As the saying goes, “no good deed goes unpunished”.
There isn’t a worse feeling than thinking that you’ve just done someone an enormous favor, only to have it backfire.
Rather than get thanks and congratulations, you instead find yourself in hot water, or the subject of ridicule.
All because you were trying to help someone else.
Redditor Beltoni15 found himself in such a situation, after coming to the rescue of his step-mother.
When he shared what he did with his friends, their reaction turned out to be not at all what he expected.
Wondering if he had, in fact, made a miscalculation, the original poster (OP) took to the subReddit “Am I The A**hole”, where he asked fellow Redditors:
“AITA for carrying my father’s wife up the stairs?”
The OP first explained how his stepmother came home to discover their elevator broken while in a fragile condition, but he saw a solution to the problem.
“A couple of years back, my (21 M[ale]) father (49) re-married to “Clarissa” (43 F[emale], I think).”
“Somewhat surprisingly given their age, they had a child, and my half-brother ‘Edward’ was delivered by C-section last week.”
“They live in a very spacious apartment on the 5th floor of their building, which is normally accessed by elevator.”
“Murphy’s law being what it is, the elevator was of course broken when we got back from the hospital, for the first time in over a decade.”
“Dad took the baby upstairs, but we were trying to figure out how to get Clarissa home.”
“She can walk, barely, but she didn’t think she could climb five flights, so after some inquiring as to when the elevator would be fixed, and getting several different variations of ‘no idea’, I offered to carry her up the stairs.”
“She’s a tiny woman, like 5’1 and slightly built, so I thought I’d need to rest once or twice going that far, but I was sure I could carry her.”
“And yeah, eventually carried her up the stairs to the fifth floor.”
When the OP told his friends about his actions, however, they found his actions to be anything but heroic.
“I told a few of my friends about it, in a kind of ‘why does everything have to go wrong at once’ sort of griping, and I was surprised that the reaction I got was almost universally negative.”
“That I should NEVER under any circumstances, put my hands on my stepmother.”
“I don’t think of her that way and that it was borderline perversion.”
“I have to admit, I don’t fully understand the reaction, but since everyone nearby seems to share it, I just wanted some neutral confirmation by people who are strangers.”
“Am I the a**hole here, or are my friends just weird?”
Fellow Redditors weighed in on where they believed the OP fell in this particular situation by declaring:
- NTA – Not the A**hole
- YTA – You’re the A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everybody Sucks Here
Unlike his friends, the Reddit community commended the OP for what he did with his stepmother and agreed he was in no way the a**hole for carrying her up the stairs.
Everyone agreed it was abundantly clear the OP was only trying to help his ailing stepmother and his friends completely overreacted.
“NTA.”
“Touching your stepmother in a nonsexual, nonromantic way is hardly perversion.”
“Sounds like your friends have internalized porn plots and now use them to reference reality.”-clorpdotcomm
“NTA.”
“Your friends are weird.”
“Your stepmom just had major surgery and a baby pulled out of her body.”
“You helped her get home.”
“There’s nothing perverted about it.”- ivylass
“NTA.”
“Your friends are weird.”
“You were obviously helping an injured person, no subtext included.”
“If they think otherwise, it’s on them.”- Sunny_Hill_1
“NTA.”
“You were doing a service for your stepmother who just gave birth.”
“There was nothing wrong in your actions.”-Impossible-Leek-2830
“NTA.”
“Your friends are creepy and watch too much porn.”- plaignard
“NTA.”
“It doesn’t sound like it was sexual or inappropriate in any respect, and it was an unanticipated semi-emergency.”
“If she didn’t have a problem with it then there wasn’t a problem.”
“I think your friends’ objections may have said more about them than they intended.”-ProfessionallyJudgy
“NTA you did a kind thing for someone in your family.”
“Your friends are wrong.”- OutlandishnessNew259
“NTA.”
“Your friends are weird.”- queertheories
“NTA.”
“There is definitely something wrong with your friends.”
“How exactly could any of this be considered sexual?”
“That doesn’t even make sense.”
“Sounds like they all have some growing up to do!”
“Good on you for helping your stepmom.”- overlook447
“NTA.”
“She just had a major surgery to deliver a child.”
“I’d carry my Mom, Brother, Sister, dog, cat, whatever, up 5 flights of stairs for even less of a reason.”
“What you did was an act of kindness and human decency.”
“Some people are creepy to their step-family, but going off of this message, your behavior is exactly what I’d ask for in a step-son.”- Xielvanic
“You carried her.”
“You didn’t grope her.”
“Your friends should ask themselves, what their deeper issue is.”
“Step-mom, mom, aunt, friend.”
“If someone needs help and you can, it’s nice.”
“Nta.”- MasterpieceOk4688
“No, NTA.”
“You did the gentlemanly thing. “
“If your step mom did not object, no problem.”- Ecstatic_Being8277
“NTA.”
“And it’s super weird that anyone implies you’re wrong for helping.”- Jolly_Security_4771
“NTA.”
“Your friends are all weird and probably lusting after their own step mommies, with the added twist of some hot post-c section kink thrown in for good measure.”
“You were just being kind and thoughtful towards yours.”-Cultural-Ambition449
“NTA and frankly, you need new friends.”
“The only thing weird is that they would even think something was wrong about you helping out your step-mom.”
“Especially after she had just given birth!”
“Your friends are twisted.”- VixenNoire
“NTA.”
“I am baffled by the responses.”
“You acted nobly and intended to help only.”- MySuperLove
“NTA.”
“Your friends are sexualizing your step mom by saying it’s perverted to touch her – they need to reflect on why they feel like that.”
“She had a surgery to birth a baby.”
“There’s zero chance she could walk up 5 flights of stairs without consequences to her health.”
“You did what was best for your step mom.”- jabmwr
“You need better friends.”
“NTA.”
“You literally helped someone after a super invasive surgery go up 5 flights of stairs.”
“If your friends immediately envision a gross step parent porno scenario thats on them for being pervs.”
“Not on you for being a decent human being.”- OsaBear92
“NTA.”
“Your friends are being weird.”
“My friend J had surgery on her foot and my other friend M (40s, F) and I picked her and her BF up from the hospital.”
“When we got her home we realized there were a bunch of stairs to get into the apartment.”
“J is very petite like your stepmom and while her BF (who was kinda useless) was dithering about, M just swoops J up in her arms like Richard Gere in An Officer and a Gentleman.”
“It was awesome.”-Slamantha3121
“NTA your friends are the perverts.”
“What were you gonna do, leave her downstairs?”- Soso_8555
‘NTA where I’m from (USA). Knowing how differently some cultures view things, I’m sure this would not be appropriate in some places.”
“Thinking of the video I saw yesterday of a Hindu man being beaten for kissing his wife once in some kind of ritual bathing event.”
“Short of that kind of cultural difference I think your friends are weird, and a bit creepy.”
“Any chance they were trying to give you a hard time by suggesting it was inappropriate?”-sinevigiliamentis
“NTA.”
“Your friends are weird and/or immature.”
“You were being helpful in a situation where there was no real other option other than you staying with the newborn and your dad carrying her.”
“I think this was the least risky.”
“Nothing wrong with it at all.”- tinny36
“NTA.”
“Like for real; were you supposed to leave her or rig up a pulley system or something?”
“What about other situations? “
“‘Sorry Debbie, I was told to never under any circumstances put my hands on you’.”
“‘I hope you can dislodge the food in your throat on your own’.”
“‘No Heimlich maneuver for you’.”-Â MrCantankerous
“NTA.”
“I feel like your friends are the one with strange milf fantasies here.”- RandomAnthea
“NTA your friends are being weird and dumb.”- DumbQEasyAnswer
“NTA your friends are just making thus perverse.”-alexaangelff14
“NTA.’
“Your friends have icky brains.”-TheShadowHerald
“NTA.”
“You were just helping out someone who just gave birth.”- CypherDoom
“NTA.”
“You were doing her a kindness.”
“Your friends have watched way too much porn.”- JosieJOK
The OP’s stepmother was very lucky, indeed, that he was there to help.
It’s pretty hard to imagine how the OP’s friends could have seen anything wrong with the OP’s gesture.
As many Redditors have suggested, their minds might be too heavily influenced by what they’ve been watching, and it might be time for a reality check.