Nta, I would never have reconciled with my family either. The brother is clearly the golden child. There is no way the parents can make ammends for how they treated OP. Buying her a car is meaningless.
Unlike many people believe love is not unconditional. Why should they have believed him when he constantly had the stolen items in his room. Bein framed is terrible but there are two victims here. The real problem was their initial reaction to finding out who the real thief was. They should have gone instantly scorched earth but they did not because they were embarrassed how they fell for the scam.
Agreed. However considering how after a solid cry and thinking the mom kicked him out I wouldn't call him a golden child just typical youngest It seems most likely the mom was overloaded and went easier on him out of fear of an empty nest. Realizing that it was destroying any hope of reconciliation she had she decided to do ot anyway
He was stashing stolen items elsewhere so he wouldn't be caught with them and if no one noticed they were missing after a period of time he'd pawn them.
This started when he was pretty young. I mean he's OPs younger brother and it started when she was 15. I hope it's not gambling or drugs. I'd be inclined to agree with her on mental health issues since they tend to show up in the pre teen/teen years first for many (not all) and/or your 20s depending on the issue. (obviously not all of them but I know many do)
I think he was just stashing the things in his sister's empty room because no one would look in an unoccupied room and they wouldn't be in his possession
Exactly. But I think op is a little hard on his parents. The things were found in his room several times. What else is there to think. The thief isn't going to say ok, you caught me. Kids need to realize that their parents are human and are not perfect. But if they keep finding stuff in his room, what are they supposed to think.
@@oonachestnut509but it was also about their method to try to reconcile with op. They tried using money to buy his trust back, which is probably not the best method because it was just lazy of them to do that. Also, op stated that they made him feel like they apologized because they felt guilty, not because they knew they have wronged him.
@@oonachestnut509 They had their chance when they learned the truth. They barely said they were sorry, then proceeded to slap him in the face with this laughable punishment of the real thief. The later attempt by his dad was simply because they realised they fucked up majorly again, not because they're really sorry. They drove him away, and when the truth came out they also soured relations with their daughter, and the thief they can't trust, so they have no good relations with their kids.
@@oonachestnut509 they should have installed cameras before and how they are so stupid to think a person will steal multiple time and hid it in his own room AFTER being caught thus that make sense to you.
@@oonachestnut509 Their supposed to actually use their brains and think “wait a minute, we’ve been punishing THE SHIT out of him for a while now and things are still being stolen, maybe it isn’t actually him…”. I’m honestly shocked that you are trying to go to bat for a couple of morons like these
Money won't make up for everything you missed out on as punishment and the mental toll it took to be hated and shunned. Bleed them dry of money but stay nc afterward
It isn't something new. As soon as he started stealing his was dealing with issues. Many mental health issues surface during teenage years. Stealing and thiefing is to support some habit. They need to take care of it soon or it will settle into a full blown addiction if it hasn't yet. I imagine the family will find that school wasn't going well either.
Do the best thing; demand they legally disown the brother as punishment. They sign a contact they cannot help the brother with bills or leave him anything. They can speak to him and all that, but its obvious that is what he was attempting. Getting you and sis disowned.
Nta. Don't take the money or car. Call them explain that material things won't solve this. Giving me time and patience will, I can't be and won't be bought I had to struggle and work my a** off to get where I am now, I work hard for what I have and won't let you buy your way in so later you can use it against me later. Just time and patience
OP’s family is probably never going to stop slipping up in the way they treat them. They spent decades building a certain perception of OP. So, even though they’ve been confronted with the truth, the way they see OP is already ingrained in their minds. You can tell from their immediate reaction after learning that the brother was actually the thief. At that point, it was as if their good son had done something bad. While OP had just been a shady person who happened to be innocent. Reality rarely ever changes the image you already have of someone. Especially if you’ve mistreated someone as a result of your misconceptions.
The parents ruined OP's life at 15 but only took the phone from the true thief?! They truly suck. And they only get worse with the uodate. OP needs to ditch everyone but his sister.
“Their apologies feel more so that they feel guilty and less like they wronged me.” Yeah, they feel guilty because they feel like they wronged you. Why else would someone feel guilty?
I don’t get how they were supposed to know that it wasn’t her. I will be mad at my brother and kind of mad at my parents but nowhere near the y’all never speak to them again level because at the end of the day they were tricked too
They were willing to get cameras when the brother was the only other person in the house. Like who the hell else was it supposed to be? They weren’t willing to get cameras when OP was adamant they weren’t stealing. The parents could have figured it out. They chose not to. And THAT is what is never talk to them again territory.
@@goldwire12I think you’re reading into this a bit much. Stuff was stolen, consistently found in OP’s room. Any reasonable person would conclude that OP was probably stealing. The reason they got cameras is because no one else was living in the house but the brother, so they didn’t know how the hell stuff wound up in sister’s room when she wasn’t living there.
To do this at only 10 does seem like OP's brother had some issues. The line insinuating he didnt get much attention was interesting to me. The parents made terrible errors, but they seem genuinely remorseful. The dinner sounded like everything happened really fast, they may not have immediately defended you because they were shocked at the cousin saying what she did now that everyone knows it wasn't you, and you were already replying. It can also be hard to speak up and have a confrontation in a public place like a restaraunt. OP still needs to tread lightly around his family (other than sister/grandparents/possibly aunt) but mom and dad seem like they're genuine, and its good that the brother is getting help now. Uncle and cousin seem crazy though.
Meh, OP is totally justified if that he feels it’s “to little, to late”. They put him through a massive amount of shit. Never bothering to hear him out and get a camera to double check. How stupid and self-absorbed do you have to be to keep punishing your child over months and never stop to think how weird it is that the stealing keeps happening and he’s never admitted to doing it
@@NeoCreo1 I agree that he doesn't have to forgive them or have contact with them, I just meant it is a good sign that they seem to be genuinely remorseful. I don't know what year OP was 15, but I know home cameras used to be less accessible and more expensive. On top of that, if they even suspected anyone else of being the real thief, it doesn't really make sense for anyone else to steal things and then put them in OP's room. Plus, if someone is smart enough to steal things successfully, they could probably find a way around a camera.
Mom is inconsolable? So what? I was pretty upset myself when they treated me as a thief, never listened to me, and basically kicked me out of the family. How do you make up for something like this? You don’t. Would be good to tell them that they didn’t believe him/abandoned him for something like 8 years, and it’ll be at least that long OO shouldn’t take any of the offered gifts, as that’ll be leverage for attempted guilting forever. The their brother having mental health issues doesn’t mean anything as far as forgiving the parents. It’s irrelevant Don’t apologize to the cousin.
True. I have experienced getting 'gifts' from so-called 'friends' so many times before, especially without asking for it and it was always something I never wanted, used and was way too expensive. Then they started getting passive-aggressive if I didn't hang out at their place enough. I immediately gane each of these 'friends' the exact 'gift' back once I experienced any passive-aggressiveness that lasted more than 3 days (which was every single one of my encounters) and then I went NC with each and every one of them. I have 4 best-friends and roughly 10 more normal friends too that I hang out on the regular. It's not like I was in desperate need of their manipulative social contact at any point.
"You're still on thin ice for that stuff you didn't do." ...what? Like the cousin's snippy comment could potentially be seen as a *very* poor attempt at a joke, trying to make the years of abuse better by minimizing them as 'something we can look back on and laugh about now', but the uncle? He was angry and trying to reprimand OP, so no chance that was a joke. How is he on thin ice for something you know full well he didn't do? If anything the *uncle* is on thin ice, along with the rest of the family, for the things they did to OP. What an incredibly out of touch comment. Are you all just so used to cracking jokes about this guy that you forgot he was there and also proven innocent? Jesus Christ.
I’ll be paragraph guy Op’s mom calls her and say that his dad notice things were going missing again and he decide to set up cameras and found it was the brother doing it. Mom says she wants to reconnect with op. Op asks what brother punishment is reminding them that op missed a birthday, drivers license, and multiple vacations Mom says he got his phone taken away for a week and video games for a month Op blew up at her and told her to go fvck herself
Wait, let me get this straight. The fact that OP was in debt for college suggests that he paid for it himself. He was also living on his own, so he was paying his own bills. But the stealing brother was living at home for free, with college completely paid for. So his “punishment” was still just being put into the same situation OP was already in by default. Edit: Killers of the Flower Moon is a phenomenal film.
I'm not proud of it but yes I was caught stealing few bucks from my mother, it cannot be considered stealing. I used to see all adults picking up money from a petty cash box on shelf, so I thought I was also eligible to do it, but when I did it was caught stealing 🙊🙊. I'm kind of grateful that my parents were level headed, yes I was scolded but the punishment was to clean my Dad's car for a week and additional scolding from my Dad if it was not done perfectly. At the end of that week he gave me the same amount while saying "This is the total labor you have to do for earning the amount of money you stole from that box." Then he took back that money from my hand "You were already paid in advance so I can take this back as settlement your advance wage." That was the last time I picked up money from anywhere, not even when I found lost money on road and parks 😅😅
Jesus said you should forgive those who have sin against you. Jesus forgave the Romans for killing Him. I went through trauma as a young boy with a neglectful and abusive mother. The first 10 years of my life as boy, I was petrified of my mother. After years of therapy plus read the Bible, I forgave her and it's the best decision of my life. Peace in Christ.
Harry Potter forgave lord Voldemort and that guy killed his parents tried to kill him as a baby! I mean sure Harry only forgave him in death, not while he was still around or anything.
He’s going crazy because it’s something called regeneration. It sounds like a video game thing but it’s actually just like getting to a new area and you need to learn about it but you miss your order area so you wanna go back to it or you wanna go to your old hobbies so what I’m saying is basically acoustic.
People are bonkers. Sure the parents are wrong, but from their PoV, he was a problem. And to not acknowledge that and try to move on a more positive path is why Reddit is a cesspool of negativity.
The problem is FOR YEARS he said he didn’t do it and was punished and thrown away by his whole family because of his parents for something he didn’t do. They didn’t try therapy, cameras nothing. And OP was a child. But for the grown brother he just gets his phone taken?!! No they clearly hated OP and they aren’t entitled to forgiveness
@@terickastidbits2342 Yeah, and they kept finding shit in HIS room, it looked like HE was the problem. I'm not gonna go into the rabbit hole that you want to open, but let's keep it simple: 1) Therapy won't work because from the parent's perspective, it's for the son to admit he was wrong and from the son's perspective, he did nothing wrong, so neither side would yield unless an outside view suggests that it wasn't his kid, therefore it must be someone else, and the therapist is in no position to be suggesting to the parents to suspect their spouse or the other kids, this would unravel the family. 2) Cameras are the iffiest, it would need for the parents to be so sure it was their kid, they just wanted the clear as day evidence it was OP, so he couldn't deny it. and at that point their mind is set, so they would see no reason to do that. They only did it later on because the problem resurfaced, and their main 'culprit' wasn't there, THEN their gears started to turn. 3) And no child is ever evil? There's literally his brother doing that fucked up shit and he was way younger than OP.
@@bogustoast22none25 again after knowing the truth and recognizing they punished the wrong kid their response was to take the phone of an adult and think that’s good enough. No matter WHAT happens they are NOT owed more understanding than what they extended to their own child. They are NOT owed blanket forgiveness. OP has EVERY right to deal with them on HIS terms that HE is comfortable with or NOT at all
Something being in a spot is not evidence to how it got there. There were 5 people in that house. A camera is the only sure fire way to get an answer as long as it wasn't in the bathroom that should have been step one. And the child suffered for 3 years under their roof because they couldn't do a basic verification.
