For many people, hand-me-downs are a way of life. They're not just a practical way to save money for own family, but they're also an effective way to help out a fellow parent in need by passing along clothing your kiddo no longer wears. But one mom on Reddit recently admitted she put a stop to giving away hand-me-downs after learning that her sister was taking advantage of the situation and reselling the clothes she gave her instead of giving them back or to someone else in need once she was done.
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According to her anonymous post, there were a few reasons why the mom was annoyed by the discovery.
The biggest one was this: Her sister and her husband make a combined total of $300,000 a year while she makes considerably less — just $40,000.
The anonymous mom admitted that she was hesitant at first because of their different financial situations when her sister initially asked to use her son's old clothes and toys.
Her son is five years older than her sister's twin boys, so she did have some things to spare but hoped to save them in case she had another child.
Ultimately, though, she gave into her sister's request and thought nothing of the kind gesture until she found out something shocking during a conversation with her mom.
The poster explained that about a month ago, her mother had suggested she earn a little extra money on the side by selling some of her things online. And that's when she dropped the bomb.
"She mentioned that my sister had made a good amount of money selling my son’s clothes and toys on Craigslist," the poster explained.
Um, beg your pardon?
Of course, the Reddit mom was immediately furious.
She confronted her sister, who told her that she had "only sold 'the stuff they outgrew or didn’t play with.'”
Still annoyed, the woman asked her sister to return the rest of the hand-me-downs so she could consign them herself because she "really need[s] the money."
But her sister wasn't having it.
"My sister said once you give something to someone you should not ask for it back," the woman wrote.
So, the mom tried a different approach: She asked her sister to simply donate the clothes to help other people in need.
That was a nonstarter too.
"She became upset and said once you give a person something it isn’t yours and you have no say in what they do with it," the woman recalled. "I said, 'Fair enough. Do what you want with everything I have given you, but don’t ask for any more of my son’s things.'"
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Now, her sister is calling her selfish for withholding the goods.
Adding to her irritation is that the mom thinks her sister could more than afford to buy her own children's clothes and children's books.
In writing to Reddit, she asked if it was wrong to care about what her sister does with items she's already given her.
Many people in the comments agreed that what her sister did was not cool at all.
"Your sister sounds like an entitled [expletive]," one commenter wrote.
"There's cheap, and there's taking advantage of your own sibling," a second person agreed. "The sister is a major [expletive]."
"Not the a–hole — sell your son’s things as soon as he outgrows them," someone else said. "Your sister is a pill."
A few people actually thought the mom was being pretty stingy.
"You can't expect her to remember what was yours if she got it from you months ago," one person said. "She probably would have offered them back if you did have a second kid or one on the way, but I think she's right that it's not her responsibility to gift you back clothes that you already passed on."
Another person had a totally different take on the situation, though.
"She should have known to give the stuff back when she was done with it," the commenter wrote. "She was thoughtless. On the other hand she's clearly smarter than you are, and you resent it. You're also petty and resent her money too."
"Your sister is correct that a gift is a gift, you should have no expectation of influencing what is done with the gift after you give it," someone else explained.
In the end, the mom agreed with those that said her sister was acting entitled.
In fact, later on in the thread, she shared that her sister had always been the favorite, and that unfortunately, she has "grown a bit entitled from years of preferential treatment."
Although she claimed to really enjoy seeing her nephews wear her son's clothing at first and was initially happy to help them out, things have really soured since her discovery.
"It just bothers me that I provided them with clothes I worked hard to buy — at least $1,000 worth of clothes I had purchased over a period of years — and then they turn around and sell what they are not using," the mom continued.
What bothers her most of all was the fact that her sister could more than afford the items herself and isn't the one who's strapped for cash.
"They did nothing to earn them and they don’t need the money," she continued. "It would have helped me a lot if I had been able to sell them."
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
