“AITA for not apologizing for withholding financial support until the paternity test results?”
I (55m) have three children. Two girls and a boy. My son is my oldest and up until recently I thought he was a decent man. Unfortunately my daughter in law “Tessa” (32f, fake name) showed me that I was wrong and when revealed to me that the reason she was divorcing my son was because he cheated on multiple times and gave her an STD.
She made a social media post with pictures of text messages and show video recordings of messages he left proving her side. I was shocked and when I confronted my son he said that she over exaggerating and that the only reason he did it was because she wasn’t putting out.
Tessa gave birth to their second child seven months ago and their first child is three years old. I apologized to Tessa for my son’s behavior and then yelled at him for being so selfish, intentionally hurtful, and cruel. I did not hide or downplay my disappointment and was only silenced by my wife’s defense of our son.
I remember how hard it was when my wife had our second daughter and couldn’t believe she didn’t have a shred of sympathy for Tessa. Tessa is a sweet and smart person and she didn’t deserve what our son did.
My wife has been letting our son stay in our house despite my wishes saying that he needs our support but I say he’s in need of a hard lesson. We fought about this constantly.
Eventually, my son accused Tessa of getting the STD from someone else and demanded a paternity test. I knew these claims were bul^&%$*t and saw red. I yelled at him for it and his mother came to his defense and told me a man had every right to know if his kids were his.
I countered with demanding a test of my own and my wife was offended and I moved out.
She and my son sent others after me and either lied and overplayed what things were like at home and I just got tired defending myself. I was going to let things be until either my wife or son contacted my job and made hurtful accusations about a female employee that I’ve been mentoring for the past year and that’s when I snapped. I’m filing for divorce.
The house is paid off so I’m willing to let her have it but until a judge says so I’ve stopped putting money in any of the accounts that she has access to and only make payments to the credit card with the $4k limit so she has money to buy groceries, get gas, and pay for her other expenses.
I’ve also changed my main beneficiaries to my daughters and told my son if he wanted a single cent of my money, he’d have to take a DNA test. He later did and he passed, and I responded with an email acknowledgement that he was my son as well as a copy of re-updated will where he will receive 10% of my assets. My wife and son are demanding a public apology, but I don’t feel like they deserve it. AITA?
He then shared this edit with more info.:
Just to be clear since people seem to be skipping over it but my wife called my job and accused one of my mentees of getting special treatment in exchange for special favors from me and other men in the company.
She made such a big public stink that HR is investigating and my mentee is considering leaving due to the embarrassment and stress. Not to mention the damage to my own professional relationship.
Here’s what people had to say to OP:
Careless-Image-885 said:
NTA but get your half of the house. Get a really good divorce lawyer.
Document. Document. Document.
Fluffy-Home-8993 said:
Now that he’s proven, he’s your son leave the money to his children.
Large_Effective_812 said:
NTA, you now know how your son turned out this way.
StrykerC13 said:
Why would you give an apology to people who For the Cheap Seats. TRIED TO RUIN YOUR LIFE. Accusations like that at a job can DESTROY a career and depending on how bad they are Do Worse. Frankly I wouldn’t apologize and I wouldn’t be paying that card either. She wanted to ruin your career she clearly can find the money to live off By Her Self.
Mysticfluffy95 said:
Is it just me or did she like 100% cheat on OP before?
OP responded:
I did have to go on a lot of road trips in the beginning of my career.
Feeling_Basis4893 said:
Don’t give the house to your wife …You deserve to share the assets….. Personally, I think it would have been v better to stay out of your son’s affairs….By taking sides you wrecked what may have been a good marriage and I’m not sure that was worth getting involved…. There is never just one side …I doubt that you know the entire story. Perhaps some joint marriage counseling for you and your wife…..
OP responded:
I honestly never really loved the house and wanted to move anyway. Please if she sold it she could live off of that money which might mean less money I’d have to pay to her later on.
About a month later OP posted this update:
Because I still see a few people writing “Updateme” I thought I’d give a little update to the chaos that is my life.
In short the young woman who I was mentoring talked to HR is leaving the company and will be suing my wife for defamation. I am also being pushed to leave, despite HR clearing me of any wrongdoing.
A lot of people in the office just give me dirty looks and/or keep their distance. I’ve also gotten a lawyer she feels confident that because the evidence of my wife’s blatant attempt to sabotage my reputation at work, I can just give her a lump settlement instead of alimony.
My lawyer also agrees to a lot of you in regards to not just giving my wife the house, but rather sale it and split the profits. I’m back in the house for now per my lawyer’s advice and it’s pretty miserable right now. Definitely drinking a lot more than I used to just trying to hang on.
I’ve also had some hard but honest conversations with my daughters and I have come to accept that there are certain aspects of fatherhood that I failed in. I did show up to school events and spend time with my children but overall I let my wife do the majority of the parenting and she favored our son.
I just never really paid much attention and my daughters didn’t feel as if they could talk until now. However, they’re still willing to have a relationship with me and are on my side with the divorce.
I haven’t spoken to my daughter in law much but she did send me a “Thank you” text for standing up for her.
Thanks for reading.
