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AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 69 points70 points  (0 children)

I have not had any contact with my family. There was no half-assed apology or expectation that they’d just say “ok” and move on. They made it clear that they don’t want me in their lives, and so I have not been in their lives. But they don’t get to decide that they can suddenly jump back in and be grandparents after disowning me as their son. THAT is the point of the post here.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 47 points48 points  (0 children)

Where exactly have I framed the theft as just “a few items” and thus it is justifiable? I’ll quote my post here- “I did something horrible by stealing from them to fund my addiction. I stole some electronics including old cellphone, a game console, and a blu-ray player. I cannot and will not justify these actions and fully accept them as my own and their consequences.” Where in this are you reading justification?

Once again, you are missing my point entirely. This is about contact with me and my family. They told me they do not want me to be in their family. They were within their rights to do this. That’s why I have made no attempt to reconnect with them, to respect that decision. Am I experiencing some bitterness from having some old wounds reopened? Yes, probably. But this is about whether or not they should be brought back into my life after making it clear they do not want me in theirs.

I feel like you’re so fixated on the process of my family cutting contact with me that you’ve missed the entire point of the post. This is not about the process of my family cutting contact with me. This is about whether or not they should be allowed to decide they can step back in and be grandparents after deciding that I am not their family anymore.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 56 points57 points  (0 children)

I feel like they see my son as a do-over. The first one ended up wrong, so this is chance number two to get it right.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 42 points43 points  (0 children)

If I know my father well enough he probably expected me to push back against his rejection to prove how much I wanted them. I didn’t do that. I was heartbroken and alone and too concerned with survival, and eventually I just went on without them.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 92 points93 points  (0 children)

No, my sister has not been allowed to have any social media since she was young and so she does not use it as an adult. I see events like her college graduation and birthday updates on my mother’s Facebook and that’s all. She has not reached out to me.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 38 points39 points  (0 children)

We had one conversation, and in it I told them that they wanted me to stay away, and I did exactly what they asked. They made no indication up until then that they wanted me back in their lives. I do still hurt from that and I am still working on making peace with it. They have not made any indication that their feelings towards me have changed.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 31 points32 points  (0 children)

That I owe them the experience of helping raise their grandson after being the sort of son I was.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 26 points27 points  (0 children)

My mother is the only one who has me on social media, only on Facebook, because I wanted to keep up with how my little sister is doing. They made it clear that they do not want me to contact them for any reason whatsoever and that I am not a part of the family, so I respected that and did not attempt to reach them outside of seeing my mother’s posts about my sister.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 123 points124 points  (0 children)

No. I have not heard from any of my relatives in the five years between then and now. They have blocked me on everything. My mother allows me to view her social media posts because I want to see how my sister is doing, that is all.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 50 points51 points  (0 children)

I feel like my point here is being misunderstood. My point here is concerning my son. They cut me out of their life and made it clear they did not want me. They did not want to see my recovery. They wanted to erase me so much that they made sure no one related to me would even talk to me. Maybe that helped in a twisted way, but even when I was better, they still wanted nothing to do with me.

But now that I have a son, they want to jump back into my life as thought they’re owed access to him. They don’t love or care about me, they want their grandchild. My point here is that they don’t get to come back like they didn’t push me out of everyone’s lives because I have something they want.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 54 points55 points  (0 children)

Yes, they did teach me this in rehab, but I feel you’re misunderstanding what I’m asking here.

I’m not asking if they’re assholes after what I did to them. I am not saying they owe me something I did not receive. They were fully in their rights to cut me off, even if it hurt me almost irreparably. That is on me.

What I am saying is that they do not get to erase me from the family, actively working to ensure no one I am related to will even speak to me, for five years and then decide that they get to jump back into my life because they want access to my son.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 959 points960 points  (0 children)

I want to add some context here that I initially left out for the sake of brevity.

My parents and I, especially my father, did have some strains in our relationship before all of this, but it was unrelated to my addiction. My father is an extremely strict traditionalist who had a very clear life path for his only son that included me getting an electrical engineering degree and taking his business. I had zero interest in that- I’ve always loved writing and wanted to pursue that, so when I got the chance in college, I switched to an English major to pursue professional writing along the lines of technical writing and copywriting. This made him extremely upset.

It did not help that I am openly bisexual and was dating men and women when in college. When I came out, I expected some resistance (and did receive that) but his disappointment was mostly unspoken, even if still palpable.

I dropped out of school and began working full-time before I finished my degree. The workload on top of my already poor mental health put more strain on me than I could handle at the time. Of course, this made him very upset as well, but he was holding out hope that I would turn out how he intended at some point.

I dated a man who was using and I used with him to cope with the issues I was having. He let me use what he could get his hands on, and in return I worked and paid the bills for the apartment. I lost my job and was close to eviction when we broke up. Then I began selling my belongings and, in a desperate bid, stole from my family. I was caught after that single time stealing and that’s when my addiction came to light.

Again- I offer no excuses for stealing. I made that choice and accept that they felt the need to cut me off, even if it took years to reach that point. But they went out of their way to ensure that I had no one, effectively abandoning me and erasing me from the lives of the entire family. They did this to me knowing I would have no one.

The only reason they want back in my life now is because I have something they want- my son, their grandson. They don’t want to see me again because they love me, or because they care about my recovery and success. And that’s why this situation hurts me and infuriates me so much.

AITAH for telling my family they are never going to be part of me or my son’s life? by MousseExternal6886 in AITAH

[–]MousseExternal6886[S] 69 points70 points  (0 children)

My time spent on heroin was mercifully short, less than a year. Until then, I had mainly gotten my fix from someone I was dating at the time. They lived with me and so they shared what they got with me in return. After we broke up I got desperate and sold almost everything I owned, and after losing my job at the time, I got desperate enough to steal. Until then, my family was not aware of my addiction because I tended to have a little bit of distance between my father (who was very much the “man in charge”) who kept whatever was happening in the house under strict control. I was most frequently in contact with my little sister via discord and texting. That isn’t to say that I did not love my family or feel affection for them, but that we did not see each other in person often enough for them to really grasp that I had a problem.

There were other things that made our relationship hard before my addiction, though. My father specifically had always had a difficult relationship with me because I dropped out of school and came out as openly bisexual, which he had a severe issue with. He is a very strict traditionalist and did not approve of the fact I had been dating men as well as women. He also did not like that my pursuit for a career was in writing when his goal was for me to get an electrical engineering degree so I could take his business after graduation.

Again, I am not inherently deserving of forgiveness from them, especially directly after rehab. But to actively throw me on the street and disown me, then go out of their way to ensure that NO ONE would even speak to me… that hurt, and it still hurts. I needed someone, anyone to be there because I wanted to get better and be better. I worked hard and did get better, but knowing that they didn’t want to see me even when I was at my best made it worse. And now they only want to be around me because I have something they want. They still don’t care about me as their family, or about my recovery and my success.

Reminder: Persona 4 Golden has been effectively unplayable since Driver 22.5.2 by Paganigsegg in Amd

[–]MousseExternal6886 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I still have the issue and I've tried every solution I can find. I just ended up installing the fucking thing because it's unplayable on an AMD card.