Woman Who Ruined Sister’s Engagement By Revealing Fiancé's 'Shady' Past Says She Wanted Her Family To Make An 'Informed Decision'
Her future brother-in-law couldn't handle everyone knowing about his past.
Amine İspir, Dziana Hasanbekava / Pexels During a recent family event that she and her future brother-in-law attended, one woman was told, in confidence, about her brother-in-law's past by the man himself.
After finding out about her 23-year-old future brother-in-law’s past, the 37-year-old woman took it upon herself to share what she knew with the rest of her family — but she had no idea the kind of damage she would cause by doing so.
The woman ruined her sister’s engagement by sharing her boyfriend’s ‘shady’ history.
She went to the subreddit “r/AmItheA--hole” (AITA) to share her story and get a second opinion about whether or not she did the right thing. She started off the post by explaining what happened in a little more detail.
“He comes from a rough background but he has always been very polite and charming,” she wrote. “He doesn't talk about his own family or about his upbringing. My sister said it's a painful topic for him so no one ever pushed.”
The two had been dating for around a year, and it was clear that his past has never been a big problem for them seeing as now, the pair were engaged to be wed. However, all that changed when he decided to let his girlfriend’s older sister know about his past.
“He ended up offloading some quite shocking things from his past including that he has a history of very serious drug use (including needles) and that he has done sex work and p--n (men and women),” she explained.
She claims that she had originally felt bad for him because he had been crying on her shoulder from the pain, but that compassion quickly turned into discomfort as “it does make me feel differently about him.”
“Obviously I told my husband what [my future brother-in-law] told me because I didn't feel comfortable keeping it to myself,” she continued. “I also told my sister because I didn't know how honest he had been with her and it could impact her decision to marry him.”
Considering they were engaged, her 27-year-old sister was already aware of the situation and said that it didn’t change how she felt about him. It would, however, eventually change how he felt about her once her sister decided to tell the family.
She said her family deserved to know in order to make an ‘informed decision’ about their relationship.
“I know others might disagree but I decided if my sister and [future brother-in-law] weren't going to bring it up then it was my responsibility to make sure my family had the information they needed to make an informed choice about what kind of relationship they have with him,” she explained.
She claimed her parents said it was the right thing to do, her brother said he saw her point but didn’t think it was her information to share, and his wife said she was out of line.
As a result of this information being made public to the rest of the family, “They are no longer engaged because ‘he thinks he's not good enough for her’ and no one in my family has seen him since all of this happened.”
She claims that this wasn’t her intention and that no one said he wasn’t good enough, but also said it was naive to “pretend that you see someone exactly the same way after finding out they're an addict.”
“Whether you like it or not there are risks that come with that lifestyle and relapses are common. I'm concerned that my sister will get hurt and I don't think it's unreasonable for my family to have access to the same information I do, especially when they're inviting him to their homes and there are children around etc.”
According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, between 40% and 60% of addicts will inevitably relapse. They emphasize, however, that relapses “can be part of the process” and don’t mean that their addiction treatment has failed.
Not only that, but a history of sex work does not make the man a deviant, so making a point of saying that he would be around children is stigmatizing. His history was traumatic to him, clearly, judging by the response he had when he told her, and he seemed to be past it.
The information was not hers to tell, and hopefully, she’ll do her best to fix the engagement that she had unintentionally broken.
Isaac Serna-Diez is an Assistant Editor who focuses on entertainment and news, social justice, and politics. Keep up with his rants about current events on his Twitter.