Perhaps the whole history of humanity is a continuous history of hypocrisy. Just imagine - from the earliest childhood we are taught to tell the truth and nothing but the truth, but at the same time, with age, the truth acquires many additional conditions and conventions, which we call "decency" and "appropriate words".
And so, as soon as we honestly admit our own emotions and feelings, we are immediately accused of being rude and impolite. Hypocrisy? Maybe. Or maybe it's just a kind of social interaction - after all, if a certain reaction is expected from us, then any other response may offend the other person. For example, when someone announces their pregnancy. And that's exactly what we're going to tell you about today.
This story is brand new - it only appeared on the AITA Reddit community a few days ago - but despite that, the post by user u/Alive-Kick8154 has nearly 12K upvotes and over 3.8K different comments. It would seem that the reason for the family drama looks completely simple and innocent, but there is a moral dilemma, and we will now try to resolve it.
More info: Reddit
The author of the post is 18 Y.O. and she has an elder sister who is married and has four kids
Image credits: Vidal Balielo (not the actual image)
So, the author of the original post is eighteen years old and has an older sister, "Kay," who is more than twice her age. Kay and her husband have four children, four girls between the ages of eleven and three. As the Original Poster reveals, she often helps her elder sister to babysit the nieces so that she can relax and hang out with friends. Moreover, the OP also financially supports her sister's children, and no one can say that she is a bad aunt.
Image credits: u/Alive-Kick8154
One fine day, the author's sister came over and announced her fifth pregnancy, expecting everybody to be happy
And so, one fine day, Kay and her husband announced that they were planning to come over to the OP's parents' house to tell them something incredibly important. When they arrived, the OP was watching TV and was engrossed in what was happening on the screen, so when Kay announced that she and her husband were expecting their fifth child, the woman simply said something like: "Cool, awesome" and continued to watch TV.
Image credits: u/Alive-Kick8154
In contrast to the OP, her mother literally radiated joy and happiness, and apparently the contrast was so striking that Kay asked her sister: "Just 'cool', you don't seem that excited for me?" The author of the post was kinda logical - she asked what exactly was expected of her in this situation, a show of joy and happiness or a real expression of her true emotions?
Image credits: cottonbro studio (not the actual image)
When the author just said something like "Cool, awesome," her sister seemed to feel both embarrassed and indignant
If Kay expected her sister to jump for happiness, then she definitely won't receive such emotions, the Original Poster continued. In the end, this is not their first or even second child. A storm of emotions would be completely understandable if Kay was expecting her first baby - but she has already experienced all possible joyful sensations, and her relatives, as well.
Image credits: u/Alive-Kick8154
Moreover, the OP asked the sister if they planned to conceive this child in advance. She, completely confused, replied that no, and that everything turned out completely spontaneously. "Well," replied the author. "So my emotions are completely normal." When Kay indignantly asked if her sister was not happy for her, she calmly objected that she was glad, of course - just not in such a way as to dance with happiness at the news.
Image credits: u/Alive-Kick8154
The author honestly told her that happiness would be appropriate at the first pregnancy announcement, though her relatives dubbed her impolite for saying so
This turn of events was obviously not expected by the elder sister, so she took all her kids and stormed out of the parents' house with her husband, declaring that they would not stay for dinner. When the relatives left, the mother lashed out at the OP, arguing that, according to her, the daughter should apologize to Kay for not being excited about her pregnancy announcement. So the teen first decided to ask the opinion of netizens about this situation.
Image credits: Yan Krukau (not the actual image)
Some of the commenters sided with the teen, though some of them thought she just broke her sister's positive vibe
The opinions of people in the comments, however, were very divided. When some commenters wrote to the Original Poster that she probably should have just smiled and congratulated her sister, she replied that she actually did, but the mom-to-be seemed to need something like 'OMG wow!' Moreover, the author sincerely believes that her sister and BIL in fact cannot afford such a big family.
On the one hand, commenters believe, it's not such a terrible burden to be happy about the things that make someone you love happy. On the other hand, according to people in the comments, who would expect a teenager to be overly joyous at the news of someone having a fifth kid? In any case, as many people in the comments think, it's not worth wrecking the mother-to-be's vibe, although pregnancy announcements are sometimes really boring.
We're pretty sure you do have your own point of view on how to behave when a family member or a friend announces they're pregnant, so please feel free to let us know about it in the comments. And if you have any other interesting story on this topic, then we all will read it with real pleasure.
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