‘Pulling the “family” card, like what family?!’: Biomom abandons her 4-year-old son, then 17 years later asks him to donate money to help pay for her new family's medical treatment

Author image for Jesse Kessenheimer
Jesse Kessenheimer • Writer and Editor
Oct 7, 2025 5:00 PM EDT

Family is more than just flesh and genetics; it's hours spent at the soccer tournaments, invested grandparents, family recipes, lake house weekends, and sibling rivalries. Complicated, messy, and oftentimes frustrating, no family dynamic is perfect, but we have a choice to consider some relationships worthy enough for the title. Sometimes, good friends will become like family or aunties and uncles will have a stronger kinship than parents, and it's those chosen relationships that are far stronger than genetic ties. 

When a boy was abandoned as a 4-year-old by his biological mother, after almost two decades of fending for himself and getting closer to his chosen family, his mom came out of the woodwork with an asinine request: Donate money to her new family's struggles. 

At this point, the boy had already estranged her from his life, happily living without the reminder of her abandonment, but when she pulled the "family" card, he was too furious not to say anything, and rightfully so. Sometimes, a person's got to say their peace to move on from biofamily trauma, and it's then that they realize that it's their chosen kin who are their true relatives.

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    Cheezburger Image 10561405184
    via Alena Darmel

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

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    AITA for ignoring the GoFundMe my biological mother set up to fund treatment for one of her kids?
    via Elijoyhh
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    The background to everything is that my dad d d when I (21M) was 4.5 years old. After his passing my biological mother left me with my paternal grandparents and
    via Elijoyhh
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    she just never tried to be a parent to me. I saw her once when I was 6 and she was looking for money from my grandparents, who told her where to go. She didn't even
    via Elijoyhh
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    check in with me to see how I was doing. It was just give me money, he was my husband and I deserve it and then left again.
    via Elijoyhh
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    My grandparents were my legal guardians and they had custody of me until my 18th birthday. They never chased my biological mother for child support and instead saved for
    via Elijoyhh
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    my future. I had a small inheritance from my dad too and there were things of dad's that I wasn't interested in keeping that my grandparents sold and added to the inheritance from dad.
    via Elijoyhh
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    Since my biological mother didn't want them either and the sentimental things dad loved were saved they felt it was for the best.
    via Elijoyhh
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    Two years ago my biological mother reached out to my grandparents via social media and asked for dad's things they had already sold. She
    via Elijoyhh
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    said she needed the money from them. They told her they were sold years ago and she wasn't getting a penny. She put two and two together and told them some of that should
    via Elijoyhh
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    have went to her and they told her she forfeited it all and they had the messages to prove she wanted none of it at the time. She told them she had a kid with cancer who
    via Elijoyhh
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    needed the money for treatments and my grandparents told her dad was not funding another man's child's treatment.
    via Elijoyhh
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    Another year later my biological mother contacted me and said she wanted to talk about the money she knew I had and how it would help her and her husband a
    via Elijoyhh
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    lot because they had four kids and one who was undergoing cancer treatments. I blocked her without replying. Then a few months after this,
    via Elijoyhh
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    this past summer to be more exact, she contacted me on another account and sent me the link to a GoFundMe where they were raising money for this treatment for their kid's cancer. The money was only
    via Elijoyhh
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    partially going directly to funding it but they also wanted to have someplace to stay and everything. I ignored the GoFundMe too and I never donated.
    via Elijoyhh
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    It was two months later when I got a message from my biological mother's husband (a stranger to me) who was like this is your half sister and you should be helping her. I
    via Elijoyhh
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    ignored the message and blocked his account and I made that whole account private. But then my biological mother found a different account on a
    via Elijoyhh
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    different platform and she DM'd me several times in a single night while I was asleep. She told me I was running from my little siblings and a sick sibling who needed
    via Elijoyhh
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    my help and I was doing it to punish her when they don't deserve it because they're innocent and blah blah blah. I responded that they needed to leave me alone because I
    via Elijoyhh
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    was not a part of her family and I was not interested in spending money on her children. Then I blocked her account.
    via Elijoyhh
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    So then she contacted my grandparents again and said they had raised me to be heartless and with no regard for my family. They told her where to go again. But it's
    via Elijoyhh
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    crazy to me that they are so annoyed by this. Her husband was involved in yelling at my grandparents too and it's like what is this. They're acting like we owe them or their kids
    via Elijoyhh
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    something. She's nothing more than my biological mother. She's not a donor because she didn't do a generous thing by giving people the chance to have a
    via Elijoyhh
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    kid, she's not some selfless person, she's not a caring mother either who made a simple mistake. All she cares about is getting money from me. So her kids are nothing
    via Elijoyhh
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    more to me than random kids I hear about on social media. This feeling grows with every interaction my grandparents or I have with this woman and her husband.
    via Elijoyhh
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    But I wanted to check and see what people think. Was ignoring the GoFundMe a bad move? I could have donated, it wasn't that I couldn't afford to donate anything, I simply didn't want to. Does that make me TA?
    via Elijoyhh
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    Chall... NTAH in NO WAY EVER. Hilarious they are pulling the "family" card. Like what family?! The baby you abandoned and never even contributed to financially in
    via Chall
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    your entire life is in no way responsible to help save you, your family or your kid, at all financially now that he's grown. Calling you heartless?
    via Chall
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    That's rich, where was her heart when you were growing up? Where was she when you were sick and needed a mother's care. F her and her family. You are a stranger
    via Chall
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    to her and her expecting you to help is no different than her approaching a random stranger on the street and asking for money. They either give it or they don't.
    via Chall
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    Nsr444 NTA of course. Cherish your grandparents. Try to ignore them. Best of luck in your life...
    via Nsr444

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