A mum has defended falling in love with her late husband's brother less than a year after he died.
The woman, Kaitlin from New Hampshire, has faced a lot of judgement online after revealing she was in a relationship with her deceased husband's brother, Rory.
The mum-of-four was married to Aaron for four years and they shared a son together, Camden, but that relationship tragically came to an end when Aaron died from an overdose in 2016.
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Speaking to Truly for an episode of My Extraordinary Family, Kaitlin explained: "After my husband Aaron passed away, I fell in love with his brother."
Kaitlin and Aaron developed a drug addition together, which went on to cause many issues within their marriage.
"When Aaron and I first got together, we abused prescription drugs together and then when I got pregnant, we both stopped," she said.
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After their son Camden turned 'six months old', the pair 'started using pills again'.
Kaitlin continued: "We moved on to harder drugs. We would just fight a lot.
"When we were getting high we would turn into different people - it was really not healthy."
Rory revealed that when Kaitlin and his brother were together he 'was not very fond of her' and 'didn't really trust her'.
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Kaitlin later decided to go to rehab and get clean and, while she was getting help, Aaron sadly overdosed and died at just 22 years old.
"It has been hard to deal with the survivor's guilt of that," she added.
While both Kaitlin and Rory grieved the loss of Aaron, they kindled the start of a relationship together.
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"I was not expecting his voice to remind me of Aaron so much," the 30-year-old widow recalled. "It was such a comfort."
"Rory started to come to visit me and Camden on the weekends and that's kind of how we started getting closer," she continued.
They were initially 'hesitant' to break the news of their new relationship to their families.
Rory said: "I didn't want them thinking that like we didn't care about Aaron."
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While Rory's mum 'thought it was a little weird' at first she has since found a way to wrap her head around it.
Speaking of her nine-year-old son, Camden Kaitlin explained: "[He] was really young when his dad died. He was only two and when Rory and I got together, he just took on the position of the dad role for Camden."
When asking Camden if he wanted to call Rory 'dad', even though is actually his uncle, his 'face lit up'.
Kaitlin and Rory have now been together for seven years and, alongside Camden, they have two children of their own, Presley, five and four-year-old Madeline.
They are also raising Rory III, 12, from a previous relationship.
"Something bad happened to her, something bad happened to me — and basically we found comfort in one another," Rory said.
"The negativity doesn’t do anything to us … I think we’re good for one another."
Topics: Sex and Relationships, US News, Real Life, Parenting
Rhiannon Ingle