just got my ear talked off by my mom, i swear all my aunts are the reason my family's all deaf. i flew out to florida over christmas to visit some extended family there - my cousin (my ate mimi), her parents, and her 3 y/o daughter . my mom flew out from california to visit, and my cousin's younger sister came to move their from the philippines. yeah, my family's complicated.

anyways, my ate mimi's husband passed away from brain cancer a week before christmas, making her a widow at 36 sand my niece fatherless. my ate's a strong lady, but she still cried a few times talking about him and everyone was in a grave mood. we all came to comfort her so she and her daughter weren't alone for christmas.

unfortunately, i came out to them transgender earlier this year, so this was my first time seeing any of my family since i was 12, and i come from a family of asian conservative christians. the only thing they know about trans people is that their pastor said it was a sin and the drag queens that sometimes walked the street back home. i didn't want to come in the first place because it was bad timing, but my mom bought the tickets and guilted me into it. 

so yeah, i was the elephant in the room. called by the right name, but treated at an arm's length. the only person who talked to me without looking visibly uncomfortable was my cousins' daughter june, who absolutely adores me. she's an only child and probably pretty lonely, so she would always drag me off to play with her. i spent most of christmas upstairs either avoiding human interaction or hanging out with the kid while my family would have ear-wrenchingly loud conversations in rapid filipino. they're like a pack of hyenas when they get together.

i went out with them and all, but i was pretty quiet and minded my own. i didn't want to make a big deal out of my being there because in my eyes it wasn't really my place. i know my family will take a long time getting used to my transition because to them it's a shock, and right now my ate mimi's going through the hardest time of her life. i was trying to mind my own and sort of save it for later because i knew that a. my presence made everything more complicated, and b. if i was too involved with the family them asking about my transition and all was inevitable, and i wanted to avoid that. i'm flying to the philippines in the summer and want to lay out everything there.

well, it's january now. my mom called me up, and my ears are still ringing. 'how dare you be such a recluse! you haven't seen your family in half a decade and you spent the whole christmas avoiding us! you know we're all worried about you ever since you were hospitalized! i spent $500 on your plane ticket and i barely even saw you!' etc. she's livid and in her eyes i'm a brat child for not being a part of the family. i tried to explain to her why and even offered to pay her back for the plane ticket but she only got angrier and said 'that's no excuse! i told them not to talk about it, they wouldn't have said anything!' 

so, my head hurts, and i feel like an ungrateful jerk. so reddit, am i the asshole?