This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/bestofredditorupdates by /u/Choice_Evidence1983 on 2025-06-29 04:02:06+00:00.

I am NOT OOP, OOP is u/Status-Silver1722

Originally posted to r/AITAH

AITA for refusing to allow my stepdaughter to use one of my cars and telling her to get a job and buy one instead?

Thanks to u/queenlegolas & u/soayherder for suggesting this BoRU

Trigger Warnings: entitlement, manipulation

Original Post: June 20, 2025

My husband and I have a 5 years old son together and he has a 18F daughter Sally from his previous marriage. Sally is an entitled, manipulative young lady who has spend her entire life milking the “child of divorce” card in order to make her parents feel bad for her and give her everything she wanted. As a result, she is now a lazy adult, has poor grades in school, no perspective, no job, no desire to get a job or do something with her life.

Although my husband and her bio mom are both responsible for how she turned out, instead of coming together and work towards helping her do something, they prefer to blame each other and they do everything they can to undermine the other one. For example, if my husband punishes Sally by not giving her spending money, her mom will immediately throw money at her. If her mom takes her car away as a punishment, my husband will immediately give her his car to use to go places. It’s a very strange dynamic they have and very different of what he has with me. When I asked him why he is so different in terms of parenting my son with me vs Sally with her bio mom, he said I am his wife and I am a normal, sane woman who he can actually communicate with. Whatever, I feel like they are both wrong but Sally is not my daughter and I am happy I don’t have to spend too much time with her.

Now that the summer break started Sally has the most important problem in the world: her car broke and she needs one to use this summer to go places, meet her friends, go to parties etc. Her mom is not willing to give her car because she needs it to go to work, my husband needs his car to go to work and neither of them is willing to buy her a new one. So Sally the genius found the perfect solution and asked me to give her one of my cars. To be clear I have 2 cars: a big SUV that was given to me by my employer and a smaller one that I use when I go into town because it’s easier to park. I refused and I told her she can’t use any of my car. She insisted and said I don’t need two cars at the same time but she needs one to get around. I told her she is free to use the public transportation or get a job and buy one herself.

Now Sally is going around to my husband’s relatives complaining that I am trying to exploit her and send her to work. I had a good laugh about this with my husband’s sister but my MIL claims I could have just refused instead of telling her to get a job. I am a little confused what it’s so bad about telling an adult to get a job. It’s not like I sent a 12 years old to work for her food or anything.

AITAH has no consensus bot, OOP was NTA

Relevant Comments

Commenter 1: NTA. You are spot on. Tell your husband that since Sally is 18, she can move out now. She either gets a job or goes to live with her mom. You need to focus on your kid.

OOP: Fortunately for me she lives with her mom and just visits us or spends a couple of days here

Commenter 2: If you start getting messages from her family members about how you are trying to manipulate her into getting a job you need to confirm that shit as clearly as possible. You are trying to make her get a job, and will continue to do so as long as you can.

You have the opportunity to erase some of the damage done by her 2 enabling parents. Do not be deterred.

OOP: The strange thing is that my husband agrees with me, her mother totally hates me and is teaching her that everything I say is BS, my husband sister’s agrees with me and my MIL babies her because she is her first grandchild. But I feel like no one in this situation is doing her a favour. I am not trying to manipulate her but her situation is so different to what I am used to or how I parent my own child that it’s insane. Like how can it be so horrible to teach an adult responsibility? To want to give her a direction in life. I don’t know what they expect to do with her honestly…they can’t support her for the rest of her life. And it’s sad because she is a capable, healthy adult. Even people with disabilities work and want to do something with their lives, so she has ni excuse

Commenter 3: ESH Sally is how she is as a direct result of the parenting you described. Why would you knowingly marry and children with such a poor, childish excuse for a father?

OOP: The thing is I have a totally different parenting experience with him. We agree on everything we do in regards to our child, he disciplines our son and is a good father. His excuse when it comes to Sally is that her mother is insane but I don’t agree with him and I told him that. Even if the other parent is indeed insane, this is not an excuse for him to accept and tolerate poor behaviour from his daughter. I guess he does not want to push her too much so that he does not lose her?

OOP explains more about her work vehicle and if there are rules for it*

OOP: I can use the work car for personal needs as well, not only for work related activities. But I was handled that car by my employer and it was given to me to use, not my family members

The car is in my employer’s name but I can use it all the time, even for personal use. However it was given to me for me to use, not my family members and especially not for stupid reasons like going to the movies with friends or going to parties

Commenter 4: She learned early the fine art of playing one parent against the other and now expects to be a leech. Nothing wrong with pointing out the obvious fact of she needs to get a job. Don’t give in-NTA

OOP: Oh she did. Even now at 18 she still does it. Like she will come to us and complain about her mother, mom does this, mom does that, mom is like this. And of course then she goes to her mother and complains about us. I guess this is part of the reason her mom hates me. I am sure that Sally goes around telling her stuff that is mostly not true. I would have expected and wanted her mom to be an adult and come talk to me if she had any doubts but she barely talks to my husband so… I was made aware I am not a parent, just her father’s wife and I have no say in her upbringing

Is the stepdaughter in therapy to deal with her behaviors towards her parents and OOP?

OOP: She refuses therapy and her mother exploded when it was mentioned in the past. For her and her mother only insane people get therapy, so what can we do? We can’t force her.

Also, I understand what you are saying but the truth is she is manipulative and cares for no one except of herself. She will come to our house and talk shit about her mother. Mom does this, mom does that, mom is like this. Why? To gain sympathy from my husband, to make him feel like he needs to compensate for what her “horrible” mother is putting her through. Then she will go to her mother’s place and talk shit about us to fuel her mother’s dislike for us and make her also feel guilty and compensate. I think over the years she managed to convince both her parents that the other one is crazy.

How did the stepdaughter’s car break down?

OOP: Her car was an older one and some parts broke. There is a way to fix it, like they can replace all the parts that are broken but as far as I know it’s not worth repairing because the costs will exceed the actual value of the car entirely

bored36090: I don’t change my behavior to protect adults from themselves. Keys are on the table, my wallet is over there, beer in the fridge. However, choices have repercussions. You’re right, unfortunately, there will be ZERO accountability for “Sally.” But that’s something they can talk about when the cops show up. OP comes home, car is gone. I could wonder who stole it or just call the cops 👍🏾

Update: June 22, 2025 (two days later)

Hello again! Thank you for all the feedback you provided to my previous post, I really appreciate you spent your time to give me some ideas.

The majority of you advised me to hide my cars keys because Sally would most likely try to steal one of my cars when I am not home. You are not far from the truth because she oftentimes does this with her mother’s car, meaning she will take the car when her mom is not home without asking her if she needs it later or ask for permision. So your advice makes a lot of sense. However I refuse to do such thing in my own home. I believe if I end up in a position to have to hide my things in my own house, we’ll have a bigger problem that needs to be solved. Also where does this stop? Today I have to hide my car keys, later my money, later my purse? This is not the kind of life I want to have and it never happened to me as a teenager/young adult. When I used to live with my parents, I knew where everything was (car keys, m…

Content cut off. Read original on https://old.reddit.com/r/BestofRedditorUpdates/comments/1ln5ie6/aita_for_refusing_to_allow_my_stepdaughter_to_use/