He was caught feeding one of BIL’s horses avocados (poisonous to horses) to make it sick. I (37) have dogs and don’t want him to hurt them as well.
He demands to be called the names of two specific fictional characters. He believes he is these characters, reincarnated. If you call him by his real name or refuse to go along with his delusions he becomes aggressive.

There is a hole in the back. The hole is stained. I have tried not to jump to conclusions about what he does to that plushie and failed. It smells rancid, and honestly just thinking about the thing makes me want to vomit.

I have tried so hard to be patient with his ‘quirks’ as my wife (35) puts it, but what really pushed me over the edge was an incident that occurred a few weeks ago.

For context, my wife has struggled with infertility for our entire marriage, and we had given up on having our own kid until we recently discovered she was pregnant. Given the fact that she’s 35, we have been surprised and overjoyed.

A few weeks ago, my wife started randomly getting rude texts from our nephew, insulting our baby.

One text implied that our baby would have FAS, due to my wife’s previous drinking problem, even though she has been sober for years. I wanted to call up that insensitive brat and tear into him, but my wife insisted we gently let him know via text that we didn’t appreciate his comments.

When he kept going and my wife started crying, I called SIL. She was able to shut him down and get him to apologize. I have no idea what got into him, but I suspect it has to do with his hatred of women.

My wife believes that he may be on the spectrum/have undiagnosed mental illness and that he needs to be treated patiently.

I think he has been coddled his entire life and it has only made him worse. I think if someone doesn’t put their foot down, his behavior will escalate into something dangerous.

Here’s where I may be the jerk. Each year, my wife and I host Easter Dinner for her entire family.

My wife has already forgiven our nephew for the incident and is insisting we invite him so that he isn’t isolated from his family, something she believes will worsen his behavior. I see her reasoning, but enough is enough. I refused. I said she is being a doormat like everyone else in the family when it comes to him, and that our manchild of a nephew can’t just make her cry and get away with it with an empty apology.

Some of my friends are saying that I am being controlling and that I can’t stop her from seeing her own family. I feel like I am going insane. AITJ?”

Another User Comments:

“NTJ – and honestly I wouldn’t want him around my wife if I were in your shoes.

He sounds a bit dangerous (the horses for example) and abusive. He needs help, and his parents need to step up and realize that he needs serious intervention and attention. You setting this boundary might be the exact thing they need to actually do something about him.

Yes it will be hard and yes it might cause a family rift, but you could preface it with ‘We love him and care for him but don’t want him around us until he is getting help.’ Stand firm. This is about protecting your wife (and tell her so) and your sanity.” SlowLime

Another User Comments:

“You are NTJ for trying to limit her nephew from coming to the house. To be honest, I’d be concerned about your wife’s safety in this situation. It sounds like her nephew has undiagnosed mental health problems that are serious and aren’t being addressed. If he’s willing to poison animals and show active hostility to your wife and baby, then there is a risk that he might try to poison your wife.

This is unfortunately easy to do. And if I can think of half a dozen things that could potentially end a pregnancy if ingested, then they can’t be that hard to find on Google. Do you know if he’s harmed other animals? If he’s demonstrating a psychosis about being a fictional character, he might easily slip into the delusion that the fictional character would do things and it’s ok.

To be honest, this is not your problem to fix – it’s the massive failure of your BIL/SIL as parents to not get their son the help that he needed YEARS AGO. If your wife INSISTS on allowing the untreated mentally ill, potentially dangerous, relative into your home, it would be perfectly reasonable for you to literally stand guard over him to make sure he doesn’t do anything that could put your wife at risk.

Pretty sure that wouldn’t go over very well. Personally, I can’t imagine my husband letting anyone into our home that would upset me, so I hope you and your wife can come to an agreement.” savinathewhite

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