Reddit Stories - My SIBLING-IN-LAW PLEADED with me for $5,000 for a crisis, but later UTILIZED

Episode Date: November 3, 2025

#redditstories #askreddit #aita #crisis #siblings #familydrama #moneyissues #trustissuesSummary: My sibling-in-law pleaded with me for $5,000 for a crisis, but later utilized the money for personal gain. Feeling betrayed and deceived, I am now questioning our relationship and struggling with feelings of anger and resentment.Tags: redditstories, askreddit, reddit, aita, tifu, siblings, family, money, trust, crisis, deception, betrayal, relationships, anger, resentment, personalgain, financialissues, moralquandary, emotionalstruggle, communicationissuesBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/reddit-stories--6237355/support.

I hope you enjoy this story. My sibling in-law pleaded with me for $5,000 for a crisis, but later utilized it for a getaway instead. Consequently, I informed our guardians, who uncovered that she had also deceived them for $3,000. She's being forced to sell everything. My relationship with my step-sister used to be solid, we're both in our mid-20s, and we've generally gotten along well since our parents got married about 10 years ago. We even lived together for a couple of years and never had any serious drama. I trusted her, and I thought she trusted me.

We're family. So, about a month ago, she came to me and asked if she could borrow $5,000 for an emergency. She was super vague about it. I did ask what was going on. You don't just hand someone $5,000 without reason. But she looked on the verge of tears and said something like, I don't want to get into it, but I really need your help, it's urgent. I'll pay you back next month, I promise.

She seemed panicked and desperate. I figured if she was swallowing her pride to ask me for such a huge favor, it had to be serious. Maybe medical bills or some crisis she was too embarrassed to explain, I don't understand women's bodies so I thought it could be something related to that, so don't ask me for money in the comments, ha ha. Anyways, after a bit of hesitation, I decided to help. I had to pull for my personal savings, money I'd set aside for other goals, but I gave her the $5,000. It was a lot of money for me, but I felt like I'd be a terrible brother if I didn't step up when she was begging for help. Fast forward to this week. I found out, through our cousin, of all people, what that emergency really was.

And it was complete BS. My cousin, who's close to both of us, asked if my stepsis enjoyed her Hawaii vacation. I was like, huh? What Hawaii vacation? That's when the whole story came out. Apparently, my stepsister went on a luxury trip to Hawaii with her boyfriend last month, literally right after she got the money from me. We're talking first-class tickets, a fancy resort, cocktails on the beach,

the whole Instagram influencer package. At first I honestly thought, there must be a mistake. Maybe my cousin mixed her up with someone else? But nope. My cousin showed me photos that my stepsis had sent her. There was my stepsis, posing on a sunny Waikiki beach with a drink in hand, living it up in paradise. I asked my cousin why on earth my stepsister would send her those pictures, knowing she supposedly had no money and that I'd given her $5,000 for an emergency. My cousin then revealed that my stepsis had sent them specifically to show off and make her jealous. Bit of backstory, my cousin has always wanted to go to Hawaii but can't afford it.

My stepsister knew this and apparently thought it'd be fun to rub it in. According to my cousin, my stepsis literally admitted that she managed to go to Hawaii and wanted to share some picks, clearly bragging. So not only did my stepsister lie to my face and basically steal my money, she also used the whole thing as an opportunity to one-up our cousin. I can't even fathom why she'd do something that mean-spirited aside from pure pettiness. I am beyond furious. $5,000 is not pocket change for me.

It took a big chunk out of my savings. I gave it to her because I truly believed she was in a crisis and needed help. To find out she blew it on a Hawaii getaway with her boyfriend, and then had the audacity to flaunt it, makes my blood boil. I've been sitting here stewing for a day, trying to figure out how to handle this. I hate family drama, and confronting her would definitely be a nuclear option. As of now, I haven't done anything yet because I'm still processing how messed up this is. This isn't a random friend or stranger scamming me, it's my own sister, well, step-sister,

but we've been family for years. I never imagined she'd pull something like this given we normally got along fine. I'm posting here because I'm angry as hell and honestly at a loss. Update 1. All right, I took about a day to cool off, or at least to not be seeing red, and then decided I had to confront my stepsister about those Hawaii photos. I figured I'd give her a chance to explain herself, if that's even possible, and see if she'd own up to the lie. I went over to her apartment after work, once I knew her boyfriend wouldn't be around,

and told her we needed to talk. I didn't even sit down. I came right out and said, Look, I know you went to Hawaii with the money I lent you. I've seen the pictures. Do you have anything to say for yourself? She tried to play dumb, acting like she had no idea what I was talking about. She was like, what photos?

What trip? I never, and then started sputtering nonsense. I shut that down by flatly saying our cousin's name and that I had seen all the vacation picks. At that point the facade fell, and she switched to trying to justify herself. And let me tell you, her explanation made me lose a few brain cells

at least what was left of it. She basically redefined what an emergency was so that she could feel righteous about what she did. According to her, the emergency was actually her needing a mental health break. I shit you not, her defense was that she'd been so incredibly stressed by work and life that she had to take a luxury vacation

or else she was going to have a breakdown. She framed it like if she didn't go on that trip, she might have had a serious mental collapse, and therefore it was practically a health emergency. Then she actually tried to guilt-trip me for confronting her, saying I wouldn't understand how much pressure she was under and that I was being insensitive to her mental health needs. I was standing there with my jaw on the floor,

trying to process what she just said. I mean, I get that people need breaks, but you don't lie to your family and swindle them out of thousands for a fancy getaway. I told her point-blank that this was the biggest load of BS I'd ever heard. I said I sympathize if she's truly stressed, but calling a trip to Hawaii an emergency is absurd and deceitful. I reminded her that she knew I never would have agreed to give her the money if I'd known the truth. You don't get to decide a luxury vacation counts as an emergency. I basically said, you lied to me to get a vacation. That's not okay, and it's a massive betrayal.

She didn't like that. She kept trying to turn it around on me, getting angry that I was attacking her and claiming I have no idea what she's going through. There was a lot of circular arguing, her trying to justify, me calling out the lies, until finally she backed down a bit once she realized I wasn't buying it. Eventually, she muttered an apology, more like I'm sorry you're upset, but I really did need that break, not exactly taking full responsibility. She then promised she would pay me back.

She said, I'll pay you back next month when I get my bonus from work, okay? I swear. She insisted she had always planned to pay me back once her work bonus came in. Funny how this plan was never mentioned until she got caught, I was still furious, but at that point I just wanted to get out of there before I exploded. I told her, fine. You have until the end of next month to pay me the full $5,000 back. I also made sure to get it in writing, I pulled out of that.

my phone and texted her to confirm, just so we're on the same page, you will pay me $5,000 by end of next month, right? And she replied, yes, I promise. Great, now I have proof of her promise. I also took a screenshot, so that even if she deletes or removes it, I have some sort of proof. I have heard too many Reddit stories on YouTube to not cateck me lacking. Thank God that it even helps sometimes helps too. I left after that, still few. but slightly may, that I might actually see my money again. I figured I'd give her one chance to follow through since she made a promise, and I have it documented. Plus, I wasn't ready to blow up the family over this if there was a chance she'd make it right quickly. So, I agreed

to wait for that bonus she talked about. We'll see what happens. Update 2. Next month came and went, and surprise, surprise, no payment for my stepsister. Color me sure. I even gave her a full extra week past the date she had promised, just in case her payroll was delayed or whatever. Still nothing. Not a peep from her about the money. So I finally reached out to her. I sent a message basically saying, it's been over a week since the date you were supposed to pay me back. Where's the mullah? She replied with a sobbed story. She claimed her work bonus was way smaller than expected, so she couldn't pay me back. as planned. She said she felt bad about it and asked me to please be patient and give her a few more

months to come up with the money. That alone had me irritated, it was exactly what I feared would happen. But literally the next day after that conversation, I found out she bought herself a brand new designer purse. And not a cheap one, I'm talking a high-end handbag that easily costs around $5,000. Here's how I found out. A friend of mine was mindlessly scrolling on Instagram and saw her real post flaunting her new purse using a different account. This friend knew about the whole situation and immediately texted me like, Yo, isn't your sister supposed to be paying you back? How is she buying that expensive bag?

I checked her IG myself and yep, there she was, showing off this expensive purse with a caption like finally got my dream bag. I nearly blew a fuse. She's telling me she can't pay me because her bonus was small, but somehow she has the funds for a luxury handbag. I even looked up the retail price of that bag out of curiosity. It's in the $3,000, $5,000 range for a bag shipped from China with just their logo on it. So basically, the money that could have gone toward repaying me likely went to this damn purse. At this point, I saw red. I wasn't even surprised, just angry that my suspicions were confirmed.

I called her up and as soon as she answered, I asked, why the the hell do I see you on Instagram with a brand new Louis Vuitton when you can't pay me back. She immediately got irritated at me. She said, that's none of your business. I'll pay you back when I can, okay? Just stop harassing me about it. Harassing her. Amazing. I told her she basically stole my money for her vacation and now has the nerve to splurge on luxury items instead of paying me back. She just kept saying, I said, I'll pay you back. just give me time, and acted like I was a huge jerk for pressing her. She wouldn't give any firm timeline, just vague excuses. That was the last straw. She clearly has zero intention of taking

responsibility and less forced. I'm done being patient or polite. Five thousand dollars isn't something I can just write off, and beyond the money, the principal here is insane. She lied and effectively stole from me. I'm not going to just let that go while she buys herself treats. After cooling off a bit from that call, I started looking into my options. I talked to a couple of close friends, and I saw the advice from some commenters on my original post, and they all basically said this is not okay and I might need to take legal action. Suggestions ranged from taking her to small claims court to outright filing a police report for fraud. I was this close to going down that route. But going through legal hassles is time-consuming and stressful.

So I decided on a different approach first, can you guess? I might get Papa and Step Mama involved. We'll update after talking to them. Update 3. Read previous posts for contexts. Before involving cops or lawyers, I figured I should tell our parents what was going on and see if they could talk some sense into her, or at least back me up. Normally I hate airing private family drama, but she crossed a line and it's beyond what I can handle alone. So I called up my dad and my stepmom, who is my stepsister's mother, and asked if we could get together to discuss something important. We ended up meeting at their house over the weekend. I sat them down and basically spilled everything. To say my dad and stepmom were shocked would be an

understatement. And here's something I didn't know, I wasn't the only family member she hid up for a August emergency loan. When I mentioned the timing, that she borrowed the money from me about a month ago, my dad and stepmom exchanged a look. Then they told me that around that same time, she had also asked them for money. Her story to them was that her car needed an urgent repair. She claimed her car was unsafe to drive and she didn't have the cash to fix it, so they lent her about $3,000 for those repairs. Of course, there were no car repairs, it was all a lie to get more Hawaii funds. We realized my step-sister had essentially funded her entire luxury vacation by scamming her family. She got $5,000 out of me and $3,000 out of our parents, and who knows if she borrowed or

stole from anyone else. Probably the only reason she didn't hit up more relatives is that she'd gathered what she needed for the trip. My dad was absolutely livid. I don't think I've ever seen him that mad at either of us. He's usually a calm, reasonable guy. but he was pacing the living room ranting about how this is basically fraud and theft. My stepmom was furious too, you could tell she was both angry at her daughter and deeply embarrassed that she'd lied to all of us. They both agreed this was completely unacceptable and that they'd support me in getting my money back, and getting their money back, of course. My dad even said, if she weren't my stepdaughter, I'd be calling the police right now.

Coming from him, that's a big deal, because he hates the idea of involving cops and family matters, but he was that angry. My dad called up my step-sister and told her to come over to the house that day, without giving her a detailed reason. He just said something like we need to talk, family emergency. She showed up a couple hours later and found me, dad, and her mom all waiting in the living room. She immediately looked wary and was like, what's going on? Why is everyone all serious? She probably thought someone died or something. Well, in a sense, it was the death of her free ride. My dad unloaded on her. He told her we know everything. At first she tried the usual denial and deflection. I don't know what you're talking about,

and it's not what you think, etc., but three of us firing off questions shut that down quick. She pretty much crumpled into a chair and started crying. But notably, I didn't hear a straight apology at first. Instead, she was sobbing about how life has been so hard for her. her lately. She said she didn't know how to handle her problems and felt cornered, so she made bad choices. She also mumbled something about being in debt and extremely stressed, which was the first we'd heard about her being in any financial trouble. My stepmom shot back that being stressed is no excuse to screw over your family. Dad was boiling over and basically told her that what she did was inexcusable and tantamount to fraud. He actually said,

if you weren't my stepdaughter, I'd be speaking to the police right now. That made her cry even harder. She kept saying she didn't want to go to jail and that she was sorry and would make it right. We pressed her on how exactly she planned to make it right, considering she had told me just days ago that she needed a few more months and then went and bought a designer purse. She didn't have a good answer, just more bawling and I messed up big time. My stepmom was irate and told her she'd better figure out a way to pay every cent back immediately or else. We didn't explicitly say or else will go to the police, but it was heavily implied. I also made it clear that she hadn't just wronged me. Doing the same thing to mom and dad was unbelievably low. At one point my step-sister

tried to claim she was going to pay us all back eventually, but none of us were willing to believe that without a concrete plan. Then came the hard part, deciding what to actually do. The three of us, and my parents, stepped aside for a bit to talk privately while she sat in the kitchen. We agreed that we'd give her one last chance to fix this within the family, but it would come with some serious conditions and oversight. We called her back into the room and basically laid it out. My dad told her point-blank that she needs to pay back every dime to me and to them, fast, or else the next call would be to the cops. She was still blubbering and saying, I'm trying, I'm trying, but we needed actual action, not just words. We gave her a week to figure something out

and ended the conversation there and that's how. I am writing this here on Reddit. We'll update in a week or two. Small update. I was out at a bar with a few buddies, my gym friends who know about the drama, basically kidnapped me and took me out saying I needed a beer. While we're there, guess who shows up? My stepsister's boyfriend strolls in with two of of his own friends. I saw them come in and just hoped we could all ignore each other. Nope. These guys make a beeline for me. The boyfriend is visibly pissed. He gets right up in my face and I for real could smell dead rats from his mouth and he starts going off about how I caused a bunch of trouble for my step-sister. He told me I needed to back off and stop harassing her and

accused me of trying to fuck her life over. It was a bizarre rant. I barely know that. I barely know this guy, so him confronting me out of nowhere was a shock. He was clearly looking for a fight, basically threatening that I'd regret it if I didn't leave her alone. His two buddies flanked him like backup goons. Now, I'm not a huge guy and I'm not into bar fights as I'm into women, so for a second I actually thought I might get my ass kicked. But the thing is I wasn't alone. I was with three of my Jim brothers, and my friends are big dudes. Two of them work as bouncers on the side, just to give you an idea. As the boyfriend is puffing himself up at me, my friends all stand up from our table. One of my buddies, who's six feet five inches, and built like a tank,

steps forward and says calmly, is there a problem here? The boyfriend's bravado vanished real quick. He went from agro to uh-oh in seconds. One of his pals muttered, nah man, let's not do this, and actually pulled the boyfriend back. The boyfriend, suddenly not that. so tough, started mumbling trash about me being a snitch and that I'd better watch myself, even as he was retreating. Then they all bailed out of the bar. Not gonna lie, seeing him turn tail was pretty satisfying. The gall of that dude, acting like I'm the villain for telling my own parents and I could have gone to the police, you know? When he literally enjoyed a free luxury on my dime. I made sure my parents knew about this little incident, just in case the

clown try something else. My dad was fuming when I told him. He even called out my step-sister about it. She claimed she had no idea her boyfriend would confront me, and honestly I believe her, she probably just told him I snitched. Either way, my parents made it crystal clear to her that if anything like that happens again, the police will be involved immediately. So, yeah, fun times. Update 4. It's been about another week. since the big confrontation at my parents' house. For a few days after that bar incident, my step-sister basically went M-I-A, she ignored calls and texts from me and from our parents.

I suspect she was hiding out of embarrassment, and maybe trying to think of a way out. Of course, that only made my dad more furious. He was about ready to drive to her apartment and bang on the door, but my stepmom convinced him to give her a little space to cool off. They did warn her via texts that she needed to. to come back over and discuss how she was going to pay us back, or else we'd be taking further action. Eventually, she agreed to come over. We all sat down again in my parents' living room, me, my dad, my stepmom, and one very miserable-looking step-sister. I guess the stress is hitting her now.

The first thing my dad said was basically, we've given you time. We need to know what your plan is to pay us back. There was a long silence, and then she just crumbled. She started sobbing and said she had no way to pay us back right now because she's essentially broke and in serious credit card debt. Those weren't her exact words, but pretty much the gist. We all sat there quietly while she spilled everything. She finally admitted the full truth. She's been living way beyond her means for a while. She has multiple maxed-out credit cards and the Hawaii trip, plus her regular spending, pushed her over the edge. I asked her bluntly, how much debt are you in? And after some hesitation, she confessed its upwards of

$30,000 spread across several cards. Honestly, what the hellie? It's worse than I thought. She explained, through a lot of tears, that she felt completely overwhelmed by her finances, and she lied to me and to our parents because she was desperate for cash and desperate for a vacation to escape her stress. She kept saying she was sorry that she never meant for it to go so wrong, and that she thought she could fix it on her own, but everything spiraled out of control. My stepmom was clearly upset but had shifted into problem-solving mode. She told my stepsister something along the lines of,

here's what's going to happen. You're going to get your act together and pay back every cent you owe to us, to your stepbrother, and to the credit card companies, and your father and I are going to make sure of it. Then she gave something of a plan. One, sell her car immediately. Her SUV is fully paid off and could fetch enough to repay what she owes me and my parents. She cried that she needs her car for work, but my dad flat out told her it's happening, non-negotiable, too.

Move back in with our parents. This way she won't pay rent for a while, and they can monitor her spending and help her budget. She was clearly embarrassed by this condition, but she didn't fight it. 3. Sell off her designer purses and other luxury items. All the money from those sales will go straight toward paying down her debts. Goodbye, Dream Bag, 4. Cut up all but one of her credit cards. My parents had her literally destroy the excess cards on the spot. She kept one for emergencies that they'll monitor. Through all of this, my stepsister was just sobbing and saying, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry over and over. I do believe she's sorry, sorry for getting caught and hitting rock bottom,

at least. She's also clearly very angry about the consequences. She wouldn't even look at me at all during this meeting. The only time she addressed me was when I directly asked, so when can I expect my $5,000 back? She mumbled that as soon as her car sale goes through, I'll be paid. My dad quickly confirmed that, yes, I will be getting my money back out of the car sale proceeds first, then they'll recoup their $3,000, and any remaining money will go toward her credit card balances. I guess that's all folks, I'm so done with this whole thing. My step-sister is furious with me for telling on her, as if I was supposed to just keep her scam a secret. She has barely said two words to me outside of that meeting. But if she wants to blame me, so be it. I know, and my dad and step-mom.

know that I didn't cause this, her own actions did. I'm just glad I stood up for myself and didn't let her string me along. If I had kept quiet, she'd probably still be out there racking up debt, and I'd have zero chance of seeing my money again. At least now there's a resolution in motion.