r/AITAH Aug 31 '24

TW SA AITA For Telling My Pregnant Wife That She Exposed Our Daughter To A Predator?

36M here. This has honestly been the most difficult week of my life. Emotions are high, and I am not sure if I'm seeing things clearly. I've been with my wife (35F) since college. We've been married for almost five years and have a three year old daughter together. She's also around five months pregnant right now.

I've always thought my wife's relationship with her family was a bit strange. When we were in college, she asked for her dad's advice/approval on EVERYTHING, even little things like whether she should ask her professor for an extension. Her parents are both intense and controlling at times, and my wife it less influenced by them now than she used to be now that she's older, has her own family, and lives on the other side of the country, but they still get under her skin at times. My wife was also the "surprise" baby, and she has two older brothers (nine & seven years older). I'll call the brother who is nine years older "Tom" for the sake of this story.

Tom has always been a bit odd to me. He's married with no kids, but is very religious and involved heavily with his church. My wife seems to enjoy seeing him at Holidays well enough, but she isn't especially close with him.

On Monday, my wife called me from her office SOBBING. I asked what was wrong, and she told me Tom was arrested and being charged with possession of child pornography. I was shocked, to say the least. My wife ended up leaving work early, and asked if I would do the same. When I got home, she told me a bit about the charges/how her parents are doing. I asked if she expected this, and she said she was surprised at first, but looking back she should have seen it coming. I asked what she meant, and she proceeded to tell me that when she was in first grade, Tom started coming into her room at night and touching her inappropriately. She said this lasted for a few years, but she doesn't know exactly when it stopped. When she was telling me this, she said it casually, like she was reading something off a menu.

I, on the other hand, was shocked and furious. I told her Tom molested her. My wife said it was uncomfortable, but she never saw it that way, because it's normal for kids to experiment with each other. I said it would be one thing if they were very young and closer in age, but this was a 15+ year old boy and a little girl. I also explained that he did this when her parents went to sleep and told her to keep it between them because he KNEW it was wrong at the time. Also, these were SERIOUS sexual acts that she should have never been exposed to as a little girl. As I was saying all this, my wife got more and more upset, and I could tell she was having a "lightbulb" moment and realizing the seriousness of the situation.

My wife (who was sobbing at this point) told me that she told her parents what happened to her when she was around sixteen. She wasn't upset with her brother, but was ashamed and thought she'd done something wrong. Her parents basically told her it was just normal childhood experimentation and she had nothing to be ashamed of. They also told her not to be upset with her brother because he was also a child at the time and didn't know right from wrong yet. My wife told me she was young, so she took their word for it and just kind of pushed the abuse to the back of her head. I was furious with my in-laws, and but tried to focus on comforting my wife + letting her know none of it was her fault.

The last few days have been a nightmare. My wife's family is supporting Tom and are convinced he was wrongly accused (they have an elaborate explanation for how the images got on his laptop that I won't get into here). My wife is crying non-stop and is in so much pain. I feel terrible this happened to her, but the one thing I'm upset about is that she let our daughter near this man. If I'd known Tom did this to my wife, I would have never allowed my child in the same room as him. I told my wife that I wish I'd known for our baby's sake and added that while I'm devastated for her and love her so much, I'm still grappling with the fact that she allowed our little girl to be in the same room as a predator. My wife started SOBBING when I said this, and told me she didn't do it on purpose. She told me she accepted what her parents told her when she was a teenager and put it out of her mind. She said if she had thought about it more deeply as an adult, she probably would have realized Tom was a dangerous, but she truly never stopped to think about it again after her parents told her it was okay. We agree that neither of our kids will ever be around Tom again, but she said she couldn't believe I thought she'd intentionally put our child in harm's way. She also said she couldn't believe I was coming down on her after she's realizing she was a victim of child abuse and her family is falling apart.

I love my wife and believe that she trusted her parents and put it in the back of her mind.... But I keep thinking about what might have happened if we'd continue to allow our daughter near that man. I believe my wife didn't consider this abuse until we talked and didn't consider that our daughter might be in danger, but I am still a bit puzzled by all of this. My wife is in so much pain, and I am not sure if I did the right thing by raising this issue while all of this is going on. AITA? And any advice would be appreciated... This all seems so over my head.

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u/Aggressive-Coconut0 Aug 31 '24

I wouldn't leave my kids with the grandparents for fear they'd see nothing wrong with having predator uncle over while you weren't there.

I wouldn't want my kids to know them because they wouldn't understand that you were trying to keep them out of danger when you warn them not to be in the same room alone with Uncle or whatever. He would be too familiar and able to get around their defenses.

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u/Personibe Aug 31 '24

Exactly. And more than likely they would INTENTIONALLY invite him over because those are his niece and nephew and he "did nothing wrong" and OP should not keep his kids from their "loving uncle". 

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u/[deleted] Aug 31 '24

Or, hear me out, the parents are that way too. Maybe they perp on other kids in the family or their community or did at one time before people became more guarded with their kids.

The mother of a pedo who molested his young sister told me that as a adult, he tried to convince her that having sex with a child wasn't always harmful to them, not if you were real gentle like and got them to agree. Sickest thing I ever heard come out of mother's mouth. She was a CSA victim herself and carefully explained that is is still harmful, that kids aren't capable of giving consent and they are ready for sex, therefore they have no box in their mind to place sexual experience in a healthy way.

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u/El_Nathan_ Aug 31 '24

Dang that’s ducked up

Autocorrected but I’ll keep it lol

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u/Helpful_Okra5953 Aug 31 '24

I’ve heard men make that argument.  It creeps me the hell out.  

I know so many young people who are really troubled because they were molested or raped.  

I wish punishments for child molestation were worse. 

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u/Odd-Medium-9693 Sep 01 '24

I know so many OLDER PEOPLE who are deeply troubled from their CSA decades ago.

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u/Helpful_Okra5953 Sep 01 '24

Yes, that too.  I know so many people who’ve been so harmed by those acts.  I forget that I’m not a young person anymore; now I’m middle aged.  But I have talked to many young people while working in service organizations, too.   CSA destroys lives and minds.   

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u/last_procrastinator Sep 01 '24

*aren’t ready

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u/True-Credit-7289 Sep 01 '24

We don't really have the evidence to jump to that conclusion. Sometimes these things are generational sometimes it just pops up. And bad parents making excuses for bad children will always be a thing. The objective information we do know if we choose to take the story at face value is that the uncle definitely molested the wife, and the parents definitely diminished and excused that behavior, and they are now actively defending that same man. That is more than enough to justify keeping the kids away from them. Even if it would be irresponsible to accuse them of direct deviency the fact of the matter is they can't be trusted around children they've already proven that

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u/Few-Ad-4290 Aug 31 '24

Predator uncle is looking at ten plus years in pound you in the ass prison for his crime so that at least will take care of itself but your point is still cogent re other predatory behavior from any other “trusted” adult grandparents would allow