For one reason or another, not all families have a mom and a dad. In some situations, one of the kids even steps up to fill the role of a parent.
In today’s story, a woman shares that she basically raised her younger brother, and because of that he calls her “mom.”
Now her coworker is weighing in on the situation and making her question whether this is weird or not.
Let’s see how the story unfolds…
I (29f) have a very bad home life.
My mother died when I was 8, and my father has been horribly absent since then.
I have 3 younger brothers 26m 22m and 17m, but this will be mainly about my 17 year old brother.
She basically became the mom.
Once my mother died, I started raising my two younger brothers and did literally 95% of the work.
The only thing my father did was give me money weekly for me to buy food and other necessities for us three.
When I was 13, my dad brought home my youngest brother who was a few months old.
I didn’t know he existed much less that my father was seeing someone.
Me and my father had a horrible fight that night and we have rarely ever talked since then.
Her relationship was different with the oldest brother than it was with the middle brother.
Now, I 100% raised all three of my brothers, but with my eldest brother let’s call him jake, he remembered a life before our mother died for the longest bit.
He resented me his whole life, the classic “you’re not my mom” stuff when he was junior high age, so I never viewed him in a son role and he most definitely never viewed me in a motherly role.
With my middle brother, let’s call him sam, he was a baby when our mother died. As he grew up he would occasionally call me mom, but I would shut it down mostly and remind him of our mother and that I’m just “sissy”.
He definitely viewed me more in a motherly role than jake did but he still viewed me as a sister.
The youngest brother thinks of her as his mom.
With my youngest brother; however, let’s call him henry, he 100% views me as a mom, and I look at him as my son.
I know I’m not his mom, but I know absolutely nothing about her. I have her first and last name, but cannot find anything about her anywhere.
When he was young and started calling me mom, I would try to remind him that I’m not his mom I’m his sister, but after a bit I just gave up.
Henry still calls her mom.
Now here’s the issue at hand.
I was on my break at work yesterday, and I texted the group chat with my husband (30m), daughter (10f) and henry asking what they wanted for dinner and what they wanted picked up from the store.
Henry texted “just some chips, thanks mom 🙂” and I thought nothing of it.
Then my coworker (24f) looked over my shoulder and found it very strange that my brother was calling me mom.
Her coworker thinks it’s weird that her brother calls her mom.
I would say that me and this coworker are decent friends. We’ve gotten drinks a few times after work, and I’ve talked to her a bit about my family life.
I tried to explain to her yesterday our situation and how I’ve raised him since he was 3 months old, but she just didn’t budge.
She then went around our job telling others that my brother calls me mom.
She doesn’t understand why her coworker is making it into a big deal.
I really don’t understand why this is an issue and why other coworkers are “picking sides” but I would say 60% of the people she has told agree and think my brother calling me mom is strange, while the others just don’t give a care which, fair.
I’m just simply not understanding the issue to this, and I’m genuinely wanting talks opinions lol.
Apologies if this is all gambled and messy it’s currently 6 am and i have just woken but but had to get this off my mind.
Thanks internet.
It sounds like her coworker needs to mind her business.
Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story…
Her family’s opinion is all that matters.
Why is her coworker reading her texts?
This person thinks the coworker is awful.
Another person would report the coworker.
She basically IS her younger brother’s mom.
Her younger brother should be the one to decide what he calls her.
Her coworker needs to stop being a bully.
If you enjoyed that story, read this one about a mom who was forced to bring her three kids with her to apply for government benefits, but ended up getting the job of her dreams.
