This college student opened her first bank account as a teenager, hoping to save money from her part-time job and build some independence.

Instead, she quickly noticed funds disappearing, taken by her father to cover “bills,” with vague promises of being paid back someday.

Years passed, the withdrawals continued, and the repayments never really came.
Now that the numbers are adding up to thousands, her patience is officially gone.

WIBTAH if I closed my bank account to stop getting my money stolen

Hello, I (19 female) live at home with my parents, I have two older siblings both moved out but one of which is still mostly financially reliant on my parents (college).

I first received a debit card at 14 as it was when I got my first job and wanted to save money.

However I very quickly noticed that some of the money would be taken every one in a while, upon confronting my dad he said it was to pay some bills and he would pay me back whenever he could.

Yikes.

I understood and moved on but noticed I never really got paid back and more money was always taken.

I got over it and realized that being an adult is hard and he wouldn’t take it for nothing, so I lived with this for 5 years.

I am now 19, in college living from home, with a semistable income and I am starting to get more upset as my money is continually drained without any permission.

Time to put an end to the madness.

Now if it was minor amount it would be okay but as of December 2025 I have gotten 5k taken from my account without permission and practically forced to pay another 5k on top of that to pay off my car.

I’m not able to work a lot because of school only about 20 hours a week and it’s not a high paying job, so the idea of how much money I would have saved up if I wasn’t getting it stolen is starting to upset me.

I already pay for my share of insurances and help buy food for the house and don’t really know what else to do as this alone takes majority of my paycheck each week.

Oh heck no.

So would I be the a****** for closing access to my bank account to stop the money stealing?

And would it cause problems with the relationship I have with my parents?

Any advice appreciated!

Closing her account feels like the only way to protect what little she can earn, but she fears it could damage her relationship with her parents.

So she’s turning to Reddit to ask whether setting this boundary makes her selfish…or finally responsible for herself.

This person advises to open a new account ASAP.

This person agrees.

And this person says NTA at all, this is literally HER hard-earned MONEY.

At some point, “helping the family” starts looking a lot like unpaid withdrawals with interest.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check this one out about a man who created a points system for his inheritance, and a family friend ends up getting almost all of it.