Toxic or normal
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Uh oh, my cousins call me hun.
*banjo music intensifies*
But in all seriousness the kiss is weird, however you’ve been honest about it and have maintained boundaries so your boyfriend doesn’t get to keep punishing you for something that happened before you even came on the scene. He either accepts you’re being faithful or he doesn’t. Don’t keep jumping through his completely unreasonable hoops.
OMG – we call family members hun, and dear, and sweetie and all manner of terms of endearment regardless of gender. This is normal. This is a non-issue.
As for kissing your cousin, I understand that you did not grow up knowing him and met him for the first time as a teenager. I think the “ick” factor depends on what degree of a cousin he is- 1st = high ick. 3rd, 5th, 4th 2 times removed, etc. – the farther out that familial relationship goes the less the ick factor becomes. Far enough out and depending on where you live, cousins can marry. So everyone needs to chill on the one singular kiss between teenagers who had no relationship their entire lives. Again, a non-issue.
The issue here is that you told your boyfriend about this non-issue kiss. Life advice here – you do not have to tell your partner everything, especially years ago things that were non-issues. Now the BF is handing out ultimatums regarding your family members because he is as narrow minded as some of the commenters on here.
I stand by my original thoughts, that if you give on this and cut off or cut back your cousin you are giving permission to your boyfriend to tell you who you can be friends with. Because I promise he will find a problem with someone else and do this again. Because you gave him permission to do it.
You did nothing wrong. And honey, this happened long before you met your boyfriend. It is in the past – gone and done and he has no right to try and punish you for something that happened before he was in your life.
I say, again, get a better boyfriend.
I call my nephew and nieces sweetie. I dated a guy once that called every female darlin. I see no problem with calling relatives pet names. It’s not weird in a lot of cultures.
The kiss was kind of messed up. Why did you even tell your boyfriend? That’s something you should keep to yourself going forward. You don’t need to tell every person you date your past intimate experiences.
You do sound young. I’d cut your losses with the boyfriend and MOA.
I wrote what I did before I read all of purplestars reply. So I’m with you in everything @purplestar.
EDT: In high school, I was with a friend hanging out with some new people. A third cousin or something thought I was cute and asked about me at a later time. He heard my last name, asked who my parents were and noped out of that quickly. His dad and my mom are cousins on my grandma’s side. I don’t think it’s weird. I think it’s funny. Fun fact, he and his dad farm my family’s land that was passed down on my grandpa’s side.
I told my boyfriend because my cousin was going to be living with my family, and since I didn’t know my cousin well enough I was scared my boyfriend could hear it from him and not from me; if I had known that it was a secret kept safe I honestly wouldn’t have told him.
Also- in Brazil it’s not taboo or crazy. I was raised here so I acknowledge it’s crazy, my boyfriend was raised there, and a known phrase in Brasil is “God made cousins so you don’t hook up with you sisters”
But Kylie, you have to consider, just because it’s your cousin doesn’t magically make him not a threat. Many cousins have gotten married; the Bible doesn’t even forbid it, although people generally don’t accept it, and it can have common consequences.
The fact that you didn’t even know your cousin existed, puts your cousin in more of the category of a stranger than family. It’s not as if you two grew up together. You met both of these guys around the same time, really. It sounds kind of like you’re using his family status as an excuse. This is a new person you met as an adult.
Although Copa may be right by saying your boyfriend should not be dictating who gets to stay in your life and who you need to cut ties with, because it’s not appropriate, Copa is missing one very important thing. It is completely appropriate, even necessary, for your bf to dictate who gets to stay in his own life and who he cuts ties with. And that could mean, you, your cousin, or both of you. If he doesn’t want this other guy in his life, he does’t have to, no matter how many jerks people call him. And if he really wants that, and you are too attached to the guy, then he’s not wrong for cutting you out of his life too. He won’t be wrong for that, b
ecause it’s his life.He should at least give you some credit for being honest with him though. But it’s not fair to call him controlling though if he’s only trying to control his own life.
He’s controlling because he doesn’t like something yet he’s putting the onus on her to fix it. If he really wanting to dictate who stays in his life in an appropriate way HE can leave, exactly like you said.
It sounds to me like he tried to leave and she wanted to talk it out. I mean if I were to breakup with a girl because someone in her life was someone I really couldn’t deal with, and she asked what could avoid the breakup. I too would tell her cutting that person out would do it.
I don’t read this as him issuing and ultimatum. I read it as him trying to end things and her trying to convince him to stay. I don’t think he actually expects her to break ties with the cousin.
I think she asked him after he tried to dump her “what can I do to get you to stay? And her ex just gave her an honest answer, not expecting her to actually do it. He may even realize how unreasonable his request may seem and made it hoping it would get her to accept the reality that the relationship is over.
I don’t care if in Brazil “god made cousins so you don’t date you sisters.” That’s absolutely disgusting.
Somehow I doubt that’s really a acceptable thing? Why are you defending it so much? That’s what I find weird about this situation. Stop talking about your cousin and how it’s not weird. It’s really weird. I think most of us agree kissing your cousin past the age of 17 is kind of weird. Defending it is weirder.
This is reading like a troll at some points.
A bit off topic, but it’s actually legal in a surprising number of U.S. states to marry your first cousin. I don’t think it’s common, but still. I’ll take LW’s word for it that the kiss happened under the most benign of circumstances. And I stand corrected that it’s not weird for cousins to use pet names. (I am from a particularly unaffectionate family so to me it would be weird. Not gross, just not at all what I am used to.) Take all that out and you’re left with a boyfriend telling you to cut family you live with out of your life.
@Anon – Really feel like you’re being way too harsh on the OP. Let’s remove the cousins thing for a moment and just pretend that this is someone she isn’t related to that she kissed once and then became very good friends with after the fact. Neither of them have made had any real romantic overtures after the one kiss. Would you still advocate for her to cut the friend out of her life to appease a jealous boyfriend?
Cousins or not, that’s BS in my book.
