AITA For telling my pregnant daughter that my husband and I will have nothing to do with raising her baby in front of the entire family?

ESH.

I am a child of a 16 year old who was raised by her grandparents. My mother had two children given up, one went into to the foster care system. She went on to have other children she kept. I used to think like you and the NTA crowd here, but having had my own children in my thirties, I got a new perspective.

Kelly sucks here because she sprang this in an event for Opal. Opal will have some complex feelings about the news and Kelly should have had the opportunity to be told this news in private, so she had the opportunity to process the news. There will be many ‘why was I the one not kept’ feelings.

However, YTA too. The reason I am saying this, is because I had my first child at Kelly’s current age and it was excruciatingly hard word, even with a supportive husband. I recognised my mother was a child of 16, who was trying to raise a child. 16 years olds are still kids; they don’t have the life experience to do the basics like cook, make a household budget, EARN household budget, and if they are working, they’re on the lowest wages.

Like you, my family continued to berate my mother into adulthood, for a getting pregnant as a child and not being able to cope like an adult. Already, your family has blamed and shamed Kelly for 16 years. How much longer does she have to pay for being a child that got pregnant?

In my family also, nobody supported my mother to be a good mom, even in small bursts, they all took over and treated her like an errant teenager, so that’s how she acted. Even a little praise would have given her confidence to take over child rearing more as she grew up. All 16 year olds need support (read nagging) to do basic stuff, although for most, it’s having to tidy up their bedroom, do a chore or do their homework. Raising a child is a BIG ask for a child of 16.

In demonising Kelly to the tune of 16 years, you’ve denied a mother and child a bond and took it over as Opal’s adopted mom. I can say this because the same happened in my family, my grandmother was territorial too, thinking she had the high moral ground. Opal could have had a mom who maybe grew into the role and a special relationship with her grandparents, and this would have enriched her life.

Now you are battering Kelly with the same shame stick you’ve used for 16 years, and overlooking the likely possibility that you are about to deny Opal a relationship with their new sibling. I really think, for the good of Opal, that you need to learn to forgive and more FORWARDS. Kelly is no longer a child having a child. She’s in her thirties, which is fairly old to have a child actually, it’s not like she’s popping out children in the interim and not coping. I suspect she’s waited a long time to become a mother again because of feelings of shame and inadequacy.

I forgave my mother for being a child that got pregnant and couldn’t grow up quick enough to cope. It enriched my life to have a compassionate view of our past. I firmly disagree with my family’s choice to shame and judge my mother for events that happened when she was a kid, and give her no opportunity to grow up and show people the mother she could have been if she had been older and ready. I have a FANTASTIC relationship with my younger siblings, some of whom are over 20 years younger than me. I think Opal needs the space, away from the family’s judgement of Kelly, to develop a relationship with Kelly and the baby. It’s important she feels supported to do that.

Forgive and move forwards.

/r/AmItheAsshole Thread