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Originally Posted by CopperStar
So how would you handle the other side of the coin. Like for example, if you were in my shoes, and it turns out an affair is happening, you saw the warning signs, and then your mother gets an STD, and confronts you about never telling her what you saw - what would your response be? Would you feel guilty? Would "it was none of my business" be a cowardly cop-out?
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I believe that like attracts like. Your mother and stepfather are both immature and have issues. They are compatible. You know, rarely do I say exactly what I think because frankly, I don't think people really want to hear it - but I'm going to go out on a limb here and trust that even if you don't - you'll appreciate the honesty.
Your biological mother married an insecure, immature, unfaithful and potentially abusive man and brought him into your life. She has a responsibility to you first and she failed when she married this guy. Now I stand behind the idea I presented before that like attracts like and however different they may be - they have about the same level of maturity.
Rather than fix herself, she tried to marry a solution. She failed. You are suffering now because she put her wants before your needs. Would you try to help a drug addict who was still using drugs or would you require, at the very least, that they put the drugs down first before you helped them? Well mom is an addict. Instead of putting drugs into her system to make her feel normal or acceptable, she uses emotional games.
If she was in therapy, trying to talk your step-dad into marriage counseling, making any positive step in the right direction of becoming more healthy and stopping with the same ineffectual and unhealthy behaviors that led her to this man in the first place - then yeah, tell her. But she isn't. She brought this on herself and it is not your responsibility to save her from herself. When the drug addict spends their rent money on drugs, do you pay their rent for them?
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Originally Posted by CopperStar
In other words I am looking for your reasoning as to why not saying anything would be the ethically right thing to do, so that I can understand it for myself. I want to feel that what I choose is right, but I need to understand it before I can feel it. I have to be able to explain it to myself and make sense of it.
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I pretty much said it all above but we do not help the people we love by shielding them from the consequences of their actions. She picked him - at both her and your expense. Let her pay the bill. I'm feeling a lot of co-dependency in this family.
Quote:
Originally Posted by CopperStar
Part of it is that if someone were cheating on me, and a loved one had strong suspicion but never said anything, I would feel extremely betrayed. If I got a disease in the process, I don't think I would ever forgive the person who didn't say anything. I would feel like they were just cowardly and not a true friend. So part of me is projecting that onto my own position.
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I understand, but your position and hers are different.