Q&As

I’ve been married for 15 years with my wife and our son is 18yo. I think I was a good father to him, always present, always supporting him, I was the first he talked to when he had a bullying problem, a math problem, when he needed romantic advice. He is straight but likes crossdressing and doing makeup, and I was the first one to support him on that too, while his mom was trying to make him more “masculine”.

However, recently I discovered that he is not actually my child. My MIL said he had to tell me something important, so I went to meet her and told me that my child is actually my wife’s high school boyfriend baby. She gave birth at 20 but apparently she was cheating on me with her old boyfriend. My MIL said my wife told her the truth after he was born because she had suspected that the baby didn’t exactly look like me and MIL confronted her about it, but the baby was already born and nothing could be done. 

I was mad and asked her why is she telling me this right not? She told me it’s because she saw my son hanging out with his biodad at a park and believes that he is back in their lives.

I decided not to shoot the messenger and went out to confront my wife and son about this, after a long argument they told the truth. The biodad was back and wanted to meet his real son.

A lot of shit happened and I’m divorcing, and also cutting my wife’s son out of my will, because, I never had a real son and all this time I was putting all my energy and effort raising another man’s child. I’m also consulting if is possible to sue the biodad for all the money I’ve spent raising his bio son thought out the years. 

My wife is obviously mad at me, but my (step?) son is just devastated, I can see him depressed, not talking to me, and constantly apologizing. My plan was to divorce and cut contact with them right after that, but now I’m wondering if I’m going too far by punishing him too.

Edit: Everybody is asking this: The kid knew about his biodad for about 4 months before I discovered it. And yes, we did a DNA test, he insisted a lot of it and after it came back negative is when I think his depression really hit. Y'all right, maybe it is useless to sue the biodad, but I'll ask a lawyer anyway.

Edit 2: Many people are comparing my situation to being a step dad or an adoption. There is a difference, I thought for over 18 years that he was my real son. I 100% believe that adoptive parents are real parents and their adopted children are their real children, but they willingly went into the adoption process, they know their family is not blood family. I was tricked into my situation. If I had known my wife after the baby was born I wouldn't have cared because I knew it was somebody else's son, but I thought this was my real son and just now I find out that he isn't. Anyway, I need to talk to him when he feels like it.

Have been clean for a year. Wife wants me to go another year and will give me head whenever and wherever i ask. Has been working so far

Thank u to the Redditor that reached out to online support for me. Very cool of you i appreciate it

This is probably incredibly stupid and petty but this feels really disrespectful to me. I have been dating "Matt" for 2 years. We don't live together but in the past 6 months or so he has been here fairly often. I have 3 older children (13yo boy, 12yo girl, 10yo boy) and they all get along with Matt well. My issue is that Matt has zero respect for other people's things; towels mainly.

I have no washer/dryer in my rental and have to travel 35 minutes to the nearest laundromat. I only have time to do this once a week due to my work schedule and all else. I can only go Sundays. Matt knows this. I also only had 4 towels (one for each of me and my kids). It became a problem of like.. every single time that Matt and I has sex, he would go to the bathroom and grab one of the towels off the hook and wipe off with it after I told him not to several times. He said it was a force of habit (that's what he cleans up with at his place for 15 years). He will apologize, etc. Just to repeat it. Or I went out and bought him a towel for when he's here (I was tired of him using mine and he has severe ADHD and can't remember to bring his own / can't remember pretty much anything). He never uses his towel to clean himself. It's always one of the kids. Or there's been a few times that he will grab the kids towels and put them on the floor to soak up the water that he tracked out of the shower. Every single time I have talked to him about it, I've gotten increasingly more pissed off. The last time I had to mention it was a few weeks ago and I lost my shit entirely and told him to stop touching my kids fucking towels or we were done. He said something like "it's just a fucking towel" or "maybe it's time you get more than one towel per person" and whatever but he did stop using the towels. Until this morning.

This morning he woke me up for a quickie before we both had to go to work and tmi but I started bleeding. Sorry for the mental image. He runs to the bathroom, grabs a towel and starts cleaning both of us up. I truly thought it was his towel that he grabbed (and he had mentioned having to do his laundry anyhow so I didn't make a fuss) but then he turned on the light and it was my oldest son's towel. I asked him why the fuck he didn't grab his own, since he was doing his laundry anyhow and could have just taken it with him. He said he "panicked" and just grabbed the first one available. His towel is literally the first one on the hook when you walk in to the bathroom and I keep the bathroom light on at all times so there's no way he could have just not seen which towel he was grabbing. Now I have to go and do laundry today, again, after just having gone on Sunday. I told him that I needed a break from him because he has zero respect for me at this point. Yes, it's small and it's a fucking towel for Christ Sake but it's still something I've asked him not to do several times. He doesn't think it's a big deal and says I'm acting ridiculous over a towel. AITA?

No, I can't get a mini washer/dryer per my lease agreement. No, he won't wash our laundry as well. I asked him to take the towel with him and he said "no" because I "made him feel fucking stupid" and says that if I had been nice about it than maybe he would have but he won't now. Yes, I could get more towels but this was never an issue before he started coming around and frankly, I'd like to keep the laundry to a minimum because I already have a bad back and the laundry can be difficult. So I shouldnt have to buy more towels just so he can clean himself up with them.

So this happened a few days ago I 40M and my wife 35F are taking our 2 children 8M and 12M to McDonald's for dinner we get the food and return home our children go to wash their hands before eating I see my wife reaching her hand in our 8 year olds happy meal box. I ask her what she's doing and she said she just wanted a nugget I told her not to because he only had 4 nuggets plus we are both on a diet at the time so I tell her that and she stops I leave to wash my hands and help the kids open the new soap bottle because the old one ran out once I open it I wash my hands and then they start to wash there's I walk back into the kitchen and I see my wife licking her fingers I look beside her and see my 8 year olds happy meal torn apart and all 4 of his chicken nuggets were gone I asked her why she ate his nuggets and she said that the salad she had wasn't enough and that she couldent resist her urges and that she was hungry she then said that 4 chicken nuggets wouldn't affect her diet I then yelled at her that it's not about the diet but that you ate our 8 year olds fucking dinner she said she still has fries and apple slices and that he can share with his older brother i yelled at her that she was a piece of shit for eating our 8 year olds dinner she ran off crying saying that im a horrible husband. I don't see what I did wrong but I want you to let me know, am I the asshole?

Edit: seems alot of people are making up things, number 1 i did not tell in front the kids they were still in the bathroom,2 she got a salad from Wendy's obviously McDonald's doesn't sell them, and 3 stop acting like I cussed her to the point my face turns red I said one bad thing for her actions and you all act like I beat her up

Edit 2: I'm back from my work and I see I have over a thousand comments, sorry but there's no way I can respond to all of you before another 1000 has arrived

I went out on a date from a girl I met in a dating app, it was going well (according to me) and I eventually tried to kiss her. She pushed away and said "sorry, I just feel more of a friend's vibe between us". I am not up for losing my time, and I'm not looking for friends, so I just immediately said "OK, thank you for your time, I'll head home now", paid for my drink and left. She looked pretty phased as I was getting up and wouldn't stop apologising

Some acquaintances have told me it was "an asshole move" to leave her like that and that I should have carried on, but what's the point in doing that? Feels a bit stupid IMO, but maybe I'm the asshole

I don’t know if I am in the wrong here. About 15 years ago I gave birth to Kerra. She passed when she was three months. She was a surprise and would have been around 10+ years younger than any of the other kids.

She passes and her urn in on the mantle in our home. Life moved on. My DIL has seen the urn before and commented it was a nice name. I didn’t think anything about it at the time.

I got a call from my daughter telling me that I need to talk to them. That they plan on naming their daughter Kerra and knew it would be a problem so they were going to surprise me with it after she was born.

I sat them down and asked if they were going to name their daughter Kerra. They told me it was in the running. I asked if they were naming her after anyone and it was a no. That they just liked the name. I told them I am not very confortable with them doing that. I know I don’t own a name and suggested it could be a middle name and we would just call her her first name. I explained it would be very hard for us and we worry that we may start projecting or it will cause mental distress to use.That I don’t think it is fair to the kid to have that burden.

My husband also said that he wouldn’t be that happy with the decision and feels wrong to name her that.

After that it started agruement, that she is pissed we are trying to veto a name and called us jerk.

My husband and I don’t know if we are jerks or not. We thought we handled this well and communicated clearly our feelings on it.

I have been taking my 9yo stepdaughter to dance classes for four years. I drive her every week. My husband (her dad) and I pay for every single fee associated with her dance school.

This year, her end-of-year recital lands on her mother’s custodial time. Her mom has committed to taking her to the show.

I volunteered to be the backstage parent (managing the class backstage when they’re not performing, helping with hair and makeup, etc). I did this for the last two recitals and my stepdaughter loves having me there to hang out and support her.

The dance school reached out yesterday to tell me that my stepdaughter‘s mother asked them to remove me as backstage parent and put her in. They agreed to do it without discussing it with me first because she basically told them it was her custodial right. (To be clear, nothing in their court order says anything that would prevent me from being able to be around her even though she’s not in dad’s custody.)

Mom and I have a history of high conflict. I believe she is trying to remove me because she doesn’t want me spending any extra quality time with her daughter. She simply hates me and my husband. (If you are wondering, I have nothing to do with why she and my husband never worked out).

I could bow out and accept this because I’m not the biological parent, but it breaks my heart because I love being there and dance is “my thing” with my stepdaughter.

WIBTA if I reminded the school who their paying customer is and ask them to go back on the decision and advocate for me? I want to fight back and give them all the context so they can understand why I have the right to be there. But I also don’t want more conflict with mom, who would be upset if the school has my back. (If you are wondering, I don’t think she would go to the lengths of not taking her to the recital over this, because she has to know that would be devastating to her daughter who’s worked hard to prepare for her performance.)

I’m not sure what the best way for all of this to play out would be.

Thank you so much for your judgments! I’m all ears!

Update:

I called the dance school, but not to have them change their decision. I gave them all the context. (I should’ve clarified in my OP that she lied to them and implied I wasn’t legally allowed to be there on her time which is not true). The owner of the school says he feels completely manipulated by her mom. He apologized. He offered to make it right and said he and his wife (co-owner) were comfortable with reaching out to mom and telling her that I am the backstage mom. They also said it would never happen again.

I told them that I really appreciated that they are owning up to how it went down. But I told them that I would rather take the high road and leave it at that. I told them not to reach out to mom. Let her have it. I also apologized to them for having to deal with drama that should’ve been handled by our family privately.

The only thing that matters to me is that my stepdaughter has a wonderful experience. I could’ve “won” this, but if that would’ve created even an inkling of stress for my SD on her big day, it wouldn’t be worth it.

My plan is to tell my SD “hey I know I said I’d be backstage this year but great news, your mom wants to do it! You guys will have so much fun together. I’m glad she will be there for you.” Then I’ll be in the audience with a bouquet of flowers and a huge smile on my face.

Thanks to everyone here, even the assholes lol

I live in a little neighborhood, a lot of kids and grandmas. The community is pretty nice besides one person. A new women moved in by the hill in the fall. She is right next to the park where people hang out.

The problem is she is mental about her property. She has a very big area and there is no line from the park to where her property is. If your ball goes over she will come out a tell you to get off her property.

The kids school bus stop is right there and like 40 kids get on in the morning. They all don’t fit on the sidewalk and will stand in the grass. She put a sprinklers and soaked all the kids before school. They were not messing things up.

In the winter she yelled at a group of kids having a snowball fight and they went over the line. It has happened so many time and it has happened when people were still technically in the park.

I wish she would just put up a fence since it would actually show where it begins. So basically no one in the neighborhood is fond of her. The kids don’t like her, the parents don’t, and even the old lady’s find her to be destroying the peace.

We are suppose it have a block party in about two weeks and I organize it. This year I got a petition to not include her. I also moved it so it would be on the other side of the park so no one would be anywhere near her property.

I sent out invites to all the homes besides hers. She came up to me and asked why she didn’t get an invite. I told her because the neighborhood find her to be a jerk.

She called me a jerk and I am morally conflicted

This comes out of the neighbors pockets, no how or city funding

My BF of 2 years is pulling the "you really ended things because my kid asked a fucking question" but that's not the case.

BFs kids (7yo boy and 10yo girl) have been coming and staying here somewhat often for the past 5 or 6 months and it's been hell. My food bill went from $350-$400 a month to $1100. My house is constantly trashed. I now have holes in my walls and broken controllers because the 7yo has severe anger issues whenever he is playing video games (he gets an hour a day per dad's rules). My BF contributes to the bills but not nearly enough to make up for the money I've been dishing out since his kids started coming here and he can't afford to pay any extra because of child support and medical insurance. And to be blunt, I'm tired of looking like the fucking asshole because I'm the only one who steps up and tells his kids to cut the shit when they are doing anything wrong.

The problems are mainly with the 7yo. Every time I tell him to do anything, he throws a fit and asks his sister to do it for him. Refuses to even get his own cereal because he "doesn't want to" and will call his sister stupid or retarded if she says no. Or pull the "this is why I hate my life" or "this is why no one likes you" talk. If I tell him not to do something, he will absolutely make a problem out of it by asking the dumbest, most obvious questions. Like I said to him the other day "stop touching things" because he would not stop screwing things up and he goes "so I can't touch the floor? I can't touch the air?" Or last night, when I kicked them out, it was because I told him he wasn't allowed to eat past 1pm anymore (talking about lunch) because that kid will decide that he's finally ready to eat lunch 20 minutes to an hour before I make dinner and then refuse to eat his food and wastes it. He goes "so I can't eat dinner anymore?" And his dad goes "valid point". Are you kidding? So I kicked them out. Told my BF I would be damned that I play the role of a parent to a giant man child and his disrespectful children. Now he's telling everyone I kicked him and his kids out because I was pissed that his son asked me a question.

I'm not regretting kicking them out, at all. Good riddance. But he has since told me that I would make a terrible mother and that I am absolutely shit with children and where I have zero patience, I should stay away from people with kids so I don't "fuck up some other poor kids life" with my attitude. AITA?

I'm (23f) pregnant with my first child, a daughter. My boyfriend (23m) and I have decided to name her Wren. We didn't tell many people yet. My boyfriend told his parents and I told my parents and my siblings. After I told my sister (30f) she asked me if we could talk and she showed me a list she had of names her and her husband had chosen for future babies. Wren was the girl name they had chosen too. I had no idea. My sister never thought anyone in the family would go for a name like Wren. And when she heard we had chosen that she got a little sad.

You see, my sister and her husband have been TTC for 6/7 years and have been unsuccessful with the exception of one miscarriage 5 years ago. Right now they are undergoing some fertility treatments to try and have a child. It's been super hard on her and when my boyfriend and I learned we were expecting we agreed I should tell my sister first and give her time to process. She told me how much she appreciated it and she was sad for a little while after. As well as super jealous. But I understand because this is something she has wanted for so long and it was difficult for her to see me get pregnant so fast.

I love my sister and I always want to try and be understanding and not make her feel like shit because I'm having a baby and she's still trying to. But when she asked me to please choose another name so she could name a future daughter that, I didn't feel like I could agree to that. My daughter feels like Wren to both me and my boyfriend. We've already got some items with her name on them. We have grown very attached and bonded more with our Wren.

I know to many it's not a big deal for people to share the same name in a family but our family doesn't really like doing that. Our names might have been used in previous generations of the family but we never liked the idea of two living members of the family sharing a name and we're all so close that it would get confusing. So I know to her it means Wren has to leave their list if I use it.

I told my sister I couldn't change my daughter's name after we had already committed so heavily and the name felt so right to us. She burst into tears but told me she understood. She hugged me and everything. Then my BIL got involved and he tore me a new one for not sacrificing a name so that my sister can hold onto the hope that she'll get to name their future daughter that one day. He said she has been such a good big sister to me and this would cost me nothing.

AITA?

My husband and I talked a few weeks back about bringing the kids fishing this past weekend and had talked in specific detail about us needing to reconnect as a family. He works so often that me and the kids hardly ever see him anymore (I work full time at home), so the entire point of this fishing trip was to spend time together as a family and as I said, it was discussed in great detail. Our youngest child is 5 months old and strictly breastfed, as well.

We head out Friday morning to go grab our boat and head to our camp for the weekend. Everything is going fine until about 40 minutes in to the drive. Husband gets a phone call and starts saying things like "yeah I will be there soon" or "what did you bring?" When he got off the phone, I asked him who that was and he told me "Heath". A coworker of his that I have never once met. I asked him if he had invited some random dude that I don't know to go on our family putting and he said he had and that he didn't think it would be a big deal. He also said something about how his buddy wanted to check out the boat and whatever. I've never heard a single thing good about this guy (very sexist and makes gross "jokes"). I asked him to turn around and bring me and the kids back home. He asked why and I said that this trip was meant for US as a family to reconnect, as we had discussed in great detail, and that I wouldn't be sitting around awkward, nursing my baby in front of a man that I do not know and watching over all of our kids when he shoots the shit and hangs out with his buddy. I told him it was messed up that he would even consider this to be a good option, considering that now meant that I would be doing all the parenting alone while he got to be social. He said that it wouldn't be like that and that he told his buddy that this trip was meant for the kids and that he would have them the entire time but I honestly just was not having it at all. I know how it would have been because he said this dude brought beer (I asked). So, I had him drive me home and told him to go by himself. He left pissed off.

I ended up taking my kids on my own trip. I rented an AirBnB on the lake for the entire weekend. I brought my kids fishing, swimming and to the amusement park down the road. We had a good time. I did not have cell reception at the Airbnb so I didn't speak to my husband, outside of texting him prior to leaving - stating I would be gone for the weekend. When I got home Sunday morning, my husband flipped out. Said that he had only stayed out on Friday until 5pm (so 6ish hours) and came home to spend the rest of the weekend with me and the kids, just to find that we had left and he couldn't contact us. I told him that none of this would have happened if he had just stuck by his word originally instead of making a social hour (with a guy he sees EVERY DAY) out of what was meant to be a family weekend (he also allowed this dude to stay at our camp for the weekend because he apparently invited him to stay the entire weekend anyways). AITA for anything?

This issue started a while ago, my son married Becky. Becky and my daughter do not get along. Looking in on it, personalities don’t mix well. They frustrate eachother a lot. About a year ago, the family was having a BBQ and Becky was asked to bring paper plates so no one had to clean plates.She brought plastic plates so my daughter would need to wash them in order to give them back to Becky by the end of the night. The BBQ was at her home.

I think it was a breaking point for her, because she grabbed me and went inside. She had a big rant were she was not pleasant about Becky. It was mostly about her not following instructions and in her eyes that she was incompetent. I told her to calm down and just enjoy the night. I will do the dishes.

A few days later I got a call from my son saying he will only communicate with me if becky is there. So group chats, if she is on the phone with him or inperson. That he heard that we were talking shit about his wife and this is what he is doing now. Same thing with my daughter, he didn’t let me explain.

So from them on we have been communicating that way. It has been frustrating at times and I don’t feel like I can talk to him about anything personally.

This bring me to the main issue, I have breast cancer. I informed the kids one by one about it. I am not comfortable to explain my diagnosis with his wife in the room. We are not close and I am very emotional about it. So I texted him that we needed to talk alone and he told me that anything I stay I can say in front of his wife. I called him but no answer and me saying it was very important didn’t do anything.

My option was to tell him with an audience or not tell him and let him learn from someone else. I chose not to tell him, I had my first appointment and my daughter made a post on instagrams wishing me luck and support.

He called me up pissed that he found out about this on social media and called me a jerk for not telling him. My point was I did try and he wouldn’t listen to me.

First this is not my story but my daughter. In the USA during the incident.

So my daughter just left to go over seas with other family members/ friends, 4 people total. The financier of the trip bought herself a first class ticket and then 4 seats for the other 3 people to give them a little more space since 2 of them are a little larger. They used their boarding passes including the pass for the extra seat. Everything went fine for the first leg of their trip. They had a layover before getting on another flight.

Once boarding the second flight they got settled before a flight attendant saw the empty seat and told them to scoot together so she could seat someone else in the row. They tried to explain they had the ticket for the empty seat. The flight attendant then told them that since it was an international flight it was against international law to buy the extra seat and they could either move or be thrown off the plane. So not wanting to get thrown off they scooted in.

Once arriving at their destination they found out the flight attendant had canceled their return flights. My daughter (17) is currently thousands of miles from me without a return flight. First is it really illegal to buy extra seats on an international flight? Second, what can be done about the lost cost of the seat that was paid for? Is the airline just getting paid twice for the same seat? Can they cancel return flights over this without a real reason? The airlines website says extra seats can be bought for comfort and privacy on both domestic and international flights.

My ex-brother in law wants to be the “representative” of his estate.

The house has significantly appreciated in value, and was awarded to my deceased ex in the divorce which occurred in October 2023. As part of the decree, he had 180 days to get my name off of the mortgage, or the house had to be sold. He met to refinance the house on April 22nd and died the following day. The mortgage company backed out and my name is still on the mortgage. He had no will, so everything will go to next of kin, our 18 year old daughter. We (myself and my daughters) did not have a good relationship with his family. There needs to a “representative of his estate” to oversee the sale of the house and the settling of debts. This will be too much for our daughter. She is a very anxious person. My ex brother in law has volunteered to do this: help sell the house and set up a trust fund for both girls (aged 18 and 15). He has a lawyer - who helped my deceased ex through the refinance process - who is preparing paper work for my older daughter to name ex brother in law as “representative”.

Here’s my issue/question. As the “representative”, is there any way at all that my ex BIL can divert those funds to himself? I have some trust issues with my ex’s family. My ex had a significant brain injury and I received no help and support from them during our 20 year marriage, and now all of a sudden they want to be involved. People are telling me that I need to get my own lawyer. I can’t decide if that’s overkill or not, being as the lawyer that my ex BIL is working with helped my ex husband with the refinancing, and seems to be representing his estate. Is there anything I should be wary of? Am I being overly paranoid? This is my first time posting on Reddit about anything serious lol. Thanks in advance for any advice.