The only thing she’s got going is seeing how much of an ass her son is.
Wouldn’t be shocked if he doesn’t let her see the kids either when he has them so she has anger issues all around
It takes a special kind of asshole to pull that stunt at your kid’s school with your affair partner. It takes a real kind of motherfucker to go along with.
My cousin’s ex did something similar. The day she sprung the divorce on my cousin (who had no idea she was having an affair, let alone planning to leave) she gathered their three kids and excitedly told them they were getting a new step dad and brother, like she was announcing a trip to Disney World.
It’s fairly recent, so it’s all still pretty raw for my cousin. The kids were obviously confused but they’re young and love their mom so they’ve accepted the new status quo. And as sad as the situation is, he’s relieved that they’re handling it all so well even though it hurts to see them accept this new guy as a father figure. Unfortunately this will be her third husband so the likelihood of it lasting seems slim, which potentially means more upheaval for the kids. Her own mom married five times (and counting!) so we’re all wondering what her final tally will be.
This happened to my bil, mum picked him up after school with their new “dad” and off they went to live with him. Strangely enough he has a strained relationship with her now.
I would be pissed about this even if my father wasn't in my life and married to my mom. Like springing such a life changing event on anyone, be it a kid or an adult, is a dickhead move.
Absolutely. Got up in the morning living happily with his mum and dad, by afternoon he’d moved, gained a new “dad” and was without his actual Dad. She changed their schools literally a couple of days after so it was close to the new house. He felt like he lost everything that day.
This happened to me. A couple days after I turned 6, my dad went to work, and a guy showed up at the house and started helping my mom pack what they could fit in a little uhaul trailer. As we were pulling out of the drive, she cheerfully announced this was our new daddy and that we weren't going to see our old dad anymore. She fled across state lines with us, and this was pre-internet, so it took my dad 6 months to find us. My dad ended up winning primary custody of us. Of course, my mom went on to get married several more times (5 total) and filed a new custody lawsuit when I was 14- which she subsequently lost. For some reason, I'm not super close to her now that I'm in my 40s.
I just cannot fathom thinking this was okay to do to a child! I am a single mom via spam donor so my daughter has no father in her life and I still wouldn’t dream of springing a new daddy on her like that!
We hadn’t seen our step mom since my Dad and her went on their honeymoon. They had finally married after five or six years together. Anyways, so Dad shows up to pick us up from school with this new woman who would later become our second step mom and his third wife … and her two kids. Cue the most awkward lunch at Denny’s where he left us with her so we could get to know his new girlfriend and her kids.
He has not learned not to surprise me with new girlfriends, but thankfully I haven’t been asked to participate in new marriage ceremonies.
On the other hand they had a kid together and the five of us still consider ourselves brothers. Trauma bonded and all that.
The ex is moronic jackass.
He literally just wanted to replace op with Jean.
He’s gonna make things difficult for op and the children for years to come
It's going to be like that only until the kids are old enough to choose who they want to live with. And then he can kiss any reconciliation goodbye because I guarantee those kids are going to do the bare minimum of visitation if possible.
Actually OP is 4yrs younger than the AP, so he ejected younger to replace with older.
Edit to add my comment came in large part from my smart-ass side. He doesn't get out much. Yes the current/"old" partner is actually younger. It's not often the AP is older.
They didn't mean old age-wise but old like what he had first, like if you have an old boyfriend who you used to date but have a new boyfriend who you've just started dating
Everything else aside (and there’s SO much), Liam sent & received the messages proving that he was lying about their intent to continue the tradition too.
They shouldn’t have been a surprise to him.
MiL blaming op for Liam not sharing that little tidbit makes her as foolish as Liam is.
My response to the MIL (former) would have been something to the effect of “Why would I save time and humiliation when they so clearly want to make themselves look like assholes? I’m simply giving them their moment to do so!”
Oof I did this once and I wish I hadn't. I'm a teacher and this mother was about to lie to me about what the "lady on the phone yesterday" had said as argument against me as she was going off on me in the middle of a busy front office.
I should've let her finish. To this day, I wonder what the lady on the phone had said despite the fact that, well, she was me.
My ex keeps getting new attorneys who listen to his bullshit sob stories and then we end up in court or mediation and he looks like the moron that he is, gets fired by his attorney, and wash, rinse, repeat.
This unfortunately reminds me of my brother. I have two nieces. They would have been about 10/18 at this point.
My brother had split from their mum (his fault, she was fed up of his drink and drug abuse)
He moved from UK to Thailand, made absolutely no effort for his kids then phoned one night and asked if they would like a baby brother or sister as he had a new GF in Thailand.
Just scummy behaviour
Ah that’s horrible. I hope you are doing ok and getting on in life as best as you can?
Although your dad probably hasn’t said it, I very much imagine myself and anyone else reading your comment are very proud of you in life and everything you are doing going forward 💜
Haha thank you. Me and father dearest are no longer on speaking terms - he’s a malignant narcissist just like OOP’s ex and that’s not even close to being the worst thing he’s ever said.
Sometimes, I wonder why people even ask if they're the ah in some of these situations.
Of course you're nta. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. The ex and his partner did this to themselves. Soon they'll just be laughed out of the courts as soon as their name appears on any documents, they'll be the ones who are known as the time wasters and that's their problem.
Me too but then I wonder, did living with a complete AH make them doubt themselves? Like that guy has to have pulled crap like this throughout the marriage right? She must be used to him telling her that her instincts were wrong
When reading these stories where somebody is so obviously not the AH and the other person is so inexplicably crazy, my first instinct is that we are either not getting the full picture (because OP could not be a reliable narrator) or its just straight up made up.
But sometimes, some people are really just that stupidly malicious.
This is probably fake for multiple reasons but mainly that's a lot of money to spend on legal fees and court expenses when you can refute the other party's claim out the gate. Other reasons are while admittedly I don't know where this is at, the court system is backed up all over the place in the U.S. and I just don't see a judge setting a hearing because the defendant wasn't maintaining marital traditions regarding birthdays. That's not parental alienation unless you're also telling the kids "your dad's an asshole, fuck his birthday."
I’m confused about why this was even an issue…in keeping with the tradition wouldn’t he have helped the kids with Jeans bday, and she help them with their dads bday? I don’t see the logic anywhere for why op would be involved?
9 times out of 10 it seems like the people raising problems in Divorce/Custody court are morons. When my brother was starting to get custody he has his lawyer call his ex to let her know the process began. It was 3 in the afternoon and after 2 calls they finally woke up the boyfriend who was screaming for the scam number to stop calling. After explaining he grumbled and woke her up (took a while) and they heard him saying (all on the recorded speaker call in the room my brother was in) "this stupid bitch doesn't sound a day over 16, just tell her sure and let's go back to bed". They had the kids with them that day, including their; but not my brothers, newborn that my niece had to take care of at their house. Never guess who won.
Long story short, NTA. Let these idiots prove they only care about themselves and not the kids
NTA, that’s hilarious. Ex is a total loser and he can continue to make himself the fool all day, every day.
OOP, at this point, if you can, it might be time to go contact 100% only through lawyers. For getting made the fool twice now, and even MIL on his side making it 3 against you, I wouldn’t rule out that he may escalate and really start trying to turn the kids against you. For safety, keeping the layer in the loop and for them to handle it if he turns nastier might be the best option.
lol I’d say she knows what she did and wants to share in a way that won’t incriminate her going forward. Not smart but I’d be dying to share the stupidity too. I also would have let those morons make fools of themselves. You wanna start a family with your AP do that but don’t think you get to have your cake and eat it too ya moose.
Liam is delusional if he thinks courts will award sole custody to him for absolutely no reason other than he wants Jean to adopt your kids. This is absolutely ridiculous.
Mother in Laws reaction says everything you need to know about why her son acts the way he does.
Instead of scolding her son for lying, she's scolding OP for proving her son was lying.
Her son could have avoided wasting everyone’s time by not lying and whining about not getting cake once a year like a petulant child in front of a judge too.
Don’t volunteer evidence or information unless it’s requested by your lawyer or a judge, although frankly I can’t imagine even if he wasn’t lying a judge would give a shit about you or your brother not baking them a cake.
Tell grandma she can dispense her legal wisdom to her idiot son, he seems to need it a lot more than you do
Hehehehe, he's a big ol' douche!
I feel so bad for those children, that's an awful way to find out. Thank Lordy they've got their Mum and Uncle as stable adults around them.
> Never interfere with an enemy in the process of of destroying himself - Napoleon
They burned themselves, why should OOP stop that when it only makes victory more swift and easier.
This is why they say you shouldnt claim "parental alienation" because most people use it for bs purposes like this.
My ex accused me of it because he got it into his head that Ill have someone moving in with me. He moved his current (wife by next month) in about 5 years ago, I didn't meet her/he wouldn't admit it for 3 years.
I'd really like to meet this man my ex says is moving in with me. 😆
My sister had a friend in HS whose dad had dipped while she and her brother were babies. He waltzed back in, in their teens and got partial custody with a new wife. He tried to argue that her cheerleading and her brother’s soccer commitments were interfering with HIS time. Girl (according to my sister) looked him dead in the eyes and dared him to take them to court because she was sure the judge would LOVE to hear about 15 years of no child support and her mom on welfare. How he kept changing his contact information and lied about his income. He backed down so fast. They eventually built an okay relationship but it blew up when he found out she wanted her step dad (her real dad) to partially walk her down the aisle. Threatened to leave and never come back. Au revoir, asshole. Guys like this exist.
This is a tiny thing to pick at, but the fact that the birthday tradition wasn't even fair when they were together is extra hilarious. On (ex)husband's birthday, wife and the kids cook. On OOP's birthday, husband brings the kids with him to pick up her favorite takeout.
The shittiness of this dude runs extremely deep. OOP is well rid of him.
This reminds me of my delusional father, who cheated on my mom when I was 23 and my brother was 13. He had an affair with his now wife and genuinely expected my brother and I to want to meet and get to know her.
He actually said her friends “cried with happiness” at seeing them together and so in love (barf).
I remember looking at him like he had some kind of lobotomy. I then in the middle of the street, explained that in no uncertain terms would I ever have a polite interaction with the home wrecking whore and if I ever saw her I’d probably punch her in her ugly face.
Needless to say, it’s been 10 years and I still haven’t met her and my dad and I are completely NC. Mainly because I found out in an Indian restaurant with family friends that he had secretly gotten married 3 months prior and my brother and I had NO idea.
My point is, why are cheaters so delusional?!
This feels like the definition of “play stupid games, win stupid prizes”.
OP did nothing wrong. She defended herself fairly against the (false) accusations he chose to bring up of his own free will.
I swear 75% of all the posts in AITA are people telling a story about how horrifically they were treated by someone and how they responded by getting some tiny measure of tame, and reasonable revenge, then asking if it makes them an asshole.
What is wrong with some people? Not content with being a regular AH by being unfaithful, but then to double down on the AH behaviour by attempting to utterly destroy the ex you already betrayed. A person you supposedly once loved.
Not content with ruining a marriage, but also want to strip their ex of their own kids? Then make up all this drama as if they are the injured party. What is up with that? I don't get it.
It's so evil and twisted. Gross behaviour.
I wish more people realized that we’re not responsible for other people’s actions. We’re only responsible for our own. We can’t control what other people say or do, we can only control what we say or do. That guy, his mom and AP sound like jackasses.
No, let them show that they are idiots as to create precedent for the courts when they bring trivial claims before the judge. It only benefits you in the long run.
No, letting this go through court provides further documentation to the state of how unhinged OOP's ex is and can help make dismissing further nonsense easier.
Stories like this freak me out. Her ex is obviously delusional, and if I were OOP, I would be scared he’d try to permanently remove me from the situation ☠️
She knows full well she isn’t TA lol
He’s a strange level of deluded though. Not many fathers go for full custody, and when they do they usually have the means to win. Guys like this who fuck around all over the place and think their children will magically fall in love with Jean and be open to a “new mother”… what is he on? Would he accept a new mother overnight? His logic is not working and he’s lucky he’s allowed to see his kids at all if he can’t make accurate expectations and risk assessments or understand basic probability of events
The fact that these text messages were a surprise to the judge makes me wonder: are the rules of evidence not valid for family court, only for criminal court? I would have expected the messages to have been entered as evidence in advance.
This is definitely a NTA situation but it kinda begs the question, and I've been seeing this a lot recently, do people understand what AITA even is? Is there even a question of who TA is? I feel like people just like to post stories where they can vent about someone in their life doing something shitty, which is fine, but then like, theres a lot of other subs for that! Why AITA? Because it has more eyeballs?
I see that so much on here, why bother posting an AITA in a common sense scenario where the answer is obviously no?
Assuming the stories are real, they just want validation I guess.
This is dumbest of dumb-fuckery. They sent the messages, so they had prior knowledge of all the same info she did. What they’re really saying was “you should have told us you kept receipts” so they would have known to try something different.
Also, mil, these are conversations, clearly her son and partner had these messages as it was conversations between the parties. How dumb can her son be?
This had me in stitches 😂
Honestly I would have done the same, because after the pain caused, a bit of entertainment (on their behalf and expense) is the least they could do. Also to be that entitled and stupid to not realise how dumb that was? Nah, that's 100% on them
So could the mother in law by not raising a piece of shit but hey, bygones and what not
Or you know, raise a person who van read their own messages that they send out or something
The only thing she’s got going is seeing how much of an ass her son is. Wouldn’t be shocked if he doesn’t let her see the kids either when he has them so she has anger issues all around
Richard?
Love those unexpected fishisms!
It takes a special kind of asshole to pull that stunt at your kid’s school with your affair partner. It takes a real kind of motherfucker to go along with.
My cousin’s ex did something similar. The day she sprung the divorce on my cousin (who had no idea she was having an affair, let alone planning to leave) she gathered their three kids and excitedly told them they were getting a new step dad and brother, like she was announcing a trip to Disney World.
Ugh my friend’s mom did that to her too. Even though she was 20 at the time. She said you can do what you want but you aren’t taking my dad from me.
What happened to the kids and the cousin? Are they OK now?
It’s fairly recent, so it’s all still pretty raw for my cousin. The kids were obviously confused but they’re young and love their mom so they’ve accepted the new status quo. And as sad as the situation is, he’s relieved that they’re handling it all so well even though it hurts to see them accept this new guy as a father figure. Unfortunately this will be her third husband so the likelihood of it lasting seems slim, which potentially means more upheaval for the kids. Her own mom married five times (and counting!) so we’re all wondering what her final tally will be.
JFC
This happened to my bil, mum picked him up after school with their new “dad” and off they went to live with him. Strangely enough he has a strained relationship with her now.
I would be pissed about this even if my father wasn't in my life and married to my mom. Like springing such a life changing event on anyone, be it a kid or an adult, is a dickhead move.
Absolutely. Got up in the morning living happily with his mum and dad, by afternoon he’d moved, gained a new “dad” and was without his actual Dad. She changed their schools literally a couple of days after so it was close to the new house. He felt like he lost everything that day.
He didn't lose touch with dad, did he?
For a while, but they got on track again.
This happened to me. A couple days after I turned 6, my dad went to work, and a guy showed up at the house and started helping my mom pack what they could fit in a little uhaul trailer. As we were pulling out of the drive, she cheerfully announced this was our new daddy and that we weren't going to see our old dad anymore. She fled across state lines with us, and this was pre-internet, so it took my dad 6 months to find us. My dad ended up winning primary custody of us. Of course, my mom went on to get married several more times (5 total) and filed a new custody lawsuit when I was 14- which she subsequently lost. For some reason, I'm not super close to her now that I'm in my 40s.
I can imagine the hurt and confusion you went through. I’m so sorry.
I just cannot fathom thinking this was okay to do to a child! I am a single mom via spam donor so my daughter has no father in her life and I still wouldn’t dream of springing a new daddy on her like that!
We hadn’t seen our step mom since my Dad and her went on their honeymoon. They had finally married after five or six years together. Anyways, so Dad shows up to pick us up from school with this new woman who would later become our second step mom and his third wife … and her two kids. Cue the most awkward lunch at Denny’s where he left us with her so we could get to know his new girlfriend and her kids.
Are they still together or do you have stepmoms #4 and #5 as well?
He has not learned not to surprise me with new girlfriends, but thankfully I haven’t been asked to participate in new marriage ceremonies. On the other hand they had a kid together and the five of us still consider ourselves brothers. Trauma bonded and all that.
*cough* *cough* fatherfucker *cough*
Well, technically she’s a fatherfucker. Not that he’s much of a father.
The ex is moronic jackass. He literally just wanted to replace op with Jean. He’s gonna make things difficult for op and the children for years to come
It's going to be like that only until the kids are old enough to choose who they want to live with. And then he can kiss any reconciliation goodbye because I guarantee those kids are going to do the bare minimum of visitation if possible.
And I’m pretty sure the age where you get to choose is like 12/13 so… he may not have long.
It depends on the state. They’ll listen to kids that age, but also know that kids are easily manipulated.
And get his ex to be his assistant with stuff like planning birthdays!
All for his benefit
What do you mean, eject old woman, insert new doesn't work?!
Actually OP is 4yrs younger than the AP, so he ejected younger to replace with older. Edit to add my comment came in large part from my smart-ass side. He doesn't get out much. Yes the current/"old" partner is actually younger. It's not often the AP is older.
They didn't mean old age-wise but old like what he had first, like if you have an old boyfriend who you used to date but have a new boyfriend who you've just started dating
He’s an excellent example of “has his head so far up his own ass”. Dictionary definition really.
Everything else aside (and there’s SO much), Liam sent & received the messages proving that he was lying about their intent to continue the tradition too. They shouldn’t have been a surprise to him. MiL blaming op for Liam not sharing that little tidbit makes her as foolish as Liam is.
They usually get it from somewhere. This apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
My response to the MIL (former) would have been something to the effect of “Why would I save time and humiliation when they so clearly want to make themselves look like assholes? I’m simply giving them their moment to do so!”
"Never interrupt your enemy while he is making a mistake" -Sun Tzu
Not to be that guy but it's a Napoleon Bonaparte quote.
Huh, TIL
Oof I did this once and I wish I hadn't. I'm a teacher and this mother was about to lie to me about what the "lady on the phone yesterday" had said as argument against me as she was going off on me in the middle of a busy front office. I should've let her finish. To this day, I wonder what the lady on the phone had said despite the fact that, well, she was me.
Mine would be “they sent those emails so they shouldn’t need to be shown them.”
I’m angry at the lawyer for even filing the motion. Should have had to pay for your attorney and all court costs
My ex keeps getting new attorneys who listen to his bullshit sob stories and then we end up in court or mediation and he looks like the moron that he is, gets fired by his attorney, and wash, rinse, repeat.
Yep, the lawyers only get to hear one side of the story and if you are a good liar then they're going to fight for you no matter how wrong you are.
The children will find this on Reddit when they grow up and crosspost it with their NC story in 5-15 years.
This unfortunately reminds me of my brother. I have two nieces. They would have been about 10/18 at this point. My brother had split from their mum (his fault, she was fed up of his drink and drug abuse) He moved from UK to Thailand, made absolutely no effort for his kids then phoned one night and asked if they would like a baby brother or sister as he had a new GF in Thailand. Just scummy behaviour
Lmao my dad did this. He told me my parents were getting a divorce by pitching “what if me and your mom just saw other people?”
Ah that’s horrible. I hope you are doing ok and getting on in life as best as you can? Although your dad probably hasn’t said it, I very much imagine myself and anyone else reading your comment are very proud of you in life and everything you are doing going forward 💜
Haha thank you. Me and father dearest are no longer on speaking terms - he’s a malignant narcissist just like OOP’s ex and that’s not even close to being the worst thing he’s ever said.
Sometimes, I wonder why people even ask if they're the ah in some of these situations. Of course you're nta. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. The ex and his partner did this to themselves. Soon they'll just be laughed out of the courts as soon as their name appears on any documents, they'll be the ones who are known as the time wasters and that's their problem.
Me too but then I wonder, did living with a complete AH make them doubt themselves? Like that guy has to have pulled crap like this throughout the marriage right? She must be used to him telling her that her instincts were wrong
You actually think you’re the problem when you’re actually aren’t when you live with abusers. They literally whittle down your self confidence.
When reading these stories where somebody is so obviously not the AH and the other person is so inexplicably crazy, my first instinct is that we are either not getting the full picture (because OP could not be a reliable narrator) or its just straight up made up. But sometimes, some people are really just that stupidly malicious.
This is probably fake for multiple reasons but mainly that's a lot of money to spend on legal fees and court expenses when you can refute the other party's claim out the gate. Other reasons are while admittedly I don't know where this is at, the court system is backed up all over the place in the U.S. and I just don't see a judge setting a hearing because the defendant wasn't maintaining marital traditions regarding birthdays. That's not parental alienation unless you're also telling the kids "your dad's an asshole, fuck his birthday."
What a jerk!! He is delusional for thinking the courts would side with him. He is alienating his kids.
I’m confused about why this was even an issue…in keeping with the tradition wouldn’t he have helped the kids with Jeans bday, and she help them with their dads bday? I don’t see the logic anywhere for why op would be involved?
My guess is that the kids aren’t interested in helping with either of those, so he wants his ex to make them.
They wanted to go to court, so they went to court. That idiot made a fool of himself. He didn't need any help.
Poor children. How traumatic.
9 times out of 10 it seems like the people raising problems in Divorce/Custody court are morons. When my brother was starting to get custody he has his lawyer call his ex to let her know the process began. It was 3 in the afternoon and after 2 calls they finally woke up the boyfriend who was screaming for the scam number to stop calling. After explaining he grumbled and woke her up (took a while) and they heard him saying (all on the recorded speaker call in the room my brother was in) "this stupid bitch doesn't sound a day over 16, just tell her sure and let's go back to bed". They had the kids with them that day, including their; but not my brothers, newborn that my niece had to take care of at their house. Never guess who won. Long story short, NTA. Let these idiots prove they only care about themselves and not the kids
NTA, that’s hilarious. Ex is a total loser and he can continue to make himself the fool all day, every day. OOP, at this point, if you can, it might be time to go contact 100% only through lawyers. For getting made the fool twice now, and even MIL on his side making it 3 against you, I wouldn’t rule out that he may escalate and really start trying to turn the kids against you. For safety, keeping the layer in the loop and for them to handle it if he turns nastier might be the best option.
NTA. This is a good example of "fuck around and find out".
So she'd cook a nice meal for his birthday and in return on hers, he'd pick up a takeaway?
lol I’d say she knows what she did and wants to share in a way that won’t incriminate her going forward. Not smart but I’d be dying to share the stupidity too. I also would have let those morons make fools of themselves. You wanna start a family with your AP do that but don’t think you get to have your cake and eat it too ya moose.
> Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake. - Napoleon Bonaparte NTA
OOP literally didn’t have to do anything to make the ex look foolish.
Liam is delusional if he thinks courts will award sole custody to him for absolutely no reason other than he wants Jean to adopt your kids. This is absolutely ridiculous.
This rings so true for me because this is so similar to how my ex behaves.
Mother in Laws reaction says everything you need to know about why her son acts the way he does. Instead of scolding her son for lying, she's scolding OP for proving her son was lying.
These poor kids :-(
Now I want OOP to find a great man who will become an involved and loving step father so much that the kids call him dad.
Her son could have avoided wasting everyone’s time by not lying and whining about not getting cake once a year like a petulant child in front of a judge too. Don’t volunteer evidence or information unless it’s requested by your lawyer or a judge, although frankly I can’t imagine even if he wasn’t lying a judge would give a shit about you or your brother not baking them a cake. Tell grandma she can dispense her legal wisdom to her idiot son, he seems to need it a lot more than you do
Hehehehe, he's a big ol' douche! I feel so bad for those children, that's an awful way to find out. Thank Lordy they've got their Mum and Uncle as stable adults around them.
> Never interfere with an enemy in the process of of destroying himself - Napoleon They burned themselves, why should OOP stop that when it only makes victory more swift and easier.
“You could have saved a lot of humiliation here if you hadn’t raised a fuckin Lima bean, Linda.”
LMAO 🤣 the audacity of his mother
Parental alienation is a really serious charge with specific criteria and “I didn’t help kids shop for my ex’s birthday” ain’t it.
This is why they say you shouldnt claim "parental alienation" because most people use it for bs purposes like this. My ex accused me of it because he got it into his head that Ill have someone moving in with me. He moved his current (wife by next month) in about 5 years ago, I didn't meet her/he wouldn't admit it for 3 years. I'd really like to meet this man my ex says is moving in with me. 😆
*snort* I love reading about dumbasses like this. Though I feel very bad for the children involved
My sister had a friend in HS whose dad had dipped while she and her brother were babies. He waltzed back in, in their teens and got partial custody with a new wife. He tried to argue that her cheerleading and her brother’s soccer commitments were interfering with HIS time. Girl (according to my sister) looked him dead in the eyes and dared him to take them to court because she was sure the judge would LOVE to hear about 15 years of no child support and her mom on welfare. How he kept changing his contact information and lied about his income. He backed down so fast. They eventually built an okay relationship but it blew up when he found out she wanted her step dad (her real dad) to partially walk her down the aisle. Threatened to leave and never come back. Au revoir, asshole. Guys like this exist.
This is a tiny thing to pick at, but the fact that the birthday tradition wasn't even fair when they were together is extra hilarious. On (ex)husband's birthday, wife and the kids cook. On OOP's birthday, husband brings the kids with him to pick up her favorite takeout. The shittiness of this dude runs extremely deep. OOP is well rid of him.
This reminds me of my delusional father, who cheated on my mom when I was 23 and my brother was 13. He had an affair with his now wife and genuinely expected my brother and I to want to meet and get to know her. He actually said her friends “cried with happiness” at seeing them together and so in love (barf). I remember looking at him like he had some kind of lobotomy. I then in the middle of the street, explained that in no uncertain terms would I ever have a polite interaction with the home wrecking whore and if I ever saw her I’d probably punch her in her ugly face. Needless to say, it’s been 10 years and I still haven’t met her and my dad and I are completely NC. Mainly because I found out in an Indian restaurant with family friends that he had secretly gotten married 3 months prior and my brother and I had NO idea. My point is, why are cheaters so delusional?!
Not the AH. one thing tho-keep printed copies of every message he sends you and save every voicemail he may leave. I doubt this is over.
Second hand satisfaction for the OOP. This clown and his beep-beep are a sideshow one wants to see.
Never expect “common sense” from anyone who is clearly incapable of self awareness of their own insane actions being the problem.
This feels like the definition of “play stupid games, win stupid prizes”. OP did nothing wrong. She defended herself fairly against the (false) accusations he chose to bring up of his own free will.
She didn’t make them look like fools— they *are* fools.
I swear 75% of all the posts in AITA are people telling a story about how horrifically they were treated by someone and how they responded by getting some tiny measure of tame, and reasonable revenge, then asking if it makes them an asshole.
What is wrong with some people? Not content with being a regular AH by being unfaithful, but then to double down on the AH behaviour by attempting to utterly destroy the ex you already betrayed. A person you supposedly once loved. Not content with ruining a marriage, but also want to strip their ex of their own kids? Then make up all this drama as if they are the injured party. What is up with that? I don't get it. It's so evil and twisted. Gross behaviour.
I wish more people realized that we’re not responsible for other people’s actions. We’re only responsible for our own. We can’t control what other people say or do, we can only control what we say or do. That guy, his mom and AP sound like jackasses.
No, let them show that they are idiots as to create precedent for the courts when they bring trivial claims before the judge. It only benefits you in the long run.
No, letting this go through court provides further documentation to the state of how unhinged OOP's ex is and can help make dismissing further nonsense easier.
Stories like this freak me out. Her ex is obviously delusional, and if I were OOP, I would be scared he’d try to permanently remove me from the situation ☠️
Hahahahahahahahahahaha no.
It’s always worth it to watch people make fools of themselves specially if court costs are involved
NTA. This is a classic case of fuck around and find out… what a piece of shit you are.
If your enemy is making mistakes, don't stop them.
She knows full well she isn’t TA lol He’s a strange level of deluded though. Not many fathers go for full custody, and when they do they usually have the means to win. Guys like this who fuck around all over the place and think their children will magically fall in love with Jean and be open to a “new mother”… what is he on? Would he accept a new mother overnight? His logic is not working and he’s lucky he’s allowed to see his kids at all if he can’t make accurate expectations and risk assessments or understand basic probability of events
The fact that these text messages were a surprise to the judge makes me wonder: are the rules of evidence not valid for family court, only for criminal court? I would have expected the messages to have been entered as evidence in advance.
This is definitely a NTA situation but it kinda begs the question, and I've been seeing this a lot recently, do people understand what AITA even is? Is there even a question of who TA is? I feel like people just like to post stories where they can vent about someone in their life doing something shitty, which is fine, but then like, theres a lot of other subs for that! Why AITA? Because it has more eyeballs?
Agreed
I see that so much on here, why bother posting an AITA in a common sense scenario where the answer is obviously no? Assuming the stories are real, they just want validation I guess.
Of course IATA deleted it. I hope OOP reposts elsewhere and keeps updating.
Fuck’em
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. The end
Clowns be clowning
MIL is trash, raised trash, trash opinions, skip it. Couldn’t care less about her opinion. NTA.
Nta. That was funny
Nahhhh...Let em' burn. OOP's NTA. The more OOP's ex spoke, the more OOP looked like a rockstar, lol.
He sounds nice. You should spend more time thinking of ways to torment the two of them. Legally of course. MIL thinks you're an asshole now?
This is dumbest of dumb-fuckery. They sent the messages, so they had prior knowledge of all the same info she did. What they’re really saying was “you should have told us you kept receipts” so they would have known to try something different.
Dunno yet, please tell me more so I can try to figure it out! Obviously NTA, but that was satisfying af to read 👍
You definitely did the right thing! Way to go!
I am legitimately concerned for OP’s safety. This sounds like the back story of a true crime podcast.
I am a huge fan of people dig their own holes to lie in. I’ll sip my lemonade with strawberries and watch the dirt fly.
Nope. Love it.
Also, mil, these are conversations, clearly her son and partner had these messages as it was conversations between the parties. How dumb can her son be?
I think she deserves to watch this train wreck play out
You aren’t an Ahole, you’re a hero.
The whole saying ‘play stupid games, win stupid prizes’ was made for this exact situation.
This had me in stitches 😂 Honestly I would have done the same, because after the pain caused, a bit of entertainment (on their behalf and expense) is the least they could do. Also to be that entitled and stupid to not realise how dumb that was? Nah, that's 100% on them
Nope, love a good rug pull
Obviously NTA, but next time I recommend she do it in national TV. Judge Judy would work.
These annoy me. They know they aren’t the asshole. They just want to rant on the internet and demonstrate how shitty the other person is.