Rivalry between 33-year-old girlfriend and 10-year-old niece heighten when boyfriend and niece exclude girlfriend at the mall and hold hands in front of her, she considers breakup

Author image for Molly Vincent
Molly Vincent
Aug 13, 2025 12:00 PM EDT

No one wants to be jealous. It's such a demonized word in Western culture, as if it's a permanent sickness ingrained and imbued into our DNA, phenotypic and impossible to change. You always hear people say things like, "I'm not a jealous person," or "are you a jealous person?" Instead of letting the feeling exist in the ephemeral space that we allow all other emotions to exist in. It's absolutely peculiar how we categorize jealousy, and stems from origins in Christianity and the Seven Deadly Sins, in that jealousy is linked to envy. 

Psychologically, it's not that jealousy actually functions differently from other emotions, it just has worse PR. Jealousy isn't specific to romantic relationships either, although it's often associated within that context. In my opinion, jealousy does have a function and it's a natural emotion, but it's important to meet jealousy with rationality. Sometimes it helps to separate yourself from the emotion and wonder what it looks like if you weren't yourself. In the story below, the protagonist wasn't quite able to remove herself from her psyche and body. She lets her jealousy over a child consume her, but you can decide if she's in the right. 

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  • 01

    AITAH for wanting to break up with my bf because of his niece

    Father with little girl on his back.
    via dusanpetkovic from Getty Images / Canva

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

  • 02
    My bf (33) has a niece (10 y/o) who he has been helping raise since she was 6 months. I was told her mom and dad were not involved. When we first decided
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  • Petty to be jealous of a 10-year-old? Maybe so. But I think this is just an impossible scenario to sustain for anyone. It's not molding itself to be the predication of a healthy relationship, and she should find another boyfriend. 

  • 03
    to get serious I knew about his niece and his role in her life but did not realize the extent of his role. When I first met her she was
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    a nice kid but the second time I met her, it was terrible. We went to the aquarium and she wanted an ice cream so when we sat down so she could eat, my bf
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    shared a funny video with me from his phone. After watching it and laughing and talking about the video I turned and looked at
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    his niece and she had thrown her ice cream down on the table and was crying. He then asked her what's wrong and she proceeded to look at me and then back at
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    him. Right then I knew this would be trouble. After he calmed her down he basically ignored me the rest of the time to keep her happy. She had started crying
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    because he showed me a video and not her and felt left out. After we dropped her off, he tried to apologize and I told him I was left
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    feeling uncomfortable. I felt like I was a bother to them, something like a 3rd wheel. He told me he was just trying to make the rest
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    of her time there happy for her. I ended up letting it go but told him he needed to talk to her and let her know I wasn't going anywhere. He agreed.
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  • 11
    Fast forward months later, my bf and I planned a trip out of town so he could race in a running marathon. He then proceeded to tell me that his niece wanted to
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    come. I asked if that was a good idea since I hadn't seen her since the aquarium issue. He said he talked to her and just wanted to
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    have a good weekend. I agreed and decided to give her another chance. We picked her up that morning of the trip and not even
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    an hour into it she was already crying. She cried mostly all day so his attention was of course on her. I tried to be sympathetic and
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    let him do his thing but noticed anytime he showed me any attention she would start crying. I bought us tickets to watch a movie she kept asking for and
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    Child at aquarium.
    via nd3000 from Getty Images Pro / Canva

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

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    she cried not wanting to watch it when we got there. Then nighttime came and she had agreed to sleep on her own bed but then when she saw my bf lay
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    down next to me the water works started and she did not want him laying with me. He then jokingly told me "hey I'm gonna sleep with cry baby in her bed, ok?" |
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    was fuming because I know it was intentional. She was literally just sitting there fine until she saw me and him together. Then I was fuming because instead of talking
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    to her he gave in. The next day we were at the mall and him and her were holding hands walking in front of me basically leaving me out while they chit chatted
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    Father holding his little daughter's hands.
    via CasarsaGuru from Getty Images Signature / Canva

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

  • 22
    and enjoyed each other. By the end of the day my bf said "what's wrong? You've barely spoken a word to me?" As if I could. Then
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    later on when he was finally talking to me showing me attention, his niece kept interrupting us. I knew once again what she was doing. It is the end
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    of the trip now and after replaying everything in my head, I want to end this. However I know he's going to try and throw it in my face that she's a little girl who
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    has abandonment issues and is just scared of losing him. I understand that however I don't agree with how she's being
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    brought up. I don't feel she should be getting her way every time she cries for something. Am I harsh? does that make me the AH?
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