Her Dad Mocked Her Fiancé For Crying After His Grandmother Had A Stroke And Called Him A “Weak Pathetic Man,” So She Kicked Her Parents Out
This 26-year-old woman’s father enforced traditional gender roles and the idea that men can’t express sadness or cry. Her family believed that men who cried were weak. When her paternal grandfather passed away, her father didn’t cry during the funeral.
Her dad wasn’t emotionally affectionate toward her or her brother, and she grew up assuming he didn’t love her. She expressed this thought to her mom, who told her that her father loved her but wasn’t affectionate because of his personality and belief in rigid gender roles.
Unfortunately, her father was strict with her brother and projected his beliefs onto him. Whenever her brother was sad and started to cry, their father mocked him and ordered him to “man up.” She was disappointed when her brother grew up to hold the same beliefs their father had.
After graduating from college, she moved out of her hometown and met her fiancé, Jackson, 27, who had the opposite beliefs from her father. Jackson expressed affection often and openly discussed his feelings. She was thrilled when Jackson first asked her on a date. Before meeting Jackson, she had no idea that men should feel comfortable opening up about their feelings in the same way women are.
Recently, four years into their relationship, they got engaged. While her family knew she was in a relationship with Jackson, she made up reasons why she couldn’t introduce him to her family. She was hesitant for her family to get to know Jackson because she knew it might not go well, mainly because her father believes in rigid gender roles.
Up until Jackson proposed, she only ever introduced her family to him via video chats. She always tried to keep the calls short because she didn’t want her family to get to know him. Finally, Jackson asked her why she wouldn’t introduce him to her family, and she was honest with him. Jackson was understandably hurt.
“He said he will respect my feelings, but he did warn me that one day, I’m going to have to face them with him,” she said.
A week after they got engaged, she broke the news to her parents. Her father told her they could come to see her so she could finally introduce them to Jackson in person. She immediately started panicking, but Jackson held her hand and comforted her, so she told her father they could come over for a visit.
“I was tense when they arrived. Dad was his normal self. Dad seemed to approve of Jackson, and I relaxed,” she explained.
fotofabrika – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only, not the actual person
On the third day of her parents’ visit, Jackson’s sister called him and said their grandma suffered a stroke. Jackson has a close relationship with his grandmother, and he began sobbing during the phone call. She consoled him and said they could pay his grandma a visit. Moments later, her father walked into the living room, where she and Jackson were talking.
“He looked at Jackson with this look of disgust on his face I’ve seen so many times over the years growing up, and he told him to be a real man and that only babies cry, and he doesn’t want his daughter to marry a weak, pathetic man,” she shared.
Jackson was stunned, and she was furious. She ordered her father to leave, but he refused. Her father argued with her, claiming that a man expressing his honest feelings was a sign of weakness. He said he wouldn’t let her marry a man who he viewed as “weak.”
The argument got tense, and she warned her father that if he didn’t leave, she’d call the cops. Eventually, her mom convinced her father to stop, and they left. As her parents left, she expressed that she wouldn’t communicate or have a relationship with them anymore.
Since then, other family members bombarded her with texts and calls, claiming it was impolite to make her parents leave. According to her family, she should tell her parents she was sorry. In response, she told them she wouldn’t before blocking them.
Her brother texted her and questioned if she was serious about going no-contact with their parents over something that, in his view, was “silly,” and she sobbed after reading his text. She hasn’t shared the texts from her family with Jackson because she knows he’s already overwhelmed and sad about his grandmother’s stroke, and she feels awful about how her father treated him.
What would you have done if you were in her shoes?
You can read the original post on Reddit here.
Sign up for Chip Chick’s newsletter and get stories like this delivered to your inbox.
More About:Relationships