‘They never showed any regrets and never apologized’: 28-year-old tells her niece she cut off her parents after years of favoritism and neglect, leading to their angry demands for reconciliation

Author image for Etai Eshet
Etai Eshet • Editor
Feb 24, 2025 9:00 PM EST

Family relationships are as fragile as a house of cards, delicately balanced on forced smiles, unresolved issues, and a collective agreement to just not talk about the past. Everyone knows their role—there's the favorite, the peacekeeper, the rebel, and occasionally, the one who decides to throw honesty into the mix like a wrecking ball at a tea party. The unspoken rule is clear: keep the peace by keeping your mouth shut.

But every family has someone who doesn't get the memo, and when truth starts spilling out, things get messy fast.

In most families, truth-telling is less about clarity and more about carefully avoiding deeply buried emotional landmines. Everyone knows that some topics stay entombed under layers of duplicity and passive-aggressive casserole exchanges. But every now and then, someone, usually the one who has the least to lose, decides to light a match and watch the fireworks.

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  • "AITA for telling my niece why I don't speak with my parents?"

    "I don't even care about them, about their well being, just like they never did for me"
    via golubovy

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • So, for some context, I (28F) was never close with my parents. My older brother was their main attention, and they showed him a lot of love, attention, gift him expensive gifts and would never shut up about him. I was always
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • ignored by them growing up, they would often forget me at friend's houses, birthday parties and almost every day at school, until I decided to start walking home, wich was like twenty
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  • minutes away on foot. Anyway, this made me not care about them at all, and I became really independent. I got my first job at fourteen and ignored them all the time. Back then, my family were my friends, since luckly, after
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • years of being bu ied, I was able to form a great and healthy group of friends. When I was sixteen, my parents went through a really rough patch because my country was on crisis and my dad lost his job (we're from Latin America) wich left my mom to be
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • the only one to sustain the place. I used to give them a half of my salary, wich wasn't much, but it helped a lot. They were really grateful, but I remember I still avoided them. My older brother and I started to get even closer
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • around that time. He had always been there for me and was always a great guy, however, I resented him growing up due to our parent's clear favoritism growing up, and I kinda distanced myself from him. I regret it to this
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • Cheezburger Image 10472387328
    via Pixelshot

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • day. When my niece Olivia (13F) was born, I helped him a bit alongside my parents since he worked lots of hours and her mother had dissapeared from her life shortly after she was born. Still, when I finished highschool, I moved away for a whole year to
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • work in another continent. I had a great time and I had already cutten contact with my parents by that time. I came back and began to study a carreer as I was working, and I was able to rent this small apartment with a friend. My brother and I
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • maintained a great relationship, and I was always really close with my niece, but I still refused to speak to my parents, and it didn't really seem like they care a lot either. However, my brother passed away when my niece was nine in a car accident, and he had
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • asked me before if I could take care of his daughter if something ever happend to him. So I did, I had graduated a year ago, I had a decent job and some savings. He left me his too, and after a little bit more saving, I was able to buy
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • Cheezburger Image 10472386816
    via fizkes

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • an apartment with two bedrooms. I put Olivia in therapy to deal with the loss, and I've been trying to give her a good life and educate her to be a good, responsible person. So far, it seems like I've succeded at that at least.
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • Anyway, I had to get in contact again with my parents after my brother's passing. Even though I don't like them and don't want them in my life, they were always great with Olivia and she loves them very much. I reply everytime
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • they ask about her, but when they try to ask something about me or try to talk about something else, I give short answers or simply don't reply. Olivia usually spends christmas with them while I spend it with friends and my
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  • boyfriend, and we spend new year's with my boyfriend's family. She has asked why I don't get along with them, and I just told her they just never liked me, but she shouldn't care because they like her. Of course, she told them
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • this because they are now angry at me. They have called and texted millions of times, I ignored even single one of them, but they told me it's unfair for me to reply this to Olivia when they have been trying to make amends and
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • build a relationship with me for over a decade, my response was simple: I don't care if they want to repair my relationship with me now, I have the final say, and my choice is to not have a relationship with them, it's just
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • too late to build one now. They keep trying to get me to change my mind, but I just told them that I won't and to not insist because | wasn't going to change my mind now or ever, and to also not bring Olivia into this whole mess,
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  • and they stopped, but they called me heartless and cruel. I told them that neglecting a child and showing favoritism was also pretty heartless and cold, but they never showed any regrets and never apologized.
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • So, I don't resent them now, although I used to. I don't hate them. But all those years of neglecting me, constant dissapointments and the realizations that they didn't gave about me did not only af
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  • changed they way I saw them, but the way I felt about them. I don't love them, I don't even like them, h I, I don't even care about them, about their well being, just like they never did for
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • me. I know that losing my brother was a huge hit for them. They actually loved him and he was the most important thing for them, but it won't change my mind here.
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • I'm curious about how people with a neutral perspective will see this, so that's mostly about why I'm posting. So, AITA?
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448

  • This time, it was a niece curious about why her aunt avoided her grandparents like they had cooties. So, the aunt laid it out: her parents had spent her childhood prioritizing their golden child, leaving her to basically fend for herself. Of course, the grandparents weren’t thrilled about this honest stroll down memory lane. Cue the angry calls, texts, and fits of outrage over her “heartlessness.” How could she be so heartless?

    But for someone who spent most of her life being ignored, their sudden interest in her feelings showed up a few decades too late.

  • _s1m0n_s3z Speak your truth. You're raising Olivia, now, and you are raising her to face the truth. You are not teaching her to hate her grandparents, but she asked
    via _s1m0n_s3z
  • why you're not close with them, and you told her. Perfect. The fact that they now find this embarrassing is not your problem. It's theirs. They created this reality. NTA.
    via Obvious_Hedgehog_448
  • brittxxoxxox You set boundaries, and that's completely valid. Olivia comes first.
    via brittxxoxxox

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family drama inheritance aita AITAH brother mother tradition siblings family feud favoritism wedding aunt sister fiancé grandmother Father
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