
up her misinterpretation of the situation.

Speaker 1 (05:05):
Before you proceed.

Speaker 2 (05:06):
And there is an update to the other thoughts.

Speaker 1 (05:09):
I think that last one was perfect, where it's like,
feel free to bring up the fact that she's off base,
because it's like that was It's just it's this is
all just like too much. It needs to be so
much like there's a simple way to do this, and
it's just being like I was wrong, I made a mistake.
Please forgive me, Like, shouldn't reacted that way? Yeah, Instead,
it's like that, but then all this other stuff around

(05:29):
it where it's like, but actually I'm perfectly justified in everything.

Speaker 2 (05:33):
Three, so it's not really my problem.

Speaker 1 (05:36):
Right.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
So, after sister in law sent that very toxic apology,
my husband was very upset about it, and so was I.
After I took some time to process and read all
of your very helpful comments, he decided not to write
back right away and to take some time to think
about an apology. We usually email back and forth during
the work week to talk about stuff, and I sent
him a summary of what I had gleaned from your help,

(05:57):
which was borrowed heavily from someone else. This is an apology.
She doesn't seem contrite, and she's reframing this as I'm
sorry for wanting to take care of my child. No,
that is not what this is about. She acted entitled, petulant, immature,
and boorish. We're not expecting a three year old to
be perfectly behaved at all times. It's her attitude and
actions that we take issue with. Your mom, my mother

(06:18):
in law, and sister in law's mother in law deserves
a real apology. It wasn't fair to her to make
her mother's funeral more stressful. It wasn't fair for her
to have to face losing her mother and her best
friend and potentially her oldest son and grandchildren in the
space of two days. It wasn't appropriate for sister in
law to ignore her and give her the silent treatment
because sister in law was upset with us. If she
was legitimately upset with the way that I interacted with

(06:40):
three year old during the funeral, she needed to pull
me aside and have an adult conversation about it and
asked me to not do those things. And explain why.
If she was upset with the way that both of
us interacted with three year old about the dog, then
she needed to pull us aside and have an adult
conversation about it and try to resolve whatever it was
that she was upset about. She should have included me
in that that email or sent me a separate apology.

(07:02):
Not including me in the greeting, not including me on
the email, deleting and blocking me on a Facebook is
still giving me the silent treatment that she started a
Thanksgiving You and I are a team. I am part
of this family too, and this situation involved both of us.
Looking back on this, I'm not sure how valid this
point is about me giving me the silent treatment. I'm
not sure if she even has my email address, although
she certainly has my phone number. I do kind of

(07:24):
feel like sister in law is leaving me out on purpose,
but I don't really have any evidence other than the
fact that she didn't include me in the apology at all,
other than the last sentence with the emotional manipulation part.
Saying you have no value because you have no children
is a crappy thing to say and a horrible thing
to believe. What about the millions of people on this
earth who are unable to have children? Is she saying
that those people are worthless? Is she saying that human

(07:46):
beings are only valuable if they reproduce? What if her
own children grow up and decide not to have kids,
would that mean that her children have no value? That
is horrible, That is not okay. This was an extremely
hurtful thing to hurl at us, and she needs to
apologize for saying this. And although this probably won't happen
and isn't really our place to tell her, she needs
to examine her own beliefs and think about what made

(08:07):
her say that in the first place. Obviously, a three
year old isn't going to be as well behaved as
a first grader. But children and tuls aren't exactly stupid.
They can understand social cues way better than they can
speak or throw a ball. For example, look at three
year old's cousin, who is the same age. He was
at the same funeral, in the same pew, and he
was perfectly well behaved because his parents brought quiet toys
for him and taught him how to behave on top

(08:29):
of that, the whole it's just that three year olds
are and there's nothing poor little me can do about it.
It's just a really crappy attitude to have when you're
raising a child. I mean also, if he was crying,
you take him outside, right, you go, you know, you
deal with his emotions, not in front.

Speaker 1 (08:43):
Of everyone, police the children in private.

Speaker 2 (08:46):
Sure, try try harder. You don't start from a point
of failure and expect success to materialize. Saying I just
want my child to have an uncle and aunt is
classic emotional manipulation. Instead of hashing it out between the
three of us, the adults, she's use three year old
as bait. He isn't involved in this except parenthetically. The
problem we have is with sister in law. Sister law's

(09:07):
attitude and sister in law's behavior. Husband agreed with all
these points and told me that he still needed to
think about how to respond, which I told him was
completely fine and that I understood. We went ahead and
sent Christmas presents to them, although we haven't received any
gifts from them. They did send a non personal Christmas
postcard last week. We didn't spend much money under seventy
dollars and kept it very generic for the adults. A

(09:29):
book for brother in law, a lotion chapstick scept for
sister in law, and tailored the gifts for the kids
Minnion puzzle for three year old who loves Minions, sippy
cup for baby, and topped it off with a twenty
dollars target gift card for the whole family in a
generic car that just said Merry Christmas with our names well.
Sister in law texted both husband and me on Christmas
Eve with pictures of the kids with their presents and

(09:50):
said Merry Christmas. I responded with Merry Christmas back to her.
The day after Christmas, she texted both of us again
with the picture of the baby smiling and holding the
sippy cup and said that he loves with the cup
and asked where we got it. Husband responded with the
place and we made some small talk about it, exchanging
about three four texts. Three to four texts. Husband and
I took turns responding. Later that afternoon, I got on

(10:10):
Facebook and noticed that I had a friend request. Sister
in law refriended me. After the conversation. Okay, okay, some
progress a little bit, that's something somewhat I'm uncomfortable with
accepting her request until my husband responds. I told him
that she had requested to be my friend again and
told husband that I didn't want to accept until he responded.
He agreed that I shouldn't accept until he responds, but

(10:31):
that he wasn't sure what yet what to write. I
suggested using a version of the falling response. Thank you
for writing and apologizing. To be clear, none of us
were angry at three year old. We were frustrated and
hurt by your behavior. It was our few days for
all of us, especially my mom, and your behavior really
hurt feelings, especially the way you treated mom during dinner
and then shouted at us about not having children.

Speaker 1 (10:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (10:52):
I feel like the initial apology was her being like, oh, yeah,
you just take my three year old, and everyone's like, no, right,
you behave badly. Right your three year old was a
three year old, right, you are an adult.

Speaker 1 (11:03):
Someone here hates the three year old they're three. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (11:06):
We understand that it was a stressful time, but it
is not okay for you to treat the family that
way in the future. If you're having an issue with
either of us, please pull us aside so we can
have a private conversation and work it out then and there.
We appreciate you reaching out, and we agree that we
should all move forward together. Lad that you all enjoyed
your Christmas gifts things for the pictures. You read it
and thought it was a good start to a letter

(11:27):
and said that he would tinker with it, but that
he wasn't ready to send a response yet. I'm a
bit frustrated with this because I don't want to offend
sister in law by letting her friend request it and
starting a whole bunch of new drama. But I also
am not going to accept it until husband sends a
response to me. Accepting her friend request feels like a
tacit acceptance of her apology. In some ways, I wonder

(11:47):
if we shouldn't have sent gifts or responded so much
to her text. However, I do want to make peace,
so I do think it was good that we did
those things. At least she can't say we weren't civil.
I'm not sure why my husband is dragging his feet
so much. I think it's probably because this is the
first time in ten years that he's really stood up
to her and not let her get away with throwing
a fit. He's also a peacemaker and very non confrontational,

(12:09):
which I think is playing into I completely understand needing
time to process and thoughtfully compose a response. But it's
been two weeks since sister in law sent her apology
and I would like to get this resolved. Am I
being ridiculous? Should I just go ahead and accept her request?
I really don't want to until a husband responds. Should
I let my husband take things on his own timeline?

(12:29):
Or should I continue to encourage him to respond? The
only reason I'm feeling pressure to resolve it is the
Facebook thing? Should I just let that go? And there
is a second update? I think to finish off this story?

Speaker 1 (12:41):
But what do you think?

Speaker 2 (12:42):
Let it go?

Speaker 1 (12:42):
We're getting lost in the sauce here? Did Yeah?

Speaker 2 (12:46):
He's like, should I accept the request?

Speaker 1 (12:48):
Yeah? Except the rest? And I'd such my message being
like I think your apology was lacking.

Speaker 2 (12:53):
Yeah, go, I honestly stop sending your messages.

Speaker 1 (12:56):
Call her?

Speaker 2 (12:56):
Yeah, Call her and be like, hey, it felt like
that apology didn't really like. I wasn't really satisfied with that.
I would like to talk more about this issue.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
I'm always a fan of the IRL mouth to mouth freestyle.

Speaker 2 (13:06):
That's true. Edit too small update the day after I
posted this, we went to a five k race with
my husband's parents that we were planning on going to
with them for several months. Right before the race, sister
in law texted me later that day, first time she's
directly spoken to me since the whole thing, and asked,
it's your hat's been ever going to speak to me again?
I've tried reaching out to him via email and text.

(13:27):
I responded. I showed my husband first and asked if
it was okay, and he said it was fine and
said I'm sorry, just got your text. I haven't seen
the text for about an hour because I didn't have
my phone on me. He was really upset and told
me that he still needs some time to process, that
he'd rather wait than send something he'd regret because he's
still upset. Thank you for reaching out, and I think
we all want to move forward. I think he needs
a little more time, but that he will send a

(13:48):
response when he's ready. I do want to express that
I'm still feeling a little hurt too, and I would
really like to have a phone conversation with you, yes
sometime soon, to talk so we can have a good
relationship going forward. She didn't respond, and I primarily want
to talk to her about two things, based on the
comments and based on how I'm feeling about the situation
in the future. How do you want me to interact
with your children. I don't want to step on any toes,

(14:09):
and I don't think I was out of bounds in
what I did. But if she is an issue with
me doing anything other than playing with them, then I
would like to know. I pretty much view what happened
from my end as a normal authority figure oversight trying
to entertain him and keep him quiet, and trying to
keep him from antagonizing a dog and getting hurt. I
would like to hear her view of what happened and
understand what she was feeling when I was doing those things.

(14:30):
I would like to know what line she felt I
overstepped so that in the future I can be sure
not to overstep that. I think it was mostly with
the funeral stuff. If she has a problem with the
way we handle the dog situation, I don't think I
would ever feel comfortable being in the same room with
my nephew, because I won't stand by and do nothing
if there's a chance he might get hurt. If appropriate,
I would like to ask if she's okay. Some pointed

(14:50):
out that she might be overwhelmed with the kids, and
I think that might be a really good insight. I'm
not going to demand an apology or anything. If she
wants to give a real apology, then she will. If
she doesn't, I think I can let it go. But
I don't want to be walking on eggshells the next
time we visit, wondering if the way I interact with
my nephew is going to make her upset again. Well,
you know what never makes me upset? I do know
listening to fall episodes of stories just like this. Just

(15:12):
go to Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favorite podcast app
and search a pokey story time. But there is a
teeny tiny bit left of the story.

Speaker 1 (15:19):
Yeah, I agree with everything.

Speaker 2 (15:21):
Yeah, that was a great response. I think that you
know what you need to do. Got to have that
phone conversation, get it off your chest, Yeah, and then
move forward.

Speaker 1 (15:28):
Plan it in some way, I guess. And you know,
you can't really demand the apology. That would be weird.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
So although you can express to her that you are hurt,
that this is how you felt about the apology, but like,
don't request anything of her. She will do what she
wants to do.

Speaker 1 (15:42):
You know.

Speaker 2 (15:43):
At the five K I walked with his mom, and
he and his dad both ran it. I was planning
on bringing up the subject and asking her advice since
she has known sister in law for much longer and
because sister in law was so rude to her, But
as soon as mother in law and I were alone,
she brought it up and asked if we had heard anything.
I told her that sister in law had sent us
sort of but not really apology didn't go into specifics,
and mother in law said that she got a very

(16:04):
similar email that wasn't actually an apology but a bunch
of excuses. You didn't go into specifics. Either go into specifics, man,
come on specifics. Mother in law said that she was
completely fed up and didn't want to deal with her
after years of this kind of behavior, and that she
hasn't responded and doesn't plan to, and advise me to
just leave it alone. But I'd already sent the message,
so I don't really know. I'm not sure if I

(16:25):
should wait for sister in law to respond, or if
I should text again and ask if there's a good
time for me to call her. Let her respond honestly.
Let her Yeah, you've already put You've already given the
little olive branch. See if she takes it. That's on
her app thought.

Speaker 1 (16:37):
Done what you can, You've done what you must. Now
you must leave the rest with her.

Speaker 2 (16:41):
Must trust trust, you must leave the rest the musk.

Speaker 1 (16:48):
I banned my brother's cheating girlfriend. Years later, she's still
playing victim.

Speaker 3 (16:54):
Don't you try, don't play My thirty one female sister
in law thirty four female has been a thorn in
my side for almost two decades.

Speaker 1 (17:05):
When I first met her in my middle school years,
I idolized her for being older and cooler. Except when
I met her, she wasn't dating my brother thirty three male.
She was dating his best friend. By the way, this
comes from user Depth National fifty three fifteen, and if
you want to submit your own stories, go to the
r slash Okay storytime subreddit. So my brother and I
have always been extremely close and share a friend group,

(17:26):
so I was often with some of his friends. D
also started coming around frequently. Not too long later. D
had caused some chaos within the friend group, cheating on
her boyfriend with my brother cheating on my brother with
his best friend and slowly making her way around the
rest of his friends.

Speaker 2 (17:45):
Spare one whoa spare that one spare them.

Speaker 1 (17:49):
Only one was spared from the wrath of D. As
you can probably guess, my adoration for her quickly dissipated.
Her true colors continued to show more and more. D
has no filter and says it was very rude and
inappropriate things to myself, my family, and our friends constantly.
Most friends actually distanced themselves for my brother because of her.
She became more insufferable as time went on. This caused

(18:11):
my brother to get booted out of the house that
he was renting with his friends. They ended up getting
an apartment together, and by they, I just mean my
brother Ded didn't work, doesn't drive or know how, and
just went to school. My brother had to rearrange his
work schedule to drive her to and from classes, pay
for the apartment and everything that comes with it, and
had to cook and clean because with school she was

(18:31):
too busy. It was hard to watch and even harder
to be around. Oh God, you hate a relationship like that.
She had rules like not being able to get a
glass of water if we came over because we didn't
pay rent there, and would scold my brother if he
did so. Anyway, what no water, no water? No water?

Speaker 2 (18:49):
Imagine if like every time someone came over to her, us
were like no water.

Speaker 1 (18:52):
She would also make very rude and snide remarks anytime
she was around anyone, saying things to me, specifically like
you probably shouldn't have kids, or you might pass down
a lazy eye. My eyes are perfectly fine, by the way,
or I think your mom could have mistreated you more.
To be honest, could this lady?

Speaker 2 (19:13):
You would shut up?

Speaker 1 (19:14):
You're stinky. You're so ugly on the inside. I can't
imagine the rot within you. She also told my baby cousin,
who was struggling with an eating disorder, that she should
quit after high school so she doesn't lose her prime
years of being skinny. Needless to say, I was less
than a fan of her. Yeah, not too long later,
I got a call from my brother, who was beside

(19:37):
himself because he walked in on her cheating on him.
I was relieved, to be honest, but I listened and
reassured him that he didn't deserve any of it. It
was heartbroken for months, but during that time, we got
closer than before, and his friend started coming around again.
Months later, they reconnected. I was close enough with my
brother to let him know that I don't condone cheating
or the hurt she put him through, and I don't

(19:58):
think it's a very smart idea. I told him I'd
support him no matter what, but I didn't want to
be around her. I reminded him that it wasn't the
first time she'd done it either, seeing as that's how
they had gotten together in the first place. You gain it,
you lose him. How you got it.

Speaker 2 (20:13):
Your brother also sucks. Man.

Speaker 1 (20:14):
You lose her, you got him. He reassured me he
would be fine. Conspiracy theory.

Speaker 2 (20:19):
He's not fine. He's not fine.

Speaker 1 (20:22):
Weeks went by and my parents were out of town.
I lived with my dad and stepmom at the time,
and my brother asked if he could come stay at
my dad's while they were gone to get some peace
from his roommates. I agreed, but didn't realize he would
bring her. I immediately and immaturely confronted her and yelled
at her to get off my property and that she
would not be staying there. Things escalated physically, and they

(20:43):
ended up leaving fast forward to now. I live out
of state and come home for holidays. This was my
first Christmas home with my fiance, though he's been home
with me before. This year was special to me because
Christmas is my favorite time of the year. It has
nothing to do with gifts, but everything to do with
my very big, very loving family. Every year we go
to my dad's for Christmas Eve, open presents with our
immediate family, and then head to our cousins to eat, drink,

(21:06):
play games, and spend time together and be merry. Yeah,
we've got another person here who enjoys Christmas time to.

Speaker 2 (21:13):
Riesmas Die is here.

Speaker 1 (21:17):
Sophie loves the chees. This year I was kid free.
My kiddos were with their dad, my ex husband. Even
without kids, it's a lot to plan and execute a
trip because I normally only get to stay for a
day or two. After factoring in travel time and my
work schedule, I forgot my niece's presence back home. I

(21:38):
asked my brother if you could re send me her
list so I could run to Target buy her gifts
to open and mail the rest. They ended up having
the exact same gifts except one, so I got everything
wrapped them up and headed to my dad's. I was
greeted by my younger brother, twenty five male, My dad
and stepmom, and my older brother and niece showed up
right after me. D was nowhere to be found, and

(21:59):
my brother plain that her parents were in town and
staying at their house, so she stayed behind. To entertain
that my family is very welcoming and wouldn't have minded
having them, but her family is not shocking, shocking that
her family sucks in your family rocks. At my brother
and sister in law's wedding, her family set up two
tables to split the families, then had my brother and

(22:19):
D sit with her family in seats that made their
backs face my family. They did not speak to us
the entire reception whack. We opened gifts, and my niece
was glued to me, which was great because I don't
see her often and was missing my kids. We enjoyed
the rest of the night and our trip. Six days later,
I received a text from my older brother stating that

(22:40):
I was the reason D didn't come to Christmas. Oh
boo freakin' who, that I offended her and they no
longer wanted to be around my children or have me
around theirs.

Speaker 2 (22:49):
Well, I don't want to be around D, so yeah, shut.

Speaker 1 (22:52):
Ut DT on the shut up D. Yeah, literally shut
up D. Shut up D. Just shut up D. D.

Speaker 2 (22:58):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (22:58):
See, now you're always Souny's family. I was very confused,
because I honestly don't care to talk to D at all,
let alone converse about her. He explained that my little
brother's girlfriend, Laura, who I'm very close with, brought up
the story of our altercation, and D was embarrassed and upset.
I called Laura and explained, and she explained that D

(23:19):
was actually talking negatively about me to her. Laura simply
agreed that she knew we weren't very friendly and explained
she knew about the altercation, clarifying that my little brother
was actually the one who told her. I called my
brother and explained that I was not the one who
brought this up to Laura. I also didn't appreciate that
D was speaking negatively about me and was now upset

(23:40):
because she didn't like something that was said about her.
The difference was that she was talking about me in
the present while our situation happened in the past, something
my brother and I had already hashed out years ago.
I told him I didn't understand why D couldn't just
talk to me herself. We are grown adults. We have
been we have each other's contact numbers, and we have
been pretty cool RGIL for years now. I let him

(24:01):
know I would apologize, but I wasn't going to do
that through a middleman, right because we're adults, not twelve
year olds in our first year of middle school, like
speak to each other.

Speaker 2 (24:11):
Like adults's your big boy pants.

Speaker 1 (24:13):
A week went by and D never contacted me. I
did send her a text stating that I'd love to
talk things out, but would prefer not to do it
over text because it's very impersonal. I told her if
she wanted to wait until I was back in town
at the end of the month, she could, or she
could call me. I got no response, and really, can
I just say, like, how, why is why is her
brother staying with her?

Speaker 2 (24:34):
I don't know. It seems like she's just thought of
the worst.

Speaker 1 (24:37):
They have kids.

Speaker 2 (24:39):
Yeah, that's fine.

Speaker 1 (24:40):
Now it's February and I get a call from another
family member who had recently flown to our home state
to visit. She informed me that D and my brother
could do nothing but talk about me, my family, and
my children, and how horrible I was. My family is
not very fond of her and shut it down immediately.
At this point, I reached out again, reiterating that I

(25:01):
think this is a personal matter between her and I,
and I'd appreciate it if she would talk to me
instead of everyone else. I get a response two days later,
with paragraphs upon paragraphs. The first paragraphs stated how she
will not bite her tongue at the disrespect, and that
she knows I was just hoping she would get over
it because I haven't reached out to her. She literally
reached out to you, numbskull, What are we talking about?

Speaker 2 (25:23):
Are you a dunch?

Speaker 1 (25:24):
What are we doing?

Speaker 2 (25:25):
A little Dunce cat silly?

Speaker 1 (25:26):
Are you late for your potty at the Dunce hat factory? Ooh,
where you're the number one customer constantly buying one every day.

Speaker 2 (25:34):
Here's the Dunce hat factory on fire because you just
got burned.

Speaker 1 (25:37):
I just went to the Dunce hat factory, and everyone
there knew you. The second paragraph tells me how immature
I am and how tough I must feel that even
back then I wasn't protecting my brother from her and
that I created the cheating narrative in my head and
must be projecting otherwise, how did my marriage fail? That's
how she said after finding out that I'm pregnant with

(25:59):
the daughter, she hopes for her sake, I don't go
through with it because I'll end up like my mother,
which again, I have three perfectly healthy, happy children that
I've raised pretty much on my own. And finally, she said,
I'm a pathological liar because I never sent my niece's
Christmas presents, which again, if you missed it, she opened
the same exact ones on Christmas Eve, which she would
have known had she been there, and I hadn't sent

(26:20):
the other one that the store didn't have because I
had received the text from my brother cutting me off
from my niece. But also that I'm trying to manipulate
her through her daughter because I bought the most expensive
gifts on her Christmas List registry, which I do because
they have one child and have to buy for my three,
so it only seemed fair to spend a decent amount.

Speaker 2 (26:39):
So she is giving gifts.

Speaker 1 (26:41):
This person's trash and your brother's a fool. Yeah, And
I would just wait for the niece to get to
the age where she has autonomy, and then you can
establish a relationship with her.

Speaker 2 (26:53):
Deal with this terrible, terrible D character D list.

Speaker 1 (26:56):
Shut up D. By the way, if you want us
to shut up, too bad, because we have full episodes
with stories just like this, and we talk all about
it on iHeartRadio, on Spotify, on Apple podcasts, wherever you listen.
Just search Okay storytime the name of this show, and
there you will find fifty consecutive days. That is twenty

(27:18):
four hours times fifty. That's how many hours worth of
stories we have for you to peruse. So chop, chop,
You've got a lot of catching up to do. We
do have a little bit more story.

Speaker 2 (27:29):
Let's go into it.

Speaker 1 (27:29):
Let's just finish her off. At that point, ooh, my
gloves came off. I did tell her I will not
be responding to half of those comments. I told her
that the word immature being thrown around so ironically here,
since she is in her mid thirties and can't have
a conversation with me about something that's been upsetting her
from twelve years ago. I let her know that I

(27:50):
respect how supportive my brother is of his wife, but
I do not care for her and only apologized out
of my love for him. I also let her know
that it will be a blessing if she uses me
as an excuse not to come to family functions anymore,
because it won't bother me either way. I'll always be
welcomed because it is my family. And lastly, I listed
all the friends and family that she has pissed off

(28:12):
and why and assured her ninety nine percent of them
would agree that out of the two of us, I'm
not the problem.

Speaker 2 (28:19):
I think they would agree. They'll probably gea. You're probably
gonna get award for making sure she doesn't come back.

Speaker 1 (28:24):
Slam dump you said. By the way, whole family would
agree with me too. Boom it, come show you man,
and welcome to the gym.

Speaker 2 (28:31):
But that is the end of that story.

Speaker 1 (28:32):
That is the end of that story. Hey is John
og host. We're gonna get back to the stories, but
a quick free minute break of ads from our sponsors.

Speaker 2 (28:40):
My mother was given away as a child. Now her
biological family wants her to care for them.

Speaker 1 (28:46):
Uh Goo goo Gta I.

Speaker 2 (28:47):
Thirty five female, grew up in the US, born and
raised in Austin, Texas. My father's seventy male is Canadian
and my mother sixty eight female, is Greek. Every summer
we vacationed in Greece with my maternal grandparents. So, by
the way, this comes from throwas Out at ninety forty
two and if you want to submit your own stories,
go to our slashowy storytime Separate. So when I was
twenty five, my parents retired and moved permanently to Greece

(29:11):
after my mother inherited a house and a significant amount
of money from her mother when she passed away. That's
when things took a strange turn. During the last few
months of my grandmother's life, my mom went to Greece
to care for her as she was no longer able
to care for herself. In her final days, my grandmother
revealed a shocking secret. My mom was adopted. Ah She

(29:31):
wasn't the biological child of the parents who raised her.
Thank you for finding adopted. Instead, she was the daughter
of my grandmother's cousin. Apparently, in Greece decades ago, it
was common for struggling families with many children to give
a baby to a relative who couldn't have kids. My
mother was devastated. She grieved the fact that she never
knew her real family and that no one ever told her.

(29:53):
After my grandmother passed, she decided to move to Greece
to reconnect with the biological family she never met. She
traveled to the re where her biological mother lived and
met her for the first time, along with two older
brothers and a younger sister. Her oldest brother was especially
emotional because he vaguely remembered the day they gave my
mother away as a baby. But from the start, my
mom was hurt that none of them had ever tried

(30:15):
to find her, but her excuse was that she had
moved to the US and it was difficult to track
her down, while her biological mother said she had made
a pact with her cousin, my adoptive grandmother never to
reveal the truth. The entire village had been told that
my mom had passed away as a baby, so no
one even questioned it.

Speaker 1 (30:31):
What is the why? Why? I don't I'd rather tell
them all that they'd no longer alive, instead of just
being like, we couldn't afford to have the baby, so
we had to give it.

Speaker 2 (30:39):
Away, and we just like never told anyone.

Speaker 1 (30:42):
That's kind of pathetic.

Speaker 2 (30:43):
Not gonna lie like, I mean, I understand, own it,
just like tell her, yeah, own your position.

Speaker 1 (30:49):
Own it.

Speaker 2 (30:49):
For the past ten years, my parents have lived in
Greece and my mom has built a close relationship with
her siblings. However, her relationship with her biological mother has
remained distant and formal. I mean, of course, this person
kept I mean told her adoptive grandmother to keep this
live from or you know, keep the truth from her
for her whole life, and also gave her away. So

(31:10):
obviously that's gonna be a complicated relationship. She never got
over the fact that this woman kept all her other
children but gave her away, likely because she was a girl.
At the time, boys were valued more because they worked
the fields and contributed to the family's income, whereas girls
were seen as a burden. Two years ago, I was
able to move to Greece as well, since the parents
who raised my mom left her a sizable inheritance. It

(31:32):
allowed us to live comfortably, and honestly, I preferred the
lifestyle here. We live in a beautiful place near the capitol,
and life is peaceful. Now here's the issue. My mom's
biological mother is now ninety six years old and in
very poor health. Her biological father passed away decades ago
due to political circumstances or two older brothers. Her sister
lives abroad have been taking care of their mother, but

(31:53):
they are exhausted. Their wives are complaining. Tensions are rising,
and at a recent family gathering, they told my mom
that she it also help take care of their mother
because it's unfair that they are doing it alone. To
what she should say, Well, it was unfair that she
gave me away, so.

Speaker 1 (32:07):
Yeah, what's more unfair being given away when you're a
baby bummer?

Speaker 2 (32:12):
Hmm?

Speaker 1 (32:12):
Oh, so you find me when you need something from me,
that's convenient.

Speaker 2 (32:17):
My father was furious when he heard this and told
my mother to cut them off entirely. My mom refuses
to take care of this woman. She doesn't love her,
doesn't feel any emotional connection to her, and can't forgive
her for abandoning her. My mom is not close to
this woman, and of course she has no legal claim
to Annie inheritance from this family. However, she has truly
enjoyed her relationship with her siblings and their children and

(32:38):
doesn't want to lose that. She's feeling pressured, though, and
she's deeply upset. By their demands. When I found out,
I was livid. How dare these people ask this of
my mother, knowing full well that she was abandoned and
that no one ever attempted to find her. I feel
like they're manipulating her, and she's unable to see how
unfair this is. I'm getting married in a month to
my fiance, who's Greek and fully supportive of me, and

(33:01):
I am seriously considering uninviting all of them from the wedding.
I want to send a clear message that we don't
want contact with them anymore. However, my mother is hesitant.
She doesn't want to escalate things, even though she's hurting.
I feel like she's not as attached to these people
as she thinks. She's mourning the idea of the family
she never had, rather than truly loving these people, and
I hate seeing her being taken advantage of. I always

(33:23):
idealized Greece and the strong bonds of family, but now
I see that's not always the case. I'm so disappointed
by all of this. What would you do in this situation?
Would you cut them off? Would you disinvite them from
the wedding? How can I help my mother navigate this
and edit, I forgot to mention something I think is important.
My mom suggested they find a senior care facility to
put her biological mother in. She even offered to pay

(33:45):
a quart of the price. My biological uncles were offended
because they said it was disrespectful to put their mother
in a nursing home another Greek thing, although they are
generally financially comfortable, A quarter for a good structure can
mean four hundred to five hundred per person per month,
which by Greek standards is enough. I think their idea
of help is taking her biological mother home for a
few months. And there are some comments and an update,

(34:08):
but I no, no, your mother should not be helped. Honestly,
should not help them kind of at all. They don't
even deserve her money, Like it's it's incredibly kind that
she's even offering that. I also don't think they deserved
come the wedding anymore.

Speaker 1 (34:21):
She's a really hard situation to navigate for the mom.

Speaker 2 (34:24):
Absolutely, this is a family that she didn't know about
for her whal life, finds out about, reaches out to,
thinks that she's gained this you know, whole new side,
and now they're trying to exploit.

Speaker 1 (34:35):
Her, manipulating her, you know, because they know that she
has now found this thing that she didn't have. But
you can't give these people any money for the woman
who abandoned you. Yeah, and I don't think that you'll
be able to maintain a real relationship with them because
it's always going to come back to this thing of like, well,
you didn't help us, you didn't help our mom. But

(34:57):
it's like, it's not our mom, it's your mom I had.
That's not my mom, it's your mom exactly. So you're
probably gonna have to come to terms with losing that.
Yeahn me hard, but there are some comments. Mermaids Studios says,
your mom doesn't owe her anything and her siblings are
being unfair. Cutting them off completely might be extreme if
she still values the relationship, but she should set firm
boundaries for the wedding. If their presence would stress you

(35:17):
or your mom out, uninvite them.

Speaker 2 (35:19):
If you'd rather keep things neutral, that's fine too. Do
what feels right for you both. Maybe. Shari says, likely
the sons are tired of taking care of mom, and
I'm betting their wives are complaining. The most wives are
what is this new daughter doing she should help? Heaven
only knows how much help they think your mom should do.
It is slippery slope with no good outcome. Creating distance
and firm boundaries between your mom and new siblings is best.

(35:40):
And Opie responds, that's my thought exactly. I am having
second thoughts, and surely some comments gave me some perspective,
but that's my main thought. And there is an update,
so we're to jump right into that because I think
we're all on the same page about this family update. Hey, y'all,
I've decided to share it with my mom the post
and let her read your comments. She was really moved

(36:01):
by the similar stories some of you shared. This led
to a deep conversation between us. Over the past few years,
my mom has learned a lot about her adoption. Unfortunately,
my Biograndma was not a good person. It doesn't seem
like she was the wife of one of my bio uncles,
let's call her. Maria, sat my mom down a few
years ago and told her everything. Turns out my biograndma
was a very strict and spiteful woman who treated the

(36:24):
people who worked for her horribly. She never wanted daughters
and even tried to give away her other daughter, but
that adoption fell through, so she kept her.

Speaker 1 (36:31):
Oh wow, Oh this.

Speaker 2 (36:32):
Person is a nightmare. My bioaunt went through a really
tough time growing up and that's why she moved abroad.
Her brothers never supported her the way they should have,
and they even cheated her out of part of her inheritance.
So the brother's also. Maria is now thinking about leaving
her husband since their kids are grown and she doesn't
want to stay married to a man she knows isn't
a good person. As for my mom, she never fell

(36:53):
to bond with her biomother, but after hearing everything from Maria,
she decided she doesn't want much contact at all. She
knows exactly what kind of people her bio brothers are
and never wanted a super close relationship with them. They're
not in daily contact anyway, but she does feel attached
to her nieces, nephews and their wives. That's the main
reason she hasn't cut ties completely. My mom has decided
she will help financially, but won't take Biogradma into her home.

(37:16):
I mean, again, that is already going way above and beyond.

Speaker 1 (37:20):
Don't take this little demon woman into your home. I
mean she's not I'll do that.

Speaker 2 (37:24):
She's definitely not. She's just giving her money, which is
a lot. She's doing it mainly to support her bios sister,
who is under pressure from their brothers to care for
their mother. My mom has tried to get closer to
her biosister over the years, but her sister has kept
her distance. She explained that she has deep trauma from
growing up with her mother and wants to maintain some
emotional space, but she's still happy they met. This past Christmas,
my bioaunt came to Greece and stayed at her house.

(37:46):
I wasn't there because I was visiting friends in the Netherlands,
but my mom and her sister spent time together and
it brought them closer. My aunt told my mom to
cut off her brothers completely and even invited her to
move to her country.

Speaker 1 (37:57):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (37:57):
She has made it clear she wants only a formal
relationship with the rest of the family, except for my Mom,
who she loves dearly. Side note for the skeptics, my
aunt is financially independent and comfortable. She has never asked
my Mom or anyone else or anything. I think that's
the way to go. Stick with the family member who's
actually like cool and like doesn't want to take your money.

Speaker 1 (38:17):
What a crazy notion that would be.

Speaker 2 (38:18):
I had no idea about most of this because my
mom doesn't want me to see my uncle's in a
bad light. She still thinks she'll keep some minimal relationship
with them, but she's especially close with a few of
her nieces and nephews and doesn't want to lose that.
One of my cousins, Maria's son, even confided in my
mom that he wants to cut ties with his father.
When my bio uncle asked my mom for help, this cousin,
who's only twenty five, pulled her aside and told her

(38:41):
to stay away and not give them anything because they
don't deserve it. That really got to me. It showed
me that not everyone in this family is selfish or manipulative.
I actually have a good relationship with this cousin. He
gets along great with my fiance since they work in
the same field. After learning all this, I met up
with him last night and we talked. He has moved
out on his own, but still keeps some contact with
his dad, mainly because he wants to wait until Maria

(39:03):
leaves before cutting ties completely. He told me that his
father and uncle inherited a lot of wealth and never
really yet to work. They started some businesses, but when
they struggled, they took large sums of money from Biograndma
and other relatives. Now they're recovered and live comfortably, but
they never paid back what they owed. My cousin is
ashamed of his family's actions and doesn't want to be

(39:23):
judged for them. He also believes they're trying to financially
exploit my mom. Because he cares about her and really
respects my parents, he warned them not to get involved.
I mean, they're clearly trying to financially exploit her if
they have the money to take care of the mom
and they're coming to OPI and be trying to guilt
her into this.

Speaker 1 (39:38):
Where do these where do they build these people? Like
in a laboratory out of like just evil evil laboratory arts.

Speaker 2 (39:45):
Yeah, it's kind of a Frankenstein Frankenstein's lab situation. After everything,
my parents and I made a decision. My mom will
give one lump sum of money for her biomother's care,
whether they put her in a nursing home or hire
a caregiver is their problem. She will also have a
final talk with her brothers to make it clear that
she is not taking care of their mother because that
woman was never a mother to her. When Maria managed

(40:06):
to get divorced, which my parents want to support her through,
we expect the relationship with the brothers to fall apart.
My mom is still sad that she never found the
ideal families she imagined, but she feels lucky to have
her sister, Maria and her nephew, whom she truly loves.
As for the wedding, we decided to invite them to
avoid unnecessary drama. That's the update for now. I truly
appreciate all the comments and support. I feel sorry for

(40:29):
those who have gone through similar painful experiences and I
hope no one has to go through this again. And ps.
Someone in the comments, probably a Greek, suggested that my
biograndpa might have passed away for political reasons because he
was fighting against the Yatzis. Unfortunately it was the exact opposite.
My biograndparents were right wing extremists at a time when
the left right conflict in Greece led to suffering and

(40:52):
a lot of their wealth came from unethical means. Okay,
so your biograndma and grandpa are terrible people confirmed.

Speaker 1 (40:59):
Thank god, odd you got given away.

Speaker 2 (41:02):
The terrible people confirmed. It seems like I mean, obviously,
I'm sure that your mom had a very you know,
that's just like a lot of trauma to learn. Seems
like she kind of came out on top here.

Speaker 1 (41:12):
Yeah, And don't give any of these any money. No,
you're not. Don't give them moneyppes.

Speaker 2 (41:19):
But you can give us your time by listening to
full episodes with stories just like this. Just go to
Apple Podcast, Spotify or your favorite podcast app in search
of time. But there is a little bit left. Sometimes
sometimes the truth.

Speaker 1 (41:33):
Shall set you free, and it just took a little
bit to get there. Yeah. First you thought the truth
was I missed out on having a family. Then you
learn that the truth is that you didn't have to
deal with a bunch of Nazi s.

Speaker 2 (41:45):
Yeah. I was saying, that's funny. Yeah, but there's a
little bit left. Lastly, I feel terrible, forever doubting my grandparents,
the one who actually raised my mom. They were amazing,
kind and compassionate people who help so many others in
the us. Everything they had was earned through hard work.
I'm so grateful they adopted my mom and I wish

(42:07):
they had also taken in my aunt. Thank you again everyone.
If I have another update, I will be back. And
that is the end of that story. Honestly, to your
mom's comment about you know, wishing she had that family,
she does. She has that family you know in your
adoptive grandparents.

Speaker 1 (42:22):
Yeah, exactly, But that is.

Speaker 2 (42:23):
The end of that story.

Speaker 1 (42:26):
My family excluded me and my wife from the family trip,
so we went on a vacation of our own.

Speaker 2 (42:33):
Oh little little toe to toe, who's gonna have the
better vacation background.

Speaker 1 (42:40):
My family has always been well off, and by that
I mean like we would take family vacations two or
three times per year. It's still like that now, but
I've noticed a difference in how my family acts now
that my female twenty seven wife female twenty four, and
I are married. By the way, this comes from user
a water Place and if you want to submit your
own stories, go to the r slash Okay storytime subredd it. So,

(43:03):
about three weeks ago, my dad booked a trip to Italy.
Everyone was excited and the family group chat was lit
up for days. Following the announcement, I called my dad
and talked to him for a while, and eventually I
thanked him for including my wife, who'd always felt left out.
There was a slight pause, and he told me that
he booked the rest of the available seats on that
particular flight, and there was only enough for him, my mother, grandparents,

(43:24):
my sister and her husband.

Speaker 2 (43:25):
And me. So to try to exclude Op's partner.

Speaker 1 (43:29):
Trying to exclude your wife because she's your wife and
that's when you're her wife, and they don't like that,
and they don't like wives. They don't like you being
both wives.

Speaker 2 (43:37):
They don't like.

Speaker 1 (43:38):
Wife squared wives because they're squares squares. So he booked
the flights without even taking my wife into consideration. Now,
I know what a lot of people would think, that
it was just a mistake, but I don't think so,
given the fact that my wife has been excluded in
other ways before, and if it were a mistake, he'd
do everything he could to change it. Before even announcing

(43:59):
the vacation, my heart sunk. I looked at my wife,
who could tell something was off, and I told my
dad to just give my seat to someone else, because
if she wasn't included. I wasn't going, yeah, thank you,
come see more partners like that.

Speaker 2 (44:12):
No, we read all We always read stories where they're like, well,
they told me you couldn't come, So I guess that's it. No,
stand on business. If you're gonna marry and or be
in a long term relationship with someone, defends them.

Speaker 1 (44:24):
Stand on your business, make your partner your business, make
your partner your business. Stand on your partner, stand on business,
Stand on your partner, and start a business.

Speaker 2 (44:31):
There you go.

Speaker 1 (44:31):
In the past, I was able to include my wife myself,
but I was tired of us being singled out. They
never did that to my sister and her husband. They've
always included them as a couple. But when it comes
to my wife and I, we've always had to figure
out our own way into the mix, as if we
weren't to be taken seriously, I'm not doing that now,
and I drew a hard line in the sand this time.
This man had the audacity to say that her and

(44:54):
I could book our own flight and just you.

Speaker 2 (44:56):
Know, meet them there, or maybe we could go somewhere else.
Book flight that goes in the opposite direction to where
you are.

Speaker 1 (45:03):
Yes, let us know exactly where you're ats so we
can be on the opposite side of the earth. I
don't even want to be near you. I just told them,
absolutely not, and then hung up. Needless to say, my
wife was in tears. She was upset, but she was
glad that I was sticking by her. A couple of
days went by and we decided to go on our
own vacation to a much humbler location, a large rental

(45:23):
cabin with her family. We are all down right amazing,
well lovely. Yeah, I'm happy about that. It's happy about
going to the cabin, A little bit little cabin in the.

Speaker 2 (45:32):
Cabin, action with the with the in laws, you like,
nothing wrong with that anyway.

Speaker 1 (45:39):
Well, my family found out and they have not stopped
blowing up my phone. Why do they care all the sudden.

Speaker 2 (45:44):
They're jealous of the cabin. They know it's gonna be cool.

Speaker 1 (45:46):
And the cabin was Yeah, I want to be a cabin.
My mom called me one night during all this and
said that I was being unreasonable and that there's no
way I couldn't just book a separate flight and instead
booking intirely different vacation with her family. I explained to
her that that wasn't the point. That the point was
that they have excluded my wife from every family related

(46:08):
event ever since we got married, which always put me
in the position to fix it. My mom basically called
me crazy and that I was overthinking a simple mistake
on my dad's part. For some reason. I'm starting to
think that maybe I'm overthinking it, and then I should
just talk with my dad to see if excluding my
wife was intentional, which was another point my mom brought up.
Am I the a hole? There's an edit here? I
guess it's not a bad idea, but your gut's already
telling you. I'm you already know that they're excluding you

(46:30):
because you are not a heteronormative like relationship clearly.

Speaker 2 (46:33):
And also, if it was just a mistake, then he
could have fixed it, you know, like, if it was
a mistake, he would have said, hey, we got tickets
for everyone, and then you would have said, oh, not
my wife, and that he would have said, oh, my god, right,
I need to get tickets right now.

Speaker 1 (46:45):
There's an edit here. Thank you so much for the
overwhelming support. We went to bed and then woke up
to almost two hundred notifications. That's crazy. My wife and
I sat down a couple of hours ago and had
a discussion about what our next steps should be. We've
both agreed that we were going to have a family
meeting with my family this Monday and confront them head
on do it. We seal that this is the best

(47:07):
way to handle the situation, and we honestly just need
answers directly from them. As for the comments, a lot
of you brought up gas lighting and how it causes
rifts in families, so we're going to learn a little
bit more about it to protect ourselves. I made a
vow to my wife when we got married that I'd
put her first and make her my priority, and I'm
sticking to it again. Thank you so much for all
your support, and hopefully I can make an update post

(47:27):
to fill you guys in on everything. Greatest wishes. There's
a comment here, let's come in comment everyone. You're in
the queer community. You know this is intentional, but let's
just say this, one time your father made an honest
mistake and that wasn't his intention. Based on your family's
history on excluding your wife, you have every right to
assume call them out and if need be, go low
contact I know it's hurtful, but your presence in the

(47:48):
family is an ultimate bargaining chip. If they are still crappy,
then you can put them on probation till they improve,
and there's an update. Let's just go ahead and oh
die did right in, swim right through.

Speaker 2 (48:01):
I think that's a good idea.

Speaker 1 (48:02):
First off, thank you all for the positivity. It's been
amazing seeing so much support. We didn't post an update
yesterday since it was Valentine's Day, so we're posting it today.
We had a family meeting at our house on Monday,
and it was interesting. I started with reminding my dad
what he did, how it matched up to all the
other times, how it made her and I feel, and

(48:22):
how his and my mom's reactions made us feel. I
told him that my wife is my everything and what
we do we do together. Our marriage is just as valid.
You either want us in your life or you don't,
and lately your actions have told us the latter. Then
I brought up gaslighting. We did some digging the previous night,
watching videos and read articles to better understand it. I
explained to them what it was, how they did it,

(48:44):
and how it made us feel. My conclusion was my
reasoning for planning this separate vacation with my wife's family.
My sister started crying. She apologized for not saying anything
and not paying attention. Her husband was upset as well.
My sister said, you have to book a different fight, Dad,
to which I pointed out that it was too late.
Our vacation was already booked and we couldn't bail on it.

(49:04):
My sister said, well then we're not going to Italy.
Then you too, Mom and dad can go, but we're not.
I feel horrible now. Q in argument between my parents
and my sister.

Speaker 2 (49:13):
I feel like this is just kind of making it betterself.

Speaker 1 (49:15):
Sisters like, I feel bad.

Speaker 2 (49:16):
I feel this makes me feel bad because you're not
going hot. It's like, no, be like you know what, hey,
I'll support you.

Speaker 1 (49:25):
I don't.

Speaker 2 (49:25):
I'm not going to go either. This is not fair
to you.

Speaker 1 (49:28):
Yeah, I'd like, I really know.

Speaker 2 (49:29):
It makes me sad, shut out and go to Italy
at you. I'm sad.

Speaker 1 (49:34):
It's like, no, be sad that our parents are are
bigoting my wife.

Speaker 2 (49:38):
Dude, what are we doing getting her?

Speaker 1 (49:39):
My wife and I sat there with our mouths hung
open until my sister and her husband got up and left.
My suspicions were right. The reason why my wife and
I were being treated unfairly was because of inheritance fears.

Speaker 2 (49:50):
What they didn't want to give you an inheritance because
what that doesn't make any sense?

Speaker 1 (49:56):
Is it because of your wife?

Speaker 2 (49:57):
I'm so confused, Like, is the point that they're being
grant that?

Speaker 1 (50:01):
I think it's yes, I think it's both being old and.

Speaker 2 (50:03):
Also they're like, oh, you don't have any you're not
gonna have any kids. And also that's just an assumption too.

Speaker 1 (50:08):
I've got I've got the next sentence.

Speaker 2 (50:09):
Oh, okay, perfect.

Speaker 1 (50:10):
Their explanation was that they didn't want inheritance quote getting
into the wrong hands, so they wanted to dote on
my sister and her husband to ensure that it won't.
Their actual words, that's right, they confirmed everything because they
basically said, yes, we treat your sister and her husband better,
and we're driving it home with the inheritance. It sounds

(50:32):
like they don't want their inheritance going to people who
are not heteronormative.

Speaker 2 (50:35):
Wow, they And that's I think it's time to maybe
like go very very low to no contact.

Speaker 1 (50:41):
With Yeah, I would go I would just like give
them one fart and say goodbye forever. Oh, that's that's
what I think of you. Peace out. It ended with
my parents leaving angry, not at their actions but the
fact that they were getting called out. From this point on,
we will be going low contact with my parents and
maybe try to amend things between my sister and her husband.
We will not attend gatherings or events. If one or

(51:03):
both of us feel excluded, we will demand that we
be treated just as seriously. We now know our boundaries
and we will set them. And by the way, you
can set your earbuds into your ears and then listen
to full episodes with stories like this. All you have
to do is go to iHeartRadio or Spotify or Apple
podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts and searched. Okay,

(51:24):
story time, and that's all you gotta do, easy peasy.

Speaker 2 (51:26):
But to this story, you gotta cut them off. They
freaking stink, They're stinky, and they don't care about you
or your partner.

Speaker 1 (51:38):
It was a very heartbreaking experience and we were disgusted
at the whole thing, and we still are right now.
We just have to take this time to move forward.
I doubt we'll be able to make any more updates
beyond this, but again, we wanted to thank you all
for the advice, love and support. We truly appreciate it.
This was a throwaway, but I think I'm gonna keep
this account up, but just not save the login info.

(51:59):
What a quirky guy. Thank you so so much and
the best wishes. We got some comments. Until the inheritance
comes up, I doubt they'll split it equally, if not
to be queathed. I've seen the worst of people surrounding inheritances,
tossing family under the bus. Reply. Op says she doesn't
need it anyway, while her sister does, so it wouldn't
be the end of the world if it was uneven split,
but it'd better at least acknowledge Op properly. I mean,
like no, because if my parents like don't like me

(52:22):
or my wife just being the way that we are,
then I'm gonna be like, I don't want your stinking
you don't want money.

Speaker 2 (52:27):
I mean, if you are comfortable enough to like not
need it, then I would not want to be indebted
to them at all.

Speaker 1 (52:35):
Hey, it's Sam. We're gonna get back to the stories.
But here's three minutes bads from our sponsors.

Speaker 2 (52:39):
My brother tried to exclude me from Christmas dinner, so
I said, I won't attend.

Speaker 1 (52:43):
To try to exclude me. I'll exclude myself.

Speaker 2 (52:46):
Guess who's freaking getting cold for Christmas?

Speaker 1 (52:49):
You?

Speaker 2 (52:49):
My family has always spent the Christmas together at our parents.
Last year was the first year we spent it at
my brother's twenties and his wife twenties. Due to it
being the first time, they were understandably very stressed and
had troubles getting things together, especially taking into account my
dietary restrictions. By the way, this comes from Flat three
one one and if you want to submit your own stories,
go to our slash jokey story to him subpured it.

(53:10):
So last year I female twenties, didn't live in the
same city as them, so I couldn't really help with
the preparations, but this year I do since I'm a student.
The money is tight, but my brother and sister in
law earn extremely well, even compared to our parents. When
we spent the Christmas at our parents, we didn't have
to contribute financially towards the feast, but this year the
cost are shared by our parents and them as I

(53:33):
can't afford it. My compensation is the organization and cooking
the feast, as none of them enjoy such things. This
is not a small task, since I'll have to start
the preparations days before Christmas and do everything on my own.
That's crazy that they're making you. Cooking is arguably the
easy I mean, the hardest part. Like just buying the
things is like the easiest thing.

Speaker 1 (53:54):
I was about to correct you so much.

Speaker 2 (53:56):
I just misspoke.

Speaker 1 (53:57):
Cookies arguably the no that I'm like, that's what is
good at it.

Speaker 2 (54:01):
No, No, cookies are like it's definitely the hardest part.

Speaker 1 (54:04):
It's so rough learning to cook, dude. I used to
mess up noodles every time. I used to used to
used to.

Speaker 2 (54:10):
You, this is not a small task, since I'll have
to start the preparations days before Christmas and do everything
on my own. However, since I'm not the one paying
for the meal, I have shared my plans weeks ago
with all of them and they have agreed on the menu.
A couple of days ago, I sat down and calculated
how much all of this would cost and sent the
info to my family. This did not go down well

(54:32):
with my brother. He is extremely frugal, which is fine
on all, but the cost of the feast is the
same as it has been every year. Mind you, it
is nothing crazy, honestlye it costs more than a regular
everyday meal. I said, fine, we can cut something back
if he wants, and asked what he wanted to give up.
He chose the one thing I wanted to make for
myself as a treat, since almost everything else is something

(54:53):
I can't eat, but the rest of them can't eat
all of it. I said, okay, anything else, but he
didn't want to give up anything something else. I asked
him if he was serious that my dish would be
the only one we would get rid of, and not
one of their multiple sides. I don't want to eat
only potatoes and salad. His response was that it's all
so expensive, and since it's something that most of us
wouldn't eat, it doesn't make sense to make it. My

(55:15):
brother pulled the same move last year, and my mother
put her foot down and forced my brother to include me.
Since then, he has constantly told us how we are
so emotional and stir up unnecessary drama. So to his opinion,
I said, that's fine. I'll just not attend and spend
the Christmas by myself since I can't afford to pay
for the dish. Since I already prove I did to

(55:36):
my man, my brother got mad and said that it's
not what he meant. I replied that this would be
the most elegant solution to the problem, since the feast
would be cheaper and I wouldn't have to work so
hard for a meal I can't eat, and this would
have the added bonus of not causing too much drama
since I do so voluntarily. I know I'm probably an
a hole just for this. He got super mad at me,
while my mom got mad at him and decided to

(55:58):
spend the Christmas at my place. But now everyone is
mad at everyone. But honestly, I'm mainly just sad and
feel like I ruined everyone's Christmas? Am I the a hole?

Speaker 1 (56:07):
No?

Speaker 2 (56:07):
I mean there is more to this story. There's an
addit too, I don't think so. I think you just said.
I mean he was supposed to pay for it, and
he couldn't do that one thing, and he could have
fixed it all by just saying I'll pay for one
more thing.

Speaker 1 (56:19):
It's it's uh, I like being like, Okay, so you
just don't want me to have my meal. You don't
want me to have my thing that I can eat.

Speaker 2 (56:27):
It's frustrating. It's like because he would probably be like, oh, well,
you can pay to make it. It's like, okay, ops
doing literally everything, making all the food that she can't
eat willingly and is asking you to and honestly, her
meal is probably like maybe an extra at most like
ten bucks.

Speaker 1 (56:43):
Honestly, yes, super deserves to be put on blast, and
like if you really can't afford it right now, it's
I'll pay you back. Yeah, let's figure out how you
even pay me back?

Speaker 2 (56:50):
Yeah, or pick me but the thing is that, or
you pick something else on the menu that you know,
not just the one that ope he can eat right, articulate.

Speaker 1 (56:58):
Just a read of thoughtfulness for.

Speaker 2 (57:01):
One second, edits ad. I have seen a lot of
comments saying that they would like to help me to
contribute financially towards the meal. While I find these offers
extremely kind, I simply feel like this wouldn't be appropriate
since I will be fine regardless of the outcome of
my Christmas. Instead, I'd like to ask you to consider
donating only if you truly can to your local homeless shelters,
food banks, et cetera. So those that have nothing, we're

(57:22):
very little could have something for the holidays. Thank you
and happy holidays. What a lovely that's so sweet.

Speaker 1 (57:27):
Oh he's a little sweetie.

Speaker 2 (57:28):
Oh he's a little sweet sweetie. I mean, just from that, oh,
he was like, yeah, I'm great. And then frickin' went
the mile further and showed that the brother is definitely
the a hole here, comments common one, not the a hole.
Honestly sounds like your brother is the one stirring up drama.
He chose your dish on purpose. Ohpie says, I'm honestly
unsure about that. I don't think he thinks it as
excluding me, but since he's not interested in eating it,

(57:50):
he feels it's unnecessary and doesn't seem to understand why
it's such a big deal for me. Comma two, not
the A hole. I must say that I've never heard
of family charging family for a holiday meal. Your solution
really is the best way given your brother's at Itu
and Obi says, we usually do pay for it, or
at least part of it when we go over and
eat at his plate. Since he's so strict with money
that he basically won't buy enough food for everyone to

(58:11):
feel full afterwards.

Speaker 1 (58:12):
That's I mean, I mean, like, why if he's that,
why are you hard for money? Don't host?

Speaker 2 (58:18):
That's kind of silly. Like, if you're so strict about
it that you're not going to pay for any.

Speaker 1 (58:22):
Of it, sometimes you can't afford to host it, that's fine, evening,
Just don't host.

Speaker 2 (58:27):
Yeah, I guess we are kind of resigned to this
after so many years. But he never offers any money
in return when visiting. Reply. Do you know other families
who do this? Is it a cultural or miserly issue
with your brother? I admit I had to laugh at
myself for thinking, Hey, I could have been profiting off
my family this whole time. JK. But I'll add that
he's stingy and a hypocrite for charging family but then
eating their food for free. It's a whack situation in

(58:48):
my opinion.

Speaker 1 (58:49):
He'd just be like, that's just the way I do it.

Speaker 2 (58:52):
He's like, I don't have the money to host you
to host myself, but also I'm just gonna come. Oh,
he says, I honestly don't know for sure how it
is done within other families when the kids are adults
in our hosting, When our parents hosted, we kids never paid. Yeah,
I mean, that'd be crazy if you guys were paying.
Your parents charge the kids.

Speaker 1 (59:11):
Charge my kids. Every time I make them dinner, I
charge them, charge them two bucks as sport outs in
the Daddy's h New Power Tool fund.

Speaker 2 (59:21):
Sure, last year my brother and his wife paid completely,
but this year my parents decided to take part in
covering the costs. As my brother has been going on
about the costs in summer, my mother actually got really
mad at him at some point, and so them paying
half is partly out of spite. But yeah, I think
in our culture it's polite to offer to pay so
that the host can decline and there is an update.

(59:42):
But yeah, I think that this is I mean, it's
that you got out like a smaller Christmas this year.
But your brother seems like he stinks.

Speaker 1 (59:49):
Yeah, it sounds like he's gotta really go back to
the lab. Yeah and figure out why it's so stinky.
Why you know, he needs more money. He needs money
if he really can't if he feels like he needs
to charge people for the food.

Speaker 2 (01:00:01):
I can't imagine that even if he had more money,
he would act any differently, because I think when you
have this very very stingy mindset, it's not even like, oh,
I don't have a lot of money, so I can't
be doing you know, I can't be doing that right now.
It's like I'm going to do it anyway, but also
charge everyone around me and make everyone else pay for
my lifestyle.

Speaker 1 (01:00:19):
It doesn't really feel like it's.

Speaker 2 (01:00:21):
I don't like. I don't think that's something that changes
when you get more money. I think it's just kind.

Speaker 1 (01:00:24):
Of like a It doesn't feel like a scarcity mindset.
Scarcity mindset, I don't think you're hosting in the first place. No,
it feels like kind of greedy. Yeah, but there's a
nice thanks.

Speaker 2 (01:00:34):
First of all, thank you for all the comments on
my original post, even for the ones who deemed me
the ahole. I try to respond to all of them,
but after a hundred comment it became hard to keep up.
But I did read all of them. For those who
are interested, I have something to update on my family,
Christmas and my brother. He called yesterday and wanted to
come over to talk, and he got here. He started
by apologizing on his part of the argument, Admitting that
he acted poorly. He told me he hadn't really paid

(01:00:56):
much attention on the menu since I was in charge
of it, and thus when he suggested to be caught
out my side, he didn't realize I'd practically have nothing
else to eat, and in the heat of the moment,
he couldn't take that into account. He then went on
to tell me something I didn't quite expect him to,
since he isn't one to really talk about these kinds
of things. I won't go into too much detail, but
when I was a baby and he was young, our

(01:01:18):
family went through some financial hardships. I'm too young to
remember it, but it left a mark on him. He
said that this is what was behind his reaction, and
he was sorry for letting his anxieties get a hold
of him. He did reassure me that his attention wasn't
to exclude me. He offered to pay for my side
and asked me if there was anything else I wanted
to have, but I told him I was fine with
this side, as there was some concern regarding the division

(01:01:40):
of labor and me paying for my own man when
there's was included in the family budget. I did raise
the issue and said i'd, however, appreciate if they pitched
a bit more in terms of the labor. He agreed
and said we really should include my mane in the
budget as well. So I told him I would send
him recipes and instructions and would be available for advice
if they needed it. I'm still doing most of the labor,
but I consider this fair and not a hardship. They'll

(01:02:02):
do the dishes after though, as I hate those really
quick pausing, it seems like really positive.

Speaker 1 (01:02:08):
Actually, it seems like we've pivoted.

Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
Yeah, because I was gonna be like, ah, well, there's
no way he really means that, but it seems like
he kind of means it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:15):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:02:15):
I mean he realized that he made a mistake owning.

Speaker 1 (01:02:17):
Up to it. You love that ill? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:02:20):
Oh bad. I also asked what made him think about
his actions, and he told me it was really hard
not to come to the realization that he acted poorly
when everyone he cares about is mad at him, including
his wife. Good on those people. Nice wife, And on
top of that, he didn't feel good about the thought
of leaving things like that and of not having me
over for Christmas. So yeah, I don't think I cut

(01:02:41):
him too much slack in the end, even if some
thought so. He can be a little misguided sometimes, but
he's not a bad person. It just sometimes takes a
little bit more time for him to come around. There
is definitely work to be done regarding him respecting other
people's opinions. But I have hope for him still, and
I have hoped that you guys can listen to full
episodes with stories just like this one. Just go to
Apple podcast, Spotify or your favorite podcast appen search a

(01:03:03):
boquy story time and you'll find all of those stories
that you've been hankering for anchor. But there is a
little bit left to this story. What give have any
final thoughts?

Speaker 1 (01:03:14):
You know, sometimes all you gotta do is listen to
the people around you who are screaming at you that
you're wrong.

Speaker 2 (01:03:18):
Yeah, sometimes when everyone is saying you're wrong, you made
a mistake, you have to be like, wow, I'm right.

Speaker 1 (01:03:25):
But then also sometimes sometimes though, sometimes when that happens,
you gotta go no, you're all wrong, You're all wrong.
It's very hard to determine sometimes which which version of
that it is, But in this case, it was very
clearly like everyone yelled at you because you were wrong,
and they were right about that.

Speaker 2 (01:03:44):
It's a tricky, slippery sloop.

Speaker 1 (01:03:46):
Yeah, but like everyone yelled at Steve Jobs, he was right.
And there you have it.

Speaker 2 (01:03:49):
I did apologize for my actions too, so don't worry
about that. I wasn't completely blameless in how things progressed
after all. So I guess this means that we will
have our family Christmas to spite this hiccup if I
try to figure out a solution that's fair for all
for next Christmas, be it a pot luck or something else. Anyway,
I do hope that everyone has a wonderful holiday, and
thank you again.

Speaker 1 (01:04:08):
For all the comments.

Speaker 2 (01:04:09):
And that is the end of that story.

Speaker 1 (01:04:13):
There we go, wow wow wow, where.

Speaker 2 (01:04:15):
I'm glad that. I'm glad that he figured himself out mistakes.

Speaker 1 (01:04:19):
Sometimes you just got to see the light before.

Speaker 2 (01:04:22):
You can see it. Ain't that the freaking truth.

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}My sister-in-law caused Thanksgiving DRAMA…but refused to own up to her mistakes! - r/relationships | Reddit Stories | EP2114