Working a part-time job is a great way to build character as a teenager, but what if you’re a teenager who needs one to survive?

What would you do if the folks who hired you in a babysitting job you took to help support your family was taking advantage of you? One girl took to Reddit to seek insight on this exact scenario. Here are the details.

WIBTA if I quit working for the family I babysit for?

Hi! I’m a 16 year old girl who has been babysitting for several years for family and family friends.

Recently, I started babysitting for a family with an 8 year old daughter with autism and ADHD, and I was willing to because they had initially agreed to my $16/hr (the average in my area is $18-$19) on weekends only for about 7hours/day.

I really needed the extra money because my parents have been struggling and I wanted to help out.

Sounds like a good kid.

Now, that was a total lie.

I’m a people pleaser at heart and was receptive when they told me that they could no longer do the rate we agreed to because they were in some financial trouble.

Uh, oh…

I expected maybe a few dollars less, but I was told my first day (a weekday, which they also lied about, now expecting me to babysit 7 hours a day 5 days a week) that I would be getting $35 a day, for a total of $175 a week.

That’s $5 an hour.

Like I said, I really needed the money, so I agreed and have been working that way for about a month and a half now, but they frequently don’t need me for a day or two a week so I’m making significantly less than I’m wanting per week.

These parents seem like cheapskates.

I brought this up with them, and they agreed to pay me by the week instead, so I was making $175 even if I don’t work a day.

They seemed alright with this arrangement and even though my entire family has been telling me to quit, I was happy to be able to help not just my parents but them as well.

Now, since that, the mom has been giving me a bad attitude in messages and I heard from the daughter I watch that they’ve been complaining about me and saying I have “a whole lot of audacity” and am expecting too much.

Crazy thing to say about someone basically raising your kid for free.

I feel like that’s unfair, since they never told me I was being unreasonable in person.

Would I be TA if I quit because of their comments? I don’t even hate babysitting for them, but I don’t really want to help people who would badmouth me instead of coming to me first.

More than understandable.

My parents and my sister are telling me I should just ghost them, but I don’t know. I know I’m a bit of a doormat, hahha.

Yikes, crazy that a kid has to be in a situation with these kind of adults. Let’s see what Reddit commenters chimed in.

Everyone agreed with the original poster.

And offered some sound advice.

Some really went after the parents.

But all ended on a helpful note.

Their business practices sound dirtier than their kid’s diapers.

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.