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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/No-Play4746 on 2023-09-30 21:54:21.

My (16F) cousin (17F) is autistic, ever since I can remember my family has been babying her, excusing any of her bad behavior and blaming it on her autism. She has always been a bit of an attention seeker, there have been many instances where something exiting or upsetting has happened to someone and while everyone is celebrating or comforting them she would pull some kind of stunt to make it about her. For example on my 12th birthday, just as everyone was singing happy birthday to me she began to cry, claiming she was upset because I had been mean to her earlier in the day and she wanted to go home. I tried to explain to my mom that this wasn’t the case as I had barely spoken to her at all that day, my mom instantly came to her defense, claiming she would never lie. Over the years I’ve gotten used to her antics and usually just roll my eyes and move on knowing there’s nothing I can do about it.

Last Saturday my family came to my house for a family gathering. As we were all talking my brother (15M) suddenly passed out, everyone began to panic, immediately trying to help him. After a few minutes he regained consciousness, he was still pretty out of it, everyone was making sure he was okay and trying to figure out what caused the episode when my cousin suddenly burst into tears, talking about how scared she was and how awful the experience was, even getting mad at my family for panicking so much and claiming they scared her. Instantly, all the attention was on her again and my brother even attempted to go over to see if she was okay. I say attempted because he almost passed out again the moment he tried to stand up, (I had to grab onto him to stop him from collapsing) but of course nobody noticed because everyone was paying attention to my cousin. This honestly pissed me off so much, my cousin was yet again taking all the attention, however this time it wasn’t just on a special occasion, this was a serious medical situation. I began to yell at her, I told her that my brother could have been seriously hurt and she as usual was commanding all of the attention, and not everything had to be about her. This just made her cry even harder and she ended up having a full on meltdown, my mother practically had to drag me out of the room.

Now almost my entire family is mad at me (except my grandma, my brother and my other cousin). At first I thought I was in the right but now I’m not sure, I may have just spoken out of worry and I feel like I should have just bit my tongue because I really upset her.

What do you think AITA?

For all those worried about my brother and are wondering why he passed out, it turns out the absolute dumbass had forgotten to eat ALL DAY! Rest assured I will be on total big sister mode for a while and I’ll make sure he’s eating 👍