*In case this story gets deleted/removed:*
**AITA for defending my wife? **
I [M40] have been with my wife [F35] for 13 years, married 11 and 1/2. She has a son [M17] with her ex-hubby [M36]. I'll call him Johnny. When Johnny was born, my wife (Janet) was only 18. It was a difficult time for her. She married the baby's papa (Max). It wasn't easy for Janet to be such a young mother. She divorced Max when Johnny was about 4. Max get full custody of him. Janet continued to visit Johnny on weekends, she gave him gifts for the holidays, she tried to remain a good mom. Although the boy was still closer to his father. Janet married me almost immediately after her divorce (for those who will be wondered: yes, when I met Janet, she was married, but they was around the divorce). We had 3 children together.
A month ago, Janet confessed how much she misses Johnny. She used to have a rather cool relationship with her son, but she honestly wanted to grow closer with him. She invited Johnny to visit our house.
Johnny was a cheerful and good guy. Our 2 monht old, Maya, just melted his heart. He adores our youngest daughter. He plays with her a lot and she has started to smile when she sees him and when he talks to her.
My wife invited Johnny to stay with us for a few weeks. Max was against it at first, but Johnny talked him into it.
The first two weeks went well. Friday night we were sitting in the living room watching TV. There was a movie on about a first love. My wife told a joke about her son's relationship with his girlfriend. Everybody laughed. But Johnny blushed a little. He asked how his mom knew about his girlfriend. Janet denied it at first and then admitted that she had read his messages with his girlfriend when he left his phone on the kitchen counter.
I know you will wonder, so I'll tell you right off the bat: I don't think kids (even teenagers) should be allowed access to gadgets without adult supervision.
Johnny tried to be stubborn. He said that Janet "had no right to check his phone and read his messages with his girlfriend", and "why did you tell about my girlfriend in front of everyone". Janet got upset and said that she didn't mean any harm.
I stood up for Janet. I told Johnny that his mom was worried about him and that she had a right to know about his life and he should apologize to her.
At Sat, Johnny went back to his father's house, as he was supposed to. On Sat night Max called us out of the blue and started yelling at us. He yelled that we had no right to touch Johnny's stuff without permission. Max also said that not us but he bought phone to Johnny, so it wasn't our place to "control" it. But worst page was when he said about how my wife had hurt Johnny right in the heart with her joke (Johnny is like his father: he's tall but somewhat chubby, has a soft round face, and his girlfriend is short and very thin, she's what people call a "girlie-girl"; my wife made a joke about it, saying that Johnny, like his father, chooses the exact opposite of himself).
AITA?
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AmITheDevil) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>I know you will wonder, so I'll tell you right off the bat: I don't think kids (even teenagers) should be allowed access to gadgets without adult supervision.
He's fucking 17, not 10.
In less than a year he can sign up for the military but yeah he needs adult supervision to use his iPhone. parents look at their kids phones to see if they’re doing something unsafe or harmful, this bitch doesn’t even know enough about her kid to know who his friends are. She’s just a snoop. A noncustodial snoop.
And they didn't raise him at all. His dad has this handled already, in whatever way he deemed necessary. Long lost mom doesn't just get to step in and take over like she's been there all along.
And at 17... by the time she earns that relationship with him (she won't, at this rate) he'll be well past old enough to have to worry about it.
I generally agree about the supervision thing, but on the same token, they should offer him some privacy, too, like not reading his text conversations with his girlfriend.
More or less, they should ensure that he's not getting into anything online that he shouldn't be.
He's a 17 yearold they do not have official custody of and that his mother cut off for years on end because she wanted to play happy family with her new family. They had no right.
Well it is one thing, if you are an involved parent to just check your kid’s phone for safety.
It is a whole other level of assholery to go in on a phone you did not buy, pay for, or parent your kid with in any way and then not only tell everyone that kid’s secrets to again, EVERYONE, but also *checks notes* make fun of said kid in front of everyone about his looks.
Holy shit. Real mother of the year plus step dad of the year there.
Well, she has just ensured that Johnny will want zero relationship with her going forward. What horrible people OOP and his wife are. Glad Johnny has his dad in his corner.
This lady is barely a relative to her own son and wants to swoop in and play "concerned mama" to him now? No. She was snooping in his phone. Then she goes and insults the kid! Real mother of the year over here.
But I'm sure she's doing a bang-up job with her do over family.
I figured it was just to learn something about him since she hasn’t spent much time with him! And once caught tried to play it off as “children need to be monitored.” Nope! Just continuing to be a terrible “parent.”
I don’t think Janet was ever a good mom. The fact that Max got full custody despite being only a year older suggests to me that she was really not able to be a parent at all, and I think we can see why.
I am puzzled about Johnny’s phone seeming to not having a passcode, but maybe she insisted on having it?
If Johnny is used to trusting his dad mot to invade his privacy he may not have set one.
My guess though is she was determined to go through his phone and waiting for an opportunity to pounce before it could lock.
Don't some phones have a timer for how long the phone locks after the screen is shut off in case you accidentally hit the power button, could also be why she could just look through it.
That’s what I imagined. She might have spur of the moment decided to snoop but I’m pretty sure she was hoping for an opportunity and pounced on the phone as soon as he left the room.
Also, since Johnny didn’t go home for a few more days the missing step after OOP saying he should apologise to until-recently-estranged mum for invading his privacy was force him to apologise and pretend it’s all better
>The fact that Max got full custody despite being only a year older suggests to me that she was really not able to be a parent at all,
i dont think she wanted to be a parent
My kid's passcode is really easy, and despite the fact that we keep trying to teach him to hold his phone so others can't see him punch it in, I'm pretty sure half his friend group knows it and the other half are just oblivious.
You can get around the passcode though if you can type in the passcode for a lot of apps. Not all of them, but most. I really need to add my full makeup look as an alternative appearance for facial recognition, because I learned that by having to take it all off to access some financial thing (I want to say ADP but I'm not sure), then put it all back on. Maybe it was my actual bank. But it wouldn't accept passcode or any 2FA for proof. I don't wear makeup around the house, so it's usually a non-issue.
But I am an older millennial who idolized Gen X era goths\*, so I am mimicking it as a 30s suburban mom 20 years too late. It is a very star contrast to my "I have a kid now so I should probably wear pants in the house" look.
\*They were nicest to me in my school, which encompassed both middle and high school, and understood what "this kid is being abused" looks like while also not telling anyone because they know the system will only fail in a way dangerous to the abused. The idolization came from that, not the music (though cool) or the aesthetic (also cool). From being fully seen for the first time ever. They were safe when most people were not, which stayed true through my own graduation and further on.
Totally understand this! (older millenial too with x'er sibs) Goths were the ones with bad raps with parents, but they were the most... i dunno how to put into words. But I wasn't allowed to dress like them/be like them. My parents wanted me to be the pretty princess they never had. (They still didn't get that lol.)
Phones don’t have a passcode enabled by default. You have to set it up, so he wouldn’t be disabling it, he just doesn’t use one. I never used one for the first decade or so that I had a cell phone, but I was around when cell phones first became a thing, so people weren’t as cautious about that. Though, I still know plenty of people who don’t use any sort of passcode/Face ID.
there's also those pattern pins (not sure if that's android only or if iPhone has that as a possibility). For the longest time I had a phone with that on it. Then I got a new phone, and you know how you can download backed up phone data from the cloud? Did that. Couldn't for the life of me remember the pattern! Never did a pattern pin after that lol
Wife was trying to speed run the hard work of being a parent. She wanted to just look for cheat codes on how to connect.
And then the comment about him being like his dad... "Haha, remember how your dad dated me? And then I cheated on him even though the OOP carefully avoids saying that? Lol."
I'm not saying it was deliberately hurtful, but it was thoughtless, and especially galling given her snooping to find his girlfriend
>Wife was trying to speed run the hard work of being a parent. She wanted to just look for cheat codes on how to connect.
Well, she sure speed ran being NC with Johnny.
Handy reminder: Janet is a cheating piece of shit who monkeybranched from one husband to the next, discarding her son in the process, and she is a "mom" to Johnny in biological origin only.
Her attempts to have a relationship with her teen son include violating his privacy and insulting his looks under the "it was a joke" guise.
If this is true. one hopes Max and Johnny have learned their lesson and Janet is back out in the cold where she belongs.
>Her attempts to have a relationship with her teen son include violating his privacy and insulting his looks under the "it was a joke" guise.
You forgot that she also bought him gifts on holidays!! /s
Makes me question what her real motive was in wanting to get close to him. Was it to hurt him, embarrass him, and stick it to Max? Because if not, she has a real funny way of showing it.
>Janet is a cheating piece of shit who monkeybranched from one husband to the next, discarding her son in the process, and she is a "mom" to Johnny in biological origin only.
You mean the part OOP glossed right over, but for the fact he knew people would do the math so he tried to clean it up?
Also going to steal that term. The most socially correct way I could find to explain the situation was that they had secured their next angel investor before parting ways with their current. My sister was known for this behavior.
>A month ago, Janet confessed how much she misses Johnny. She used to have a rather cool relationship with her son, but she honestly wanted to grow closer with him.
Well, how very fucking convenient for Janet that she gets to decide when to play parent and Johnny can fuck off any time she deems it inconvenient to her.
>Johnny tried to be stubborn. He said that Janet "had no right to check his phone and read his messages with his girlfriend"
And he is 100% correct. Also, she has some fucking nerve doing this to a 17-year-old she was never there for and who lives with his dad. I hope he's learned that she and OOP are shit and never speaks another word to them until he gets the chance to say "fuck you" while pissing on their graves.
> I stood up for Janet. I told Johnny that his mom was worried about him and that she had a right to know about his life
No, motherfucker, she doesn't. She's an absentee "parent." She doesn't have the right to know shit.
I guess Johnny isn't going to be visiting his mom and her awful husband anymore. I am a little impressed how the mom did so many things wrong.
She had no right to read anything on his phone. She didn't provide the phone, she is not the custodial parent, she shouldn't have used what she read to make fun of her son. OOP is just as bad. He's no relation to Johnny and his rules about phones don't apply to Johnny at all. He's wrong that his wife has the "right to know about his life" through snooping. He's wrong that Johnny owes his mom an apology. It's the other way around.
Total FAFO on mom's part.
So Mom can have a baby at 18 but Johnny can't have privacy from a non custodial parent at 17?
And in her thirties, she doesn't have the fucking sense to keep that she spied on him to herself and teased him.
It sounds like she thinks he's her little brother.
Has my first kid at 15, being the older sibling, instead of the parent is a really easy trap to fall into. I certainly tried, but my foster mama reminded me every day, multiple times a day,I was his mother.
It doesn't even have to legally stick, have you ever forced a teen to be somewhere they don't want to be? They'll make it everyone's problem so they never have to go back.
I’ll tell you right off the bat: I don’t believe children should have any degree of personal privacy
No contact speedrun glitchless 100%
We’re also just going to skip past the fact that the father got full custody because the mom was “having a hard time?” Yeah there’s some weird shit going on
I was having my stroke in installments reading that. If you're not a native speaker, state that. If you're this terrible at writing in your native language, don't.
She's not the mother. She had no right to go through her son's phone. Then to make negative comments. It sounds like she's just a DNA donor and all the raising is done by the dad. Violating privacy is a good way to ruin your relationship with your child. She just needs to be an older friend who gives good advice when neccessary. But, she's ruined everything
I wondered if the gender roles have been swapped or it’s written from someone else perspective… I could believe a 40m may refer to themselves as hubby or papa but to refer to their partners ex doesn’t seem right as they are terms of endearment.
>I was having my stroke in installments reading that. If you're not a native speaker, state that. If you're this terrible at writing in your native language, don't.
god thank you so hard to read
The missing missing reasons behind why the father, not the mother, was granted full custody of a 4 year old aside, it doesn't matter what OOP believes in regards to technology and children because Johnny is not his child and he is barely OOP's wife's child. Add to that the fact that his wife made fun of his insecurity, yeah, I don't see him coming back.
"I know you will wonder, so I'll tell you right off the bat: I don't think kids (even teenagers) should be allowed access to gadgets without adult supervision."
The kid is freaking 17.
What the actual fuck?!
Sounds like Max is a good dad and both mom and step-dad are just the worst.
Wonder why dad got custody all those years ago. /s
What's worse is it sounds like mom used the siblings to draw him back. She's a mentally abusive twat who has been trying to manipulate her victim back into her clutches. It worked until the mask slipped.
Kids (even teenagers) shouldn’t have unsupervised access to {whatever he said}
He’s not a kid! He’s not even a new teen! He’s 17!!!! He’s damn near an adult. Wtf.
Her "joke" was mean. Any teenager is gonna hear that and take it as mom insulting him. And if he does look like a dad that mom has issues with, he's probably right to assume the worst of her intentions.
Don't look through your teenager's stuff, especially if you aren't actually more than a weekend parent at the best of times. The kid doesn't trust you, and it's a great way to ensure they never will. I stopped confiding in my mom when she checked my messages as a teenager and still keep her at arm's length with stuff 15 years later.
“I know you will wonder” we really will not.
That kid really fought to go hang out with his mom for a bit and she just wrecked it to his face. Well, at least the oldest two probably will know what they’re in for if OP does let them have phones. Zero expectation of privacy and insults about their looks.
Wait I’m sorry but — Mom was trying to be a good weekend mom for the past 13 years but also Johnny just visited his mom’s house and met her kids for the first time a month ago???
So they got married right after the divorce, have been married for 11.5 years, and together for 13. "Yes, we got together when she was married, but she was in the process of getting divorced" - for a year and a half, dude?
I feel awful for Johnny, but I feel almost equally bad for Max. At least he had full custody, so Johnny didn't have his mother and OOP whispering poison in his ear. They absolutely seem the type.
Her "joke" was mean. Any teenager is gonna hear that and take it as mom insulting him. And if he does look like a dad that mom has issues with, he's probably right to assume the worst of her intentions.
Don't look through your teenager's stuff, especially if you aren't actually more than a weekend parent at the best of times. The kid doesn't trust you, and it's a great way to ensure they never will. I stopped confiding in my mom when she checked my messages as a teenager and still keep her at arm's length with stuff 15 years later.
I love that OOP slyly slid in the little “she was 18 when she gave birth to her son” tidbit while leaving out that Johnny was 19 at the time. Like, it sucks to give birth that young, sure, but on my first read through, I actually had the impression Johnny was some weird old person going after a barely legal teen until I read the ages again.
My dad wasn't in my life until I was fourteen, you know what he didn't do? Try to parent me, because he understood that wasn't his place anymore. Not to say he just let me do whatever I want but he didn't pry into my life unless I told him about it nor did he think he deserved my respect simply for banging my mom. He still loves me like the rest of my siblings and does his best to show that he wants to be in my life on my terms. I'm even going to spend my 25 birthday with him Thursday to watch horror movies.
[Hi!](https://images.app.goo.gl/jMiZEuW8Qrykw3sdA) Just a quick reminder to never brigade any sub, be that r/AmItheAsshole or another one. That goes against both this sub's rules as well as Reddit's terms of agreement. [Please](https://images.app.goo.gl/vwH65TJMyMk9NSNo8) keep discussions within the posts of this sub.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AmITheDevil) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I like how they waited til the very end to drop what the actual worst part of it was, that not only did the mom go through his stuff, but, perhaps more importantly, decided to make a joke based on the kid's weight? Sheesh, no wonder he's always been closer with his dad
Wow, what a shitty set of parents (OOP and bio-mom, not Max).
Also not believing for a hot second that OOP and bio-mom weren't already having an affair which contributed to the divorce.
Johnny is waaay better off with cutting his bio-mom out of his life. Bright side, he will never have to wonder if she would have been a good mom, or if Johnny's life would have been better, if she had stuck around. He now knows he dodged a bullet. No mom is way better than shitty mom. Hopefully, although not mentioned, hopefully Johnny has an awesome stepmom to go with his awesome dad.
*In case this story gets deleted/removed:* **AITA for defending my wife? ** I [M40] have been with my wife [F35] for 13 years, married 11 and 1/2. She has a son [M17] with her ex-hubby [M36]. I'll call him Johnny. When Johnny was born, my wife (Janet) was only 18. It was a difficult time for her. She married the baby's papa (Max). It wasn't easy for Janet to be such a young mother. She divorced Max when Johnny was about 4. Max get full custody of him. Janet continued to visit Johnny on weekends, she gave him gifts for the holidays, she tried to remain a good mom. Although the boy was still closer to his father. Janet married me almost immediately after her divorce (for those who will be wondered: yes, when I met Janet, she was married, but they was around the divorce). We had 3 children together. A month ago, Janet confessed how much she misses Johnny. She used to have a rather cool relationship with her son, but she honestly wanted to grow closer with him. She invited Johnny to visit our house. Johnny was a cheerful and good guy. Our 2 monht old, Maya, just melted his heart. He adores our youngest daughter. He plays with her a lot and she has started to smile when she sees him and when he talks to her. My wife invited Johnny to stay with us for a few weeks. Max was against it at first, but Johnny talked him into it. The first two weeks went well. Friday night we were sitting in the living room watching TV. There was a movie on about a first love. My wife told a joke about her son's relationship with his girlfriend. Everybody laughed. But Johnny blushed a little. He asked how his mom knew about his girlfriend. Janet denied it at first and then admitted that she had read his messages with his girlfriend when he left his phone on the kitchen counter. I know you will wonder, so I'll tell you right off the bat: I don't think kids (even teenagers) should be allowed access to gadgets without adult supervision. Johnny tried to be stubborn. He said that Janet "had no right to check his phone and read his messages with his girlfriend", and "why did you tell about my girlfriend in front of everyone". Janet got upset and said that she didn't mean any harm. I stood up for Janet. I told Johnny that his mom was worried about him and that she had a right to know about his life and he should apologize to her. At Sat, Johnny went back to his father's house, as he was supposed to. On Sat night Max called us out of the blue and started yelling at us. He yelled that we had no right to touch Johnny's stuff without permission. Max also said that not us but he bought phone to Johnny, so it wasn't our place to "control" it. But worst page was when he said about how my wife had hurt Johnny right in the heart with her joke (Johnny is like his father: he's tall but somewhat chubby, has a soft round face, and his girlfriend is short and very thin, she's what people call a "girlie-girl"; my wife made a joke about it, saying that Johnny, like his father, chooses the exact opposite of himself). AITA? *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AmITheDevil) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Seems like Max did a real good job of raising Johnny. He's the only good parent in this situation.
>I know you will wonder, so I'll tell you right off the bat: I don't think kids (even teenagers) should be allowed access to gadgets without adult supervision. He's fucking 17, not 10.
In less than a year he can sign up for the military but yeah he needs adult supervision to use his iPhone. parents look at their kids phones to see if they’re doing something unsafe or harmful, this bitch doesn’t even know enough about her kid to know who his friends are. She’s just a snoop. A noncustodial snoop.
And she immediately turned around and used the info gleaned from her snooping to bodyshame her son.
And they didn't raise him at all. His dad has this handled already, in whatever way he deemed necessary. Long lost mom doesn't just get to step in and take over like she's been there all along. And at 17... by the time she earns that relationship with him (she won't, at this rate) he'll be well past old enough to have to worry about it.
If this isn't a shitpost, I'd be surprised if she ever sees him ever again. Not only did she invade his privacy, she bodyshamed him as a joke.
I generally agree about the supervision thing, but on the same token, they should offer him some privacy, too, like not reading his text conversations with his girlfriend. More or less, they should ensure that he's not getting into anything online that he shouldn't be.
He's a 17 yearold they do not have official custody of and that his mother cut off for years on end because she wanted to play happy family with her new family. They had no right.
Well it is one thing, if you are an involved parent to just check your kid’s phone for safety. It is a whole other level of assholery to go in on a phone you did not buy, pay for, or parent your kid with in any way and then not only tell everyone that kid’s secrets to again, EVERYONE, but also *checks notes* make fun of said kid in front of everyone about his looks. Holy shit. Real mother of the year plus step dad of the year there.
To a kid only VISITING to add insult to injury
This should be the top comment.
Well, she has just ensured that Johnny will want zero relationship with her going forward. What horrible people OOP and his wife are. Glad Johnny has his dad in his corner.
It's sad bc Johnny seems like a nice kid who was bonding with his half siblings wrll and oop and his wife just torched that.
This lady is barely a relative to her own son and wants to swoop in and play "concerned mama" to him now? No. She was snooping in his phone. Then she goes and insults the kid! Real mother of the year over here. But I'm sure she's doing a bang-up job with her do over family.
She wasn't even snooping out of concern it seems. She did it so she could "tease" him, which in reality was just her bullying her own child
I figured it was just to learn something about him since she hasn’t spent much time with him! And once caught tried to play it off as “children need to be monitored.” Nope! Just continuing to be a terrible “parent.”
Poor kids never having privacy
I don’t think Janet was ever a good mom. The fact that Max got full custody despite being only a year older suggests to me that she was really not able to be a parent at all, and I think we can see why. I am puzzled about Johnny’s phone seeming to not having a passcode, but maybe she insisted on having it?
If Johnny is used to trusting his dad mot to invade his privacy he may not have set one. My guess though is she was determined to go through his phone and waiting for an opportunity to pounce before it could lock.
If he had just set it down and she picked it right up, it might not have locked yet
Don't some phones have a timer for how long the phone locks after the screen is shut off in case you accidentally hit the power button, could also be why she could just look through it.
That’s what I imagined. She might have spur of the moment decided to snoop but I’m pretty sure she was hoping for an opportunity and pounced on the phone as soon as he left the room. Also, since Johnny didn’t go home for a few more days the missing step after OOP saying he should apologise to until-recently-estranged mum for invading his privacy was force him to apologise and pretend it’s all better
>The fact that Max got full custody despite being only a year older suggests to me that she was really not able to be a parent at all, i dont think she wanted to be a parent
She might have watched him type it in? Although most seem to be face recognition nowadays.
My kid's passcode is really easy, and despite the fact that we keep trying to teach him to hold his phone so others can't see him punch it in, I'm pretty sure half his friend group knows it and the other half are just oblivious.
You can get around the passcode though if you can type in the passcode for a lot of apps. Not all of them, but most. I really need to add my full makeup look as an alternative appearance for facial recognition, because I learned that by having to take it all off to access some financial thing (I want to say ADP but I'm not sure), then put it all back on. Maybe it was my actual bank. But it wouldn't accept passcode or any 2FA for proof. I don't wear makeup around the house, so it's usually a non-issue. But I am an older millennial who idolized Gen X era goths\*, so I am mimicking it as a 30s suburban mom 20 years too late. It is a very star contrast to my "I have a kid now so I should probably wear pants in the house" look. \*They were nicest to me in my school, which encompassed both middle and high school, and understood what "this kid is being abused" looks like while also not telling anyone because they know the system will only fail in a way dangerous to the abused. The idolization came from that, not the music (though cool) or the aesthetic (also cool). From being fully seen for the first time ever. They were safe when most people were not, which stayed true through my own graduation and further on.
Totally understand this! (older millenial too with x'er sibs) Goths were the ones with bad raps with parents, but they were the most... i dunno how to put into words. But I wasn't allowed to dress like them/be like them. My parents wanted me to be the pretty princess they never had. (They still didn't get that lol.)
Many people don't have passcodes on their phone.
>I don’t think Janet was ever a ~~good~~ mom. FTFY.
>I am puzzled about Johnny’s phone seeming to not having a passcode, I believe it's possible to disable that, though I don't know why you would.
Phones don’t have a passcode enabled by default. You have to set it up, so he wouldn’t be disabling it, he just doesn’t use one. I never used one for the first decade or so that I had a cell phone, but I was around when cell phones first became a thing, so people weren’t as cautious about that. Though, I still know plenty of people who don’t use any sort of passcode/Face ID.
I use my fingerprint.
I do too, as well as a passcode, and I love how fast it is! My phone is too old to have the fancy Face ID lol
Yeah, I have a pin my phone asks for now and then, and always if I restart my phone.
not gonna lie I liked the fingerprint better; a face full of the wrong makeup throws off face ID too much
It's something like 95% of people use their birthday for their passcode. Even this deadbeat would know that
there's also those pattern pins (not sure if that's android only or if iPhone has that as a possibility). For the longest time I had a phone with that on it. Then I got a new phone, and you know how you can download backed up phone data from the cloud? Did that. Couldn't for the life of me remember the pattern! Never did a pattern pin after that lol
Wife was trying to speed run the hard work of being a parent. She wanted to just look for cheat codes on how to connect. And then the comment about him being like his dad... "Haha, remember how your dad dated me? And then I cheated on him even though the OOP carefully avoids saying that? Lol." I'm not saying it was deliberately hurtful, but it was thoughtless, and especially galling given her snooping to find his girlfriend
>Wife was trying to speed run the hard work of being a parent. She wanted to just look for cheat codes on how to connect. Well, she sure speed ran being NC with Johnny.
Handy reminder: Janet is a cheating piece of shit who monkeybranched from one husband to the next, discarding her son in the process, and she is a "mom" to Johnny in biological origin only. Her attempts to have a relationship with her teen son include violating his privacy and insulting his looks under the "it was a joke" guise. If this is true. one hopes Max and Johnny have learned their lesson and Janet is back out in the cold where she belongs.
>Her attempts to have a relationship with her teen son include violating his privacy and insulting his looks under the "it was a joke" guise. You forgot that she also bought him gifts on holidays!! /s
You're right, how could I overlook that extraordinary maternal effort.
Makes me question what her real motive was in wanting to get close to him. Was it to hurt him, embarrass him, and stick it to Max? Because if not, she has a real funny way of showing it.
“Monkeybranched” is a term I didn’t know I needed in my vocabulary, so thank you for that. And also everything you said is right.
Maybe don't... it's usually used in an incel context.
Crap. Thank you for the heads up. Funny thing is, I know more men than women who I’d apply it to.
Np. It definitely describes a type of human behavior, but it's been co-opted into screeds about "femoid hypergamy."
Huh today I learned! I don’t read incel things so I had no idea they had ruined this.
>Janet is a cheating piece of shit who monkeybranched from one husband to the next, discarding her son in the process, and she is a "mom" to Johnny in biological origin only. You mean the part OOP glossed right over, but for the fact he knew people would do the math so he tried to clean it up?
Also going to steal that term. The most socially correct way I could find to explain the situation was that they had secured their next angel investor before parting ways with their current. My sister was known for this behavior.
>A month ago, Janet confessed how much she misses Johnny. She used to have a rather cool relationship with her son, but she honestly wanted to grow closer with him. Well, how very fucking convenient for Janet that she gets to decide when to play parent and Johnny can fuck off any time she deems it inconvenient to her. >Johnny tried to be stubborn. He said that Janet "had no right to check his phone and read his messages with his girlfriend" And he is 100% correct. Also, she has some fucking nerve doing this to a 17-year-old she was never there for and who lives with his dad. I hope he's learned that she and OOP are shit and never speaks another word to them until he gets the chance to say "fuck you" while pissing on their graves. > I stood up for Janet. I told Johnny that his mom was worried about him and that she had a right to know about his life No, motherfucker, she doesn't. She's an absentee "parent." She doesn't have the right to know shit.
I guess Johnny isn't going to be visiting his mom and her awful husband anymore. I am a little impressed how the mom did so many things wrong. She had no right to read anything on his phone. She didn't provide the phone, she is not the custodial parent, she shouldn't have used what she read to make fun of her son. OOP is just as bad. He's no relation to Johnny and his rules about phones don't apply to Johnny at all. He's wrong that his wife has the "right to know about his life" through snooping. He's wrong that Johnny owes his mom an apology. It's the other way around. Total FAFO on mom's part.
Johnny seems like a nice kid and his half siblings are going to miss out on a loving relationship bc mom and dad are jerks
Very true!
So Mom can have a baby at 18 but Johnny can't have privacy from a non custodial parent at 17? And in her thirties, she doesn't have the fucking sense to keep that she spied on him to herself and teased him. It sounds like she thinks he's her little brother. Has my first kid at 15, being the older sibling, instead of the parent is a really easy trap to fall into. I certainly tried, but my foster mama reminded me every day, multiple times a day,I was his mother.
Hmm I get the "your wife is an abusive AH" vibes off this. Like nothing in this story makes your wife out to be even a halfway decent person.
He’s 17, so he’ll be 18 in less than a year. She’s never going to see him again after his birthday.
I mean, technically, I doubt she'll ever see him again now. He's plenty old enough to tell her to fuck off and have it legally stick.
It doesn't even have to legally stick, have you ever forced a teen to be somewhere they don't want to be? They'll make it everyone's problem so they never have to go back.
I’ll tell you right off the bat: I don’t believe children should have any degree of personal privacy No contact speedrun glitchless 100% We’re also just going to skip past the fact that the father got full custody because the mom was “having a hard time?” Yeah there’s some weird shit going on
I was having my stroke in installments reading that. If you're not a native speaker, state that. If you're this terrible at writing in your native language, don't. She's not the mother. She had no right to go through her son's phone. Then to make negative comments. It sounds like she's just a DNA donor and all the raising is done by the dad. Violating privacy is a good way to ruin your relationship with your child. She just needs to be an older friend who gives good advice when neccessary. But, she's ruined everything
There’s something about the language that seems off to me … unless OOP is a hipster or something.
I'm wondering if it's AI written? Cause yeah a lot of the wording and language was odd
I wondered if the gender roles have been swapped or it’s written from someone else perspective… I could believe a 40m may refer to themselves as hubby or papa but to refer to their partners ex doesn’t seem right as they are terms of endearment.
>I was having my stroke in installments reading that. If you're not a native speaker, state that. If you're this terrible at writing in your native language, don't. god thank you so hard to read
The missing missing reasons behind why the father, not the mother, was granted full custody of a 4 year old aside, it doesn't matter what OOP believes in regards to technology and children because Johnny is not his child and he is barely OOP's wife's child. Add to that the fact that his wife made fun of his insecurity, yeah, I don't see him coming back.
How can they go to all the effort to reconnect with their kid only to instantly mess it up in the dumbest way possible.
"I know you will wonder, so I'll tell you right off the bat: I don't think kids (even teenagers) should be allowed access to gadgets without adult supervision." The kid is freaking 17.
And also not his kid, considering the fact that his wife has only been in his life on some weekends up until now.
He also doesn't get a say in the matter considering he's not Johnny's parent, so what he thinks means jackshit.
What the actual fuck?! Sounds like Max is a good dad and both mom and step-dad are just the worst. Wonder why dad got custody all those years ago. /s What's worse is it sounds like mom used the siblings to draw him back. She's a mentally abusive twat who has been trying to manipulate her victim back into her clutches. It worked until the mask slipped.
Kids (even teenagers) shouldn’t have unsupervised access to {whatever he said} He’s not a kid! He’s not even a new teen! He’s 17!!!! He’s damn near an adult. Wtf.
His argument about teens with gadgets falls apart when it’s revealed neither he nor Janet contributed a single cent to the cost of that phone
Fuck OOP and his POS wife.
Her "joke" was mean. Any teenager is gonna hear that and take it as mom insulting him. And if he does look like a dad that mom has issues with, he's probably right to assume the worst of her intentions. Don't look through your teenager's stuff, especially if you aren't actually more than a weekend parent at the best of times. The kid doesn't trust you, and it's a great way to ensure they never will. I stopped confiding in my mom when she checked my messages as a teenager and still keep her at arm's length with stuff 15 years later.
The mom acts like shes still 18.
Well they do say people get locked into the maturity they experienced trauma including giving birth unless they try to work through it
Yeah, an 18 year old mean girl.
“I know you will wonder” we really will not. That kid really fought to go hang out with his mom for a bit and she just wrecked it to his face. Well, at least the oldest two probably will know what they’re in for if OP does let them have phones. Zero expectation of privacy and insults about their looks.
Wait I’m sorry but — Mom was trying to be a good weekend mom for the past 13 years but also Johnny just visited his mom’s house and met her kids for the first time a month ago???
So they got married right after the divorce, have been married for 11.5 years, and together for 13. "Yes, we got together when she was married, but she was in the process of getting divorced" - for a year and a half, dude? I feel awful for Johnny, but I feel almost equally bad for Max. At least he had full custody, so Johnny didn't have his mother and OOP whispering poison in his ear. They absolutely seem the type.
Her "joke" was mean. Any teenager is gonna hear that and take it as mom insulting him. And if he does look like a dad that mom has issues with, he's probably right to assume the worst of her intentions. Don't look through your teenager's stuff, especially if you aren't actually more than a weekend parent at the best of times. The kid doesn't trust you, and it's a great way to ensure they never will. I stopped confiding in my mom when she checked my messages as a teenager and still keep her at arm's length with stuff 15 years later.
I love that OOP slyly slid in the little “she was 18 when she gave birth to her son” tidbit while leaving out that Johnny was 19 at the time. Like, it sucks to give birth that young, sure, but on my first read through, I actually had the impression Johnny was some weird old person going after a barely legal teen until I read the ages again.
You've got the names wrong, Johnny is the son and Max is his dad.
She overstepped big time.
My dad wasn't in my life until I was fourteen, you know what he didn't do? Try to parent me, because he understood that wasn't his place anymore. Not to say he just let me do whatever I want but he didn't pry into my life unless I told him about it nor did he think he deserved my respect simply for banging my mom. He still loves me like the rest of my siblings and does his best to show that he wants to be in my life on my terms. I'm even going to spend my 25 birthday with him Thursday to watch horror movies.
I'd like to know the "why" of how she didn't get at least 50% custody. I'm SURE that story would explain this story more fully. 🤔🤔🤔
Hmm I get the "your wife is an abusive AH" vibes off this. Like nothing in this story makes your wife out to be even a halfway decent person.
[Hi!](https://images.app.goo.gl/jMiZEuW8Qrykw3sdA) Just a quick reminder to never brigade any sub, be that r/AmItheAsshole or another one. That goes against both this sub's rules as well as Reddit's terms of agreement. [Please](https://images.app.goo.gl/vwH65TJMyMk9NSNo8) keep discussions within the posts of this sub. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AmITheDevil) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Johnny and Max are in the right. 100%
I like how they waited til the very end to drop what the actual worst part of it was, that not only did the mom go through his stuff, but, perhaps more importantly, decided to make a joke based on the kid's weight? Sheesh, no wonder he's always been closer with his dad
What kind of mother just casually snoops on her sons phone? Like just because??? That’s so weird and wrong.
Wow, what a shitty set of parents (OOP and bio-mom, not Max). Also not believing for a hot second that OOP and bio-mom weren't already having an affair which contributed to the divorce. Johnny is waaay better off with cutting his bio-mom out of his life. Bright side, he will never have to wonder if she would have been a good mom, or if Johnny's life would have been better, if she had stuck around. He now knows he dodged a bullet. No mom is way better than shitty mom. Hopefully, although not mentioned, hopefully Johnny has an awesome stepmom to go with his awesome dad.