Teenager to Half-Sisters: My Mom Doesn’t Owe You Anything because None of You is Her Daughter

“Who fed me from her gentle breast,
And hush’d me in her arms to rest,
And on my cheek sweet kisses prest?
My Mother.

When sleep forsook my open eye,
Who was it sung sweet hushaby,
And rock’d me that I should not cry?
My Mother.

When pain and sickness made me cry,
Who gazed upon my heavy eye,
And wept for fear that I should die?
My Mother.

Who taught my infant lips to pray,
And love God’s holy book and day.
And walk in Wisdom’s pleasant way?
My Mother.” Excerpted from My Mother by Ann Taylor

To many children around the world, mothers are a blessing from heaven. Many are filled with joy as they pay tributes to their moms, proudly telling everybody that they would not have achieved what they are today if not for these sweet and self-sacrificing women.

This is why growing up without a mother creates a void in a child’s heart. A void that she struggles to fill because from its hollowness comes this pain. A constant twitch even in her sleep. She can see other kids with their moms, see and hear how happy they are. Whereas, she has never felt that kind of joy. She has never felt that kind of love.

The void that she could not fill. The constant twitching that she could not stop. In time, the yearning could burn slowly into hatred due to life’s injustice. Why do other children have mothers, why can’t she have one?

The Original Poster of this story is a son who’s deeply loved by his mother and eternally thankful for her presence. But it’s his two half-sisters who despise his mom for rejecting them and their dad.

Was his mom, in reality, an awful kind of person?

With the username u/Material-Ice8430, OP shares the following on Reddit’s r/AmItheA-hole forum: “I’m 19m, and this is about my older half-sisters. My dad had them with a high school girlfriend but was never in their lives (he’d sleep with her a few times and just never be involved with the girls). She was a trainwreck, and he made a promise to her parents that he would take them if she got so bad they were suffering for it. But he never planned to keep the promise, and he never told anyone about them, never supported them or anything.”

OP continued to relate that his dad didn’t tell his mom the truth about his daughters when they got married. However, when his mom got pregnant with him, the girls’ grandparents suddenly showed up to force OP’s dad to take care of his kids. At that time, OP’s mom was alone at home, and the revelation shocked her.

According to OP, “Dad got home after several hours, and once he realized mom wasn’t handling it like some saint, he was trying to talk her into them raising them together. She didn’t want to stay with a liar or raise someone else’s kids, so she left him, and they divorced when I was four months old. Dear old dad didn’t want them either and would allow them to fixate on my mom. He tried to pawn them off on her many times. He’d ask in front of me for her to take them. He’d try to get her co-parenting the three of us instead of just me.”

But OP’s mom was unwavering, in spite of his dad’s relentless effort to make his ex-wife accept his daughters. The girls, who never knew a mother, also became obsessed with having OP’s mom adopt them. They would even use OP to try to get what they wanted.

OP grew up feeling extreme pressure; he also hated his dad for creating the situation. At 14, OP stopped seeing his dad and his half-sisters.

Two years passed – did anything change? OP wrote, “They made contact with me and tried to have a relationship again. But they were still so fixated on mom, which made me uncomfortable, so I always tried to avoid heavy topics with them. A couple of weeks ago, while I was at mom’s, they showed up and started yelling at mom and telling her that she was a piece of shit and that she became their mom the moment she married dad and should have been there for them. They told her she owed them as much as she owed me and asked how she could not love them.”

That was when OP intervened and told his half-sisters to leave. He made it clear to them that his mother was not their mother and they should learn to accept that fact. When the two girls refused to go, he said that both of them needed psychiatric help to get over their fixation on his mom.

At last, his half-sisters left, but they texted him later that he and his mom were AHs and they deserved somebody who’s a lot better.

What’s the opinion of the AITA community? NTA.

Hoplite68 wrote, “You need to email or text them that your mother didn’t know they existed until they turned up on her doorstep. That your father lied and she divorced him over his lies. That she never agreed to be their mother, was never their mother, and had no obligation to them. They deserve to know just how much of a monster their father is. But you should finish the email with any further contact from them and the authorities will be contacted and the relevant legal proceedings will begin.”

RecentCharge655 likewise remarked, “A letter explaining anything isn’t going to fix this mess..from ages 6-8, they knew this lady never lived with them and left when they arrived. As grown-ups, that’s a fact that should be clue number one. Clue number two is she never talked to them or came to visit them when she left. These two are just as delusional as their dad is/was when he figured out he couldn’t manipulate the ex to be a mom to his kids. He twisted these girls’ minds up so much they don’t know what’s true or what’s a lie..nothing that OP or his mom can say will ever change their minds over what they perceived as abandonment by her in their minds. The best thing to do is to keep them away from mom – if need be, go the legal route and hope they stay away. But OP needs to keep a close eye on his mom, because these two sounds like they may try to do more than verbally harass mom.”

More nuggets of wisdom from majolie1970: “NTA. I feel for your half-sisters, but, at their age, for them to continue to push this delusional belief that your mom was supposed to be their mom shows real mental health issues. By this time, they have spent enough time in the world that they should have had some of his crazy ideas worn off a little, but they persist in this belief. They need help that you cannot provide.”

Ok-Economics-246 also candidly expressed, “NTA. They’re insane. They harassed and stalked you and your mother. They should be upset with their dad and their train wreck of a mother.”