Many parents would agree that there’s nothing more special than moment your child takes their first breath in this world; a memory which they will cherish forever.
Most parents would move heaven and Earth to be present at their child’s birth, but sadly one new dad had that experience taken away from him, after his sister sneakily started deleting his missed calls from his wife while she was in labour.
The unnamed man had been taking his half sister to meet her dad for the first time in 19 years as moral support, while she used his phone to give directions. But, unbeknown to the man, during that time he had received dozens of missed calls from both his wife and mother-in-law, before his sister turned the phone onto ‘do not disturb’ mode.
“My wife was calling me because she’d gone into labour, then my mother-in-law was calling me too. My sister put my phone on ‘do not disturb’ without me knowing and erased the notifications,” he explained on Reddit’s Am I The A**hole forum.
“I didn’t even realise it until after we were leaving from having lunch an hour and a half later that she’d been calling me. All my sister told me was I had a missed call, when in reality it was more like dozens.”
The man was so angry that he couldn’t stop shouting at his sister on the way to the hospital, who told him she was sorry, and that she had only kept the calls quiet because she was so nervous about the meeting with her father.
“I really couldn’t believe it. By the time we got there, my daughter had already been born a half hour,” he continued. “Don’t get me wrong I was so happy to know my daughter and wife were okay but I was also devastated to have missed the birth of my first child.
“I couldn’t look at my sister, all I told her was to get an Uber to take her home because I didn’t want her near me right now.”
Four weeks on from the birth, the man is still furious with his sister and has banned her from even coming into the house to see the baby as he’s too mad.
“I keep hearing it from my family that I’m being completely unfair treating my sister like an outcast by not letting her in my home,” he said. “But I’m just still angry at her right now and don’t think I have it in me to be in her presence.”
One Reddit user responded: “She knew exactly what she was doing. She made you miss something once in a lifetime, and I can’t imagine how important that must’ve been for you. And the fact she did it to go see her deadbeat father. That’s tragic and ironic. And your parents can’t even see it your way a little it seems. You have every right to be furious.”
Another wrote: “Your wife is an even bigger victim in this than you are. She had to give birth for the first time without the support of her husband. Presumably without any family there at all. Your sister did you and your wife both dirty. Beyond selfish on her part.”