Babies love to study cause and effect. It’s simple like that.

In this case, a baby decided she was done with technology and dropped her grandma’s phone on the floor to see what would happen. Well, now her grandma wants the parents to pay her back for the broken phone.

The parents say she shouldn’t have handed a phone to a baby in the first place.

Let’s analyze the situation.

AITA for refusing to repair my MILs phone after my 18 month old broke it ?

So, my mother in law was babysitting our little one last night and for some reason, she gave the little one her phone to watch YouTube.

Our little one decided she was done, and threw the phone from her high chair, cracking the screen badly.

Why am I not surprised?

Now we absolutely do not do this. Our little one gets maybe 2 hours of screen time a week, and it’s always on the TV, never a phone.

For context, my mother in law is very well off … Way more so than us, and the repair bill for her phone is a lot of money to us, especially this close to Christmas.

And with the added expense of a baby, too.

My mother in law told my partner that we must pay to repair her phone screen as our daughter broke it. I argued 3 points.

1. We were not present at the time. We were not the ones supervising the little one and shouldn’t be accountable.
2. My mother in law decided to give our child the phone. It was not suggested by us , and as mentioned is not something we ever do ourselves, my mother in law knows this.
3. The cost of the repair is a significant amount of money to us, but not to her. Our combined income is less than half her solo income.

These sound like good points, but it wasn’t good enough for her mother-in-law.

My partner suggested that we pay back in installments. My mother in law refused because she thinks this is our issue to figure out.

Personally I also don’t agree with us paying her back, since the phone was broken due to her own negligence.

AITA?

That’s a tough spot to be in.

Let’s see if Reddit has any insights on this situation.

A commenter shares their thoughts.

This person makes a great point.

Another commenter chimes in.

This person keeps it simple.

Yup!

This person has a different take.

By the looks of things, her mother-in-law will charge the baby when she grows up.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.