rSlash - r/AITA for Cancelling My Parents' Allowance?

Episode Date: February 27, 2024

0:00 Intro 0:05 Parents gifts 3:49 Terrarium 7:31 Allowance 11:02 Cake slices 14:18 Childfree Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to r slash am I the butthole where OP stands up to his thieving brother? Am I the butthole for only buying my parents stuff that can't be shared or taken while my brother and his family live with us? My 32 year old brother has been knocking up his wife since they were in high school. Their oldest is now 13, but they have three more. She's a stay at home mom and he works on the cleaning staff. It's pretty good money, but they waste a lot of it. They have multiple gaming systems and the two oldest kids have new iPhones. I'm 28 and I live in the loft above my parents' garage.

I don't pay rent because my folks want me to save up for my future. I help around the house and I buy groceries for my parents as well as myself. My brother and his family live in the in-law suite in my parents' basement. That space was supposed to be a rental to get my parents some extra money for when they retire. But after my brother lost his job because he wouldn't get vaccinated, our folks let them move in there. I also used to love buying gifts for my parents, but my brother and his family always needed

exactly what I just happened to give them. For example, I bought my mom a very colorful bag from Columbia called a mochila. It's just a woven cotton shoulder bag made with very vibrantly colored yarn. My nine-year-old niece saw it and wanted to use it for a project at school where she promptly lost it. I got my father a bottle of Van Winkler bourbon since he loves to have a drink after a long day. Wow, I just looked this up and this is like, we're talking like $700 seems to be the floor of this alcohol, maybe 600.

And they can go up as much as like 2.5K. This one is, geez, that's $17,000. Okay, that is expensive alcohol, my God. My brother and his wife found it and drank it mixed with orange juice because it was too strong tasting. So now I do other stuff. I took my mom to go see Anastasia

and I got us really good seats. No one else was invited. I took my dad out for a steak dinner and then to a speakeasy in our city and treated him to a $160 cocktail. invited. I took my dad out for a steak dinner and then to his speakeasy in our city and treated him to a $160 cocktail. These are things that my parents love but won't waste their own money on. I keep the groceries that I buy in my loft. I'll make meals for my parents and have them over, or I'll bring the ingredients and cook with my dad. My brother

started asking why I don't leave the groceries in the freezer, fridge, or pantry, which they have access to. And why I stopped buying my parents gifts. He says that since I'm living here for free, I should be giving them more. I asked him how much he was paying in rent, or how he was contributing to the household. And he said that he was tired on the weeks that he was home, and his wife and his kids were too busy to help. I work a full-time job. I volunteer at a cat rescue, and I do theater sports as a hobby. But still, I managed to help my parents with yard work, housework, errands, and helping

with my grandmother who's in a locked-in facility for dementia patients. I pointed this out, and he said that I was being a little B-word. I said that I just wasn't stupid enough to leave anything around that he or his family could steal. Now we're fighting and my parents are upset. His wife called me a butthole for not sharing the treats that I buy for my parents. I can't afford to buy treats for my parents and I, but not for five more people who don't contribute.

Alright OP, here's my advice for you. Stop caring about the opinions of terrible people. Why? Because they're terrible people! Who cares? OP, just keep doing what you're doing and spending quality time with your parents. Clearly, your parents appreciated and you seem like a good son to me. Well, I say son, I guess OP could be a woman, it's not really clear.

Anyways, OP, I'm giving you zero out of five buttholes, and I'm giving your brother and your brother's family 1 out of 5 buttholes. Am I the butthole for cancelling our anniversary trip because my husband drowned my terrarium? I'm a 29-year-old woman who traveled across the country to visit a company regarding an incredible job offer. I spent two days touring the company to decide if it would be the right fit for me after years of self-employment. After meeting with the company, I visited my sister and her family a few towns over. We barely get to see each other because of work and distance, so it was wonderful to spend a few days with her, the family, and her new baby. I was gone for a total of eight days. When I returned home, I was excited to spend time with my husband, tell him about the

trip, my visit with my sister, and my impression of the city. We were meant to be celebrating our anniversary and decided to put off the discussion about whether or not I should accept the job offer until after our anniversary getaway. I had arranged for us to go on a luxury train ride because he's a big train enthusiast and we were meant to leave for the trip three days after I got home. This is when the problem started. I have a very large, closed, bioactive terrarium which I made with my mother 15 years ago. It's one of my favorite things that I have of her from before she passed. This terrarium is my pride and joy and has come with me everywhere since we planted it.

It was always super healthy and beautiful and I've only had to open it four times to do a little maintenance and watering. My husband knows all of this, which is why I don't understand why he decided to tamper with it in my absence. I didn't notice the night I got home because I was exhausted. But the next morning, I went to check on my terrarium and found it in a terrible state. The roots were rotting and the plants were dying and molding. He told me that the day that I left, he poured a few cups of water into the vessel and sealed

it again. I was so mad that I cried and it turned into a huge argument because it's just a plant and all you do is look at it anyways. He called me ungrateful and over-dramatic and that I should appreciate that his intention was to help me and that he didn't ask me because he didn't want to bother me on my trip. I ended up canceling our anniversary plans, partly because I was so upset that I didn't want to go and partly because I wanted to try and salvage the plans and that would require

time. He freaked out when he found out about the cancellation and is now sleeping in a separate room and refusing to speak to me because, according to him, I'm being petty and trying to destroy our marriage. Am I being oversensitive about my plans? My friends are pretty evenly split and have pointed out that he was just trying to be thoughtful however misguided it was. Okay, first off I gotta say OP, your husband is weird. It's a really really weird take to say all you do is look at it anyways.

Has this dude ever watched a movie? Watched a TV show? Read a book? I mean all you do is just look at those anyways. Has he ever listened to a song? What's the point? All you do is listen to it anyways. Has he ever listened to a song? What's the point? All you do is listen to it anyways. I honestly can't tell if he's genuinely stupid and doesn't know what a terrarium is and

how it works, or if he intentionally sabotaged your terrarium. I have to assume it's sabotaged because I don't even own a terrarium. I've never even touched one. But still, I know that the whole thing about terrariums is they're self-enclosed and you never have to do anything to them. They just thrive on their own like a self-contained ecosystem. So my guess is that he didn't like your terrarium and he saw this as his golden opportunity to destroy it.

Or you're just married to a run-of-the-mill moron. In either case, OP, the way that your husband reacted here is sucky. I'm giving you zero out of five buttholes. I'm giving your husband two out of five buttholes. Just the fact that he destroyed a precious keepsake from your dead mother makes this way worse. Am I the butthole for reducing my parents allowance by whatever amount they share with my siblings? My parents live in a less developed country than I do. My siblings and I all live in North America or Europe. When I got my new job, I did my budget, and I saw that I could send home roughly $1300 a month without it affecting my personal comfort.

I would still be able to save for my future, and my mom and dad could retire. So I set up a joint account for us. That way, I could see if they needed more money, and I could make sure they weren't getting scammed or anything. After about a year and a half, I started noticing that there was a $200 transfer every month. I asked my parents about it, and they said that my brother was having difficulties with his budget, so they were helping him out. My brother does not need help. He's a scholarship student.

He actually receives a stipend from my home government to study abroad. What he wants is money to party. So, I reduced the amount of money that I give to my parents by 200 bucks. Obviously, my parents don't need that 200 bucks if they can afford to give it to my brother every month. My mom called me when she noticed and was yelling at me for being a bad daughter and sister. I asked her to tell me exactly how much money they contributed to my party fund when I was away for school. Just so you know, the answer is $0.

They also tried to talk me out of attending university in Canada. I'm not sure how common the idea of filial piety is in other countries, but it's a big deal in mine. She went off about it. I told her that they didn't need the money and I had better ways to spend $200 than a gift to my brother so he could get drunk with his friends more. My mom said that I was treating them like children by restricting how they spend their money. I replied that I'm not going to subsidize my brother through them and that from now on

the amount of money they get from me would be $1100. And if they sent him money again, then I would know and I would reduce their money by that amount going forward. My brother called me to bitch me out about cutting off his money from our parents. I said that I hadn't. He was more than welcome to tell our parents to go back to backbreaking jobs at their age to pay for his partying in London. Then they would have my money to live off of and their wages to pay for his drinking. My boyfriend is on my side, as are many of my friends. Most of my family and people from my culture think that I'm being a butthole. However, for the last two months, my parents have only been spending on themselves.

I am literally recording this from China right now while living with my wife's Chinese parents. So I've got a pretty good understanding of the Eastern Asian culture of filial piety, probably more so than the average American. And from where I'm sitting, your parents are absolutely irredeemable. Yo, you're sitting them $1100 a month. That's like 13K a year just for free. Like hey, here's $13k for you to do whatever you want to with and they're calling you a bad daughter for that? Yo, that's crazy. Any family from an underdeveloped nation should be thrilled, should be so proud that

their caring, loving daughter is sending so much money to them every single month. You're a saint, OP, not a sinner. OP, I'm giving you zero out of five buttholes. I'm giving your parent and your spoiled brother two out of five buttholes. Also, it sounds to me like there's a bit of good ol' fashion sexism going on here, because in their eyes, naturally, the money should flow from the women to the men. Am I the butthole for refusing to pay for cake slices that my teenage daughter ate? I'm a 38-year-old woman, and I'm a single mom with my teenage daughter, Carly, who's

17. My 36-year-old sister lives nearby with her husband and two kids, a 9-year-old girl and a 7-year-old boy. Carly sometimes babysits for her cousins on the weekends so that my sister and brother-in-law can go out, usually for like 3-4 hours. In exchange, my sister usually pays my daughter like 10 euros per hour. Me and my sister don't FORCE Carly to babysit. She volunteers to do so.

She likes having the extra money to fund her Starbucks addiction without a part-time job in fast food or retail. Plus, the kids love getting to see her. I'm glad that she's getting to learn responsibility. I think it's a win all around. Last week, there was a problem. A couple of hours after Carly came home from babysitting, my sister called me. It was my niece's birthday two weeks ago, and there was some leftover birthday cake in their kitchen. It was a custom-made, fancy lemon curd cake, and I remember at the party a lot of the kids didn't want to eat it,

so a lot was left over. Apparently, Carly ate two slices while she was babysitting. My sister said that Carly should have asked before helping herself to the cake, and that it was expensive. I apologized to my sister and told her that I would have a word with my daughter. My sister mentions again that the cake was custom made and expensive, and says that we should be compensating her. At first, I honestly thought that she couldn't be serious, but she did want me to give her money because of the cake. I mentioned that, surely, the cake was going to go bad soon if it wasn't already stale. I said this lightheartedly, trying to lighten the mood, but I made it clear that I am NOT giving my sister

money. My sister said that she paid 70 euros for the cake, and she expects me to give her 20 euros. I told her I'm not doing that. My sister says that I'm being inconsiderate, and that my daughter ate the slices without permission. I feel like my sister is being petty. Am I the butthole for refusing to pay for her cake? Yo, hold up. How old did they say this cake was? It was my niece's birthday two weeks ago. Yo, two week old cake? This wasn't even refrigerated cake.

This is lukewarm room temperature sitting on the counter and drying cake. Yo, not only would I expect a two week old cake to be dry as a rock, I also don't even know if it would be edible after two weeks. Doesn't lemon curd contain egg? So that's two week old cooked egg just sitting on the counter? Yeah, I don't see a problem with this. No one is gonna be eating that cake after two weeks

except for a hungry teenager, of course. Plus it's doubly stupid because your sister has an amazing babysitter that they can trust and is only charging 10 bucks an hour, and now she wants to nickel and dime that babysitter and scare her away, that's just dumb. OP, you get zero out of five buttholes. I will admit begrudgingly that your daughter

probably should have asked before eating the food, assuming that that's like the standard over there that she's not allowed to eat food without asking first, but still, your sister is way overreacting and you're right, she is being petty. I'm giving you zero out of five buttholes. I'm giving your daughter also zero out of five buttholes for an understandable mistake. I'm giving your sister one out of five buttholes for being petty. Am I the butthole for throwing a tantrum because my child wasn't invited to a child-free wedding?

My sister is getting remarried and she wants a very small wedding with only immediate family. Yesterday we got her wedding invitation and to my surprise it said that the wedding is child-free and that my child isn't invited. My child is 17 years old, almost 18. By the way, my child is the only person under 18 in our family and in the groom's family So so she's the only one being excluded. I called my sister and asked her are you effing serious? She said I'm sorry, but we've decided that we want a child-free wedding I told her just say that you want a my child-free wedding and get over with it because that's exactly what you're doing

We got into an argument and she told me to stop throwing a tantrum and that my child doesn't need to be included in everything I told her that we won't be attending her wedding. Then she called me a butthole for not supporting her. All right, okay This is funny Okay, so she can invite whoever she wants to to her wedding, right? That's her right if she doesn't want to invite your daughter then tough cookies This is funny. Okay, so she can invite whoever she wants to to her wedding, right? That's her right. If she doesn't want to invite your daughter, then tough cookies. But at the same time, you're allowed to not come to the wedding if you don't want to come

to the wedding. So this kind of feels like a no-butt holes here situation. It is kind to do she that she's singling out OP's daughter for whatever reason, but you know it's their party. If they don't want to invite them, then that's their prerogative. So I'm giving everyone here zero out of five buttholes, but if someone wanted to give the sister in the story like one out of five buttholes or 0.5 out of five buttholes,

then I would understand that and I wouldn't begrudge you. That was R slash am I the butthole. And if you like this content, be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new Reddit podcast episodes every single day.