u/Specialist_Bug_8916

Ive been the one earning while my wife stayed home, first with the kids and then just generally running the house, which suited us both fine and we were always comfortable on what i brought in. The kids are grown and gone now, the mortgage is paid off, and were in a really good spot financially heading toward retirement.

The thing thats causing friction is her younger sister. Shes 44, shes had a string of bad luck and some of it her own doing, and for years now my wife has quietly been propping her up. Helping with her rent when shes short, covering her car when it breaks, slipping her money for the kids birthdays, that sort of thing. For a long time it came out of the general pot and i let it go because it wasnt huge and i didnt want to be the bad guy.

A while back we agreed that to keep things fair we'd each have our own set amount of spending money every month, no questions asked, mine for my bits and hers for whatever she fancied. Im putting mine aside toward a little classic car ive always wanted, and shes been handing nearly all of hers straight to her sister.

Thats genuinely fine, its her money to do as she likes with. The problem is shes now run out of her own and has started hinting, then outright suggesting, that i should be chipping in to help her sister too. And honestly i just dont want to. I dont think its my job to fund a grown adult whos not my responsibility, especially when the help never actually seems to change anything, it just keeps her sister floating.

So i told her plainly that if she wants to keep bankrolling her sister beyond what shes already giving, she could get a part time job herself, shes only in her late forties and perfectly capable, and put her own wages toward it.

Now shes telling me im cold and selfish, and her sister has somehow heard about it and thinks im a tightwad. I just feel like ive worked hard for what weve got and i dont want it quietly disappearing into her sisters lap. AITAH?

so ive been with my boyfriend (28) for four and a half years and last weekend was his 30th, hed told me what he wanted for his birthday but couldnt justify the money on himself so i dipped into savings and bought him a watch hed had his eye on for over a year and it cost about 2800 quid which is a lot for me because i grew up working class and still budget like it.

bit of context, my family runs a busy minicab firm where my mum still answers the phones some weekends and my dad still drives, and ive been open with my boyfriend about it from the start since he comes from a totally different world where his parents are both gps and his friend group all went to the same fee paying school he did. ive always thought he was fine with it.

his birthday was at a bar his best friend had booked out and i showed up with the watch wrapped and when i handed it over he properly lost it and made a thing of it in front of the whole table. about half an hour later his best friend who has never quite liked me came up to me at the bar and said something along the lines of "i suppose if you grow up counting pennies you get really good at saving for the big stuff well done you," said with a smile and the kind of pause that meant i was supposed to take it.

i pulled my boyfriend outside and asked him to say something to her because the comment was clearly aimed at my family and i didnt want to make a scene at his birthday, he said i was overreacting and shes just being messy and i cant take a joke and everyone knows where im from anyway so i should be flattered i could even pull a gift like that off, then he said the line i havent stopped replaying which was "honestly if i can get over your background to be with you, you can get over one joke from her."

i didnt say anything back, i went inside and took the watch from the gift table and left through the back door and drove home, the next morning i took it to the shop where they refunded me without any drama and i texted him to ask his best friend for the watch since she shares his opinion of my background.

AITA?

Im 27, still living at my parents place but I split rent and utilities like an actual tenant. I have my own area of the house, and the dog and my routines are treated as mine. Hes a fifteen year old Cocker Spaniel with chronic kidney issues and is on a prescription vet diet that runs me close to a hundred and forty quid a month, plus daily anti inflammatories mixed into a specific brand of medicated soft treats.

My brother and his wife are 32 and 29 and theyre into "all natural pet wellness" in a way that has become a full personality. They feed their own dog raw meat exclusively, refuse to vaccinate her past the puppy round, and have built an instagram brand around it. Theyve offered me their meal prep portions and homemade salves before, and Ive politely told them many times my dog needs his medical diet and were not switching him off it.

Last Saturday they offered to watch my dog while my partner took me out for my birthday dinner. I was hesitant but my dog likes them, so I said yes. I got back around half ten and my SIL casually told me she had "tidied up the pet area" while we were out, and when I went into the kitchen every bag of prescription kibble was gone, every box of medicated treats was gone, and the cupboard was full of vacuum sealed raw meat portions shed brought from her own freezer.

I lost it and asked her where my dogs food was, and she said shed binned it because raw was better and she didnt want me feeding him "processed garbage." I asked her about the treats and got the same answer. Eight bags of prescription kibble and three boxes of the specific medicated treats I have a vets prescription for, all in the rubbish.

My brother and SIL came back the next morning to pick up something theyd left behind, and that was when I really went off. I told her she needed to replace everything she dumped, including the medicated treats which require a vet visit and a prescription to even get. She said she couldnt afford that, so I told her fine, dont come back until either you reimburse me for everything or replace it all brand new.

My brother thinks Im being a complete asshole and that his wife was only trying to help. My parents agree with me on the replacement bit but think saying she cant come back at all is going too far. AITA?

My husband and I finally bought our first place last year after almost five years of renting and saving every spare dollar. It was genuinely the biggest thing weve done as a couple and we wanted to do it properly.

We threw a real housewarming. Invited family a year out, sent reminders six months ahead, even rented extra seating because we wanted it to feel like an actual event and not just people standing around with paper plates.

My younger brother is the youngest of four. Three sisters and him. My parents have treated him like the sun rises and sets on his head since the day he was born. Hes in his early twenties now and still acts like nothing is ever his fault, and his fiance backs every bit of it. Tells him hes underappreciated by us, that we should be grateful to even have him as a brother, all of it.

A week before the housewarming he tells me hes not coming because him and his fiance are going on a road trip with friends and the dates "happened to overlap." I asked him to please come, told him how much this meant to me, and he said hed think about it. My mom stepped in and assured me he would be there. Said not to worry about it.

He even had a small thing to do at the party. He was the only one who saw the house before we bought it so I asked him to say a few words when we did the little walkthrough in the living room. Nothing huge.

The day of, I found out he wasnt coming maybe an hour before guests started arriving. Hed already left the state and hadnt told me. Just texted my mom that morning. I cried in the bathroom and one of my sisters had to redo my makeup before people showed up.

Now hes buying his first place with his fiance and theyre throwing their own housewarming in a few months. His fiance sent a text saying attendance is "non negotiable" because its a "milestone family moment." My brother followed up saying he expects me there because Im his sister and thats what family does.

I mentioned to my mom that I might not go and she lost it. Called the rest of the family before I even hung up. Now my brother, his fiance, and my parents are calling me petty and a brat.

Part of me also wonders if Im just trying to prove a point at this stage. Like is the satisfaction of him knowing I skipped going to actually feel like anything, or am I just going to sit at home that day still upset about something he did over a year ago.

tldr: brother skipped my housewarming last year for a road trip with his fiance, found out an hour before guests arrived. Now hes throwing his own housewarming with his fiance and demanding attendance is mandatory.

Considering skipping.

WIBTA?

about six months ago my brother started asking me to cover for him in a specific ongoing situation. i wont get into the details but the short version is that he had an arrangement with someone else that had conditions attached, and he was quietly not meeting those conditions, and he was using me as part of how he made it look like he was.

i went along with it at first because i didnt want the fallout to land on someone i care about who had nothing to do with any of it. so i just. absorbed it. kept showing up when he needed me to. told myself it was temporary.

it was not temporary. it became the regular arrangement for months.

now there is a formal process happening. someone found out things were not what they appeared to be on his end. and my brother has asked me directly to tell anyone who contacts me a version of events that is not true.

i told him i was not comfortable lying in a formal process. he got upset and said i was being self righteous and that one honest statement from me could affect his situation for years.

my mom agrees with him. says family protects family. says no one was being harmed so what does the truth actually accomplish here.

i feel like i got pulled into this without really consenting to the role and now im being asked to go further than i ever agreed to go.

WIBTA if i just tell the truth if someone asks me directly?