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A mother has the internet divided after revealing that she will pay for her daughter’s wedding – but not her stepdaughter’s.In a recent post shared to the popular “Am I The A**hole?” Reddit forum, a mother explained that she and her husband John have a 25-year-old daughter, Hannah. John also has a 30-year-old daughter, Alexa, from a previous relationship.
Both daughters are now engaged, the Reddit poster explained, but Alexa was the older one who “always got everything,” while Hannah “got hand-me-downs.”
“She never had much of her ‘own’ things so I wanted to make her wedding special,” she added.
She now plans to pay for Hannah’s wedding – which she’s been saving for years to do – but not Alexa’s nuptials.
“Alexa asked John if he and her biological mom would be paying for her wedding and he said no. He said she should have a wedding that she and her fiancé can afford,” the woman continued.
She noted that when her children went to lunch, Alexa called her father crying because she found out her stepmother was paying for Hannah’s wedding and thought that was “unfair.”
According to the Reddit user, her husband thinks that she should use the money she saved on both Hannah and Alexa’s wedding, rather than just Hannah’s.
“I told him no because I was the one who had been saving the money. I told him if he’d like to pay for Alexa’s wedding then he should speak with her mother for them to see how much they could help,” she wrote.
John also asked his wife if she’d give any leftover money, that doesn’t get spent on the wedding, to Alexa. She said no to this request, noting she was giving all the money she saved to Hannah, and she could spend it on whatever she wanted.
In an edit to the post, the mother clarified that she started working when Hannah was 10. At that time, John and his ex agreed to pay for Alexa’s costs, while she and John split Hannah’s costs. When Alexa was growing up, her mother also had full custody, with John and her stepmother caring for the child every other weekend.
When the Reddit user was working throughout Hannah’s childhood, she told John she’d “be making a savings account for” her, with that money to be used to pay for Hannah’s “wedding or a down payment on a house.”
She also gave another update in the post, revealing that John, Alexa, and Alexa’s mother had a separate conversation about the situation. However, things escalated when Alexa told her stepmother has she wouldn’t be invited to the wedding unless she gave her “half the money.”
While the woman understood Alexa’s decision, the money had already been transferred into Hannah’s name, which John also understood.
The Reddit post has quickly gone viral, with more than 3,700 upvotes. Many readers defended the mother, saying it wasn’t her responsibility to pay for Alexa’s wedding and they criticized John for trying to encourage his wife to do so.
“[Alexa] has two parents to pay for her wedding. The husband is just trying to look like a good guy to his daughter without having to spend any money on her. Stick to your guns, sounds like your daughter deserves this win,” one wrote.
“Sounds like you have separate finances and not sure why your husband thinks it’s fair to combine money and expenses now. Also sounds like there’s been some ‘unfairness’ in terms of treatment of the kids all along your relationship, so I also don’t understand why he’s so concerned about making things fair and even for both girls now,” another commented.
“John has realized what a s*** parent he is by not providing for his child as you have for yours. Now he’s trying to make it your problem. It’s not; it’s his and his ex’s,” a third claimed.
However, other people criticized the mother for not financially contributing to Alexa’s wedding, especially since she’s been a part of her life for so long. They also claimed that the woman had resentment towards Alexa.
“You’ve been in this girl’s life since she was three or four. But you don’t view her as part of your family? She’s purely someone else’s problem?” one asked. “‘You’ have been saving for Hannah’s wedding? Do you and your husband not talk about major expenses?” another pondered.
“Oh man… you’ve been in Alexa’s life as a parental figure since she was a toddler and it never occurred to you in more than two decades to treat her like your daughter?” another responded. “You seem to be holding resentment about an older child getting new things (she had no control over that, you know) and a younger child getting hand-me-downs?
