AITA for confronting my mom about how I was treated growing up?

A grown daughter finally confronts her mother about years of boundary violations from ages 12–16—only to be called a liar, gaslit, and hung up on. The wounds: a father who repeatedly slapped her butt “as a joke” despite her protests, and a mother who policed her body in her own hallway while excusing the touching as “fatherly play.”

What makes the story more complicated, Mom insists the modesty rules were never sexual—yet enforced bras at all times to “protect” the boys. The knot tightens when every plea for accountability is flipped into an attack on Mom’s love, leaving the daughter shaking with rage and self-doubt.

She told Mom she never felt safe as a teen—Dad’s “jokes” crossed lines, Mom dismissed every complaint.

Dad slapped her butt repeatedly for years; she begged him to stop, he laughed.

One hallway trip in pants and cardigan sparked a modesty lecture—no bra, boys present.

Mom rewrote history, accused her of ingratitude, then hung up.

A father’s “playful” butt-slaps and a mother’s bra-at-all-times rule weren’t separate incidents—they were twin prongs of the same control fork, sexualizing a child while denying the sexualization. The daughter’s body became family property: Dad’s to joke-touch, Mom’s to police for the boys’ “protection.” When she finally named the harm, Mom’s denial wasn’t memory lapse; it was survival—admitting fault would collapse the myth of perfect parenting.

The modesty argument is pure sleight-of-hand: if nipples must be hidden to shield brothers, the body is already framed as sexual threat. Counter-claims of “cultural norms” ignore the core violation—repeated unwanted touching after explicit no’s. Socially, this is classic internalized misogyny: girls learn their comfort is negotiable, boys learn boundaries are jokes. The daughter’s rage isn’t “bringing up the past”; it’s the bill coming due on decades of unpaid emotional labor.

Clinical psychologist Dr. Ramani Durvasula explains, “Gaslighting in families often centers on bodily autonomy—parents rewrite the child’s reality to preserve their self-image”. Here, Mom’s hang-up was the final erasure: love measured in silence, truth punished by disconnection.

Here’s how people reacted to the post:

Every commenter screamed NTA and urged the daughter to run, not walk, toward low or no contact.

A few zeroed in on the modesty contradiction with surgical precision.

Two delivered gut-punch humor to cut the tension.

Some other comments from readers.

The daughter asked for acknowledgment; Mom offered a hang-up and a guilt trip. Commenters see assault excused as affection and autonomy crushed under “modesty.” When does confronting past harm become “hurting” the parent who caused it? Have you ever been told your trauma is an attack on someone else’s love?