Me [21/F] with my little cousin [5.5 F] and our family, she keeps calling/texting me and I don't know how to stop it without hurting anyone's feelings.

EDIT: Alright, I've decided to call my cousin and spend some quality time with her. I'll gauge the situation from there and I'll use some of the advice I've received in the comments. Thank you all!

 

 

My cousin received a cheap smartphone on her 5th birthday, mainly for kid games and such. However, since seeing us adults use our phones to text people and take pictures, she demanded that she join us. Somebody had the bright idea to install a texting app on her phone and since I'm her favorite cousin, she wanted my number on there immediately.

Let me say something here: while I'm nice to her because she's family and all, I don't enjoy kids and I avoid talking to them most of the time. Communicating with her face to face costs me some energy and 80% of the time I wish I were literally anywhere else but there. I'm not antisocial or anything, it's just that kids in particular are boring to me and I have to fake interest in our interactions because I'm not a monster and I can see she loves me a lot. I'm looking forward to her being older and being buddies with her but that can't happen if she dislikes me when she's little. So, for now, I'm keeping up the pretenses.

My problem: from the moment she got that app, she started calling/texting me multiple times a day. I can't and don't want to talk to her constantly. I soon blocked her and told her apologetically that I'd deleted the app. She understood.

Today, I got an SMS from her number. It says that she loves me and she asks me to call her as soon as I can. Now, I don't mind calling her today. But if I do that, she'll see the opportunity and she'll start blowing up my phone through SMS this time. Maybe you're wondering wtf are her parents doing in this situation. Well, so am I since this SMS is pretty fucking well spelled and she can't really read that good yet. I suspect they've helped her write it which puts me in a really uncomfortable spot.

I don't know what to do. My own parents are always pressuring me to talk to her and be nice. My mom keeps looking at me with this disappointed/disgusted look anytime I say I don't really wanna talk to my cousin/kids in general. It may have something to do with her refusal to believe she isn't getting any grandkids. I feel she thinks I'm a monster for being so cold to kids. But I'm not; I don't feel in the wrong for disliking them as long as I'm nice to them.

I was thinking about talking to her parents but they've expressed their approval of her talking to me and our other adult cousins before. They even monitor the conversations, or so I'm told. I could also talk to her but how do you explain to a 5 yo that you'd prefer to talk to them at family get-togethers only? I am at a loss. I can't make myself call her right now because I can see how that will open the door to more harassment, this time leaving me no way to escape easily and smoothly like I managed last time. I don't want to offend anyone but it seems I can't make it right either way; if I don't call her, I'll be the bad guy and if I do, I'll have to dodge her later on and again be the bad guy. If I tell her parents to stop it, they'll harbor bad feelings towards me (but I suspect they'll stop her anyway because they'll be offended that I don't treasure their precious child enough).

So.. Who do I talk to? What can I possibly say without offending everyone and outing myself as a "child-hating monster"?

TL;DR Cousin wants to text and call me constantly. I blocked her on an app before but today I got an SMS. I'm not good with kids and I wish she'd leave me alone. Her parents would be offended if I asked them to stop her, as would my whole family be. What can I do?

Submitted April 30, 2019 at 06:37AM by Nisheste http://bit.ly/2vuEjOY