Well, im here to rant about something that is really lighting a fire in me. My mother (step mother, technically, but for the purpose of this conversation I call her mom), is a very hard working person. She works hard, gets her job done, and tries to do as much for her family as she possibly can. She had no biological children, and I am the only one of my siblings who feels close enough to call myself her child. Because of this, she is very close with her twin sister's daughter, who we will call Heather. From the moment I met Heather, I knew I wanted to be like her. I idolized her, I emulated her. She was pretty, funny, and my family loved her. She was the classic, popular girl who you would probably expect to be the star of some sort of Disney movie. Heather is now engaged to her fiance, (whom we will call Chad) who has always seemed very sweet, classic respectful country boy. Chad got Heather a pure bred chocolate lab (Heather works at a Vet's office as a receptionist, says she likes animals) for some reason or another. It had been 8 months since they got this dog, who is named Drake. My Mother and I found out that Drake has been living in a 6x3 foot shed with maybe a 9x9 foot fence beside it. It is not air conditioned. He did not have water. He did not have food. He has been living this way for at least a week (likely much longer, but we only found out a week ago). Heather asked my Mother to feed and water Drake last minute while she and her fiance went up to the lake (an hour away). My nother proceeds to go feed and water the dog, realizing that this animal has been out in 90+ degree heat so hot he slammed holes under the shed to avoid the sun. My mother grabbed him and took him home (I was at a friends house.) He stayed for a night, and Heather claimed that Chad's cousin would be over to take the dog from the shed and bring him to a house with air conditioning. Keep in mind, Heather has been begging us to take this dog from her. We always tell her to get him fixed before we can, she always says she will, and then never does but still asks us to take him. The cousin does not come the next day. I had to go with my mother and pull this 8 month old puppy from beneath a shed, and take him home. Drake is sweet, but extremely exhausting. My mother had to stay downstairs with him on the fourth of July while I stayed upstairs and cooked dinner (because our dogs did not get along with Drake). Drake can not be left alone downstairs because he will knock over the gate and come up anyway. My mother, instead of cooking and eating dinner with me as planned, had to stay downstairs eating alone with a rambunctious puppy, and I had to eat alone upstairs. Drake meant no harm, but in the end left scratches all over both of our arms and legs. My mother had no choice but to take him back for the night simply because he would not calm down. She came back into our home sobbing because she felt horrible about taking him back. I comforted my mother and eventually she was okay. To put this into perpective about why im so furious: My mother and I ruined OUR plans to go save Heather's dog because she wouldn't drive ONE. HOUR. To sort out her dog and make sure he didn't die of heat stroke. She doesn't even seem upset over the dog, she just seems upset over what my mother will think of her. I will never, EVER be able to look at Heather or Chad the same again. If I have the choice, I will shun them whenever I have the chance for the turmoil they have and are still putting my Mother through, and for how horribly they treat that poor dog. I see now that she truly is just a shitty person. And that truly fucking sucks. So please, respond to this however you like, or don't, but thank you for reading. And I will leave one more thing that was a deciding factor for me over this person and hopefully its useful to you too-

"Judge a person not on how they treat their equals, but how they treat their insubordinates."

- Some really smart dude

the quote at the end is the best thing I've read all day

I can't stand people like that, and I'm super particular about my animals. Heather seems like a rather negligent person on the whole tbh, people like that aren't worth your time.