Gift giving is a love language. It is an art form. And when it comes to teenagers, it is an extreme sport where the stakes are incredibly high. You either nail it and become a hero, or you miss the mark completely and get a polite nod before they go back to their phone. But one mom on Reddit just proved that throwing money at a teenager isn’t nearly as effective as actually listening to them, and her ex-husband’s family is absolutely losing their minds over it.
Our narrator is the mom of a 13-year-old girl who has been singing since she was a toddler. This isn’t just a hobby. It is a passion. The kid is serious about her craft. She practices constantly. She watches videos on technique. She is doing the work. But recently, she hit a wall with a specific piece she couldn’t nail. She was devastated. She felt like she wasn’t getting the pitch right.
Most parents would just say “you sound great honey” and go back to watching Netflix. But this mom listened. She saw her daughter’s frustration wasn’t about fishing for compliments but about a genuine desire to improve. So she did something amazing. She scraped together $600, which put a dent in her finances, and bought her daughter a three-week intensive vocal course. She bought her daughter the tools to achieve her dream.
The reveal happened at a birthday party hosted by her ex-husband and his parents. The grandparents went the flashy route. They bought the 13-year-old a brand new iPhone. The dad gave her a mani/pedi coupon. These are objectively good gifts. Expensive gifts. But when the daughter opened the envelope from her mom and saw the acceptance letter for the vocal lessons, she lost it. She was thrilled. She didn’t care about the phone. She cared about the singing.
And this is where the fragility of the ex-husband and his parents entered the chat. Instead of being happy that their granddaughter was ecstatic, they got jealous. They pulled the mom aside and accused her of being “ignorant.” Their logic? By buying her lessons, the mom was telling her daughter she “isn’t good enough.”
I am sorry but what? That is not how education works. Does hiring a math tutor mean you hate your kid? No. It means you want them to succeed. They even threw in a bizarre, nonsensical comment about her being Puerto Rican, which suggests they are projecting some deep-seated issues onto this poor child. They claimed the mom was “enabling her insecurities” by helping her fix the very thing she was insecure about.
The reality is painful but obvious. They are mad because their expensive iPhone got upstaged by a piece of paper. They wanted to buy her affection, and the mom earned it by paying attention.
The dad then took it to a level of petty that is almost impressive. He texted the mom demanding she get a refund because he refuses to pay child support to “make up for the dent” she caused in her finances. Let’s pause on the child support. He pays $40 a month. Forty. Dollars. That covers maybe one sneaker. He is threatening to withhold his microscopic contribution because his ego is bruised.
Now the grandparents are issuing ultimatums, saying they won’t see their granddaughter unless she returns the gift she loves. They are literally willing to punish the child to hurt the mother.
So is the mom the ahole? Absolutely not. N-T-A. You listened to your child. You validated her dreams. You gave her a gift that says “I believe in you enough to invest in your talent.” Her father and grandparents gave her gifts that said “look how much money we spent.” There is a difference, and the kid knows it. Keep the lessons. Ditch the toxicity.
You are 100% not the AH, but both your ex and the grandparents are. It is extremely cruel that they are threatening to cut your daughter off if she does return a gift from you, her mother, that genuinely made her happy. Your husband and the grandparents clearly care more about themselves and their own feelings than about your daughter’s. The fact your daughter is 13 years old and your ex and the grandparents are the ones acting like spoiled brat, whingey little AHs is telling. They sound incredibly toxic and, if they are willing to cut their own granddaughter off because she gave more attention to the gift of singing lessons you so thoughtfully bought for your daughter, tell them good riddance. Same with your ex. It is apparent they do not care one bit about her happiness. You did the right thing and I advise you to not even entertain the idea of taking this away from your child, irrespective of what threats these people lob at you. You are definitely not the AH. Just keep doing what you are doing for your daughter. These people will just have to deal with it and decide if they really want to lose their daughter and granddaughter based on their own insecurities and jealousy.