Mom Sparks Debate After Refusing To Give Daughter Her 'College Fund' To Pay For Her Wedding
She didn't go to college because she was a teen mom.
Daisy Daisy / Shutterstock A mother online explained that she established a college fund for each of her four children, but her eldest daughter wants to use her college fund to pay for her future wedding and house.
The mother is refusing since the money is reserved for education only — now she's wondering if she is in the wrong.
She shared her story on the subreddit thread, “r/AmItheA–-hole” (AITA), seeking the opinion of other users regarding the situation.
Users had the choice to give her a “You’re the A–-hole” (YTA) rating if they believed that she was wrong or a “Not the A--hole” (NTA) rating if they thought she was not.
The woman shared that her daughter wants to use her college fund to pay for her wedding.
The 43-year-old woman began her post by providing some background regarding her family.
She shared that she has four children, El, 22, Katie, 17, Cam, 15, and Isla, 5 — she is currently pregnant with her fifth child.
“Me and my husband started adding to college funds every month for each of our kids pretty much as soon as we found out we were pregnant,” the woman wrote.
She added that her husband has a successful job and that each of the funds was “more than enough” for each of their children to attend college.
They never informed their children of the funds they had set aside for them.
The woman's daughter dropped out of school after becoming pregnant.
The woman revealed that her oldest daughter, El, got pregnant when she was 16 and wound up dropping out of school.
“I was very disappointed but I understood,” the woman wrote. “However I was under the impression she would return later, but she has no plans to.”
Now, El is engaged to the father of her first child and they have another on the way.
They do not plan on getting married officially until they can afford a wedding.
“They were doing okay financially for a while but due to the market right now they've been struggling because El can't get a job since she doesn't have a diploma so we've been loaning them money,” the woman shared.
Meanwhile, the woman’s second oldest daughter, Katie, was recently accepted into college.
After the news of her acceptance broke, so did the information about the college fund that had been set up for her.
In a recent discussion between El and Katie, Katie revealed to her sister that she would be using her college fund when El asked how she planned on paying for her education.
“I was in the room while they were talking and this made me panic,” the woman wrote.
She shared that she and her husband intended to use El’s college fund and split it among the remaining children’s education.
When El asked her mother if all of the kids had a college fund, the woman told her the truth.
El wanted to use the money to support herself, her fiance and her child instead of an education.
“She got really excited and went to call her fiance and tell him the good news,” the woman wrote.
The woman told her daughter that she could not have the money unless she planned on using it for college, upsetting El who ended up leaving the home.
“The next day I get a call from El, she was crying and begging me to let her have the funds so she could finally afford a down payment and maybe even a wedding,” the woman shared.
“I told her she could have the money if she went back to school and whatever money was left over she could use for whatever she wanted.”
El argued with her mother that it was her money and that she was entitled to spend it however she pleased.
“I told her that it was MY money and those were my conditions and she hung up,” the woman claimed.
Afterward, her daughter’s fiance’s family began harassing the woman and her husband for refusing to let her daughter have the money.
“[They are] calling us a–holes and a lot of other names,” the woman shared. “Saying it's all gonna go to waste if she doesn't use it, were setting her up for failure, etc..”
The woman added that her father believes the college fund should be given to El as she and her husband “saved it for her after all.”
The woman asked other Reddit users if she was wrong for not allowing El to have access to the money unless she used it for educational purposes.
Redditors supported the woman’s decision and declared her “NTA.”
“NTA... It's not her money it's your money which is kind of a gift for your daughter on a condition - she is not fulfilling the condition so she has no say in it.” one user wrote.
“You are not denying her the fund only asking her to fulfill the condition. If you put an exception for one child you would need to do for others also if anything changes in future.”
Some believed that El had no one to blame but herself for her current financial predicament.
“Nope. Her daughter chose to have and keep the baby. The money was put aside for SCHOOL,” one user commented.
“Her daughter can go to the courthouse and get married. It’s not up to the mom to pay for a wedding. NTA.”
“It is crazy to me that people think she should be given the money. She's making adult choices, like having more kids and getting married, but expects her parents to fund it. Where does it end?” another user pointed out.
Megan Quinn is a writer at YourTango who covers entertainment and news, self, love, and relationships.