Woman Refusing To Help Her Homeless Parents Praised Online: 'Blocked'

A 30-year-old woman has been backed online for refusing to help her homeless parents.

A now-viral Reddit post titled "AITA for not feeling sorry for my homeless parents and not offering my house for them to stay or help?" has been upvoted 7,300 times since being posted on September 20.

Redditor u/TaHomelessParents, stated her parents were 15 when she was born and she described her childhood as "hell".

She said: "My parents never put me up for adoption or anything like that because my grandparents would help and every time the child protection service (CPS) was triggered they suddenly became the best parents in the world and blackmailed me to lie.

"But the reality is I lived alone most of the week and at eight years old, I already knew how to make myself a meal by myself. While my parents were partying, traveling, drinking, or fighting."

She explains her parents "fell in love again" when she was 15 and had four more children aged 15, 13, 12, 11, and nine.

"I left home when I was 18 years old, it hurt in the bottom of my soul to have to leave my siblings, but I couldn't stand it and I had no financial condition. At 24, I passed a public contest that pays me very well."

Aged 25, the woman was contacted by child protection services who stated they have removed the children from her parent's home. They asked if she could look after one sibling but she volunteered to have them all.

In 2020, there were more than 407,000 children and youth in foster care according to a report from the U.S. Administration on Children, Youth and Families, Children's Bureau.

The data shows that 34 percent of children have been placed into foster care with relatives.

She said: "I know it's not my responsibility, but a part of me, I always wanted to get them out of that and only now I had a good job. My house is not very big 4ba/2be, but my husband and I (he also wanted to) were able to accommodate everyone and we are not so tight financially."

"They are good students, polite and affectionate, I don't regret having welcomed each one and my husband treats everyone as if he were a big brother or a father to the younger ones."

The original poster has explained her parents have tried to "get them back" but she has permanent custody and hasn't had any contact with her parents for several years.

That was until recently, when she received a call from her aunt. The poster said: "My father's sister said she was shocked seeing my parents as homeless people, asking for money on the street. The family is moving to see if someone can shelter them and they decided to come and ask me if I could shelter them or help financially since I had a good job."

The original poster explained she had refused to help as she would rather give her money to her siblings.

"My father's whole family started to fill me with messages saying that I'm turning my back on two people who slept on the streets, how cold-hearted I am to do this and I don't even want to help when I can. I blocked everyone."

She ended the post by saying: "My husband said that he is on my side, but that I should give a symbolic amount so as not to have a weight on my conscience."

At the time of writing, over 890 people commented to show their support.

Racking up more than 9,100 upvotes, the top comment said: "Not The A**hole (NTA) You've already had your life ruined multiple times over by these people and have taken on all of their responsibilities. You DO NOT HAVE TO DO ANYTHING ELSE FOR THEM.

"Please get some therapy so you are able to unburden yourself for feeling responsible for these toxic assholes. Every single one of those family members shaming you could take in your parents, but have they? No. They could have taken in the kids but did they? No.
Absolutely block them all and don't look back."

Another said: "Exactly! What she should say to every last one of those relatives is, 'I'm raising 5 kids for them. What are YOU doing to help them?' But blocking also works."

Newsweek reached out to u/TAHomelessParents for comment. Newsweek could not verify the details of the case.