Abandoned Daughter Finds Mom on Facebook, Reveals to New Spouse She Has Kids

Growing up, I never wanted to have kids. Then I met the woman who'd be my wife, and she was all about the parental life. So I had to face a decision, do I venture into the unknown and become a Dad, even though it scared the bejesus out of me? Or do I go and tell this amazing woman: "Hey you want kids so this ain't gonna work."

Because it's not like I could be the type of person to just have a child and then say, "Oh, on second thought, I'm not about this. Peace."

But apparently, there are people who do just that. There are tons of horror stories about dads running out on their families and not wanting to have anything to do with them. And then, years later, lo and behold, they're found in some other part of the country or world living the Papa Life with another woman and set of kids.

There are countless stories/movies/songs about deadbeat dads, which is probably why people are always more shocked to hear tales of moms abandoning their families.

This is exactly what happened to Reddit user mrswallabysmith, who posted to the AITA sub about her own mother, who left her family when she was only 15 years old. It was an event that understandably had a negative impact on her life. "For a long time, no one knew where she was or even if she was okay," she wrote. "Eventually, it was discovered that [her mom] was just 'too overwhelmed' and left to handle herself."

This thrust OP into a very delicate situation with her family, she became an unofficial "mom" to her younger brothers at a very young age and went "into therapy" over the course of a few years. She's finally been "doing better" as a result of her therapy, but that kind of abandonment isn't something that's easily reconciled with, or is something one is entirely able to "get over".

OP's life took an unexpected turn when she came across her mom on Facebook "by pure mistake because [she] reconnected with some other maternal family members." She noticed that her mother had "the same first name and look[ed] pretty much the same" but that she also had a "different last name."

After digging into her mom's profile, she discovered that she was remarried with kids ranging from 2-10 years old.

Obviously, the abandoned daughter didn't take it very well.

OP is currently married herself and her husband suggested that she just "leave it alone", but it gnawed and gnawed at OP, who couldn't believe her mother could just abandon her family and then go and start a life with someone else, only to have some children of her own and act like she never had any other kids before.

So she decided to enact revenge: she dug through Facebook and found her mother's new husband's profile and sent him a little message.

In the note, she spilled the beans about her mother's abandoning ways, and let her new spouse know that she was not only married before, but that she had children she up and left and doesn't keep in contact with them whatsoever.

Apparently, he had no idea that the woman he married had a whole other family she walked out on, and it understandably irked him that she could keep such a significant part of her life a total secret.

After years of pretending like her original family didn't exist, OP's mom finally decided to message her daughter and chewed her out for revealing her past to her new husband.

OP decided to ask Reddit if she was in the wrong for reaching out to her new husband because her own hubby, along with her brothers, certainly thought she should've just let abandoning moms lie.

The overwhelming majority of Reddit users thought she was entirely fine for letting the guy know what her mom was capable of.

While a lot of commenters admitted that what she did was petty and done "out of spite" she ultimately was "in the right" when it came to letting her mom's new husband know about the children she left behind. Who's to say she wouldn't do that again when she was "feeling overwhelmed"?

What do you think? Was OP wrong to contact her mother's new husband and let him know the score? Or was she entirely right for doing so?