A few months ago my conceiver sprung on me that we may have to take care of a distant relative and she’s calling me “selfish” for being upset about it.
For a little bit of background and context, I don’t have a good relationship with ANY of my relatives and consider myself estranged. At my earliest convenience I intend to go no contact because they’re everything from abusive to racist, shallow and self-centred, narcissistic and mentally/emotionally unsafe to be around. The only relatives I have contact with are immediate; the woman who birthed me, an older sibling, and 2 nieces and a nephew. Besides my conceiver, I keep VERY minimal contact with my older sibling and his kids, though I try to be more cordial and open with them.
The relative in question is a young girl who I believe to be no older than 10 but is a child of my conceiver’s brother. My conceiver’s brother is an abuser. A CRIMINAL with a record of repeated offences; everything from robbery, battery, assault, substance use/distribution and domestic violence. He has WELL over 10 kids, all with different women because he’s a deadbeat recidivist and has no intention of being there for any of the families he’s started. In the past he’s lived on and off with me and my conceiver which frequently resulted in fights; either between him and his partners or him and my conceiver. It’s gotten so bad that the cops had to be called multiple times.
Because he’s refusing to claim his daughter and her mother was sexually abusing her, her mother also being a drug addict and refusing to claim her, the system she’s in is looking to have relatives take custody of her. Unfortunately none of my other relatives can (or want to) and my conceiver has decided to make us carry the burden, and it bothers me.
It upsets me because while I empathise with her situation, we aren’t in a position to take care of another person when we can barely take care of ourselves. We don’t live in a safe neighbourhood, we’re in the process of filing an EOP against our neighbour who’s been threatening/harassing us for YEARS, and I’m STILL dealing with stalkers after being doxxed on social media 2 years ago. Additionally, me and my conceiver work full time and won’t be able to supervise her. Understandably she has additional accommodations because of her trauma which isn’t an issue, at least not for me since I’m in therapy and overcoming my own issues, but the other issue is I’m in the process of receiving gender affirming care (GAC) and will undergo surgery soon. I’m looking for someone to take care of me myself because I’ll be immobile and unable to work and I don’t trust my abusive conceiver to.
Overall, I’m not upset at the girl but my conceiver because she’s taking on more than she can handle and it’s going to impact me in ways I refuse to allow. My conceiver is conscious of all of this yet she’s still pushing to take custody. It also pisses me off because she’s not someone you can safely be vulnerable around and I fear she’s going to worsen both me and this girl’s mental health. And at the risk of sounding selfish, I’m not putting anything I’ve planned on hold to accommodate an issue my conceiver unnecessarily created. I know that’s going to create conflict but I don’t care, she knows it’s unsafe to bring this poor child into our living situation but she’s doing it because we’re relatives. Respectfully, it’s not our burden to shoulder and re-traumatising her isn’t worth it!
Hello! Everyone makes mistakes. Especially this is typical for teenagers, when they are not experienced enough. It’s pointless to regret about having relationship with a man in the past, what’s gone is gone. But you did the right thing to quit this relationship because healthy and harmonious relationship should be based on respect, love and trust, not on manipulations. In order to save yourself from making the same mistake in future, you need to analyze this situation. Think about why this happened to you. What did this experience give you? What exactly won’t you do again in your life? What did this situation teach you? Making mistakes is normal. It is more important to draw the right conclusion and move on with this experience. It is also natural and normal to feel guilty. Let yourself experience it for a bit longer. Then just shift to another feeling, for example to feeling of gratitude for having this experience. How can you do this? It’s simple, next time you feel guilty, imagine a tiny switch inside you, and just turn in into another position, shift to a more positive feeling.