Man Refuses To Pay For His Stepdaughter's Wedding Despite Footing The Bill For Her Siblings — 'She Can Have Her Dead Dad Pay'
She has never wanted anything to do with him until now.
Thanakorn.P | Shutterstock A man is taking heat from his stepdaughter after refusing to pay for her wedding despite paying for her siblings' nuptials. The man claimed that his relationship with his eldest stepdaughter is non-existent and that she has never wanted anything to do with him — at least, until it came to the footing of her wedding bill.
However, the man had a different idea as to how his stepdaughter could pay for her wedding.
The man refused to pay for his stepdaughter's wedding and suggested that she have her late father pay for it instead.
Sharing his story to Reddit, the man revealed that he married his wife nearly a decade ago and that she had three children from her previous marriage. While the man immediately got along with her two younger children, her eldest, Kelly, was never his biggest fan.
While Kelly would make the occasional passive-aggressive comment toward the man, her behavior grew worse after her biological father passed away.
“She did not take it well and resulted in a lot of outbursts,” the man wrote. “I wasn't living there at this time. She went into therapy, but overall, it didn't seem like it helped. She threatened to run away if I married their mom.”
The man distanced himself from Kelly while he continued to date her mother. However, he grew even closer with her other two children, and soon, they began staying with him and viewing him as a father figure.
“When Kelly was 18 the two of us decided to stop putting our life on hold and get married,” the man wrote. “Kelly hated this. The other kids were happy though.”
The man admitted that every interaction he has had with Kelly since marrying her mom has been “unpleasant,” and he does not see her as one of his children.
“I eventually adopted her siblings when they were 16 and 17. They asked me,” the man shared. “During that time, she destroyed a lot of her siblings' stuff for betraying their dad.”
Today, the man said that he rarely sees Kelly and he prefers it that way. However, he has a relationship with her two younger siblings and even paid for both of their weddings.
Recently, the man received a phone call from Kelly, who is now 27, requesting that he pay for her wedding since he paid for that of her siblings.
When the man told her no, she argued that he was being unfair. That’s when the man snapped back with a brutal comment.
“I had enough and told her to have her dad pay for the wedding,” he wrote. “She hung up after some lovely names.”
Most people online agreed that while he should not have to pay for the wedding, his comment about her late father was a low blow.
“You paid for your children who you adopted weddings which is your right. She then called you out of the blue wanting nothing from you except to be an ATM?” one Redditor pointed out. “Sometimes people lose their cool and say awful things.”
“Kelly obviously took it too far by practically forbidding her mom from moving on and for punishing her siblings for deciding to bond with you, but still, having a dead parent is something traumatic, and you bringing it up just to make a point in an argument is really low,” another user noted.
“I am not going to say that you’re wrong for not paying for Kelly’s wedding," a third commenter wrote. "However, I do agree that the comment about her dead father was too far. You should have just said no and hung up the phone. You didn't need to engage after that."
Kelly’s cruel behavior likely stemmed from the emotional pain of losing her father and watching her mother move on with someone else.
While some argued that the man could have made more of an effort to get to know his stepdaughter and make her feel more comfortable, it appears that she did not like him from the beginning and had no interest in forming a relationship with him.
The loss of a parent is traumatic at any age, but in childhood, it can be devastating. Kelly's siblings were younger when their father died, and although their grief was intense, they were able to heal in a way that she wasn't. In many instances, parental loss can cause a child to lash out at living family members, as appears to be the case for Kelly.
In extreme cases, some children can't get out of their grief and develop adjustment disorder, which is simply a therapeutic way to define an extreme reaction to a life-changing event. Without professional guidance, it can be difficult for a child like Kelly to heal.
This family, specifically Kelly, has never healed from the turmoil of grief, and in order to rebuild, it will take much more than footing the bill for a wedding or hurling insults at each other.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.