24-year-old stepfather asks 35-year-old stepkid to call him dad, stepkid refuses, leading to a family dispute when mom gets involved: ‘He was about to cry’

Author image for Bar Mor Hazut
Bar Mor Hazut • Senior Editor
Dec 5, 2024 5:00 PM EST

'Delulu' is a term youngsters are now using to describe people acting completely delusional, and even somewhat crazy, and I could not think of a better word to describe the guy in this story.

As much as families are important, you cannot be forced to become family with anyone. Sure, you often don't really get to choose your family, but how you feel towards these people in your heart is completely up to you, and no one can take that away from you. But still, that doesn't stop some people from trying.

The delulu guy in this Reddit story got this title after a crazy conversation he had with his soon-to-be stepkid (OP, original poster). OP is a 35-year-old man whose mom is now getting married to a 24-year-old, and if that isn't awkward already, this 24-year-old set OP down to a serious conversation asking him to start calling him 'dad'. If that is not completely delulu, I don't know what is.

The story didn't end even after the stepkid firmly refused, so scroll down to read the rest. After you are done, click here for a jolly collection of festive memes to get you ready for Christmas.

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  • 01
    Cheezburger Image 10436546048
    via CREATISTA

    This image is for illustration only, and the subjects are models; the image does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • 02
    My (35M) mother's (58M) new fiance wants me to call him 'dad'. He's 24. How do I navigate this?
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 03
    Please buckle in because this is all so weird. I'm a 35 year old man and for some backstory my dad dd when I was 19, leaving my mom with me and my two siblings (I'm the oldest). It took some time but eventually my mom
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 04
    started dating again. We don't live together per se but our houses back onto each other and have a gate so it's pretty common for her to offer to do my laundry or me just go over for dinner or go look after our dog, that
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 05
    kind of stuff. Plus me and my siblings go over there for dinner every other Friday night or so. A bit after she started, the men she's been dating have been getting younger and younger and I've never had a problem with them. She's
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 06
    been very open to me and my siblings that she wants to get married again and we've always been supportive. At least after the initial shocks lol. The latest guy is by far the most serious and they've been dating since around last June? He
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 07
    proposed at the start of Autumn and they want to get married next Summer, again, me and my siblings are fine with this because it's her life and we trust him. He's a nice guy and they clearly love each other. But anyway...
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 08
    So long and short is, this weekend, her fiance, let's call him "Phil", calls me and asks me if I could come over. I say yeah sure, I'll be over after work and I assumed he just needed help with some DIY stuff they're doing. When I get over there he calls me "Sport" and says we
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 09
    need to talk. I should mention this is something he does to me and my little brother, calling us things like "Kid", "Sport", "Scout", "Little Buddy" or my personal favourite, calling us "Red" and "Blue" seemingly out of nowhere. My brother is 30 by the way. He tried it with
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 10
    my little sister (28) too once and called her "Princess" once but he stopped when she just stared at him. So thing with Phil is that he reminds me a lot of Charlie Day's character in Horrible Bosses in that his sole ambition has always been to meet a girl, get married
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 11
    and have a family. When he told me and my brother this, my brother made some joke about how maybe our mom's going to 'come short on the last part' and he got very upset but they made up after. Anyway, so I go round and I ask if
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 12
    my mom's around and he says no, it's just him and that we "really need to talk man-to-man." I say sure and he starts talking about how he's always wanted to be a father etc. and raise a son to call his own and then he drops this bombshell by saying: "Now I know I can
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 13
    never replace your father, the man who made you, but it would mean the world to me if you could call me dad." I'll admit it: I sniggered a little. And then I knew he was serious because he looked like he was about to cry. And he
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 14
    didn't drop it either. I asked if he really meant it and he got really emotional and started talking about "what it means to be a man" and how his purpose is to have and provide for a family and he wants me and my siblings to be part of that family. Like he
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 15
    reiterated he'll never replace my "father" (and this did rub me the wrong way a bit) but he's ready to step up and be my "dad" and provide for and protect me and my siblings. And I'm just sat there thinking, dude I'm a decade older than you and live in a separate house. I don't
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 16
    need 'providing' for and even if I did, I don't think a guy a third of my age who works part-time at the hardware store and is into collecting manga is the man to do it. No offence if you are into that lol, just...I dunno, I was a bit taken aback. I was in shock so just said "Okay"
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 17
    and he gets emotional again but in a happy way talking about how he wants to go camping or go to a baseball game (I don't even like baseball Imao) and how he joined the Lions this year and how he wants to bring me into it too "as his boy" which just feels so surreal (even
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 18
    moreso as I'm a Shriner so all this talk of service and charity isn't the brag he thinks it is) because again I'M 10 YEARS OLDER THAN THIS GUY! Well I ended it by just saying, this has gotten a bit too weird and I was going home. He got very upset and I left, called my brother and he agreed it sounds "weird as f."
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 19
    Later my mom called me and she...wasn't disappointed but admitted it's made him very upset and depressed. I told her that if he's embarrassed, he doesn't need to be, I get he's excited about the marriage and we can just laugh this off as a funny story. She then
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 20
    said that wasn't what he was upset about, he (and she too a bit) is upset about the fact he "poured his heart out and I rejected him." She said yeah it is a 'bit kooky' but this is how "he proves to himself he's a man" and I guess I was a bit angry and said something like, first
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 21
    off it's not my job to certify what's between his legs and second this doesn't prove he's a man, it just proves he's an tjob. I apologised immediately but she said she didn't want to hear it and hung up. She called back 10 minutes later and we apologised and
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 22
    she begged me to just go along with it until he "has some kids to call his own". I won't go too much into the details here but she sort of let slip they plan to try IVF treatment because she's "not ready to give up on being a mom just yet." And while I uh...have my own
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 23
    thoughts about whether or not that's a good idea, I'm not here to litigate on that. We finished up fine and I reiterated I'd support her and she agreed that it was definitely a 'stressful situation' for me but begged me to at least think about it. Which leads me to here.
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 24
    I did think it over and obviously I'm going to say no. I had a dad and he d' d (Rest in peace Dad) and that's the only dad I've ever needed, I've ever wanted and I'll ever bestow that title on. I'm not asking if someone's unreasonable or what I should do, moreso what I should
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 25
    say. This clearly means a lot to him for some reason and I deeply love my mom so want to try and minimise the damage. Especially as we're still so involved in each other's lives and they live behind me. How can I make it clear to them, as painlessly as possible that I
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 26
    think this is weird and borderline offensive. I really don't want to rip the band-aid off because I fear what it might do to the family. Edit: Showed my brother the post and he laughed so hard he started coughing
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 27
    lol then said we should call him "Dr Phil" and each other Blue and Red (so swap the nicknames he gave us around), thoughts? Edit 2: As people were asking, he has no access to my mom's money or anything
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 28
    like that. She rents the house and it came pre-furnished and otherwise has no real 'assets'. She doesn't make a lot of money anyway so there's no pecuniary motive we could think of.
    via ThrowRA_SonOfSands
  • 29
    Mariposa Fantastique I think both he and your mother have some serious delusions going on.
    via MariposaFantastique
  • 30
    Sandals Resort "You can call me dad." "Uhhh...YOU can call me sir"
    via SandalsResort
  • 31
    SGTPepper 1008 If it's so important to his personal identity to find a girl, have kids with her, and raise them as their dad, it seems like marrying a 58 year old woman with adult children significantly older than himself is a pretty ineffective way to achieve
    via SGTPepper1008
  • 32
    those life goals. If it's so important to him, he should find someone his own age and make that happen the normal way. It's not your responsibility to make your mom's boy toy feel like a man. You're closer to being his much older brother than his son. Weird.
    via SGTPepper1008
  • 33
    HermitBee ⚫21d ago • "I'm not going to call you that, because I feel it would be too disrespectful to my dad, who ded when I was 19 and you were 8"
    via HermitBee
  • 34
    HatsAndTopcoats "Mom, I love you and I'll support whatever relationship makes you happy. But I'm not going to participate in a weird charade where I'm a child getting a new stepfather. That's not a reasonable thing to ask of me and I hope you and Phil can understand that."
    via HatsAndTopcoats
  • 35
    gothceltic start calling him daddy and see how that goes lol he's a weirdo
    via gothceltic

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family drama kids mother reddit story relationships wedding dad family stepdad Reddit delusional funny weird stepkid children Father
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