I really don’t think I ABU but everyone thinks otherwise - AIBU?

[Treaclescourer]

I am quite used to always being seen as ‘at fault’ in my family but I am genuinely starting to think maybe I am being unreasonable here so wanted to get external opinions. It’s long so I apologize but I’d really appreciate any input.

backstory -
my brother has ASD (an Asperger’s diagnosis when that was still a thing) and although is very ‘high functioning’ is prone to being selfish, devoid of any empathy and at times violent.

My entire childhood revolved around him, and making sure he wasn’t overwhelmed due to the violent outbursts that would occur.

As he has gotten older the violence has started to become less frequent, but since being with my DH (11 years) he has witnessed 2-3 violent incidents from my brother towards me which has made DH not like my brother at all. He has ASD himself and because he isn’t violent doesn’t think my brother’s diagnosis is an excuse for that behavior. So I try to keep them separate, DH is polite and civil when around my brother but doesn’t enjoy spending time with him (although he does a very good job of masking it, as my brother is under the impression that he and DH are cool)

My brother lives 3 hours drive away from me.

(this is relevant) - additionally 8 years ago my father moved abroad for work and comes back to the UK every 2 years.

Now onto the issue at hand.

In November last year I was told my father was going to come back to the UK to visit for 3 weeks. This would be the first trip back since I had my DS. So it would be his first chance to meet his grandson. He was due to spend 2 weeks with my brother and one week with me.

DHs birthday is also in November and we had planned a city break for a long weekend. The city was about 40 mins away from where my brother lives. So I spoke to DH and said since we had limited time with my father I was thinking about making a detour to have maybe a nice lunch with my brother and dad on the way to the city break. To maximize the time as a family. He said of course as he also misses my dad (they have a great relationship) and wanted DS to get as much time with him as possible. I also hadn’t seen my brother for a few months at this point (as he won’t get a bus or coach to come and see us due to anxiety, and I had a newborn so wasn’t in the mood for 6 hour round trips)

Spoke to my brother, he was excited to see us all, great.

Unfortunately dad had to pull out of the trip due to medical issues a month before coming back. As that would just then leave the afternoon as just me, my brother, DH and DS I cancelled the detour to see my brother on the way to DHs birthday trip. As the only reason we were doing it was to maximize time with my father and tbh I felt bad expecting DH to spend a day around a man he dislikes on his birthday trip.

I understand why my brother is upset with this, but now I am public enemy number 1 in my family for being ‘so cruel’ to him and ‘making him feel like an afterthought’ - quite honestly he was an afterthought, he hasn’t bothered to come and visit us, he has never made the effort to come to me, and is now getting annoyed I wouldn’t do a 40 min detour to see him, I’m apparently a narcissist and almost as awful as Hitler (his words)

I’m not sure if since having DS a lot of trauma from my childhood and having to bend to my brothers will so much is coming up and making me a bit of an asshole, but honestly speaking - in this situation was I being unreasonable? Should I apologize?

Course it’s not. Did he ever apologise for pushing you, out of curiosity?

Really surprised by the number of people advising OP to continue kowtowing to her violent aggressive brother because otherwise it would be unkind.

He's 30. Not a child. It's about time he learned that treating people like punching bags has the consequence of them not having you as their top priority.

That if you push someone down the stairs, their being a bit off with you means you got off lightly.

That it is not your sister, mother or father's responsibility to accept whatever treatment you dish out and not only just take it but be kind and considerate of YOUR needs - when you have never once considered theirs.

That when you deliberately hurt someone to the point where you could feasibly have killed them, you have forfeited all rights to "good manners".

I think some PPs hit the nail on the head when they said the family have a vested interest in making the OP feel unreasonable. It means they don't have to face the truth of it. That all this has done is expose the deep cracks that were already there.

Yabu. To me, that whole backstory is white noise, irrelevant.

You had a trip to see your dad and brother. Dad cancels, now you've dropped your brother. It's a dick move that basically shows you were using him. Of course he's upset.

Time for your husband to grow up and for you to decide if you actually want a relationship with your brother or not. If you do, I'd suggest not using his diagnosis and symptoms as reasons to be rude to him.

I think this is part of the problem

My mother is a CSA survivor and is very much a ‘forgiving’ person, she was a very abused child and still wears those scars and is therefore very overly accommodating to others, so for her she would genuinely see someone who was violent towards her, she forgave the grandparent who allowed her husband to repeatedly assault her 3 year old grandchild so I think her view is so off in terms of what is normal.

Meh, OP and her brother hadn't seen each other for months, neither side seem particularly perturbed by that fact so clearly they already do not have a close relationship.

Also it was a lunch, no more than that! A lunch which had been slotted into an existing planned trip. In OP's mind it was a lunch so she could spend more time with her father, brother's presence was largely irrelevant as far as OP was concerned.

Of course not!

That was my fault because I didn’t wait longer to enter his room after I knocked and I ‘could’ have seen something on his computer.

I had a trip to see my dad and my brother was tagging along

Not a trip to see both

Him going NC seems like a good outcome for you. Try telling everyone else that you refuse to discuss it any further, then stick to that. Snooze or block people temporarily till they get the message.

Handhold though…it’s obviously very difficult for you. But it’s time to put yourself and your own family first xx

Of course don't use those as reasons.. use the fact he's violent, aggressive and pushed op down the stairs to harm her....
(Awaiting his defenders/sympathisers frame that as ops fault too!)

I can see your dhs point of view. He pushed you down the stairs? That can kill /permanently injure people. You now have a tiny baby that depends on you. You can’t afford to put yourself in danger like that ever.

even putting that aside, he can get himself to Japan, he can get himself to your house. If you get back into contact you say ‘I have visited lots, a baby means I have very little time and energy and it’s your turn to come to our town.’

But I can’t really put the safety aspect aside- not just you but there’s a defenceless baby. I’d be very careful, and worried for the baby. I wouldn’t risk for example having baby in another room or even not in your arms and taking your eyes off your brother- really op his very linear thinking could go: my sister has been horrible and selfish and demanding since she had that baby thing. if I get rid of baby my sister will have time for me again. Great idea, baby’s right over there, I’ll toss baby out the window then, and we can be happy again.

@Treaclescourer - what would happen if you wrote to your brother, outlining how his violent behaviour makes you feel, and also spelling out how little free time you have, now that you have a baby? Would he be willing to take on board how much he has hurt and upset you, and to understand why his past behaviour makes you not want to spend time with him? Would he understand why someone who has so little free time doesn’t want to spend it with someone who has pushed them down the stairs and who up is violent towards them?

And if it would be pointless to express this to him, might it be useful to lay it all out calmly and dispassionately for the relatives who are trying to guilt-trip you?

But the bottom line is that you are being completely reasonable, imo. You have every right to prioritise your own well-being, and your dh’s and dc’s well-being over the wants and feelings of someone who has been terribly violent towards you - especially as it seems as if no-one else in your wider family is putting you first.

But he didn’t know he was just “tagging along”, he thought he was part of the lunch (a reasonable assumption since he was invited) and excited to see you!

you accuse your brother of “main character” syndrome but you don’t seem to realise that his perspective might be different to yours because he’s not in your head?

we have a lot of autism in the family.
My dd is autistic (would have been called aspergers in the past)
As a child and teen she was violent. We always made it clear that it was not OK to be violent. We taught her coping strategies and how to take time out, safe places/ways to express her frustration and distress, but we were insistent that violence to other people was not OK.

She is no longer violent to other people, but she does still slam doors etc.

Autism does not = violence in an autistic person who can understand when told no.
(Obviously there are some autistic people who do not have the cognative reasoning to be able to control themselves, that is different)

It sounds as if your brother has never been taught boundaries. He might not naturally understand them, but he can be taught them and he should have been as a child and teen. The greatest disservice we do to our autistic kids is not teach them clear boundaries around things like this.

I would have had him arrested for throwing you down the stairs.

Please do get therapy, and please don't feel bad about going NC with him. You are not his punchbag

If an adult pushed me down the stairs I would never willingly be in the same room as them.

I wouldn’t bear them malice, or wish them Harm, I would just avoid them.

You had a trip to see your dad and brother. Dad cancels, now you've dropped your brother. It's a dick move that basically shows you were using him. Of course he's upset.

Well no, she didn't as a matter of fact. She had a trip away planned for her DH's birthday.

Then the opportunity to take a small detour to see her dad presented itself; brother would have been there too. She would never have taken the detour just to see brother, so after her dad cancelled, so did OP. She wasn't using her brother, she had kindly asked him to join her and their dad.

Honestly, if I sent a letter like that I fear he would harm himself.

He has always seen me as the only family member he got on with, the only person he can talk to, the only person he can discuss certain topics with (his sexuality, didn’t know whether he was trans etc.) and I do honestly think if I was to really frame the issues in our relationship as siblings he would go off the deep end. he doesn’t have any friends in real life, only online, he has no job, no real ‘future’ (in his eyes at least) so I’d be concerned around what his response would be.

I have been clearer to family but they are all still so set on defending him, my father actively told me to never say that my brother wasn’t the priority again. And especially to never say it to him, when it was the facts of that particular situation.

But he didn’t know he was just “tagging along”, he thought he was part of the lunch
So what? His lack of social awareness is not OPs responsibility.

He was told he was tagging along

Him not being quite able to comprehend that concept isn’t my fault.

The invite was clear, ‘I am coming into town on the way to X city to have lunch with dad, are you free and would you like to come’

Your family are treating you terribly, I’m honestly a little bit heartbroken for you because I’ve been through similar. Maybe some therapy would help you figure out some new boundaries?

This is ridiculous.
if OP hadn’t included all the details of past violence, people would be telling her she was rude.
Nobody would be excited to attend a lunch with family members if they understood their presence was entirely disposable/ irrelevant/ valueless/ they were simply a “tag along”.
Yes he might have understood that the lunch was mainly arranged as dad was visiting, but it’s still hurtful that she decided to cancel rather than see him when it was already arranged. This is entirely normal.

Yes, if he wasn’t a violent man who had treated OP terribly, things would indeed be different, and OP probably would have been happy to still see him. But, alas, he IS a violent man, and as I’ve already said, actions have consequences.

Doing this post has really made me realise how much is there for me to work through.

I have absolutely no doubt that my parents response is a form of them deflecting blame, my father up and left, yes his children were grown but one still needed him a bit, my brother is struggling with him not being here and instead of accepting that he is pushing responsibility to me to be my brothers emotional support animal.

It’s just hard knowing these things but not really knowing how to proceed. Especially when I am pretty concerned regarding my brothers mental health, I honestly couldn’t bear the idea of me being the one to push him to ending his life, and sometimes it feels like I have to decide whether putting up with bad behavior is worse than being responsible for my brother ending his life. As although yes it would be his choice, I know for a fact if I had been more actively involved with him he wouldn’t have done it.

I expect your parents have you earmarked as your brother’s carer when they die, hence their panic at the thought of a fall out. He’s 30 yrs old and living at home. Yes, I know that happens and it’s not easy especially these days with cuts etc to help him build independence & social skills but that’s what needs to happen. It is sad his life is limited and he thinks your relationship is different to how it really is, but he’s not your responsibility.

Yes but that is an entirely separate argument to “it’s not my problem he isn’t neurotypical enough to understand he is irrelevant”.

Ha! Nice try at emotional blackmail there. It’s not a seperate argument, you can’t seperate out his disgusting treatment of OP from how she treats him in return I’m afraid, as much as you’re desperate to for some bizarre reason. Also, you have no idea at all as to if his ND is why he can’t understand his actions have consequences, or if it’s down to be pandered to all his life and never held accountable.