When a family member dies, often their belongings become sort of sacred, and a need to keep them private arises.
For one man on Reddit, who goes by the name AIta110709 on the platform, this sort of sentiment turned into a family conflict when his sister asked to use his dead son’s yacht for her wedding.
So he went to the AITA (Am I The A**hole) subReddit to get some perspective on the matter.
The Original Poster (OP) asked:
“AITA For refusing to let my sister use my son’s yacht for her wedding?”
He explained:
“My son Thomas passed away a year ago at the age of 25. He was such a sweet soul. He was kind and sympathetic despite having suffered so much he still had a joyful smile. He wanted to be an engineer.”
“But unfortunately he couldn’t continue his education. He was involved in a car accident. Had a sever injury and became paralyzed. I did everything I could to help him regain his life but what happened was devastating.”
“We were spending time at the hospital while my family were getting together celebrating birthdays/weddings etc and excluded me and Thomas. I asked them to show up. at least show emotional support to Thomas but they didn’t visit.”
“I took Thomas home and I became his primary carer. I found that Thomas was home 24/7 with no family visiting us even on holidays.”
“Every time I complained my sister would suggest I put Thomas in home care. I stopped begging them to visit and include Thomas in their events and Check in on him.”
“They treated Thomas like he was dead.”
“He suffered from anemia. It affected his heart function.”
“His health was getting worse. 4 months before he passed away I decided to achieve at least one goal he’d in his mind.”
“He always wanted to get his own yacht and wanted to buy it himself. I sold land I had for 5 years and I bought a yacht.”
“I told him that it was his. He was overjoyed.”
“We started spending most of his time there. On weekends and on holidays. Til he suddenly passed away and it was devastating.”
“I couldn’t visit the yacht til 6 months after his passing. This is where I remember him the most.”
“My family visited, made facebook tributes, hanged pictures of him and visited his grave. I was still upset with them.”
“I kept my distance but last week my mother and sister were visiting asking if they could use my son’s yacht for my sister’s wedding this summer.”
“I declined but they talked about how expensive it is to rent a yacht and that mine was perfect. I corrected my sister.”
“Told her that’s Thomas’s yacht. Thomas who they refused to visit and comfort during his dark times.”
“My sister denied all that and said she didn’t come to talk about the past and that as her brother I should help out. I argued with her and my mother after they said I was declining out of spite and called me selfish to punish them for Thomas’ death.”
“My brother said I was wrong because the family is keeping his memory alive by talking about him and that I should get therapy otherwise I’ll be causing people to cut me out.”
“I’m sorry if anyone got confused. I’m his father-I’m sorry I should’ve included that earlier.”
OP’s fellow Redditors were then asked to evaluate who was in the wrong in this situation using the following acronyms:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
- NAH – No A**holes Here
And in this case, it was not a difficult decision.
“OP, if they did not visit once while he had all this say ‘Fine you can use his yacht as many times you visited him during that time'” —batmanboy88
“…I snorted when the sister said she didn’t come to talk about the past.”
“OP, therapy is a great idea to support you when you finally fully cut out your toxic family. I’m glad your son was in your life and impacted you so meaningfully, and I’m sorry he was taken so soon.” —Continuity-whore13
“OP make sure they don’t know where the yatch is stored in the winter and docked in the summer. Make sure both places are password protected so they can’t try to claim you gave them permission to use it.” —WeeklyConversation8
“Who are they to call themselves family to OP when they decided that family wasn’t important during the toughest part of OP and his kids’ life?”
“He doesn’t owe them a damn thing. They are ALL in the wrong here” —HeyYouShouldSmile
“OP can always tell them that yes, he sure as hell is decling out of spite. Because how dare them ignore his living son, how dare they neglect to support them in their darkest hours, and how dare them demand to use his son’s property after killing him before he was dead.” —Trick_Literature_
“…I think it’s disgusting how they are trying to get in his good books by saying they are keeping his son’s memory alive by talking about him, and yet they couldn’t be bothered to talk TO him when he was alive.” —enjoysbeerandplants
“The fact that they’re threatening to cut ties makes my stomach turn…… YOU should be the one cutting ties. NTA! X100000” —TheWhiteAngel_
“NTA. Shitty people who treat you badly will be the first to say let’s just move on. They don’t want to acknowledge the hurt they caused. They couldn’t be bothered to even visit him once and excluded you both…” —Mera1506
“Ask them and yourself what exactly are you losing if they cut you out of their lives? Because it seems like they are a bunch of assholes that didn’t visit your son when he was sick but will cash in on his memory for social media cred.”
“Caring about dead people is easy, caring for sick people is hard, they only showed up for the easy part.” —Sirdan3k
“NTA. Remove the burden of justification from yourself and put it on them. ‘Thomas’s yacht is reserved to be appreciated and utilized by those who supported and cared for him during his most difficult moments. Could you explain to me how you have done that?'” —FourLeafClover0
The moral of this story seems to be, respect is a two-way street, as the saying goes.