📝 AITA for trying to be supportive of my mom finding love again and having more kids after dad but not being super happy or into it either?

By NuffSaid0020 • Score: 7 • April 27, 2025 10:37 AM


My dad died when I (16F) was 8. He'd been sick for about a year but we thought he'd get better and then he died. It really messed with me and mom a lot and the two of us got so much closer. I knew she'd started dating a couple of years ago and I met her partner a handful of times before she told me 4 months ago that she was pregnant and she'd like for him to live with us and that they had talked about getting married. I told mom I was happy for her and that I was okay with him moving in and I congratulated her on the pregnancy.

Mom was so excited so I made sure to tell her how glad I was to see her happy like that again and to say I wanted her to be good. But it hasn't been so happy for me on the level of how I feel about it for me.

My mom's partner has tried to take on this fatherly figure role and I don't want him to. He offered to come along as a father figure to this event one of the clubs I'm in was hosting for kids and their dads or dad figures. I actually think he really wanted to come but I wasn't comfortable with it and I told him I wasn't going to go. He's talked about when he and mom get married to and asked if I'd like him to make any promises to me at their wedding and I told him just make sure he loves mom and that's all. That I don't need any promises from him to me. He asked me if I'd like to go to a hunting trip the men in his family take with their kids and I said no.

I am still getting to know him and we'll go for a milkshake or I go run errands with him. But I'm not comfortable or okay with him being a father figure or trying to step into some dad role at all. I had an amazing dad and nobody can fill that role in that way again.

And when it comes to the baby I can say that my mom's happy and I'm glad she's enjoying being pregnant again. I know her and dad wanted more kids. I always wanted a sibling too. But this baby doesn't feel like an actual sibling. I love my mom so I'm sure I'll eventually feel more about the baby but I don't feel any love or excitement about them. A big part of me wishes the baby wasn't coming. It's weird because for mom I want them to exist and I want her to have as many kids as she'd like. For me I wish the only siblings I had were full siblings that my parents had together.

My aunt was asking me about it a couple of weeks ago and I ended up breaking down and crying to her over it because I didn't want to hurt my mom but I felt those ways. My aunt ended up telling mom after and mom told me she had worried about this stuff and she sensed it. We talked about it and she told me to be honest. I was. But I tried to be less blunt about it at first but she wanted me to say it all. It made her so sad when I told her how I felt about the baby. She really was hoping I felt love for them deep down or that some part of me was excited about finally being a big sister. She told me it would be okay and she loved me and we hugged it out and I apologized to mom for upsetting her and she told me she's still my mom and even though I'm not a little kid I'll always be her kid and she needs to know all this stuff. She asked if I'd like to speak to a therapist and I said I wasn't ready for that yet. She said okay and that she wanted me to talk to her more.

My mom's partner wasn't too happy with how upset mom got and he was kind of off with me for a few days. Then he told his mom about it and I had this woman I only met once before try to berate me for upsetting my mom and she told me only selfish little children or people with no decency feel differently about siblings because they only come from one and not both parents. My mom heard her partners mom talking to me and she made her leave and she and her partner started fighting. He told her he hated seeing her so distressed by what I said and he just couldn't understand why I was being like this.

The whole thing has made me feel bad for hurting my mom and it's made me ask if I am just a bad person because of how I feel. It's not that I hate my mom's partner or their baby. I never hated anyone before. But I don't feel happy about them like mom does. At least not for me. AITA?

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