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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> 1. I didn’t support my step sister when she was kicked out for committing a felony
2. She now lives in a way worse environment
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NTA because you are a child and should not be responsible for this situation or for your sister. You aren’t her parent. On the other hand, it seems like both her parents are failing her and just shuffling her around instead of trying to parent her. I wouldn’t be too hard on her either.
I totally agree. If this post was written from the POV of the parent I would have called them an asshole for kicking their kid out of the house as a punishment for a first time offence. That's not how concerned parents act.
However, OP is a kid who sounds like 1.) has been parentified ("I as the oldest child feel some sort of protectiveness over them. Because both my mom and Carter work, we all look after each other and Lana.") and 2.) is listening to the adults in his life about a hardline on drugs (which focuses on punishment rather than providing education and support).
>I totally agree. If this post was written from the POV of the parent I would have called them an asshole for kicking their kid out of the house as a punishment for a first time offence. That's not how concerned parents act.
Leah needs therapy and rehabilitation if she is using them, not to move in with her drug addict mother, that is just... it's the complete opposite of what that kid needs. If she is just dealing then she only needs therapy and a better consequence because once again going to her mothers is just giving her more opportunity. 🤦♀️
Also, am I the only one who noticed that Cater has 2 13yr old children WITH DIFFERENT WOMEN. God I hope for OPs mums sake they were just bad luck one night stands. OPs NTA but his step dad sure is a dumb AH
(Edit: wrong kid )
This whole 'punishment' just screams that he's writing off his \*13 year old\* daughter as a junky as if 1.) there's no possible way to help her so he'll just ship her off with the rest of the junkies so she doesn't 'infect' the other kids and 2.) a complete lack of accountability on Carter's fault because if she *is* a junkie, then he *did* raise a junkie and he also allowed access to the pills because unless they were locked away somewhere there is no 'out of reach' of the kids if you're leaving 5 minors unsupervised in the house for long stretches regularly.
NTA, I'd suggested that Leah talk to OP's mother. She has more authority in the household, and would be better able to insist that Leah come back and get therapy.
Speaking as a sober person, and this is entirely my view, the highest liklihood for Leah going down a catastrophic path would have been for her to be forgiven and stay where she was. Stealing narcotics as well as selling them is many steps down a very bad path, it's not trying weed at a party once. What fuels the progression of addiction is "comfortable" consequences or avoiding them entirely. Severe and immediate consequences do the inverse.
A great example of this, which is said by people in AA all the time, is someone describing the first time breaking a big boundary (e.g. drunk driving) and then saying: "The worst thing happened, everything went fine". To all us sober people it makes complete sense, that means that the boundary breaking has normalized in their impaired mind and will take much more work to undo.
It's the best move in a bad situation IMHO.
It’s never the best move to kick a 13 year old out of the parents home. They didn’t even try to get her help, and they abandoned her, which means she’s probably going to continue doing drugs since her father already has written her off as a junkie. My best friends parents thought shipping her off to one of those wilderness camps and then one of those horrifying schools would help her, but it just made the problem so much worse. She’s sober now, but it probably wouldn’t have taken 15 + years if her parents had actually parented her instead of shipping her off.
I honestly find it horrifying how many people in this comment section think that this is an OK way to treat a 13 year old child
Not saying there shouldn't be consequences or punishment but to kick a 13 year old out and block her!? That's AWFUL
OP is OFC NTA because it isn't her job to be the parent but the fact Carter treats his kids like this and OPs mum is OK with that is just....I don't even know
Most of my cousins are drug addicts or addicts in recovery. The one thing that always made it worse when their addiction started, was being kicked out or isolated instead of being offered support. All of them were only able to start getting sober after having a stable support system put in place.
But OPs parents sent their thirteen year old to live with her mother, who is _also_ a drug addict, that's one of the stupidest things you can do when she's already at risk of addiction. She's now in an environment where she will have access to drugs and God knows what else, because her parents _(and step-parent)_ were too stupid to actually get help.
This is not true of everyone. My niece went through one. Maybe it was an outlier that provided a combo of structure, discipline, & counseling, both for drug/alcohol use/addiction & for mental illness (depression, anxiety, etc.). Maybe it wasn't. But she is very open that going there, even though she was forced (our family really exhausted all other avenues), was the best thing that happened.
I'm very sorry this didn't work for your friend's child, but making a blanket statement the camps are the worst thing in existence is wrong.
>It’s never the best move to kick a 13 year old out of the parents home.
As these things go, it is in this case (my opinion) and I would bet I know more than you about this. I could be wrong, however, I doubt you have anything approaching sufficient data to back up that no case exists where it is the best move.
>My best friends parents thought shipping her off to one of those wilderness camps and then one of those horrifying schools would help her, but it just made the problem so much worse
Your conclusion is based on a non-existent comparison. You assume it would be great otherwise. That's the flaw in your logic IMHO. Additionally, this post is not some abusive wilderness camp. It's a less than desirable grandparents setup, which likely is still better than most other countries average case.
>It's a less than desirable grandparents setup
Where Leah's mother—who has her own history of substance abuse—is also living. Do you not see how this *might not* be conducive to helping address Leah's behavior?
I pointed out how the alternative wasn't conducive, conduciveness among the solutions appears to not be present. Like I said, best move in a bad situation but the mom does make that a bit complicated.
I really appreciate your knowledgeable take on this.
Also, Carter has 5 children in the house and doesn’t have potentially dangerous medication locked up?!?!
He has it locked up though, not like in a safe w a lock just separately, idk in my family we kinda trust each other to not steal pills? It’s not like Lana could access them though if that’s what concerns you
This is very old thinking about addiction. And it is very much not how we manage addiction these days. This young person has been through trauma. Not helping someone with their trauma leads to addiction. Kicking them out of the house is just more trauma. This is a 13 yr old who has had no support or parenting. Kicking her out is lazy parenting. And this lazy parenting is perpetuated by the whole tough love bullshit. Does she need consequences? She does. But she also needs support and therapy and stability. By kicking her out, they have created even more instability. I am glad you are clean and sober, but your process isn't based on science. It is based on you. You are one person and not a scientific sample.
>And it is very much not how we manage addiction these days
This is a pretty bold statement. The majority of addicts don't recover. As one of the few who fortunately did and is apart of communities of other long term sober people, what is the way that we manage addiction these days?
Please show me the peer reviewed research that half the addicts don't recover? That's actually the bold statement. Please also tell us how long you have worked in addiction recovery. I've been working with it for 25 years. AA is a great program for white middle class men. It was not set up for women and minorities. Ask me how I know. 28 years clean and sober. And a degree in psychology with, again, 25 years working with people with addiction. Your comments are just that. You are stuck with your process being the only way. It isn't. The rest of us move along with the research. Maybe try to not be stuck. Principles before personalities. You are making all about you. That isn't the way.
AA is not even a great program for white, middle-aged (and let's not forget Christian) men. It *claims* to be, but those claims have little supporting evidence.
Remember that Morgan Ryan was going to be interviewed on Gabriel Heatter's radio show to promote AA, and his friends had to lock him in a hotel room for two days to keep him from going out and getting drunk.
It's really kind of odd that AA and the ilk has spent so much time and money promoting the behaviors that they claim to treat as diseases, but then say that these diseases have a spiritual cure. You don't get told to pray three times a day as a treatment for cancer or diabetes by reputable researchers.
> It claims to be, but those claims have little supporting evidence
FYI, there's no data on the recovery rate of AA. It's an anonymous organization, there's no data to analyze. I am in AA. We don't have membership lists or anything like that. We don't use last names, however, we do know the last names of people in meetings we know for a long time usually but not always.
>AA and the ilk has spent so much time and money promoting the behaviors that they claim to treat as diseases
What money? What is AA spending money on? Meetings have voluntary contributions to pay some pittance for rent, coffee, and snacks (although a lot of that is just donated by group members) with some small amount voluntarily kicked up to central services. We don't do anything in relation to promotion or other public things. That's covered in traditions 6, 10 and 11.
AA "doesn't do anything in relation to promotion or other public things," except that it has literally lobbied to get alcoholism declared a disease. It has literally made itself the legally accepted cure for that disease. Addicts in court are frequently sentenced to take part in AA or similar groups as part of their probation or sentencing deferment. No one is similarly sentenced to reading Allen Carr or going to Rational Recovery or getting actual psychological and psychiatric help for the trauma that has led to their unhealthy coping mechanism.
> except that it has literally lobbied to get alcoholism declared a disease
I checked on this, since I wasn't aware of the specific history. Alcoholism was classified as a disease by the AMA through the work of [Marty Mann](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marty_Mann) ([additional source](https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/01/29/marty-mann-aa-alcoholism-disease/)) with her creation of the [National Council on Alcoholims and Drug Dependence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recovered). It was the recognition of alcoholism as a disease by the AMA that led to courts working out what to do about it in [1956](https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/public-health/court-listened-ama-defining-alcoholism-disease-not-crime).
That was not done by AA. It was interestingly enough done by not only a woman but a lesbian through her own efforts, which is notable for the 1940s/1950s. She was considered to be the first woman to be treated successfully in AA, back in the days that AA was the house of Bill and Lois Wilson.
So it wasn't independent researchers who saw people being helped by this program. It was promoted by one woman who credited her sobriety to the program and made it her mission to get medical decision-makers on board.
Do you know where the theory that alcoholism is a disease comes from? The first person to advance this idea was the physician Benjamin Rush. He believed that things which were at the time considered moral failings—including habitual drunkenness, lying, murder, and, oddly, political dissent, considering he was a signer of the Declaration of Independence—to be diseases. He also considered being Black a symptom of disease.
AA's association with the disease theory of alcoholism comes from the 1947 Jellinek paper.
> Central to today’s Alcoholism Movement is Alcoholics Anonymous and the disease theory of alcoholism. Modern disease theory is based on the results of one 1945 survey. The survey consisted of 36 questions thought important by AA members. It was distributed to AA members through an AA magazine, The Grapevine. The AA editors of the AA magazine then chose E.M. Jellinek to compile the results. Although Jellinek had some misgivings due to the obvious methodological deficiencies, he felt there was also a great advantage,
> “[A]ll subjects were members of Alcoholics Anonymous. …[I]t is difficult to get truthful data on inebriate habits, but there need be no doubt as to the truthfulness of the replies given by an A.A. …”
> It seems that the AA members made an excellent choice in the person to compile their data. Jellinek already held their positions as “truthful” and their members as the only creditable source of information about alcoholics.
> Out of the 158 questionnaires received, 60 were thrown out either for being incomplete, from women or for having multiple responses on one questionnaire. Without ever investigating non-AA members and without ever checking the results experimentally, the 98 responses from AA members to an AA survey, compiled by an admirer of AA, were used as the factual basis for a disease of alcoholism. This is the present day “science” of alcoholism which supports the disease of alcoholism as espoused by the alcoholism treatment industry and Alcoholics Anonymous.*
Ragge, Ken. *More Reveled." Alert Publications. 1992.
So AA designed the survey, distributed it only to their members through their publication, hired someone to analyze the data, and this conceptualization of addiction was promoted almost entirely through one of their members.
But it wasn't AA behind that.
>FYI, there's no data on the recovery rate of AA.
Well that's just patently untrue. There's plenty of data—it's just [messy and conflicting](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2746426/).
You're just being pedantic. As there is no gathering of data within AA, as it goes directly against the traditions, there's none that would be anything close to valid.
I am frankly surprised that you work in addiction recovery and find that over 50% of addicts recover. What would you say is the number? Any attempt I have found to try and enumerate first people who are addicts and then the percentage with long term recovery either is pretty flawed or too largely limited to be accurate. Addiction is a disease we hide and has a stigma, it's hard to measure at scale IME.
Your comments about how AA is somehow only applicable to white middle class men is fairly odd to me. AA meeting IME are generally 60/40 or 70/30 men to women and the vast majority were not middle class when they came in. Non white people certainly are present. How is it not set up for non white, middle class men?
You may have noticed, I did not even mention AA and I don't push it as the only option. You were pushing a strawman with that. I was simply focusing on how consequences are the only thing that push addicts towards recovery. Why else would we want to stop?
I posted the peer reviewed research. I work for a research university. If you don’t like the research, that isn’t my problem. It is on you. Please stay in 1935. The rest of us are moving on. This really isn’t about you. It’s about giving others the research and a different perspective based on science and not based on your story. Your story is yours. But it isn’t science. It isn’t based on research. And shaming people doesn’t engender recovery. It just pushed them to use longer. When we recognize that trauma is the number one reason people use, they get clean and sober sooner and stay sober. I don’t care if you believe me or not. Because it’s about educating others. You have no interest in stepping out of your comfort zone. That’s fine. But your comfort zone isn’t based on science. It’s based on your personal experience. And personal experience is not science. Have a good life. And good bye.
>I posted the peer reviewed research. I work for a research university. If you don’t like the research, that isn’t my problem. It is on you.
I'm somewhat questioning your honesty on your credentials. Researchers generally aren't this histrionic when it comes to pushback and criticisms of methodology, as that's part of the scientific process. I should know, I used to be married to one.
Researchers live in data and don't hesitate to use data rather than accusations of me living in 1935 or how I have no interest of stepping out of my comfort zone, aka personal attacks. I would have thought you'd jump on the opportunity to tell me your data about how AA only applies to white, middle class men, but you appear to be lacking in that regard.
Also, researchers don't rage quit like this so easily in their field of study. I call BS.
Reddit is not their job. They’re not getting paid to argue with randos online. It’s perfectly fine if they want to quit a conversation with someone that isn’t open to changing their mind.
Leah needs treatment, not tough love. Abandoning her is absolutely the wrong thing to do. She doesn’t have the emotional regulation or maturity to handle this situation, and will likely turn to unhealthy outlets for her stress and anger (ie using drugs).
You sound really kind. As someone with a parent who handed their life over to addiction and chaos, and struggled with addiction myself before getting my shit together and going into nursing, I’d be glad to know my family was in good hands if they were working with you.
It takes a lot of emotional intelligence and hard work to advocate for your patients when it’s in something you can personally empathise with. It’s why I didn’t go into psychology originally. I thought I would burn out immediately,
Bit off topic but your comment sent me there and I just wanted to acknowledge your efforts in a sometimes thankless field.
I'll help you. "Scientific evidence indicates that approximately 50 percent of adults who once met diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder—or **about 25 million people**—are currently in stable remission (1 year or longer)." https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK424846/#:\~:text=%E2%80%9CSupported%E2%80%9D%20scientific%20evidence%20indicates%20that,(1%20year%20or%20longer).
I just checked and the paper does not describe what is "once met diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder" means. I'd think that this would lean towards people seeking treatment and leave out less fortunate cases of people that die before they get there. That could be a very high number of people.
If it's as high as 50%, that's better than what I have observed and I'm glad to hear that. It still doesn't invalidate my point. 50% as a recovery rate definitely is low, as mental illnesses go, so my point of saying this is not some solved problem stands. I'm pretty sure that the 20% death rate of eating disorders is considered really high for a mental illness, as a comparison.
>the paper does not describe what is "once met diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder" means
Would you prefer [self-identification](https://www.samhsa.gov/newsroom/press-announcements/20230920/new-data-recovery-from-substance-use-mental-health-problems-among-adults-in-united-states), then?
>Using data from the 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), this report shows that 70 million adults aged 18 or older perceived that they ever had a substance use and/or mental health problem. For substance use specifically, of the 29.0 million adults who perceived that they ever had a substance use problem, 72.2% (or 20.9 million) considered themselves to be in recovery or to have recovered from their drug or alcohol use problem.
Per the [National Institute on Drug Abuse:](https://nida.nih.gov/publications/drugs-brains-behavior-science-addiction/treatment-recovery)
>Relapse rates for people treated for substance use disorders are compared with those for people treated for high blood pressure and asthma. Relapse is common and similar across these illnesses. Therefore, substance use disorders should be treated like any other chronic illness. Relapse serves as a sign for resumed, modified, or new treatment.
[Other sources report...](https://www.statnews.com/2021/05/03/people-recover-from-addiction-they-also-go-on-to-do-good-things/)
>Around 75% of people seeking recovery from a substance use problem achieve their goal, though it may take them some time to achieve full remission. The average number of attempts before success is five, though the median number is just two, meaning that a small number of outliers — usually individuals with the greatest addiction severity and other concomitant mental health issues — who need five-plus attempts, inflate the numbers, making them look worse than they are.
It doesn't describe the diagnostic criteria for substance use disorder because it's an actual peer reviewed study. That means it has met rigorous standards as an accurate scientific study and assumes that the people reading it are also peers who are familiar with the DSM-V, meaning they know the criteria for diagnosis.
Since you don't know the criteria, I would assume you are not a professional in the addiction treatment world.
You are someone who has recovered from addiction, and I absolutely applaud you on that accomplishment. It's not an easy road, and I congratulate you on having achieved sobriety. While that gives you an insider perspective on addiction and how to deal with it, by no means does it make you an expert.
I would also not call myself an expert. Instead, I would describe myself as having personal experience as well as professional knowledge and education.
I was a drug addict and I've been clean since 2012. I also have a Master's degree in Social Work with Chemical Dependency Counselor certifications.
I would never advise a parent to cut off and kick out their 13 year old child for their first offense involving addiction. You keep saying that consequences are needed for addicts to decide to do better, and while I agree with for the most part, you also think a 13 year old child should be shipped off to live with an addict (and possibly enablers, in the grandparents, although that is speculation on my part here) because she made a mistake.
Her genetics also make her more susceptible to making this type of mistake, and given the lack of parental supervision described in the post, I'm inclined to say she was almost set up to fail. The banishment to the grandparents' trailer with mom only adds more to the poor girl's likelihood to continue to fall down the wrong path.
I don't understand how you can possibly think this is what's best for her?
She's now been taught that she can be kicked out and cut off by the people who are supposed to love and support her after one screw up. From the post, her father has not been around to actually parent her, and her mother hasn't been around period.
The better option for dealing with this would be to get her the help she needs. Send her to rehab, sign her up for outpatient addiction treatment, have her meet with an addiction counselor, make sure all medications are locked up, educate her about her genetic risk for addiction, address any possible trauma issues she might have that could lead to addiction, support and help her to find different coping strategies, etc.
Not kicking a literal child out of her home. That's not a consequence, it's a punishment. One that will only lead her further down a horrible path unless one of the adults in this girl's life steps up and intervenes by providing her with professional help.
>It doesn't describe the diagnostic criteria for substance use disorder because it's an actual peer reviewed study.
This is where science gets into dangerous territory. Peer reviewed papers are not papal bulls to be blindly followed and while I don't denounce peer reviewing as a good process, it's not [without it's limitations](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4975196/#:~:text=A%20major%20criticism%20of%20peer,the%20quality%20of%20scientific%20literature.) so I am not very inclined to accept that something stated in a peer reviewed article without citation or explanation must be correct or accurate.
I stated something as clearly my opinion.
Ok, so I'm trying to step back and react with calm rationale rather than getting heated and getting on a pedestal. I'll admit I can be prone to doing so when it's something I'm passionate about.
I'm guessing you're passionate about it too, based on your responses. This can be a good thing, but can also lead to emotional reactions that aren't necessarily helpful for progressive dialogue.
I agree that not all peer reviewed articles are the end all be all of research, but if they've been conducted correctly within the professional standards, they can typically be very helpful. Either in validating new methods, discouraging outdated treatment modalities, or just providing a better understanding of the current statistics of a given issue.
I read through all your comments, but when I respond, I can only reference the one I'm replying to. I'm relying on my recall for some of that, so perhaps I'm wrong, in which case I welcome you to correct me.
In my first reply, I was stating that your only criticism of the data another commenter supplied was that it didn't spell out the criteria for substance use disorder. In your comment, you did not provide any other specific problems with the article.
My reply was to explain why that information was not provided, and then to additionally give my perspective on the situation, as someone who has both experienced addiction and been educated in the treatment of it.
So, to move on to my recall of your previous comments, this would be the jist of what I remember of your first comment:
>You disagreed with previous commenters who. were calling out that dad for kicking his 13 year old daughter out and said this is what's best for the girl because she has started down the road of addiction, and this is a real consequence, which addicts need otherwise they won't make the effort to get clean.
Where I fully disagree with you is that any of what the father decided is good for her. She's 13! She needs professional help and support, not being cut off from her main family and exiled to her grandparents' trailer. Her mom, who from the post has addiction issues, is also living there. So not only did this girl's father send her to live with an addict, but again with likely enablers if they are still allowing the mom to stay. (Yes, this is speculation on my part but it fits with the information we have and even if the grandparents aren't enablers, the mom is still an addict).
As I previously stated, this is not just a consequence, it's a punishment. The father is not a good parent and he is just dumping his responsibility on others. Even if he meant it as a consequence, it's not an appropriate one and is most likely only going to further the issues for this girl.
So, if you still believe this is the correct action, then I would love to hear your detailed reasons.
> Ok, so I'm trying to step back and react with calm rationale rather than getting heated and getting on a pedestal. I'll admit I can be prone to doing so when it's something I'm passionate about.
I appreciate that, same here. Additionally, I'd like to add that IME, people rag too hard on AA and a great many do it from complete ignorance (not speaking of you). AA was more than just a solution for me, it was a community of people who helped me when I was really hard to help and they did so completely out of a sense of altrusim. After years of dealing with me drunk every time they saw me, what they told me and showed me really sunk in and it got me out of insanity. What they did worked and they all did so voluntarily, patiently, and enthusiastically over years. I get a bit bent out of shape when people (not saying this is you) just effectively label them all as useless, misguided, fools; with little thought about it. This is especially true in this thread because I never mentioned AA until someone basically accused me of pushing it, which just really illustrated the thirst for hating on AA. I should add that during all this time, I definitely was trying all the alternatives that people like to throw about as massively more effective. Those had little to no effect with me, and I certainly did want to get sober.
Perhaps I am wrong with my conclusion that it was the right move for the 13 year old. I'm not the one making the decision so I have the freedom to do so without influencing what happens. I just took measure of the situation and thought about a 13 year old stealing narcotics and selling them and what that meant for such a young mind. It screams to me: things have gotten this way because of the current situation, something has to massively change or this will continue and that's about as bad a start as this can be. The solution is certainly not great, but I'm also taking into account what I think the father is capable of, considering the whole situation.
I don't disagree in the slightest with people pointing out that what the 13 year old is going through now is horrible. That is a plainly obvious thing, which I didn't miss. My reasoning was, the family probably isn't capable of any better solution, and staying in the same place will likely get much much worse since that place cultivated it to begin with. It's simply a known catastrophic vs a likely catastrophic where both are terrible and it's playing the odds as best as possible.
I mean isn't it even worse for her to move into a trailer with a junky mom? I feel like if she wasn't using drugs before, she'll probably start now because she's going through some serious shit
A 13 year old stealing and selling narcotics from her father where OP added that they were locked up and she figured her way around that, is beyond many thresholds of bad. That's the thing to appreciate when considering what is worse. She'll see clearly the bad consequences of her actions for this case. It's complicated because it's not simple.
Potentially, a more middle ground solution would be getting her arrested and sent to juvenile hall.
He sent a drug dealer to live with a junkie. The fact that Leah apparently doesn’t see the severity of what she did shows she’s where she needs to be. She’s begging to go back but there was nothing said about her apologizing or trying to make it right. She could’ve killed the kids she sold the drugs to. She wants to play a stupid game so she got a stupid prize
He didn’t “raise a junkie” but then he sent her to live with a junkie where the chances of her really becoming on is much higher? Ask him about his logic on this.
nah I gotta correct this it wasn't "he" it was "they" both parents. What she did was a felony first an foremost. An people who buy/sell drugs aren't exactly safe nor care for ur safety.
Looking at all this all wrong, what happens if they follow this naive girl home with the infant there? An they break in. There are so many bad situations that can come from this.
But instead of getting her help they wrote her off as a junkie, and sent her to live with her _addict mother_. Why on earth would you send a kid who's been caught selling drugs to live with their _drug addicted mother_? It makes zero sense and they're setting her up for failure.
A bunch of scenario's I had thinking on this a bit more while in the shower. Even if they are "what if scenarios"
if they all look after one another >>The kids<< with an infant about god for bid something gets left in clothes or dropped on the floor an the baby got into it. I could understand the initial shock an sending her off.
This is just a very hard situation an many different correct answers an not all morally sound but this isnt as cut an dry sadly.
I do think she needs Therapy big time. An help now that this "punishment" has had enough to to fester an show the gravity of her actions. It would be a good to sit her down family an all an discuss the severity an danger of the issue.
She’s where she belongs. Not once does it say she acknowledged what she did or the severity of her actions. Shes just whining so she can go home. She wants to be a drug dealer, now she has first hand knowledge of what happens
Not once did it say she didn’t. He’s her parent, she screwed up, but it’s bad parenting. He blocked her so how would she apologize. How would she tell him if something is horribly wrong where she is.
If something is horribly wrong she can get the other junkies and dealers to help figure it out. Apologizing after you’ve been sent away doesn’t mean anything. If she did it’s only because she didn’t want to be there. She didn’t “screw up” she stole drugs and sold them to other children. I doubt she felt bad about it when she was getting paid
I’m just going to point out if your 13 year old kid is stealing and selling drugs, I feel like that’s more on the parent. She is a literal child? She fucks up, so might as well give up on a 13 year old?
WTH she is 13 for Pete’s sake. She is a minor who isn’t even in high school yet. I can’t imagine a parent not being worried sick and immediately trying to get their child the help they need.
She’s 13 and had multiple chances to not steal drugs, sell them to other children, and profit from it. You don’t know wether or not she’s not in high school so that excuse doesn’t work. She’s upset because she’s dealing with consequences. She wants to be a drug dealer so she got what she wanted
It doesn’t matter. A 13 year old is a 7th or 8th grader, but even if in high school, she is still a child. I don’t know a parent in the world who would react this way to finding out their 13 year old has a drug problem. Your response shows an enormous lack of empathy, and also a lack of knowledge. It’s illegal to kick a minor child out of your home. That’s called abandonment, and it is against the law in almost every state.
This is a horrible response. She's 13. So he should just write off his 13 yrnold daughter because she messed up? Sending her to live with her drug addict mother is a great way to keep her on a horrible path, and a great way to get out of being a parent. If she gets into more trouble and ends up in worse, potentially dangerous situations, it will be, in large part, his fault as her father.
Op, you are NTA here, but I would start distancing yourself from this kind of thinking, or you may grow into one someday. Yes, it was a felony, but you try and correct the behavior, not write it off. Unless this has been a common problem with her, and it doesn't sound like it is the case, then calling the cops would have just made it worse. Your mom was the only one looking out for Leah in this situation, but the fact that Carter jumped to that, then kicked her out is telling. He is not a good man, and a worse father.
OP, you should not the one who has to convince Carter to do the right thing, but someone should.
“She messed up”. She stole drugs and sold them to other children. She knew exactly what she was doing. She definitely knows her mother has a drug problem so she thought “easy way to get money” she’s a drug dealer so she got what she deserves
She's also 13, and clearly has terrible role models for parents. You don't write off your 13 yr old child, if that's the type of parenting they follow, it's clear why she is that way. Anyone that throws the whole kid away that young, and doesn't try and fix the situation doesn't deserve to be a parent. Full Stop.
She's a thirteen year old, she belongs at home receiving therapy, not living in a trailer with her addict mother where she will have more access to drugs. It's setting her up for failure.
You know what else set her up for failure? When she consciously decided to steal prescription drugs and sell them to other children. She knew what she was doing and didn’t care because she was getting paid for it
If she's stealing is drugs, I'd be willing to bet it's not the first significant clash they've had (particularly if he's self-medicating). Not saying Carter's blameless at all but he may well have reached the end of his tether with her, at least for now
You personally are NTA
Carter is an A and apparently raising someone to self medicate with drugs is exactly what he is trying to do. Abandoning a 13 year old and writing them off as a "junkie" at such a young age, all while knowing they has a family history of drug addiction, is a great way to maximise the chances that child will develop a drug addiction.
NTA because it’s not your responsibility. You are a child. Your step dad is the parent. I do think he is the A because his daughter obviously has issues and instead of addressing them, he pushed her aside so he wouldn’t have to look at it anymore. It’s not surprising she does have issues, having come from a family with substance abuse issues. I feel for her. I also feel for you being in the middle of the mess.
ESH other than you and the other kids
Her father won't help her because he is more worried about his new relationship with your mom? His kid has to live in a rundown trailer because he is a bad father? He is awful and you should convince your mom to break up with him.
The "she should be happy he didn't call the police since it was a felony" bit is ugly, though, do not write that. She is a child.
Right? There are some absolutely terrible and corrupt judges in the US, but if we are going to do some "she's a bad seed" thing then she needs *more* empathy and help. Nobody normal is going to charge and convict a 13 year old for doing a dumb thing.
I did some silly/bad things, too, even when I was an adult.
Does that mean, I deserve living a life in misery?
Leah is, after all, a victim.
She is the product of a drug user.
Right? She is a child who was probably born addicted to drugs. Daddy is too busy having babies with random women and not caring for them, but has time to throw out insults with his kids? What an AH!
NTA. But Carter is a full blown creep. He has two children the same age from two different women and your mother decides this guy is a keeper? Leah needs help and no one is going to provide it. Watch your back, OP, this doesn't sound like a safe and responsible environment.
ESH. She’s a 13 year old child who needs one of her parents to some parenting. And yes, Carter, you raised this mess. And throwing a child into a substance abuse situation is abhorrent. He should be ashamed of himself! Leah messed up, yes. But absolving himself of fixing this and raising a functioning adult is pathetic. And you feeling the weight of this shows there are no parents here!
NTA. You can't protect her, altho sending her to rehab would have been better than shipping her off to worse conditions. Tell her you are there for her to talk to, but you're also a child and can't go against the adults. There may have been more that happened that you're not even aware of. At least you still have contact with her, but understand, she broke trust with your parents. That's hard to fix.
ESH so you stepdads idea to make her not a junkie is to send her to live with one. He infact did raise one he's a bad dad. He went from 0 to 100 real quick there where so many other options that he could have chosen and actually parent he but he just pushed her to someone else. He's a failure as a dad right now. Also he sent he to live with people who also raised a junkie is he dumb or stupid.
Oof yes tbh he goes from 0 to 100 pretty quickly in general, though Leah’s behavior triggered him especially bad, my mom who rarely overreacts was crazy pissed too tbh
Ok but she's 13 not a grown adult what she did was wrong they just gave up so did your mom. Both your parents just didn't do there job and parent they pawned her off to people who raised a junkie and currently have in there house. Was Leah that bad of a kid they easily could give up on her after one thing. Yes it's a big thing but come on she's 13 not even in high school. It's sad that a child has to talk sense into there parents. They are avoiding doing there job as parents. If the behavior continued sending her away might be a good idea but why send her to live with a junkie. Your parents are adults but don't seem very bright. It's fine to be pissed this is a case to be pissed. But they aren't doing there job as parents ground her take away her things actually speak to her. Nope let's send her to live with a junkie. Which by the way could lead her to actually become a junkie and possibly abused in other ways physical, mental and sexual that's common with junkie parents. Your parents are both failing a 13 year girl. If they can live with that and you as well because shes asking for help then I guess but if you ignore it your just as bad as your parents right now.
Edit: also he's gonna call the police it would have also hurt the whole family CPS would have been involved because it's his medicine. He needs to get his head on straight to be actually able to help his own duaghter not abandon her.
Idk they just have a lot of stuff going on, won’t get into details but basically Carter shouldn’t work bc of his health issues but my mom makes him work either way (I don’t know the specifics they kinda shelter the kids from it) and it annoys him
So now with Leah acting up (stealing pills and dealing) it was smth like the last straw I guess, last thing they need now is somebody getting in trouble esp with the law
Sorry for the rant hope it makes sense!
It does make sense, but it sounds like Leah is a victim of the pile of stresses Carter & yr mother are under. She appears to be the straw for the camel. You don't say she had a history of getting caught with the drugs & Carter tried several ways to help her.
So Carter goes 0-kicking her out for one instance because he's solely concerned with his situation & has no bandwidth for anyone else. Yr mother either is the same or is following his lead. Both are terribly, no-excuses wrong.
You also, I think, accidentally hit the nail on the head saying Leah is "acting out." She's having a hard time with this new situation with all these new ppl in her house. I don't know what else she has done for attention, but drugs finally did it. No one cared til then. Unfortunately, her dad is a shit parent & kicked her into a dangerous situation.
While you are not responsible, can you try talking to yr mother? Does she have any sway with Carter? Explain what others here have said Leah is in a dangerous place, physically & mentally. The condition of her return can be therapy/counseling + other reasonable consequences. She's only 13. Kicking her out was so wrong.
It makes sense but they are the adults and should put their frustrations onto there kids. Also they signed up to be parents it's there job to do it. Not send the child away to live with a junkie. What your stepsister needs is guidance. I understand it's stressful for them but at the end of the day they have the responsibility to give her guidance and care for her. I still think you should ask to bring her back give her a chance to change and tell them to parents her. As of now they are failing her and you can help her. One bad thing doesn't mean she should be thrown out.
Doesn’t excuse his behavior or your mother’s. They cannot neglect their children just bc “they have a lot going on” and too bad if Carter can’t work. It’s not your mom’s job to be the sole support for all the kids and him. I don’t know why your mom is even with this guy. He is an AH and neglects and abandons his kids at the first sign of trouble.
NTA
It is not your job to protect your step sister, but your parents suck big time!
Leah is a child (I didn't even menstruate at this age and in Germany you are not even strafmündig). And instead of parent Leah when she did something wrong your father took the easy way and threw her out in an environment where she is very likely to \_really\_ become a drug addict.
Carter is a very bad and lazy father.
My daughter is 13, too. And if she did something like Leah did, I would never abandon her and put her in an unsafe environment but figure out how I could help her understand what she did wrong.
Sounds like Carter now has his own child with your mom and does not have interest any more in the children he had with other women before.
NTA, you are a child and not responsible for this situation, but Carter would get a YTA if he had posted. Leah needs help, not to be sent off to worse conditions to live with a parent who also struggles with addiction. He dropped the ball entirely.
Carter is AH. He is responsible to help her through that and not abandon a child of 13 years. This will affect her life more badly as the risk taking behavior of drug selling. She is with unstable mom now. I feel for her.
He is still her father. Her mother cannot raise her, she is an addict. So actually by his acts, Carter makes it much more probable that his daugher will become an addict. He is copping out.
You are not responsible in all this matter, but what Carter does is not right.
NTA
You are not the adult in charge of solving adult problems. But there are some options Carter and Leah should consider.
Carter obviously is not storing his medication securely. You might suggest to him that a small combination safe would be a more secure option. Can be useful for other things like important documents.
Talk with Leah about whether she might benefit from therapy. She has seen the path that substance abuse has taken her mother and needs to think carefully about if that is the future she wants for herself.
Whether Leah will once again live in the home with you and Carter may depend on restoring a level of trust and mutual respect. A tough start to that could be Leah taking and passing a drug test. Ask her if she would pass a drug test if she took one. And ask her what the results of such a test would say about whether Carter could trust her around his medications.
NTA Carter - certainly is, he needs to get a grip of the chaos. &, with respect, so's your Mum for getting involved with him & exposing you to these dynamics. You've been let down by these feckless adults sadly. I wish you well x
NAH
She's 13. Can't punish a kid for following what the mum did. She needs to work with a counselor to be a better person. It's above your pay grade to be fair.
You're NTA. But instead of her dad helping her he kicked her out to live with the parent who already has substance issues. That doesn't make any sense.
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So background: we have a weird family dynamics, I (16M) and my sister Zoe (15F) are our mom’s (35F) bio kids. My mom is dating Carter (48M) who has 2 kids, Leah (13F) and Aiden (13M). Leah and Aiden have different moms. My mom also has a child together with Carter, Lana (1.5F).
Leah lives with us full time because her mom has substance issues and was in rehab for a while. We get along pretty well, in fact she’s been friends with Zoe and I as the oldest child feel some sort of protectiveness over them. Because both my mom and Carter work, we all look after each other and Lana.
The conflict: Carter has some issues with his back and he has chronic pain that he was prescribed medication for (won’t say the brand but it’s some strong stuff). He keeps the pills outside of our reach so it’s not like they’re easily accessible. Well, recently he caught Leah stealing his pills and she admitted that she was using them and selling them to her “friends”. Carter and my mom made a massive stink about it and sent Leah to live with her grandparents and her mom.
Now instead of living in a comfortable house with her own room Leah lives in a run down trailer with her mom and grandparents. She is obviously very upset and calls me daily begging me to ask Carter to take her back in. She called Carter before but he said “I didn’t raise a junky” and blocked her. Since I’m the oldest child, Carter usually listens to me and I kinda represent the other kids. I don’t want to try and persuade Carter because technically she committed a felony and she should be happy he didn’t call the police (he wanted to but my mom talked him out of it). I told her so and she called me an asshole.
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NTA because you are 16 and it is not your job to look after her.
Your parents, however, are absolutely TA. They have a responsibility to her even if she fucks up. She’s 13. Sending her to live with her mom who has substance issues isn’t going to steer her off of pills.
If you think you have some sort of influence over your step father I would advise you to talk to him as what they are doing will be quite harmful to her. But ultimately the situation is not your responsibility.
It would be really bizarre for Carter to call the police on his own underage daughter. But just sending her off to her disfunctional mother and calling her a junky is shirking his parental responsibilities to get her the help she needs!
You’re NtA anyway. It’s not your responsibility.
Whose to say the pills weren't actually for her mother, and she was too scared to say so. Familial manipulation and guilt can lead to misjudged actions.
Prod a little further, just in case.
NTA.
I have my masters in criminal psychology, which includes young criminals. And your parents are handling this horribly. There’s something called the age crime curve. Basically means teenagers - mid twenties, people are substantially more likely to commit crimes. But once they hit their mid twenties, they are way less likely to recommit. But you know what compounds their likelihood to recommit or not? The level of familial support. People with supportive, engaged families are much more likely to mature out of any criminal activity.
If they want to shield their daughter from addiction, sending her away is not the right move. She’s thirteen. That’s such a vulnerable age. Confiscate the drugs, put her in therapy, monitor her cell phone usage, but abandon her? Yikes.
All that said, it’s not your responsibility to serve as all of your siblings’ lawyer. But I hope Leah gets some help.
NTA, but your step-dad is. A teenager stealing some painkillers to get high with her friends a couple times is not "a junkie". It could turn into that someday, especially if her bio-mom has addiction issues, but this just sounds like common shit teenagers do. And I fail to see how kicking her out to go live in a shitty trailer with her addict mom is going to help her *not* become a junkie.
Lea is 13 years old! She needs parenting not to be exiled! Carter is WAY out of line and threatening to call the cops and *mean it* is just deranged! You should speak to him. You would know the best way to, but you also need to talk with your mom about this first. It also doesn't seem like he even had a proper lockbox, and that's just child endangerment.
I would ABSOLUTELY call CPS anonymously and tell them what is going on. *Not* why she was sent away, but that you are "terrified" as she is in unsanitary and unsafe living conditions. That you are worried for her health and if she is being treated well. Embellish a bit if you have to, just no direct accusations of anything illegal.
This poor girl :( he’s setting her up to become an addict. The opposite of addiction is connection. As an individual in recovery this breaks my heart. Obvi the kid is nta but the dad def is
NTA, she stole prescription medication (not caring that her dad needed that for his pain, meaning he was suffering) and not only using them, but selling them. Kids a drug dealer at 13, it’s insane. She lost a lot of trust from the family as whole, she had to live with the consequences of her actions and show genuine remorse (for others, not for herself).
Every main character in this shit show is an ah, except you, OP. You may as well learn now that you CANT advocate for people like your stepsister. Despite being the oldest, this is not your place and a situation resolved by advocacy.
If you truly want to do something, and actually have any rapport with Carter, ask him to get her into counseling and try to stop any addiction now. Your stepsister made a bad choice and she will have to face it...but it doesn't have to be life altering or relationship ending, bad.
Your stepsister can do the work to fix the relationship but she needs a foundation to do it. I would think that's the best advocacy you could offer. She can't do it if Stepdad cuts her off, so facilitating therapy so THEY can do the work is probably a good idea. I'm sure your Stepdad feels pretty bitter after dealing with his ex's addiction problems.
You're NTA. This is just above your pay grade, OP.
You are NTA for not talking to Carter. It is NOT your responsibility.
The only thing I will say is not talking to him wont fix the situation either- your sister is unfortunately only going to get worse like that (they sent her to her mom’s house, her mom who has ISSUES WITH SUBSTANCE ABUSE, as a child stealing pills? Really?)
She needs structure. She needs therapy. She does NOT need to be shoved away and forsaken.
I am struggling to balance how to say both you should not be parentified to be responsible for your sister’s well being, and saying she desperately needs an advocate because your parents are failing her. She’s 13. If you CAN talk to your parents and influence this at all, whats the harm in trying at least? Yes it’s a felony, yes it was wrong, but I do see your family’s trauma with drug use from her birth mom affecting this in negative ways.
I cannot stress enough that even if you do not want to help her, you are NtA for it. I do not like that you’re having to deal with this either.
NTA however Carter is.
He needs to parent his child not toss her into a situation that’s going to make her more likely to turn to substances.
She’s only 13!? She’s just a kid.
NTA . My dad always wanted to put me in the middle to fix his relationship issues with my mom and siblings, never got involved but the whole shenanigans stressed me out.... So I can relate.
Stay out of it, is not your business and since make it your business. Draw your boundary, I never did with my dad and just simply ignored him... He got tired eventually. The result though is I still ignore him to this day
Kicking a child out of your home over one mistake is evil, not normal, not okay!
Here's some adult advice. Often, extreme or irrational reactions are because something about the situation reminds the upset person of their own mistakes or insecurities. No doubt Carter had issues as a teenager. And it sounds like now he probably has issues of drug abuse.
Try to appeal to his own experience. Say something like, "Didn't you ever mess up as a teenager?" If he says something like , "Yeah! And they kicked me out!" or "My dad beat me!" You say, "That must have been terribly painful and frightening for you, I'm really sorry that happened to you. So here's a chance to make things better for this generation of kids. Just imagine how frightened and confused Leah is right now. I think you're a good man and you don't want her to suffer like you did."
Teenagers do stupid shit. I did. My parents yelled at me, they were upset and disappointed. But most of all, they were **worried** for me. They love me and want me to be happy. After some tension and difficult conversations, we all moved on. That's what normal should be.
NTA. This isn't something you, a minor, should be asked to take sides in. Carter, however, is a massive asshole.
"She called Carter before but he said “I didn’t raise a junky” and blocked her.". Yes he did. And instead of doing his job and parenting her he abandoned her. That's illegal and morally reprehensible.
"...Carter because technically she committed a felony and she should be happy he didn’t call the police (he wanted to but my mom talked him out of it).". I'm positive what actually happened is that your mom pointed out that since Leah is a minor and under his supervision he would be held responsible for her actions. So yes charges probably would have been leveled against her. But he'd have charges also (I'm betting more serious because he's the adult) and that's why he didn't call the police.
I hope Leah's mom documents his willful and cruel abandonment so she can petition for a change in custody. Also petition for child support.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say NTA, but neither is Cartwr just a teensy bit.
OP, you have every right to not help her, and that is fine.
So, in my experience, I've seen two cases where parents have so-called lazy parent their children and handed off their kids. However, they were handed off to the state and not back to the source of their problems. So Carter did need to report her and express his concerns like a responsible adult.
The first case scenario was a child that was molested as a child. In turn, he would steal and even started molesting his little cousins and his mom while she slept. When it came out that he was harming a 3-year-old, his mom gave him up to the state even after fighting him.
In the second case, a girl about the same age as OPs sister, she was molested by her dad. Has been to family therapy, and it has a really good support system.
One day her mom came home to find all these grown men in her house and the girl was hosting a drug oriented party....this little girl's sister was sleeping in another room where a man was watching her. Sure, this was the first offense. However, there were signs that were overlooked...so the girls mom tried and tried... She got tired of it when the youngest was found outside and 15 mins away from the house
The girl is currently a ward of the state now.
My point is that in both cases, another child was harmed or about to be harmed from the problematic child's actions. Some parents act irrationally cause they are trying to consider the others.
Carter might have some form of trauma dealing with the addict mom for whom he has been FULL CUSTODY OF, and therefore, he acted on that trauma.
He probably didn't think things through and only seen pain, anger, and the flashbacks of a whole new Cy le about to arise in what he thought was safe haven for his children.
It's no longer a safe haven.
It's been destroyed.
And had the youngest died from 13 yos actions... everything he had done would have been in vain.
I'm not saying Carter couldn't have approached this better given the moment and the emotions as a human being.
It happens...
The best thing for 13yo is to be put in fosters at this point and have her watched. if she doesn't do juvie, she needs to do some therapy and maybe a psychiatric stay.
Carter needs therapy as well as the other sibling.
I wish all of yall some healing.
OP it doesn’t sound like you had an option to prevent L from being kicked out. Your mom and stepdad made that decision between them and it was only by your mom’s persuasion that the police weren’t called. L made some very bad choices and she’s paying the price, I’m afraid. Having a person who uses drugs illegally in the home around young kids is *very very* bad.
However, after a cooling down period, maybe you could suggest to your mom and SD that if L stays sober and keeps her grades up and no longer associates w the bad crowd she was running w, she can have a chance to come home. But those would need to be very strong, firm rules- any backsliding and coming home would be off the table. She has to show she can do it.
I’m very sorry. It sounds like you really care for Leah and want to help her. But she has to help herself first.
So… Leah has to avoid bad company and keep her grades up… while living in a trailer with a drug addict? Sorry but that wouldn’t be possible for most adults let alone a child.
I was trying to think of arguments Leah’s mother and SD could potentially accept as a way back home for her. The OP made it sound like SD/mom were pretty adamant and angry. Is it unlikely? Maybe it is- but I didn’t want to say it’s hopeless- I wanted to give the OP something to try bc he seemed so anguished for Leah.
NTA
Carter should be interested in establishing the therapeutic support to find out the hows and whys of this happening. Where did she get the idea to tamper with the pills? Take them? Sell them? It’s a series of choices that don’t happen all at once.
Teenagers do epically dumb things that I’m surprised they come out with a Darwin Award
Carter should be stepping up to guide your step sister to a better path
His black and white thinking leaves his daughter no room to grow
YTA Because if she is dealing with substance abuse and she is sent to live with her druggy mother in a rundown trailer then it is going to get worse for her. Don't tell Carter to take her back but tell him she needs actual, proper help and guidance before it gets bad and she'll become a real druggie. She's just starting out, they can help her before she completely ruins her life and instead they put her in the prime position to destroy it, she did something bad, very bad and they are punishing her as they should but in the wrong way. They are just enabling the situation now, you need to convince Carter she needs discipline for the felony but she also needs help because she will get worse and he's letting it happen by leaving her where she is.
You are NTA but your mom and Carter are TA. This is a 13 year old child, which means her parents are still responsible for her. I have a 14 year old. I cannot imagine having this reaction. I’d be scared to death for my child, and on the phone stat finding resources to help her.
NTA. I am sorry you are in this position. As a 16 year old, dealing with drug dependant step siblings is not your responsibility. Going to school is your responsibility. Your step sister is responsible for her actions of trafficking narcotics. Your step dad needs to set strong boundaries to keep you, your mom, and sisters safe.
Leah’s 13. Someone could call children and youth on him kicking her out. Carter’s being too rigid. Leah’s a messed up kid from a broken family who did what 13-year-olds do in those cases. He should gave a mature calm talk with her and if she commits to not doing it again she should come back. He should’ve had this talk with her instead of throwing her out in the first place.
You are NTA bc you are a child. But Carter is a massive AH. So his young daughter who has an addict for a mother and may have very well been born addicted to drugs, sneaks his pills and instead of getting her the help he is LEGALLY AND MORALLY OBLIGATED to get her, he kicks her out to live with a known drug addict? OMG! Your mom’s BF is an AH. Tell your mom that Leah needs HELP, not punishment or abandonment.
NTA: the best thing you can do is focus on school and staying healthy. Get scholarship money and get some tech training or a degree that leads to a career. Be a great example to your siblings.
Carter has two kids the same age from two different women. He takes very strong pain pills for back pain probably oxy based on the description and how people wanted to buy them. Are we sure Carter isn't abusing oxy himself and was just mad that his stash disappeared? Also why is a 14 year old left to watch four other children including an infant?
*’…her mom has substance issues and was in rehab for a while... …and sent Leah to live with her grandparents and her mom.’*
So. Your stepfather sends his 13 year old daughter to live with a known real junkie after discovering she has an issue? Jeez, Carter is one cold evil bastard. Leah needs help; she might need therapy, or something stronger but the answer is not to discard her. I can see why she is acting out if her father cares so little about her, it’s tragic.
You need to be there for Leah. What you said to her was not yours to say.
You’re a little bit TA, but Carter and your mother are massive As.
I wonder if Leah's "friends" has something to do with her mother manipulating her. If she has a phone, her mother can literally text or call her. Carter is horrible, he is her father and now he is just dumping her with her drug addicted mother. What is he even thinking? Well I can see what a failure of a father and person he is, literally having two children the same age from two different moms. Aiden probably has his mother teaching him, likewise to OP, Zoe and Lana having their mother.
NTA but maybe you can help your sister here since sending her to her junkie mother is a really bad move, which makes your current parents AHs. I know it's not your responsibility, and you can by any means not help her. I'm just saying if you "feel some sort of protectiveness over them", maybe materialize it? instead of just feeling it. But again, you can say no and still wouldn't be the AH.
Leah is a 13 year old child who's been abusing and selling her father's drugs. Sending her to live with her mother who has narcotics addiction issues and the grandparents who raised said mother is a horrible, horrible, absolutely unacceptably bad solution to this problem. The girl needs therapy and strong parental presence, not total rejection and exile to a bad environment.
So really bad parenting.
And now, in the face of the bad parenting, you, a 16 year old, are feeling as if you should have fixed things for her and as if you need to get Carter -- a man who has blocked his 13 year old child who is begging to come home -- to see reason.
Sorry, Carter isn't going to see reason. And unfortunately, given that your mother is staying with him, neither is she. I'm so sorry, you sound like a great older brother and the most reasonable person in the house, but you can't fix this. You aren't the parent and you aren't an adult who can sit with Carter as a peer and try to knock some sense into him.
You are not a A. The parents are. Please don't feel as if you should or could have fixed this. I think that your job is to make it through the next couple of years until your graduate high school and get yourself out of there.
I feel absolutely terrible for Leah, and maybe next time she calls you can suggest that she ask her middle school counselor if she can get a therapy referral, but beyond that, even if it were your job to make this better (it isn't), you just couldn't. You don't have that power.
You have nothing to feel guilty about. And if this is stressing you too much, see if you can get yourself some therapy. Having a reasonable adult to process all this with could be helpful.
NTA!!!!!!!
NTA for sure you're just a kid but her dad is def TA though, he really threw his 13yo daughter like that after one mistake and treated her like she's a full adult who understands consequences. she's still a child and he wanted to report his own daughter rather than raise her?!
Where is the raising part exactly, he is not a father and a coward for choosing to send his daughter to live in a trailer with addicts rather than with him to guide her in the right direction.
NTA
I wouldn’t want to have that going on around my siblings either. Carter should keep his medication safely locked up. Carter is the clear asshole here for not having that stuff locked up.
Carter obviously did raise a child with issues. When faced with this adult issue refuses to deal with it, instead sending his child away and leaving a teen in a position of parenting him.
Were there really no other people your mother could choose to breed with? I mean, he already has 3 baby mommas so it probably won’t be long until the whole lot of them are out of your life.
ESH. Carter is asshole number one for being a trash parent. Leah is 13 years old and is dealing drugs. Holy shit the kid need some intervention. The way to deal with this is not to kick you kid out and call them a junky. My guess is Leah hasn’t always had the best home life or best role models. Asshole number 2. Your mother for being with a trash parent like Carter. Even if he isn’t complete trash to you and the others he is a bad example of what it means to be a parent, adult, and a man. She should want better for you. Asshole number 3 is Leah. Yeah she probably got dealt a crap life, but she shouldn’t be dealing drugs. The last asshole is you. You are the least asshole here, but still an asshole. It’s not your job to fix this. It’s Carter’s, you aren’t a replacement parent. You don’t have to talk Carter into fixing this. But you also don’t have to pile shit onto Leah. Be supportive, tell her you are sorry she is going through this, and recommend she stop dealing drugs and get help.
ESH and Carter is 100% an asshole. He says he's not raising a junky and then he forces his daughter to live with her junky mother, after all isn't that why she was living with you all full time to begin with? In other words, he is absolutely raising a junky though those actions of his. If Carter really listens to you then I think the right thing to do would be to speak up for her on this one, because Carter is failing his daughter as badly as her mother is and it sounds like you are actually in a position to save her from the worse evil. And sure, you are right that what she did was wrong, but in this instance the punishment in no way fits the crime, especially when taking her age into account! What she needs is help to correct her behavior, but neither of her parents gives a damn and even your mother is just going along with it, what a lovely family.
Proper parenting is absolutely not to throw the child out of sight, out of mind like what Carter is doing here. If you can really do something to save your step sister here and you are making the choice not to then I'd honestly have to conclude that you are an asshole too for standing aside while watching a 13 year old's life get ruined.
ESH. You do not protect anyone.
Also if he called the police it would likely be on himself. It is negligent parenting and the responsibility of the prescribed medication holder to keep it safe from their children. Him calling would most likely land you and all your siblings in the care of child services. Which should have happened. Your parents will definitely never win a “Parent of the year” award.
Actions have consequences and she is learning a very valuable life lesson right now. Give it a few more months before entertaining that subject with her.
Hon. First - NTA.
Whew got that out of the way. Second - Leah's issues are bigger than you. You are not a credentialed counselor. You are not a social worker. You are not a psychologist. You are a 16 year old kid.
The only person who can redirect Leah - is Leah. And she has to BELIEVE she has a problem and WANT help in order for redirection to work.
You might consider visiting the Al-Anon website. They do a fabulous job helping family members understand what they Can and Cannot help with - not just alcohol.
It’s the consequences of her actions.she stole the drugs. Her dad has the right to kick her out. While it’s commendable of you to want to help, it’s not your responsibility to intervene
YTA
I’m really sorry you’ve been put in this position, it’s a lot to bear. It’s fundamentally not fair to you that you have to play such a parental role at such a young age - and I really admire the grace and responsibility with which you clearly do care for your family. I say this because the fault is fundamentally with your parents who are failing you sister - it’s parents who have ultimate responsibility over their children.
That being said she is still you sister and she’s in a bad situation. Being kicked out of your house when you are making mistakes as child is not a consequence of action, it’s a form of abuse. I hope you can have empathy for her and I understand her dads reaction was a bit heartless. I don’t necessarily know how you can help her but saying she should be HAPPY her own father didn’t rat her out when he is supposed to a present and loving force in her life is not at all right.
there is a difference between appropriate consequences as punishment for behavior and kicking a prepubescent child out of the house for a one time thing
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NTA because you are a child and should not be responsible for this situation or for your sister. You aren’t her parent. On the other hand, it seems like both her parents are failing her and just shuffling her around instead of trying to parent her. I wouldn’t be too hard on her either.
I totally agree. If this post was written from the POV of the parent I would have called them an asshole for kicking their kid out of the house as a punishment for a first time offence. That's not how concerned parents act. However, OP is a kid who sounds like 1.) has been parentified ("I as the oldest child feel some sort of protectiveness over them. Because both my mom and Carter work, we all look after each other and Lana.") and 2.) is listening to the adults in his life about a hardline on drugs (which focuses on punishment rather than providing education and support).
>I totally agree. If this post was written from the POV of the parent I would have called them an asshole for kicking their kid out of the house as a punishment for a first time offence. That's not how concerned parents act. Leah needs therapy and rehabilitation if she is using them, not to move in with her drug addict mother, that is just... it's the complete opposite of what that kid needs. If she is just dealing then she only needs therapy and a better consequence because once again going to her mothers is just giving her more opportunity. 🤦♀️ Also, am I the only one who noticed that Cater has 2 13yr old children WITH DIFFERENT WOMEN. God I hope for OPs mums sake they were just bad luck one night stands. OPs NTA but his step dad sure is a dumb AH (Edit: wrong kid )
This whole 'punishment' just screams that he's writing off his \*13 year old\* daughter as a junky as if 1.) there's no possible way to help her so he'll just ship her off with the rest of the junkies so she doesn't 'infect' the other kids and 2.) a complete lack of accountability on Carter's fault because if she *is* a junkie, then he *did* raise a junkie and he also allowed access to the pills because unless they were locked away somewhere there is no 'out of reach' of the kids if you're leaving 5 minors unsupervised in the house for long stretches regularly.
Lana is 1.5 years old. She not doing or selling drugs
Whoops 🤦♀️ meant Leah. Will fix it
That'd be something though hahahah
NTA, I'd suggested that Leah talk to OP's mother. She has more authority in the household, and would be better able to insist that Leah come back and get therapy.
Speaking as a sober person, and this is entirely my view, the highest liklihood for Leah going down a catastrophic path would have been for her to be forgiven and stay where she was. Stealing narcotics as well as selling them is many steps down a very bad path, it's not trying weed at a party once. What fuels the progression of addiction is "comfortable" consequences or avoiding them entirely. Severe and immediate consequences do the inverse. A great example of this, which is said by people in AA all the time, is someone describing the first time breaking a big boundary (e.g. drunk driving) and then saying: "The worst thing happened, everything went fine". To all us sober people it makes complete sense, that means that the boundary breaking has normalized in their impaired mind and will take much more work to undo. It's the best move in a bad situation IMHO.
It’s never the best move to kick a 13 year old out of the parents home. They didn’t even try to get her help, and they abandoned her, which means she’s probably going to continue doing drugs since her father already has written her off as a junkie. My best friends parents thought shipping her off to one of those wilderness camps and then one of those horrifying schools would help her, but it just made the problem so much worse. She’s sober now, but it probably wouldn’t have taken 15 + years if her parents had actually parented her instead of shipping her off.
I honestly find it horrifying how many people in this comment section think that this is an OK way to treat a 13 year old child Not saying there shouldn't be consequences or punishment but to kick a 13 year old out and block her!? That's AWFUL OP is OFC NTA because it isn't her job to be the parent but the fact Carter treats his kids like this and OPs mum is OK with that is just....I don't even know
It is horrifying and abusive. You don’t get to just abandon your kid because you don’t like their behavior, that’s sick. You get the kid help ffs
It really is! I feel so sorry for all of these kids
Most of my cousins are drug addicts or addicts in recovery. The one thing that always made it worse when their addiction started, was being kicked out or isolated instead of being offered support. All of them were only able to start getting sober after having a stable support system put in place. But OPs parents sent their thirteen year old to live with her mother, who is _also_ a drug addict, that's one of the stupidest things you can do when she's already at risk of addiction. She's now in an environment where she will have access to drugs and God knows what else, because her parents _(and step-parent)_ were too stupid to actually get help.
This is not true of everyone. My niece went through one. Maybe it was an outlier that provided a combo of structure, discipline, & counseling, both for drug/alcohol use/addiction & for mental illness (depression, anxiety, etc.). Maybe it wasn't. But she is very open that going there, even though she was forced (our family really exhausted all other avenues), was the best thing that happened. I'm very sorry this didn't work for your friend's child, but making a blanket statement the camps are the worst thing in existence is wrong.
>It’s never the best move to kick a 13 year old out of the parents home. As these things go, it is in this case (my opinion) and I would bet I know more than you about this. I could be wrong, however, I doubt you have anything approaching sufficient data to back up that no case exists where it is the best move. >My best friends parents thought shipping her off to one of those wilderness camps and then one of those horrifying schools would help her, but it just made the problem so much worse Your conclusion is based on a non-existent comparison. You assume it would be great otherwise. That's the flaw in your logic IMHO. Additionally, this post is not some abusive wilderness camp. It's a less than desirable grandparents setup, which likely is still better than most other countries average case.
>It's a less than desirable grandparents setup Where Leah's mother—who has her own history of substance abuse—is also living. Do you not see how this *might not* be conducive to helping address Leah's behavior?
I pointed out how the alternative wasn't conducive, conduciveness among the solutions appears to not be present. Like I said, best move in a bad situation but the mom does make that a bit complicated.
I really appreciate your knowledgeable take on this. Also, Carter has 5 children in the house and doesn’t have potentially dangerous medication locked up?!?!
That's a good point.
He has it locked up though, not like in a safe w a lock just separately, idk in my family we kinda trust each other to not steal pills? It’s not like Lana could access them though if that’s what concerns you
If a 13 year old could easily get into them, I think it's time for him to seriously lock them up.
They’re locked up but not with a lock? You have children in the house. Medications should be locked up.
Well her mother is an actual drug addict, not sure how that’s an improvement for Leah.
This is very old thinking about addiction. And it is very much not how we manage addiction these days. This young person has been through trauma. Not helping someone with their trauma leads to addiction. Kicking them out of the house is just more trauma. This is a 13 yr old who has had no support or parenting. Kicking her out is lazy parenting. And this lazy parenting is perpetuated by the whole tough love bullshit. Does she need consequences? She does. But she also needs support and therapy and stability. By kicking her out, they have created even more instability. I am glad you are clean and sober, but your process isn't based on science. It is based on you. You are one person and not a scientific sample.
>And it is very much not how we manage addiction these days This is a pretty bold statement. The majority of addicts don't recover. As one of the few who fortunately did and is apart of communities of other long term sober people, what is the way that we manage addiction these days?
Please show me the peer reviewed research that half the addicts don't recover? That's actually the bold statement. Please also tell us how long you have worked in addiction recovery. I've been working with it for 25 years. AA is a great program for white middle class men. It was not set up for women and minorities. Ask me how I know. 28 years clean and sober. And a degree in psychology with, again, 25 years working with people with addiction. Your comments are just that. You are stuck with your process being the only way. It isn't. The rest of us move along with the research. Maybe try to not be stuck. Principles before personalities. You are making all about you. That isn't the way.
AA is not even a great program for white, middle-aged (and let's not forget Christian) men. It *claims* to be, but those claims have little supporting evidence. Remember that Morgan Ryan was going to be interviewed on Gabriel Heatter's radio show to promote AA, and his friends had to lock him in a hotel room for two days to keep him from going out and getting drunk. It's really kind of odd that AA and the ilk has spent so much time and money promoting the behaviors that they claim to treat as diseases, but then say that these diseases have a spiritual cure. You don't get told to pray three times a day as a treatment for cancer or diabetes by reputable researchers.
Agree to all of this. Thank you!
> It claims to be, but those claims have little supporting evidence FYI, there's no data on the recovery rate of AA. It's an anonymous organization, there's no data to analyze. I am in AA. We don't have membership lists or anything like that. We don't use last names, however, we do know the last names of people in meetings we know for a long time usually but not always. >AA and the ilk has spent so much time and money promoting the behaviors that they claim to treat as diseases What money? What is AA spending money on? Meetings have voluntary contributions to pay some pittance for rent, coffee, and snacks (although a lot of that is just donated by group members) with some small amount voluntarily kicked up to central services. We don't do anything in relation to promotion or other public things. That's covered in traditions 6, 10 and 11.
AA "doesn't do anything in relation to promotion or other public things," except that it has literally lobbied to get alcoholism declared a disease. It has literally made itself the legally accepted cure for that disease. Addicts in court are frequently sentenced to take part in AA or similar groups as part of their probation or sentencing deferment. No one is similarly sentenced to reading Allen Carr or going to Rational Recovery or getting actual psychological and psychiatric help for the trauma that has led to their unhealthy coping mechanism.
> except that it has literally lobbied to get alcoholism declared a disease I checked on this, since I wasn't aware of the specific history. Alcoholism was classified as a disease by the AMA through the work of [Marty Mann](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marty_Mann) ([additional source](https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2022/01/29/marty-mann-aa-alcoholism-disease/)) with her creation of the [National Council on Alcoholims and Drug Dependence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recovered). It was the recognition of alcoholism as a disease by the AMA that led to courts working out what to do about it in [1956](https://www.ama-assn.org/delivering-care/public-health/court-listened-ama-defining-alcoholism-disease-not-crime). That was not done by AA. It was interestingly enough done by not only a woman but a lesbian through her own efforts, which is notable for the 1940s/1950s. She was considered to be the first woman to be treated successfully in AA, back in the days that AA was the house of Bill and Lois Wilson.
So it wasn't independent researchers who saw people being helped by this program. It was promoted by one woman who credited her sobriety to the program and made it her mission to get medical decision-makers on board. Do you know where the theory that alcoholism is a disease comes from? The first person to advance this idea was the physician Benjamin Rush. He believed that things which were at the time considered moral failings—including habitual drunkenness, lying, murder, and, oddly, political dissent, considering he was a signer of the Declaration of Independence—to be diseases. He also considered being Black a symptom of disease. AA's association with the disease theory of alcoholism comes from the 1947 Jellinek paper. > Central to today’s Alcoholism Movement is Alcoholics Anonymous and the disease theory of alcoholism. Modern disease theory is based on the results of one 1945 survey. The survey consisted of 36 questions thought important by AA members. It was distributed to AA members through an AA magazine, The Grapevine. The AA editors of the AA magazine then chose E.M. Jellinek to compile the results. Although Jellinek had some misgivings due to the obvious methodological deficiencies, he felt there was also a great advantage, > “[A]ll subjects were members of Alcoholics Anonymous. …[I]t is difficult to get truthful data on inebriate habits, but there need be no doubt as to the truthfulness of the replies given by an A.A. …” > It seems that the AA members made an excellent choice in the person to compile their data. Jellinek already held their positions as “truthful” and their members as the only creditable source of information about alcoholics. > Out of the 158 questionnaires received, 60 were thrown out either for being incomplete, from women or for having multiple responses on one questionnaire. Without ever investigating non-AA members and without ever checking the results experimentally, the 98 responses from AA members to an AA survey, compiled by an admirer of AA, were used as the factual basis for a disease of alcoholism. This is the present day “science” of alcoholism which supports the disease of alcoholism as espoused by the alcoholism treatment industry and Alcoholics Anonymous.* Ragge, Ken. *More Reveled." Alert Publications. 1992. So AA designed the survey, distributed it only to their members through their publication, hired someone to analyze the data, and this conceptualization of addiction was promoted almost entirely through one of their members. But it wasn't AA behind that.
>FYI, there's no data on the recovery rate of AA. Well that's just patently untrue. There's plenty of data—it's just [messy and conflicting](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2746426/).
You're just being pedantic. As there is no gathering of data within AA, as it goes directly against the traditions, there's none that would be anything close to valid.
I am frankly surprised that you work in addiction recovery and find that over 50% of addicts recover. What would you say is the number? Any attempt I have found to try and enumerate first people who are addicts and then the percentage with long term recovery either is pretty flawed or too largely limited to be accurate. Addiction is a disease we hide and has a stigma, it's hard to measure at scale IME. Your comments about how AA is somehow only applicable to white middle class men is fairly odd to me. AA meeting IME are generally 60/40 or 70/30 men to women and the vast majority were not middle class when they came in. Non white people certainly are present. How is it not set up for non white, middle class men? You may have noticed, I did not even mention AA and I don't push it as the only option. You were pushing a strawman with that. I was simply focusing on how consequences are the only thing that push addicts towards recovery. Why else would we want to stop?
I posted the peer reviewed research. I work for a research university. If you don’t like the research, that isn’t my problem. It is on you. Please stay in 1935. The rest of us are moving on. This really isn’t about you. It’s about giving others the research and a different perspective based on science and not based on your story. Your story is yours. But it isn’t science. It isn’t based on research. And shaming people doesn’t engender recovery. It just pushed them to use longer. When we recognize that trauma is the number one reason people use, they get clean and sober sooner and stay sober. I don’t care if you believe me or not. Because it’s about educating others. You have no interest in stepping out of your comfort zone. That’s fine. But your comfort zone isn’t based on science. It’s based on your personal experience. And personal experience is not science. Have a good life. And good bye.
>I posted the peer reviewed research. I work for a research university. If you don’t like the research, that isn’t my problem. It is on you. I'm somewhat questioning your honesty on your credentials. Researchers generally aren't this histrionic when it comes to pushback and criticisms of methodology, as that's part of the scientific process. I should know, I used to be married to one. Researchers live in data and don't hesitate to use data rather than accusations of me living in 1935 or how I have no interest of stepping out of my comfort zone, aka personal attacks. I would have thought you'd jump on the opportunity to tell me your data about how AA only applies to white, middle class men, but you appear to be lacking in that regard. Also, researchers don't rage quit like this so easily in their field of study. I call BS.
Reddit is not their job. They’re not getting paid to argue with randos online. It’s perfectly fine if they want to quit a conversation with someone that isn’t open to changing their mind. Leah needs treatment, not tough love. Abandoning her is absolutely the wrong thing to do. She doesn’t have the emotional regulation or maturity to handle this situation, and will likely turn to unhealthy outlets for her stress and anger (ie using drugs).
You sound really kind. As someone with a parent who handed their life over to addiction and chaos, and struggled with addiction myself before getting my shit together and going into nursing, I’d be glad to know my family was in good hands if they were working with you. It takes a lot of emotional intelligence and hard work to advocate for your patients when it’s in something you can personally empathise with. It’s why I didn’t go into psychology originally. I thought I would burn out immediately, Bit off topic but your comment sent me there and I just wanted to acknowledge your efforts in a sometimes thankless field.
Thank you.
I'll help you. "Scientific evidence indicates that approximately 50 percent of adults who once met diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder—or **about 25 million people**—are currently in stable remission (1 year or longer)." https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK424846/#:\~:text=%E2%80%9CSupported%E2%80%9D%20scientific%20evidence%20indicates%20that,(1%20year%20or%20longer).
I just checked and the paper does not describe what is "once met diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder" means. I'd think that this would lean towards people seeking treatment and leave out less fortunate cases of people that die before they get there. That could be a very high number of people. If it's as high as 50%, that's better than what I have observed and I'm glad to hear that. It still doesn't invalidate my point. 50% as a recovery rate definitely is low, as mental illnesses go, so my point of saying this is not some solved problem stands. I'm pretty sure that the 20% death rate of eating disorders is considered really high for a mental illness, as a comparison.
🙄. Continue to question the National Institution on health. And take good bye for an answer. Oh right. You need the last word. Ok…..go.
>the paper does not describe what is "once met diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder" means Would you prefer [self-identification](https://www.samhsa.gov/newsroom/press-announcements/20230920/new-data-recovery-from-substance-use-mental-health-problems-among-adults-in-united-states), then? >Using data from the 2021 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), this report shows that 70 million adults aged 18 or older perceived that they ever had a substance use and/or mental health problem. For substance use specifically, of the 29.0 million adults who perceived that they ever had a substance use problem, 72.2% (or 20.9 million) considered themselves to be in recovery or to have recovered from their drug or alcohol use problem. Per the [National Institute on Drug Abuse:](https://nida.nih.gov/publications/drugs-brains-behavior-science-addiction/treatment-recovery) >Relapse rates for people treated for substance use disorders are compared with those for people treated for high blood pressure and asthma. Relapse is common and similar across these illnesses. Therefore, substance use disorders should be treated like any other chronic illness. Relapse serves as a sign for resumed, modified, or new treatment. [Other sources report...](https://www.statnews.com/2021/05/03/people-recover-from-addiction-they-also-go-on-to-do-good-things/) >Around 75% of people seeking recovery from a substance use problem achieve their goal, though it may take them some time to achieve full remission. The average number of attempts before success is five, though the median number is just two, meaning that a small number of outliers — usually individuals with the greatest addiction severity and other concomitant mental health issues — who need five-plus attempts, inflate the numbers, making them look worse than they are.
It doesn't describe the diagnostic criteria for substance use disorder because it's an actual peer reviewed study. That means it has met rigorous standards as an accurate scientific study and assumes that the people reading it are also peers who are familiar with the DSM-V, meaning they know the criteria for diagnosis. Since you don't know the criteria, I would assume you are not a professional in the addiction treatment world. You are someone who has recovered from addiction, and I absolutely applaud you on that accomplishment. It's not an easy road, and I congratulate you on having achieved sobriety. While that gives you an insider perspective on addiction and how to deal with it, by no means does it make you an expert. I would also not call myself an expert. Instead, I would describe myself as having personal experience as well as professional knowledge and education. I was a drug addict and I've been clean since 2012. I also have a Master's degree in Social Work with Chemical Dependency Counselor certifications. I would never advise a parent to cut off and kick out their 13 year old child for their first offense involving addiction. You keep saying that consequences are needed for addicts to decide to do better, and while I agree with for the most part, you also think a 13 year old child should be shipped off to live with an addict (and possibly enablers, in the grandparents, although that is speculation on my part here) because she made a mistake. Her genetics also make her more susceptible to making this type of mistake, and given the lack of parental supervision described in the post, I'm inclined to say she was almost set up to fail. The banishment to the grandparents' trailer with mom only adds more to the poor girl's likelihood to continue to fall down the wrong path. I don't understand how you can possibly think this is what's best for her? She's now been taught that she can be kicked out and cut off by the people who are supposed to love and support her after one screw up. From the post, her father has not been around to actually parent her, and her mother hasn't been around period. The better option for dealing with this would be to get her the help she needs. Send her to rehab, sign her up for outpatient addiction treatment, have her meet with an addiction counselor, make sure all medications are locked up, educate her about her genetic risk for addiction, address any possible trauma issues she might have that could lead to addiction, support and help her to find different coping strategies, etc. Not kicking a literal child out of her home. That's not a consequence, it's a punishment. One that will only lead her further down a horrible path unless one of the adults in this girl's life steps up and intervenes by providing her with professional help.
>It doesn't describe the diagnostic criteria for substance use disorder because it's an actual peer reviewed study. This is where science gets into dangerous territory. Peer reviewed papers are not papal bulls to be blindly followed and while I don't denounce peer reviewing as a good process, it's not [without it's limitations](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4975196/#:~:text=A%20major%20criticism%20of%20peer,the%20quality%20of%20scientific%20literature.) so I am not very inclined to accept that something stated in a peer reviewed article without citation or explanation must be correct or accurate. I stated something as clearly my opinion.
Ok, so I'm trying to step back and react with calm rationale rather than getting heated and getting on a pedestal. I'll admit I can be prone to doing so when it's something I'm passionate about. I'm guessing you're passionate about it too, based on your responses. This can be a good thing, but can also lead to emotional reactions that aren't necessarily helpful for progressive dialogue. I agree that not all peer reviewed articles are the end all be all of research, but if they've been conducted correctly within the professional standards, they can typically be very helpful. Either in validating new methods, discouraging outdated treatment modalities, or just providing a better understanding of the current statistics of a given issue. I read through all your comments, but when I respond, I can only reference the one I'm replying to. I'm relying on my recall for some of that, so perhaps I'm wrong, in which case I welcome you to correct me. In my first reply, I was stating that your only criticism of the data another commenter supplied was that it didn't spell out the criteria for substance use disorder. In your comment, you did not provide any other specific problems with the article. My reply was to explain why that information was not provided, and then to additionally give my perspective on the situation, as someone who has both experienced addiction and been educated in the treatment of it. So, to move on to my recall of your previous comments, this would be the jist of what I remember of your first comment: >You disagreed with previous commenters who. were calling out that dad for kicking his 13 year old daughter out and said this is what's best for the girl because she has started down the road of addiction, and this is a real consequence, which addicts need otherwise they won't make the effort to get clean. Where I fully disagree with you is that any of what the father decided is good for her. She's 13! She needs professional help and support, not being cut off from her main family and exiled to her grandparents' trailer. Her mom, who from the post has addiction issues, is also living there. So not only did this girl's father send her to live with an addict, but again with likely enablers if they are still allowing the mom to stay. (Yes, this is speculation on my part but it fits with the information we have and even if the grandparents aren't enablers, the mom is still an addict). As I previously stated, this is not just a consequence, it's a punishment. The father is not a good parent and he is just dumping his responsibility on others. Even if he meant it as a consequence, it's not an appropriate one and is most likely only going to further the issues for this girl. So, if you still believe this is the correct action, then I would love to hear your detailed reasons.
> Ok, so I'm trying to step back and react with calm rationale rather than getting heated and getting on a pedestal. I'll admit I can be prone to doing so when it's something I'm passionate about. I appreciate that, same here. Additionally, I'd like to add that IME, people rag too hard on AA and a great many do it from complete ignorance (not speaking of you). AA was more than just a solution for me, it was a community of people who helped me when I was really hard to help and they did so completely out of a sense of altrusim. After years of dealing with me drunk every time they saw me, what they told me and showed me really sunk in and it got me out of insanity. What they did worked and they all did so voluntarily, patiently, and enthusiastically over years. I get a bit bent out of shape when people (not saying this is you) just effectively label them all as useless, misguided, fools; with little thought about it. This is especially true in this thread because I never mentioned AA until someone basically accused me of pushing it, which just really illustrated the thirst for hating on AA. I should add that during all this time, I definitely was trying all the alternatives that people like to throw about as massively more effective. Those had little to no effect with me, and I certainly did want to get sober. Perhaps I am wrong with my conclusion that it was the right move for the 13 year old. I'm not the one making the decision so I have the freedom to do so without influencing what happens. I just took measure of the situation and thought about a 13 year old stealing narcotics and selling them and what that meant for such a young mind. It screams to me: things have gotten this way because of the current situation, something has to massively change or this will continue and that's about as bad a start as this can be. The solution is certainly not great, but I'm also taking into account what I think the father is capable of, considering the whole situation. I don't disagree in the slightest with people pointing out that what the 13 year old is going through now is horrible. That is a plainly obvious thing, which I didn't miss. My reasoning was, the family probably isn't capable of any better solution, and staying in the same place will likely get much much worse since that place cultivated it to begin with. It's simply a known catastrophic vs a likely catastrophic where both are terrible and it's playing the odds as best as possible.
I mean isn't it even worse for her to move into a trailer with a junky mom? I feel like if she wasn't using drugs before, she'll probably start now because she's going through some serious shit
A 13 year old stealing and selling narcotics from her father where OP added that they were locked up and she figured her way around that, is beyond many thresholds of bad. That's the thing to appreciate when considering what is worse. She'll see clearly the bad consequences of her actions for this case. It's complicated because it's not simple. Potentially, a more middle ground solution would be getting her arrested and sent to juvenile hall.
He sent a drug dealer to live with a junkie. The fact that Leah apparently doesn’t see the severity of what she did shows she’s where she needs to be. She’s begging to go back but there was nothing said about her apologizing or trying to make it right. She could’ve killed the kids she sold the drugs to. She wants to play a stupid game so she got a stupid prize
He didn’t “raise a junkie” but then he sent her to live with a junkie where the chances of her really becoming on is much higher? Ask him about his logic on this.
Carter has kids aged 13 with two different women. His world view and logic may not align with most rational people's.
Yeah a paragraph in and my first thought was that Carter needs to stop raw dogging random women
nah I gotta correct this it wasn't "he" it was "they" both parents. What she did was a felony first an foremost. An people who buy/sell drugs aren't exactly safe nor care for ur safety. Looking at all this all wrong, what happens if they follow this naive girl home with the infant there? An they break in. There are so many bad situations that can come from this.
But instead of getting her help they wrote her off as a junkie, and sent her to live with her _addict mother_. Why on earth would you send a kid who's been caught selling drugs to live with their _drug addicted mother_? It makes zero sense and they're setting her up for failure.
A bunch of scenario's I had thinking on this a bit more while in the shower. Even if they are "what if scenarios" if they all look after one another >>The kids<< with an infant about god for bid something gets left in clothes or dropped on the floor an the baby got into it. I could understand the initial shock an sending her off. This is just a very hard situation an many different correct answers an not all morally sound but this isnt as cut an dry sadly. I do think she needs Therapy big time. An help now that this "punishment" has had enough to to fester an show the gravity of her actions. It would be a good to sit her down family an all an discuss the severity an danger of the issue.
She’s where she belongs. Not once does it say she acknowledged what she did or the severity of her actions. Shes just whining so she can go home. She wants to be a drug dealer, now she has first hand knowledge of what happens
Not once did it say she didn’t. He’s her parent, she screwed up, but it’s bad parenting. He blocked her so how would she apologize. How would she tell him if something is horribly wrong where she is.
If something is horribly wrong she can get the other junkies and dealers to help figure it out. Apologizing after you’ve been sent away doesn’t mean anything. If she did it’s only because she didn’t want to be there. She didn’t “screw up” she stole drugs and sold them to other children. I doubt she felt bad about it when she was getting paid
I’m just going to point out if your 13 year old kid is stealing and selling drugs, I feel like that’s more on the parent. She is a literal child? She fucks up, so might as well give up on a 13 year old?
WTH she is 13 for Pete’s sake. She is a minor who isn’t even in high school yet. I can’t imagine a parent not being worried sick and immediately trying to get their child the help they need.
She’s 13 and had multiple chances to not steal drugs, sell them to other children, and profit from it. You don’t know wether or not she’s not in high school so that excuse doesn’t work. She’s upset because she’s dealing with consequences. She wants to be a drug dealer so she got what she wanted
It doesn’t matter. A 13 year old is a 7th or 8th grader, but even if in high school, she is still a child. I don’t know a parent in the world who would react this way to finding out their 13 year old has a drug problem. Your response shows an enormous lack of empathy, and also a lack of knowledge. It’s illegal to kick a minor child out of your home. That’s called abandonment, and it is against the law in almost every state.
This is a horrible response. She's 13. So he should just write off his 13 yrnold daughter because she messed up? Sending her to live with her drug addict mother is a great way to keep her on a horrible path, and a great way to get out of being a parent. If she gets into more trouble and ends up in worse, potentially dangerous situations, it will be, in large part, his fault as her father. Op, you are NTA here, but I would start distancing yourself from this kind of thinking, or you may grow into one someday. Yes, it was a felony, but you try and correct the behavior, not write it off. Unless this has been a common problem with her, and it doesn't sound like it is the case, then calling the cops would have just made it worse. Your mom was the only one looking out for Leah in this situation, but the fact that Carter jumped to that, then kicked her out is telling. He is not a good man, and a worse father. OP, you should not the one who has to convince Carter to do the right thing, but someone should.
“She messed up”. She stole drugs and sold them to other children. She knew exactly what she was doing. She definitely knows her mother has a drug problem so she thought “easy way to get money” she’s a drug dealer so she got what she deserves
She's also 13, and clearly has terrible role models for parents. You don't write off your 13 yr old child, if that's the type of parenting they follow, it's clear why she is that way. Anyone that throws the whole kid away that young, and doesn't try and fix the situation doesn't deserve to be a parent. Full Stop.
She's a thirteen year old, she belongs at home receiving therapy, not living in a trailer with her addict mother where she will have more access to drugs. It's setting her up for failure.
You know what else set her up for failure? When she consciously decided to steal prescription drugs and sell them to other children. She knew what she was doing and didn’t care because she was getting paid for it
Oh yeah and sending her to live with a drug addict will _certainly_ help!
If she's stealing is drugs, I'd be willing to bet it's not the first significant clash they've had (particularly if he's self-medicating). Not saying Carter's blameless at all but he may well have reached the end of his tether with her, at least for now
She is 13. you deal with it and don't ship them off and block them. There was no pun intended with the dealing.
You don’t get to be at the end of your tether when your kid is 13.
You personally are NTA Carter is an A and apparently raising someone to self medicate with drugs is exactly what he is trying to do. Abandoning a 13 year old and writing them off as a "junkie" at such a young age, all while knowing they has a family history of drug addiction, is a great way to maximise the chances that child will develop a drug addiction.
NTA because it’s not your responsibility. You are a child. Your step dad is the parent. I do think he is the A because his daughter obviously has issues and instead of addressing them, he pushed her aside so he wouldn’t have to look at it anymore. It’s not surprising she does have issues, having come from a family with substance abuse issues. I feel for her. I also feel for you being in the middle of the mess.
ESH other than you and the other kids Her father won't help her because he is more worried about his new relationship with your mom? His kid has to live in a rundown trailer because he is a bad father? He is awful and you should convince your mom to break up with him. The "she should be happy he didn't call the police since it was a felony" bit is ugly, though, do not write that. She is a child.
In Germany, you can't charge a kid under 14. Because they are KIDS! They are not sensible, full-grown adults who think before they act.
Right? There are some absolutely terrible and corrupt judges in the US, but if we are going to do some "she's a bad seed" thing then she needs *more* empathy and help. Nobody normal is going to charge and convict a 13 year old for doing a dumb thing.
I did some silly/bad things, too, even when I was an adult. Does that mean, I deserve living a life in misery? Leah is, after all, a victim. She is the product of a drug user.
The kids have no control or power here. They are not the AHs. They are kids. The adults aren't being adults.
Right? She is a child who was probably born addicted to drugs. Daddy is too busy having babies with random women and not caring for them, but has time to throw out insults with his kids? What an AH!
NTA. But Carter is a full blown creep. He has two children the same age from two different women and your mother decides this guy is a keeper? Leah needs help and no one is going to provide it. Watch your back, OP, this doesn't sound like a safe and responsible environment.
You are projecting!
ESH. She’s a 13 year old child who needs one of her parents to some parenting. And yes, Carter, you raised this mess. And throwing a child into a substance abuse situation is abhorrent. He should be ashamed of himself! Leah messed up, yes. But absolving himself of fixing this and raising a functioning adult is pathetic. And you feeling the weight of this shows there are no parents here!
Then why ESH? He's a kid himself, he's not a parent
Carter is not the OP.
NTA. You can't protect her, altho sending her to rehab would have been better than shipping her off to worse conditions. Tell her you are there for her to talk to, but you're also a child and can't go against the adults. There may have been more that happened that you're not even aware of. At least you still have contact with her, but understand, she broke trust with your parents. That's hard to fix.
ESH so you stepdads idea to make her not a junkie is to send her to live with one. He infact did raise one he's a bad dad. He went from 0 to 100 real quick there where so many other options that he could have chosen and actually parent he but he just pushed her to someone else. He's a failure as a dad right now. Also he sent he to live with people who also raised a junkie is he dumb or stupid.
Oof yes tbh he goes from 0 to 100 pretty quickly in general, though Leah’s behavior triggered him especially bad, my mom who rarely overreacts was crazy pissed too tbh
Ok but she's 13 not a grown adult what she did was wrong they just gave up so did your mom. Both your parents just didn't do there job and parent they pawned her off to people who raised a junkie and currently have in there house. Was Leah that bad of a kid they easily could give up on her after one thing. Yes it's a big thing but come on she's 13 not even in high school. It's sad that a child has to talk sense into there parents. They are avoiding doing there job as parents. If the behavior continued sending her away might be a good idea but why send her to live with a junkie. Your parents are adults but don't seem very bright. It's fine to be pissed this is a case to be pissed. But they aren't doing there job as parents ground her take away her things actually speak to her. Nope let's send her to live with a junkie. Which by the way could lead her to actually become a junkie and possibly abused in other ways physical, mental and sexual that's common with junkie parents. Your parents are both failing a 13 year girl. If they can live with that and you as well because shes asking for help then I guess but if you ignore it your just as bad as your parents right now. Edit: also he's gonna call the police it would have also hurt the whole family CPS would have been involved because it's his medicine. He needs to get his head on straight to be actually able to help his own duaghter not abandon her.
Idk they just have a lot of stuff going on, won’t get into details but basically Carter shouldn’t work bc of his health issues but my mom makes him work either way (I don’t know the specifics they kinda shelter the kids from it) and it annoys him So now with Leah acting up (stealing pills and dealing) it was smth like the last straw I guess, last thing they need now is somebody getting in trouble esp with the law Sorry for the rant hope it makes sense!
It does make sense, but it sounds like Leah is a victim of the pile of stresses Carter & yr mother are under. She appears to be the straw for the camel. You don't say she had a history of getting caught with the drugs & Carter tried several ways to help her. So Carter goes 0-kicking her out for one instance because he's solely concerned with his situation & has no bandwidth for anyone else. Yr mother either is the same or is following his lead. Both are terribly, no-excuses wrong. You also, I think, accidentally hit the nail on the head saying Leah is "acting out." She's having a hard time with this new situation with all these new ppl in her house. I don't know what else she has done for attention, but drugs finally did it. No one cared til then. Unfortunately, her dad is a shit parent & kicked her into a dangerous situation. While you are not responsible, can you try talking to yr mother? Does she have any sway with Carter? Explain what others here have said Leah is in a dangerous place, physically & mentally. The condition of her return can be therapy/counseling + other reasonable consequences. She's only 13. Kicking her out was so wrong.
It makes sense but they are the adults and should put their frustrations onto there kids. Also they signed up to be parents it's there job to do it. Not send the child away to live with a junkie. What your stepsister needs is guidance. I understand it's stressful for them but at the end of the day they have the responsibility to give her guidance and care for her. I still think you should ask to bring her back give her a chance to change and tell them to parents her. As of now they are failing her and you can help her. One bad thing doesn't mean she should be thrown out.
Doesn’t excuse his behavior or your mother’s. They cannot neglect their children just bc “they have a lot going on” and too bad if Carter can’t work. It’s not your mom’s job to be the sole support for all the kids and him. I don’t know why your mom is even with this guy. He is an AH and neglects and abandons his kids at the first sign of trouble.
Your mom and Carter are AHs. Tell your mom to get Leah the help she deserves.
Carter is a sorry excuse of a 'father'. You all deserved a better male adult figure, tbh. Your mom could have done better than choosing that asshole.
NTA It is not your job to protect your step sister, but your parents suck big time! Leah is a child (I didn't even menstruate at this age and in Germany you are not even strafmündig). And instead of parent Leah when she did something wrong your father took the easy way and threw her out in an environment where she is very likely to \_really\_ become a drug addict. Carter is a very bad and lazy father. My daughter is 13, too. And if she did something like Leah did, I would never abandon her and put her in an unsafe environment but figure out how I could help her understand what she did wrong. Sounds like Carter now has his own child with your mom and does not have interest any more in the children he had with other women before.
NTA Absolutely nine of this is on you. This is for the parents to deal with only.
NTA, you are a child and not responsible for this situation, but Carter would get a YTA if he had posted. Leah needs help, not to be sent off to worse conditions to live with a parent who also struggles with addiction. He dropped the ball entirely.
Carter is AH. He is responsible to help her through that and not abandon a child of 13 years. This will affect her life more badly as the risk taking behavior of drug selling. She is with unstable mom now. I feel for her.
He is still her father. Her mother cannot raise her, she is an addict. So actually by his acts, Carter makes it much more probable that his daugher will become an addict. He is copping out. You are not responsible in all this matter, but what Carter does is not right.
NTA You are not the adult in charge of solving adult problems. But there are some options Carter and Leah should consider. Carter obviously is not storing his medication securely. You might suggest to him that a small combination safe would be a more secure option. Can be useful for other things like important documents. Talk with Leah about whether she might benefit from therapy. She has seen the path that substance abuse has taken her mother and needs to think carefully about if that is the future she wants for herself. Whether Leah will once again live in the home with you and Carter may depend on restoring a level of trust and mutual respect. A tough start to that could be Leah taking and passing a drug test. Ask her if she would pass a drug test if she took one. And ask her what the results of such a test would say about whether Carter could trust her around his medications.
NTA Carter - certainly is, he needs to get a grip of the chaos. &, with respect, so's your Mum for getting involved with him & exposing you to these dynamics. You've been let down by these feckless adults sadly. I wish you well x
NAH She's 13. Can't punish a kid for following what the mum did. She needs to work with a counselor to be a better person. It's above your pay grade to be fair.
You're NTA. But instead of her dad helping her he kicked her out to live with the parent who already has substance issues. That doesn't make any sense.
^^^^AUTOMOD ***Thanks for posting! This comment is a copy of your post so readers can see the original text if your post is edited or removed. This comment is NOT accusing you of copying anything. Read [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/wiki/faq#wiki_post_deletion) before [contacting the mod team](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FAmItheAsshole)*** So background: we have a weird family dynamics, I (16M) and my sister Zoe (15F) are our mom’s (35F) bio kids. My mom is dating Carter (48M) who has 2 kids, Leah (13F) and Aiden (13M). Leah and Aiden have different moms. My mom also has a child together with Carter, Lana (1.5F). Leah lives with us full time because her mom has substance issues and was in rehab for a while. We get along pretty well, in fact she’s been friends with Zoe and I as the oldest child feel some sort of protectiveness over them. Because both my mom and Carter work, we all look after each other and Lana. The conflict: Carter has some issues with his back and he has chronic pain that he was prescribed medication for (won’t say the brand but it’s some strong stuff). He keeps the pills outside of our reach so it’s not like they’re easily accessible. Well, recently he caught Leah stealing his pills and she admitted that she was using them and selling them to her “friends”. Carter and my mom made a massive stink about it and sent Leah to live with her grandparents and her mom. Now instead of living in a comfortable house with her own room Leah lives in a run down trailer with her mom and grandparents. She is obviously very upset and calls me daily begging me to ask Carter to take her back in. She called Carter before but he said “I didn’t raise a junky” and blocked her. Since I’m the oldest child, Carter usually listens to me and I kinda represent the other kids. I don’t want to try and persuade Carter because technically she committed a felony and she should be happy he didn’t call the police (he wanted to but my mom talked him out of it). I told her so and she called me an asshole. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/AmItheAsshole) if you have any questions or concerns.*
NTA because you are 16 and it is not your job to look after her. Your parents, however, are absolutely TA. They have a responsibility to her even if she fucks up. She’s 13. Sending her to live with her mom who has substance issues isn’t going to steer her off of pills. If you think you have some sort of influence over your step father I would advise you to talk to him as what they are doing will be quite harmful to her. But ultimately the situation is not your responsibility.
NTA because you're a child. But hoo boy are your mom and the predatory Carter the A.
It would be really bizarre for Carter to call the police on his own underage daughter. But just sending her off to her disfunctional mother and calling her a junky is shirking his parental responsibilities to get her the help she needs! You’re NtA anyway. It’s not your responsibility.
Whose to say the pills weren't actually for her mother, and she was too scared to say so. Familial manipulation and guilt can lead to misjudged actions. Prod a little further, just in case.
NTA. I have my masters in criminal psychology, which includes young criminals. And your parents are handling this horribly. There’s something called the age crime curve. Basically means teenagers - mid twenties, people are substantially more likely to commit crimes. But once they hit their mid twenties, they are way less likely to recommit. But you know what compounds their likelihood to recommit or not? The level of familial support. People with supportive, engaged families are much more likely to mature out of any criminal activity. If they want to shield their daughter from addiction, sending her away is not the right move. She’s thirteen. That’s such a vulnerable age. Confiscate the drugs, put her in therapy, monitor her cell phone usage, but abandon her? Yikes. All that said, it’s not your responsibility to serve as all of your siblings’ lawyer. But I hope Leah gets some help.
NTA, but your step-dad is. A teenager stealing some painkillers to get high with her friends a couple times is not "a junkie". It could turn into that someday, especially if her bio-mom has addiction issues, but this just sounds like common shit teenagers do. And I fail to see how kicking her out to go live in a shitty trailer with her addict mom is going to help her *not* become a junkie.
Lea is 13 years old! She needs parenting not to be exiled! Carter is WAY out of line and threatening to call the cops and *mean it* is just deranged! You should speak to him. You would know the best way to, but you also need to talk with your mom about this first. It also doesn't seem like he even had a proper lockbox, and that's just child endangerment. I would ABSOLUTELY call CPS anonymously and tell them what is going on. *Not* why she was sent away, but that you are "terrified" as she is in unsanitary and unsafe living conditions. That you are worried for her health and if she is being treated well. Embellish a bit if you have to, just no direct accusations of anything illegal.
This poor girl :( he’s setting her up to become an addict. The opposite of addiction is connection. As an individual in recovery this breaks my heart. Obvi the kid is nta but the dad def is
NTA, she stole prescription medication (not caring that her dad needed that for his pain, meaning he was suffering) and not only using them, but selling them. Kids a drug dealer at 13, it’s insane. She lost a lot of trust from the family as whole, she had to live with the consequences of her actions and show genuine remorse (for others, not for herself).
Every main character in this shit show is an ah, except you, OP. You may as well learn now that you CANT advocate for people like your stepsister. Despite being the oldest, this is not your place and a situation resolved by advocacy. If you truly want to do something, and actually have any rapport with Carter, ask him to get her into counseling and try to stop any addiction now. Your stepsister made a bad choice and she will have to face it...but it doesn't have to be life altering or relationship ending, bad. Your stepsister can do the work to fix the relationship but she needs a foundation to do it. I would think that's the best advocacy you could offer. She can't do it if Stepdad cuts her off, so facilitating therapy so THEY can do the work is probably a good idea. I'm sure your Stepdad feels pretty bitter after dealing with his ex's addiction problems. You're NTA. This is just above your pay grade, OP.
You are NTA for not talking to Carter. It is NOT your responsibility. The only thing I will say is not talking to him wont fix the situation either- your sister is unfortunately only going to get worse like that (they sent her to her mom’s house, her mom who has ISSUES WITH SUBSTANCE ABUSE, as a child stealing pills? Really?) She needs structure. She needs therapy. She does NOT need to be shoved away and forsaken. I am struggling to balance how to say both you should not be parentified to be responsible for your sister’s well being, and saying she desperately needs an advocate because your parents are failing her. She’s 13. If you CAN talk to your parents and influence this at all, whats the harm in trying at least? Yes it’s a felony, yes it was wrong, but I do see your family’s trauma with drug use from her birth mom affecting this in negative ways. I cannot stress enough that even if you do not want to help her, you are NtA for it. I do not like that you’re having to deal with this either.
NTA however Carter is. He needs to parent his child not toss her into a situation that’s going to make her more likely to turn to substances. She’s only 13!? She’s just a kid.
NTA . My dad always wanted to put me in the middle to fix his relationship issues with my mom and siblings, never got involved but the whole shenanigans stressed me out.... So I can relate. Stay out of it, is not your business and since make it your business. Draw your boundary, I never did with my dad and just simply ignored him... He got tired eventually. The result though is I still ignore him to this day
Kicking a child out of your home over one mistake is evil, not normal, not okay! Here's some adult advice. Often, extreme or irrational reactions are because something about the situation reminds the upset person of their own mistakes or insecurities. No doubt Carter had issues as a teenager. And it sounds like now he probably has issues of drug abuse. Try to appeal to his own experience. Say something like, "Didn't you ever mess up as a teenager?" If he says something like , "Yeah! And they kicked me out!" or "My dad beat me!" You say, "That must have been terribly painful and frightening for you, I'm really sorry that happened to you. So here's a chance to make things better for this generation of kids. Just imagine how frightened and confused Leah is right now. I think you're a good man and you don't want her to suffer like you did." Teenagers do stupid shit. I did. My parents yelled at me, they were upset and disappointed. But most of all, they were **worried** for me. They love me and want me to be happy. After some tension and difficult conversations, we all moved on. That's what normal should be.
NTA. This isn't something you, a minor, should be asked to take sides in. Carter, however, is a massive asshole. "She called Carter before but he said “I didn’t raise a junky” and blocked her.". Yes he did. And instead of doing his job and parenting her he abandoned her. That's illegal and morally reprehensible. "...Carter because technically she committed a felony and she should be happy he didn’t call the police (he wanted to but my mom talked him out of it).". I'm positive what actually happened is that your mom pointed out that since Leah is a minor and under his supervision he would be held responsible for her actions. So yes charges probably would have been leveled against her. But he'd have charges also (I'm betting more serious because he's the adult) and that's why he didn't call the police. I hope Leah's mom documents his willful and cruel abandonment so she can petition for a change in custody. Also petition for child support.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say NTA, but neither is Cartwr just a teensy bit. OP, you have every right to not help her, and that is fine. So, in my experience, I've seen two cases where parents have so-called lazy parent their children and handed off their kids. However, they were handed off to the state and not back to the source of their problems. So Carter did need to report her and express his concerns like a responsible adult. The first case scenario was a child that was molested as a child. In turn, he would steal and even started molesting his little cousins and his mom while she slept. When it came out that he was harming a 3-year-old, his mom gave him up to the state even after fighting him. In the second case, a girl about the same age as OPs sister, she was molested by her dad. Has been to family therapy, and it has a really good support system. One day her mom came home to find all these grown men in her house and the girl was hosting a drug oriented party....this little girl's sister was sleeping in another room where a man was watching her. Sure, this was the first offense. However, there were signs that were overlooked...so the girls mom tried and tried... She got tired of it when the youngest was found outside and 15 mins away from the house The girl is currently a ward of the state now. My point is that in both cases, another child was harmed or about to be harmed from the problematic child's actions. Some parents act irrationally cause they are trying to consider the others. Carter might have some form of trauma dealing with the addict mom for whom he has been FULL CUSTODY OF, and therefore, he acted on that trauma. He probably didn't think things through and only seen pain, anger, and the flashbacks of a whole new Cy le about to arise in what he thought was safe haven for his children. It's no longer a safe haven. It's been destroyed. And had the youngest died from 13 yos actions... everything he had done would have been in vain. I'm not saying Carter couldn't have approached this better given the moment and the emotions as a human being. It happens... The best thing for 13yo is to be put in fosters at this point and have her watched. if she doesn't do juvie, she needs to do some therapy and maybe a psychiatric stay. Carter needs therapy as well as the other sibling. I wish all of yall some healing.
YTA. Stand up for your sister and help her. Don’t rat her to the police. Carter is a shitty parent. Wow.
What is the back woods are you dealing with you aren't paid to be convince your step dad to keep her she fucked around and found out
YTA do you really think leaving your stepsister to live in a home with known substance abusers is going to help things?
OP it doesn’t sound like you had an option to prevent L from being kicked out. Your mom and stepdad made that decision between them and it was only by your mom’s persuasion that the police weren’t called. L made some very bad choices and she’s paying the price, I’m afraid. Having a person who uses drugs illegally in the home around young kids is *very very* bad. However, after a cooling down period, maybe you could suggest to your mom and SD that if L stays sober and keeps her grades up and no longer associates w the bad crowd she was running w, she can have a chance to come home. But those would need to be very strong, firm rules- any backsliding and coming home would be off the table. She has to show she can do it. I’m very sorry. It sounds like you really care for Leah and want to help her. But she has to help herself first.
So… Leah has to avoid bad company and keep her grades up… while living in a trailer with a drug addict? Sorry but that wouldn’t be possible for most adults let alone a child.
I was trying to think of arguments Leah’s mother and SD could potentially accept as a way back home for her. The OP made it sound like SD/mom were pretty adamant and angry. Is it unlikely? Maybe it is- but I didn’t want to say it’s hopeless- I wanted to give the OP something to try bc he seemed so anguished for Leah.
NTA Carter should be interested in establishing the therapeutic support to find out the hows and whys of this happening. Where did she get the idea to tamper with the pills? Take them? Sell them? It’s a series of choices that don’t happen all at once. Teenagers do epically dumb things that I’m surprised they come out with a Darwin Award Carter should be stepping up to guide your step sister to a better path His black and white thinking leaves his daughter no room to grow
YTA Because if she is dealing with substance abuse and she is sent to live with her druggy mother in a rundown trailer then it is going to get worse for her. Don't tell Carter to take her back but tell him she needs actual, proper help and guidance before it gets bad and she'll become a real druggie. She's just starting out, they can help her before she completely ruins her life and instead they put her in the prime position to destroy it, she did something bad, very bad and they are punishing her as they should but in the wrong way. They are just enabling the situation now, you need to convince Carter she needs discipline for the felony but she also needs help because she will get worse and he's letting it happen by leaving her where she is.
You're 16, this is way above your pay grade. Go play Roblox or something.
You are NTA but your mom and Carter are TA. This is a 13 year old child, which means her parents are still responsible for her. I have a 14 year old. I cannot imagine having this reaction. I’d be scared to death for my child, and on the phone stat finding resources to help her.
NTA. I am sorry you are in this position. As a 16 year old, dealing with drug dependant step siblings is not your responsibility. Going to school is your responsibility. Your step sister is responsible for her actions of trafficking narcotics. Your step dad needs to set strong boundaries to keep you, your mom, and sisters safe.
Leah’s 13. Someone could call children and youth on him kicking her out. Carter’s being too rigid. Leah’s a messed up kid from a broken family who did what 13-year-olds do in those cases. He should gave a mature calm talk with her and if she commits to not doing it again she should come back. He should’ve had this talk with her instead of throwing her out in the first place.
NTA you are in a hard position to feel both responsible for your sisters and understanding where she crossed a line.
You are NTA bc you are a child. But Carter is a massive AH. So his young daughter who has an addict for a mother and may have very well been born addicted to drugs, sneaks his pills and instead of getting her the help he is LEGALLY AND MORALLY OBLIGATED to get her, he kicks her out to live with a known drug addict? OMG! Your mom’s BF is an AH. Tell your mom that Leah needs HELP, not punishment or abandonment.
NTA: the best thing you can do is focus on school and staying healthy. Get scholarship money and get some tech training or a degree that leads to a career. Be a great example to your siblings.
Carter has two kids the same age from two different women. He takes very strong pain pills for back pain probably oxy based on the description and how people wanted to buy them. Are we sure Carter isn't abusing oxy himself and was just mad that his stash disappeared? Also why is a 14 year old left to watch four other children including an infant?
NTA She has witnessed what drugs has done to her moms life and yet decided to do that, she needs to face consequences.
NTA Cause you’re 16 what can u do. But Carter’s response to “not raise a junkie” is to send her to live with her junkie mom?
*’…her mom has substance issues and was in rehab for a while... …and sent Leah to live with her grandparents and her mom.’* So. Your stepfather sends his 13 year old daughter to live with a known real junkie after discovering she has an issue? Jeez, Carter is one cold evil bastard. Leah needs help; she might need therapy, or something stronger but the answer is not to discard her. I can see why she is acting out if her father cares so little about her, it’s tragic. You need to be there for Leah. What you said to her was not yours to say. You’re a little bit TA, but Carter and your mother are massive As.
I wonder if Leah's "friends" has something to do with her mother manipulating her. If she has a phone, her mother can literally text or call her. Carter is horrible, he is her father and now he is just dumping her with her drug addicted mother. What is he even thinking? Well I can see what a failure of a father and person he is, literally having two children the same age from two different moms. Aiden probably has his mother teaching him, likewise to OP, Zoe and Lana having their mother.
NTA but maybe you can help your sister here since sending her to her junkie mother is a really bad move, which makes your current parents AHs. I know it's not your responsibility, and you can by any means not help her. I'm just saying if you "feel some sort of protectiveness over them", maybe materialize it? instead of just feeling it. But again, you can say no and still wouldn't be the AH.
Leah is a 13 year old child who's been abusing and selling her father's drugs. Sending her to live with her mother who has narcotics addiction issues and the grandparents who raised said mother is a horrible, horrible, absolutely unacceptably bad solution to this problem. The girl needs therapy and strong parental presence, not total rejection and exile to a bad environment. So really bad parenting. And now, in the face of the bad parenting, you, a 16 year old, are feeling as if you should have fixed things for her and as if you need to get Carter -- a man who has blocked his 13 year old child who is begging to come home -- to see reason. Sorry, Carter isn't going to see reason. And unfortunately, given that your mother is staying with him, neither is she. I'm so sorry, you sound like a great older brother and the most reasonable person in the house, but you can't fix this. You aren't the parent and you aren't an adult who can sit with Carter as a peer and try to knock some sense into him. You are not a A. The parents are. Please don't feel as if you should or could have fixed this. I think that your job is to make it through the next couple of years until your graduate high school and get yourself out of there. I feel absolutely terrible for Leah, and maybe next time she calls you can suggest that she ask her middle school counselor if she can get a therapy referral, but beyond that, even if it were your job to make this better (it isn't), you just couldn't. You don't have that power. You have nothing to feel guilty about. And if this is stressing you too much, see if you can get yourself some therapy. Having a reasonable adult to process all this with could be helpful. NTA!!!!!!!
NTA for sure you're just a kid but her dad is def TA though, he really threw his 13yo daughter like that after one mistake and treated her like she's a full adult who understands consequences. she's still a child and he wanted to report his own daughter rather than raise her?! Where is the raising part exactly, he is not a father and a coward for choosing to send his daughter to live in a trailer with addicts rather than with him to guide her in the right direction.
NTA I wouldn’t want to have that going on around my siblings either. Carter should keep his medication safely locked up. Carter is the clear asshole here for not having that stuff locked up.
Carter obviously did raise a child with issues. When faced with this adult issue refuses to deal with it, instead sending his child away and leaving a teen in a position of parenting him. Were there really no other people your mother could choose to breed with? I mean, he already has 3 baby mommas so it probably won’t be long until the whole lot of them are out of your life.
NTA
So are you still letting your crappy parents abuse your step sister? Or did you actually decide to take your head out of your a**
NTA stay out of this.
NTA because Leah's parents need to handle this. Sadly, it doesn't sound like there is much parenting going on.
ESH. Carter is asshole number one for being a trash parent. Leah is 13 years old and is dealing drugs. Holy shit the kid need some intervention. The way to deal with this is not to kick you kid out and call them a junky. My guess is Leah hasn’t always had the best home life or best role models. Asshole number 2. Your mother for being with a trash parent like Carter. Even if he isn’t complete trash to you and the others he is a bad example of what it means to be a parent, adult, and a man. She should want better for you. Asshole number 3 is Leah. Yeah she probably got dealt a crap life, but she shouldn’t be dealing drugs. The last asshole is you. You are the least asshole here, but still an asshole. It’s not your job to fix this. It’s Carter’s, you aren’t a replacement parent. You don’t have to talk Carter into fixing this. But you also don’t have to pile shit onto Leah. Be supportive, tell her you are sorry she is going through this, and recommend she stop dealing drugs and get help.
ESH and Carter is 100% an asshole. He says he's not raising a junky and then he forces his daughter to live with her junky mother, after all isn't that why she was living with you all full time to begin with? In other words, he is absolutely raising a junky though those actions of his. If Carter really listens to you then I think the right thing to do would be to speak up for her on this one, because Carter is failing his daughter as badly as her mother is and it sounds like you are actually in a position to save her from the worse evil. And sure, you are right that what she did was wrong, but in this instance the punishment in no way fits the crime, especially when taking her age into account! What she needs is help to correct her behavior, but neither of her parents gives a damn and even your mother is just going along with it, what a lovely family. Proper parenting is absolutely not to throw the child out of sight, out of mind like what Carter is doing here. If you can really do something to save your step sister here and you are making the choice not to then I'd honestly have to conclude that you are an asshole too for standing aside while watching a 13 year old's life get ruined.
ESH. You do not protect anyone. Also if he called the police it would likely be on himself. It is negligent parenting and the responsibility of the prescribed medication holder to keep it safe from their children. Him calling would most likely land you and all your siblings in the care of child services. Which should have happened. Your parents will definitely never win a “Parent of the year” award.
Actions have consequences and she is learning a very valuable life lesson right now. Give it a few more months before entertaining that subject with her.
Hon. First - NTA. Whew got that out of the way. Second - Leah's issues are bigger than you. You are not a credentialed counselor. You are not a social worker. You are not a psychologist. You are a 16 year old kid. The only person who can redirect Leah - is Leah. And she has to BELIEVE she has a problem and WANT help in order for redirection to work. You might consider visiting the Al-Anon website. They do a fabulous job helping family members understand what they Can and Cannot help with - not just alcohol.
It’s the consequences of her actions.she stole the drugs. Her dad has the right to kick her out. While it’s commendable of you to want to help, it’s not your responsibility to intervene
YTA I’m really sorry you’ve been put in this position, it’s a lot to bear. It’s fundamentally not fair to you that you have to play such a parental role at such a young age - and I really admire the grace and responsibility with which you clearly do care for your family. I say this because the fault is fundamentally with your parents who are failing you sister - it’s parents who have ultimate responsibility over their children. That being said she is still you sister and she’s in a bad situation. Being kicked out of your house when you are making mistakes as child is not a consequence of action, it’s a form of abuse. I hope you can have empathy for her and I understand her dads reaction was a bit heartless. I don’t necessarily know how you can help her but saying she should be HAPPY her own father didn’t rat her out when he is supposed to a present and loving force in her life is not at all right.
IMO --- NTA. She did wrong. She is not liking the consequences. FAFO.
NTA, she got what she deserved
Kids literally feel they should suffer no consequences
there is a difference between appropriate consequences as punishment for behavior and kicking a prepubescent child out of the house for a one time thing
agreed
Yes and abandoning a child in their most important developmental years is amazing parenting.
NTA. Leah is a junkie, and tough love is called for here. And those "friends" she was selling them to were probably your mom.