It can be hard for parents to keep things fair between kids when it comes to gift giving, and it gets even more complicated in blended families.

What would you do if your ex were buying your child an expensive birthday present, but you couldn’t afford to buy something as expensive for your stepchild?

Would you try to convince your ex to buy a less expensive gift in order to keep things fair, or would you stay out of it and simply buy what you could afford and let your ex do the same?

In this story, one mom is caught in the middle of what seems like an unfair gift giving situation, at least from the perspective of her stepdaughter, and she’s not sure what to do about it.

Let’s read all the details.

AITAH for refusing to fund step daughter’s car way out of budget

I am 42f currently married to Ryan 44m since five years.

I have one son denis 18m from previous marriage with ady which was abusive.

But he is great to our son and we shared custody.

Ryan shares a daughter sophie with ex wife Nikita.

I work a decent job so does Ryan. Same with Nikita

Her ex is very well off financially.

Ady is other level of rich though.

He gambled and made huge amount of money and invested..during covid he got even more rich.

Something we can’t compete with.

The amount of gifts denis got always caused issues , but my ex’s gifts to our son aren’t my business and he would never listen anyways even if I asked him to tone down.

But I helped Sophie get into same international school as my son and paid one third of annual fees.

I also have a son with Ryan who is 4m.

This is a really nice birthday present!

Now on denis’s birthday.

Ady decided to gift him car and asked me to contribute.

I contribute around 5k usd as he will go to college this august and most probably out of state.

He gifted him audi A4 contributing most to its budget.

Still it is gift from both of us.

Ryan wasn’t happy with such an expensive gift but he said he can’t stop my ex anyways.

Sophie wants an equally nice gift.

Now Sophie is turning 18 next month and asked us which Audi she is getting.

Which we refused to.

Ryan and Nikita will buy her a car around 10k usd.

But that’s it.

Ryan never gave expensive gifts to Denis nor i demanded it from him..

I already contributed to sophie’s schooling.

But I don’t think I can just give away thousands of dollars in car budget.

And maximum I can match is what I have to my son. Which is 5k.

I have to think about my other child and his future too.

Her husband wants to give in to Sophie’s demands.

Sophie started throwing tantrums And called us names.

My husband asked me to sell our plot which we bought together and its market value is around 80k usd.

Which i refused to do so.

A plot is an asset. A car isn’t.

I have pre marriage assets from my inheritance.

Ryan made clear to me that his assets will go to his bio kids.

So I also want my assets to go to my bio kids only.

She’s not even trying to compete with her ex.

I told him I can’t compete with my ex.

And he said either ask my ex to downgrade my son’s car and we have a problem

First my ex will never do it nor I can take it from my son’s inheritance from my dad.

This has caused tension and Ryan is giving cold treatment to me and my son..though Nikita fully understands.

Sophie will still get a nice car.

I am still contributing 5k to sophie’s car.

Ryan never did that much for my son. So I am not going to do more than that.

15k car is more than enough.

We have one family car which is around 20k.

Still Sophie is calling me names.

I understand why Sophie doesn’t think this is fair, but she also sounds pretty entitled.

Not everyone is given a car by their parents. She should consider herself lucky.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story.

Maybe she shouldn’t contribute anything towards Sophie’s car.

Ryan is expecting too much from her.

She does not have to throw away money on a car just because her ex did.

She has already contributed a lot to Sophie’s schooling.

Sophie is a brat.

It’s the thought that counts not the price tag.

This girl needs a serious reality check.

If you liked that story, read this one about grandparents who set up a college fund for their grandkid because his parents won’t, but then his parents want to use the money to cover sibling’s medical expenses.