To think, 17 years on, my Mum could let this go?

It wasn't an odd thing to do; it was a SMART thing to do. Everyone should always back up their important data. She trusted her intuition, and that's great in my opinion! Really great!

I’m confused as to why she doesn’t use it as an example of you being an absolute gem of a daughter and a genius. She should be praising you. Shes obviously a cunt.

Yes, and...

Look at it another way, maybe the way she is treating you over this gives you an insight into her personality that you didn't see as a child and this is why your father couldn't continue with their marriage.

...quite possibly also yes, now I come to think of it.

I think what OP did was odd and I can understand her mother being alarmed by it, especially since OP has been quite evasive/disingenuous about her motives for doing it. So I see where the mother is coming from there.

However, the mother accepted the information OP gave her, took it to her lawyer and they used it to benefit her. If OP's mother really had such exorbitant sensibilities around what her daughter had done, she would have destroyed the intel and never tried to use it. She is completely complicit in this and as an adult at the time, is more culpable than the OP. She CHOOSE to use the information to her benefit. No-one forced her to.

I'm to be brutally honest here: your parents both sound like a pair of cunts.

@HowSharperThan out of interest, what did you dad make of your foresight and how is your relationship with him?

@HowSharperThan It's two things really. Firstly she feels inadequate because you had more foresight than her. You say she's intelligent, but this made her look stupid. Secondly you remind her of him, so that's where the "untrustworthy" comments come in. Either that or she's just plain weird. Personally I'd tell her to shove the hard drive up her arse. You saved her bacon at a time of crisis and also proved yourself to be very smart. Most mothers would be pretty proud of that, not the complete opposite.

YNBU and you also sound amazing. Love the sensible preparation for all eventualities.

I’m confused as to why she doesn’t use it as an example of you being an absolute gem of a daughter and a genius. She should be praising you. Shes obviously a cunt.

Look at it another way, maybe the way she is treating you over this gives you an insight into her personality that you didn't see as a child and this is why your father couldn't continue with their marriage.

It's because she is still unhappy & looking to unload blame. maybe if you had told her you didn't know sooner she could have saved her marriage.

I think it's not that wierd, at 17, to have realised your Dad was hiding something, you saw him jump & his shifty closing screen manoeuvre.
You had an intuition.

As for getting her to stop this now. She won't. it's part of who she is. there are not enough words in the dictionary, & air in the universe.

You need to grey rock now, "here we go", "righto", "I'm leaving" every time.
You could tell her one last time. "I am not speaking about this again, your insecurity & blaming is a "You" problem, after all these years, you should get therapy." & Walk out.

Op you were 17 years old and you had more sense and intuition than she did as a grown woman.

Obviously there can be very good reason for that and I'm not judging her. But it's very possible that she judges herself that you had to step in and take action to protect her rather than the other way around and that's a very uncomfortable truth to hold. So instead of dealing with it properly and accountably she's hiding from her misplaced guilt and is putting it on you instead and deflecting her anger on to you.

It's deeply unfair and its in no way your fault.

Wow, she needs to rethink how that is coming across. You did that outbid loyalty to her and to protect her.

That's a pretty horrible thing for her to say.

Not only should she be grateful for your 'premonition' which meant that you were able to give her invaluable information about your father's finances, enabling her to come out of the divorce with her fair share, she should also be massively grateful that you still have a relationship with her in the face of her ingratitude and her unfair and untrue allegations that you knew about your dad's infidelity at the time and deliberately kept it from her.

Talk about 'biting the hand that feeds you'. She is a textbook example of that.

@HowSharperThan - I know it’s not the main point of the thread, but I have to say I admire your way of dealing with sudden worries - like the prepping for a nuclear incident that you described. It sounds much healthier than not doing anything, but carrying on fretting over something, which is what I tend to do.

On the main subject - it is deeply unfair of your mum to have said the things she did in the first place and to keep dragging things up now. As other posters have said, she owes you a big debt of gratitude because your dad was trying to screw her over, financially, and you prevented that. It is sad that strangers on the internet can understand and accept the way you deal with sudden worries (‘do what I can and then shelve it’), and your own mum can’t.

Not only should she let it go, she should do a complete 180 and thank her lucky stars you had so much nous!

Your mum should be eternally grateful for the fact that you listened to your intuition and did what you did. It must be very galling to feel that she keeps turning this back on you.

Yeah your mom has issues with your dad's dishonesty and she needs to cop on to herself. If you had loyalty to your dad and not to her you'd hardly have given her the files.
I'd explain what you said above once and then tell her to shut up about it to you and if she wants to talk any more about it go and get some counseling cos you're sick of hearing it.

No good deed goes unpunished.

I expect someone has already said this, but it's a weird quirk of human nature that it is so often true.

Sounds like you're the only one in the house with any common sense 🤣🤣🤣 Tell the ungrateful bat to get a grip, she should be thanking you.

Another technique for people who can’t move on/hold grudges/only want to complain/criticise is to push the solution back onto them, e.g. “What do you feel needs to happen to resolve this?”.

Obvs, if she’s looking for you to apologise, admit you did something wrong or that you have some sort of character flaw/behaviour problem (secrecy), that should be a hard no from you.

You got a twinkle. That's it, it happens to most of us at least once.

Tell your mother that if it hadn't have been for you she would have been screwed in the divorce. That you didn't know and if she doesn't shut the fuck up about it then you'll have to option to cut ties with her.

This shit is ingrained. The way you handle it doesn't work. Go for the throat.

Remind her that your dad kept secrets not you. Tell her to take it up with him. You did her a favour and she's using it against you.

You were incredibly asute and thank goodness, but I can understand why your mum is jumping to the wrong conclusion. It does sound unlikely that you didn't have a clue, even if it's the truth.

Your dad must have been giving off some weird vibes for a while that subconciously made you distrust him a bit anyway. Even if you didn't know he was having an affair, there must been some sort of awareness, even if you couldn't fully put our finger on it at the time, that he was behaving distantly in general.

The fact that you immediately jumped to the correct conclusion that he was being secretive around his finances is not the normal reaction of a teenager who had no reason not to trust their dad, based on that one incident alone. All you can do it try to explain that to your mum. Say I don't know how I knew, I just knew something wasn't right. But I had no idea what.

You did your mum a massive favour with having all
the information , tell her if it wasn’t for you she would have got nothing!! And she should be grateful

Sounds familiar!

YANBU. Sounds like your mum hasn’t healed from the affair/break up and is displacing her feelings of betrayal of trust on to you. Affairs are so damaging because it’s humiliating and unsettling to be so hoodwinked. I assume she hasn’t had therapy nor would consider it?

I guess all you can do is not take it to heart. You did absolutely nothing wrong:

• You were a child.
• Your father’s deceit (both financial and emotional) was his problem, not yours.
• Even if you’d known about the affair, it’s v unreasonable of a parent to expect a child to get involved in their parents’ relationship, choose sides or act in a way that’s likely to break up their family.
• Your gut instinct and foresight are commendable. And have no doubt made your mum’s life easier, financially.
• Your actions aren’t signs of untrustworthy or secretive behaviour: it was a family computer you were allowed to use, the files weren’t password protected and you only kept them safe. You didn’t look at them or share them with anyone else - and only with your mum when clearly needed.