rSlash - r/Trueoffmychest My Wife Stole $170,000 for Her Shopping Addiction

Episode Date: January 27, 2023

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Welcome to R-SlashTrue Off My Chest, where a mother steals $170,000 from her own child. Our next Reddit post is from Wife Stole the Money. Uh-oh. I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place, and I don't know what to do. And the problem is, I can't discuss this with anyone I'm close to for privacy reasons. I've been with my wife, Andrea, who's 48, and my stepdaughter Cassie, who's 17 for eight years now. I'd love them both to death, and Cassie is a very brilliant young woman. Recognizing her potential, me and Andrea decided to put together a college fund for Cassie so that she wouldn't be

crushed by debts. Over the years, it's a massed to $200,000. Cassie is aware of this and she's banking on it since she's trying to get into Ivy League. To make a long story short, last week I found out that almost $170,000 of the money was missing from the account. I freaked the F out and asked Andrea if she knew anything about it. She teared up and said that she had been spending the money over the years to fund her spending habits. She described herself as a shopping addict and the money from Cassie's account was just too tempting not to use. She didn't make excuses but offered no solutions. As stated before, I was beyond furious.

She ruined Cassie's chances at going to college debt-free and has changed the trajectory of her whole life. I asked her to stay with her sister while I tried to figure this out. Cassie was concerned about why her mother was leaving, but we just said that we needed a little bit of space. I asked Andrea to come back home yesterday, and we had an extremely long discussion about how to handle this.

She stopped me from talking and asked a favor of me. She asked if I could take the fall for her. For context, her and Cassie don't get along for a variety of reasons. And knowing how independent Cassie is, she might leave her mother's life. In fact, me and Cassie get along very well, and she comes to me for a lot of her issues. Andrea fears this will permanently drive Cassie away and she doesn't want to lose her. I told Andrea that before we even talk about that, she needs to acknowledge her mistake and own it. She needs to go to individual therapy. We

need couples counseling. She needs to find a shopaholic support group and also I'd be controlling the finances from now on. She said those terms were steep, but fair. I said that she had to tell Cassie what she did, apologize, and hope for the best. She refused and said that she could never lose Cassie. She said that I could survive the mistake, but she couldn't. I told her that to even consider me taking the fall, she needs to agree to my terms. I don't know what the hell to do. The last thing I want to do is lie to Cassie, but I don't want Andrea and Cassie to split

up forever. And the worst part about this whole thing is that Cassie's life is ruined either way. And I don't know how to replenish the money other than maybe borrowing from my 401k. Reddit, do you have any suggestions? Divorce is always an option, but I love Andrea despite her mistakes, and me dating at age 52 is next to impossible. Opie, if you lie to your daughter, then Cassie's gonna go from having one parent

that she hates to having two parents that she hates. Like if Andrea didn't want to ruin her relationship with her daughter, then maybe she shouldn't have stolen 170K from her. And then, after stealing 6 figures from her own daughter, she wants to just get off the hook, Scott free? OP, you have got to hold your wife accountable here. She's already addicted, so if you don't give her consequences, then you think that's gonna help with her addiction?

No, of course not. Also, I can pretty much guarantee that the 170K is just a tip of the iceberg. OP, you really need to see if any credit cards or loans have been taken out in your wife's name, your name, or Cassie's name. I wouldn't be surprised if there's even more money missing. The other thing I have to worry about is, um, this kind of sounds like a, like a smoke screen, doesn't it? Oh well, I'm addicted to shopping. Whoops, 170K gone.

Whoops. I feel like if my partner were blowing 170K dollars, I'd notice, right? Like what is she buying? Boats and fur coats? If someone blows the money on gambling, I can kind of understand because you go to the casino, you spend the money gambling, and then it's just gone. It vanishes into the ether and you get nothing back. But with shopping, you get, you know, shoes and purses and TVs and whatever. How does OP not notice all this stuff coming in? OP didn't mention it. He made no mention of what she bought or

that she had been spending more money and buying more things recently, which kind of makes me think that she's not spending the 170K on shopping. It makes me think she's spending 170K on, you know, her affair partner, or gambling, or drugs, or whatever, something that vanishes when she spend money on it. Right, like, don't you think that if your partner has spent $100,000 on random stuff that you kind of would notice?

Hey, sweetie There's a new yacht on our driveway. Any idea where that came from? Opie, honestly, I think there's three things that you absolutely have to do to get your life back on track One, tell Cassie the truth two, divorce your wife three, freeze your and Cassie's credit So, um, I stopped reading that story and I went over to, I started reading other stories and I found the update, there's an update to this post. It's super long, so I'm gonna skim some of it

because this guy loves to write. First, some relevant details. Over half of the 200K came from Cassie's grandparents as an Andrea's parents. OP never handled the account because even though OP treated his stepdaughter as his real daughter, technically it's a stepdaughter. So therefore, Andrea handled Cassie's account.

OP points out that he did notice all the stuff that she was buying. She claimed they were either on sale or because she got a work bonus. And she makes it very good living. I thought that she was responsible with money, so I said okay. I did ask her why she needed so many Christian Luba-tons shoes, but she shrugged it off.

And although people can't wrap their heads around it, it's very easy to spend $170,000. A large chunk of the money went to buy a Mercedes, which I thought was a lease. She has a seven-year-old Lexus that, according to her, her friends were laughing at. Keeping up appearances for her wealthy friends is very important to her. Okay, Opie had a long talk with his wife and eventually convinced her to talk to Cassie. That afternoon, we sat Cassie down and told her the facts. She thought that we were just kidding at first, but then she realized we weren't and got extremely upset. I'll spare you the details, but she and Andrea got into an extremely loud and vicious

shouting match. Cassie called her some truly awful names, and Andrea, while she didn't curse at Cassie, tried to defend herself, but she started getting angry at the names that she was being called. They were so loud, the neighbors called the cops. I had to awkwardly explain the situation to them while hoping they didn't think that I was some kind of wife-beater. Cassie told Andrea that she never wanted to speak to her again. That she never wanted to dime of her money and stormed off.

At this point, I asked Andrea to stay with her sister indefinitely while we give Cassie and me some space. She didn't want to go. She fought me to stay, but I told her that me and Cassie needed time apart from her. So she packed up and went to her sister's house. As for Cassie, she went to her room and locked the door. She let me in after I told her that her mother had left. She cried in my arms and expressed that her future was now ruined. I told her that her mother had left. She cried in my arms and expressed that her future was now ruined. I told her it wasn't that I would cover her college from my retirement and that I would make it right. She doesn't exactly know what a 401k is yet, but she told me that she doesn't want me to work until I'm 90 like the people at Walmart

just because of her. I told her that she's worth it and that you do stupid things for people you love. She said that she would start looking for scholarships and maybe other schools where she could get a full ride since she is excellent grades and extracurriculars. I then admitted that Andrea wanted me to take the fall for her and that I had considered it, but I came to my senses. She got upset with me and told me that that would have been the stupidest thing I ever could have done. She said that she would have never believed that I did that anyway, and it would have made her only more upset with her mother. She told me that she doesn't blame me, and she's not mad at me for the money being gone, but she is mad that I would want to cover

for her mother. I apologize for that. We talked and cuddled for a while before calling it a night. The next morning, I got a call from Andrea's parents asking if the story was true. Cassie had told them the story and they were calling to confirm. I had the voice recordings in the bank statements to prove it. They were livid, but they begged me not to leave Andrea for this and to try to help her through her addiction. I told them that I wasn't sure about that yet and hung up. A while later, my parents called and asked me about it.

I confirmed. They were probably more mad than Cassie was, all things considered, and they're threatening to press charges. I told them to calm down and that I would handle it. Andrew has been calling to talk, but I'm just letting it ring so she's leaving voicemails.

She's offering anything to make it right. Money, intercourse, favors, you name it, but it's not going to work. OP also clarifies that deep in his heart, he knows his relationship is over. Okay, so I'll completely admit that I was 100% wrong about assuming that there was something else going on. It really is just a shopping addiction. It's not pain killers, it's not an affair, it's shoes and a car. Basically, six figures worth of shoes are next where it poses from pink curls. My mom cheated on my dad, and I get why. So, back when I was a teen, it came out that my mom was carrying on an affair with another man. My dad ended up forgiving my mom and moving forward together. I held resentment for my mom for a real long time because how dare she do that to my dad?

Hindsight is 2020 though. Well, now that I'm almost 30, I can see their relationship for what it really is. My dad is a great dad. Absolutely wonderful. Although I can see the misogyny from how he was raised. As a husband slash partner, I can see how lousy he is. My mom is basically his mom too. She does all the cleaning in their house.

My father can't be bothered to even wash a dish or clean a bathtub himself. My mom does it all. The mental load she takes on everything. Keeping track of groceries they need for the next shopping trip. She's in charge of paying all the bills, cooking all the meals. Oh, and she still has to work her regular full-time job of 45 plus hours a week. My dad's health isn't the greatest, so my mom has also become as nurse when he's ill, managing the myriad of his medications and general health. Also, she cares for my grandma too because she's sick with a couple of diseases.

So, on top of everything she does, she also manages grandma's health too. All without a thank you, or I appreciate you. This past Christmas put everything into perspective. My mom coordinated with my siblings to go all in on a super expensive gift for him for Christmas, an item that he really, really wants. And the effort that he put into her gift, zero. He got her absolutely nothing. I spoke to him privately prior to gift exchange about what he got my mom. He said, well, I bought her a nice anniversary in birthday gift, isn't that enough?

I see the disappointment that my mom feels on her face and it hurts me. She never gets flowers from him. It's like he just sees her as some person to take care of him in his home. This has been their whole relationship, not just after the affair, but prior to it too. So, although I absolutely do not condone cheating, I can understand why she did what she did back then. I get sad thinking of my mom and how she takes care of everyone, but the person who's supposed to take care of her doesn't do that. I catch myself occasionally thinking, they should really just get divorced. I've learned over the years to really cherish

my mom, so even if he doesn't spoil her, I do. I take her on weekend trips and we go to out of town concerts together. I try to buy her a small just thinking of you give so that she can feel appreciated and loved. Yeah, I can also kind of understand why she cheated, but in my opinion, the solution to being in that situation isn't to cheat, it's to leave the situation. Because if you're in an unhappy relationship and you cheat, that doesn't solve the problem, that just creates a second problem. Now you're still in a bad relationship, except now you've got a secret affair to hide. Also, um, you guys might see this as virtue signaling, and I don't know, maybe it is. Maybe it is me bragging about being a loving husband. But I like to share what I got my wife for Christmas

since this douchebag got his wife nothing. One of my hobbies is Legos. I really enjoy the like adult sets. Oh, I say adult sets. I don't mean like I'm making Lego models of a giant dong. So like Lego sets of houses and like landmarks and things like that. Anyways, I like Lego.

My wife knows that I like Lego and shes and things like that. Anyways, I like LEGO, my wife knows that I like LEGO, and she bought me LEGO for Christmas. Well, I took her favorite photo of her and our daughter, and I like pixelated it into a huge square image of the two of them, and I made a mosaic out of LEGOs of their two smiling beautiful faces. And that thing, man, that thing took me 24 hours to put together.

I don't mean like I started on Tuesday and I finished on Wednesday. I mean like actually sitting down and doing it, it took collectively 24 hours at least to finish. My fingertips were like bruise and tender from pushing in the little Lego pieces and went after the other, but I did it. And I was happy to do it because I love my wife

and I also love Lego. I don't know, I hope you guys don't see this as me like bragging or virtue signaling. I'm just sharing this because when you love, like, okay, how do I say this? You don't get your partner a nice gift because it's the right thing to do or the nice thing to do.

You get your partner a nice gift because you love them so much that you just want to do or the nice thing to do. You get your partner a nice gift because you love them so much that you just want to do it. Our next reddit posted from Throwaway22. My girlfriend refused to let her terminally ex-see his dog, so I took it to him. My girlfriend kept the dog that her ex had after they broke up. The dog was originally his and he tried to get it back, but she wouldn't let him. I heard that he stopped trying to get it back after she wouldn't let him. I heard that he stopped trying to get it back after a while because he got sick. It's been months now. I heard

that her ex was very sick and he sent his relative to try to tell my girlfriend to let him see the dog but she refused and threatened to call the cops on them. I found this so cruel of her especially since it was originally his dog, so that was unnecessarily cruel and unsympathetic. Despite not being a huge fan of dogs, I put the dog in my car, contacted her ex, and went over to his mother's house to let him see the dog. He cried when he saw his dog, and spent two hours with it before I took it back. He was so appreciative, though I only did this because of being human.

I know if I was in his place, I'd want someone to help me see my beloved pet when my ex keeps refusing for no reason other than to be bitter and petty. The guy passed away days ago. Thinking about it, I feel relieved that I did what I did, although I can't tell anyone. She doesn't know that I drove the dog to her ex that day while she was at work. OP, what are you doing, man? I don't mean what are you doing about the dog thing? What you did with the dog was super sweet and I commend you for it. I mean, what are you doing still being in this relationship? Your girlfriend is so toxic that she will steal a dying man's dog just to make him

suffer and you're like, yup, that's my girlfriend. You're so scared of your girlfriend's evilness that you have to sneak around behind her back so that you can commit a good deed. OP. Run. Run. The next time she goes to work, take every single thing you own because you know that she'll never give it to you if she catches you. Move into a new place and completely ghost her.

Your girlfriend is nuts, like psychopathic nuts. And like, people down in the comments are saying, well yeah, but what if they really hate each other's guts? What if they had a really toxic relationship? Uh, okay, even if that's the case, what about the dog? Because the boyfriend's not the only one who suffers here. The dog also would naturally miss the ex-boyfriend because dogs are, you know, one of the most loyal creatures on the entire planet. I don't know, whatever reason she has, this is a major deal breaker for me OP, and I would run,

not walk, to the nearest exit. That was our slash true off my chest, and if you like this content, be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new Reddit podcast episodes every single day. Like this content, be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new Reddit podcast episodes every single day.