Grandma breaks into 19-year-old granddaughter's house when she's not home and riffles through her belongings: 'Just because she occasionally feeds me doesn’t give her the right to do this'

Author image for Emmy Pratt
Emmy Pratt • Writer and Editor
Mar 31, 2025 8:00 AM EDT

There's something so unnerving about someone going through your things without asking. When I was a kid, 95% of my arguments with my sister were about this exact issue. I would want to borrow some of her clothes for school. I would take them without asking because she was still sleeping, and she would get mad at me. You would think I would be the clear villain, but I remember waking up many mornings to find her doing the exact same thing in my closet. While this whole beef could've been resolved if we had reached a verbal agreement, it was way more fun to fight about it than actually communicate. In my opinion, this kind of snooping and borrowing had pretty low stakes. Unless you ruined your sister's clothes, you're not causing the harm that chronic snooping does. I'm talking about your mom reading your diary levels of betrayal…

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  • The grandma in this story committed that level of betrayal to her granddaughter. She is constantly entering her home without asking and looking through her personal items. The worst thing is that there's nothing she can do about it, because her dad owns the house and gave his mother the key. 

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    via alexharvey

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    AITA for telling my father I don’t want his mother in my house?

    I 19F started university last year. Since my university is far from my family, I basically live alone, though I stay close to my grandparents' house. Ever since | moved here, they've been looking after me. When I first started uni, I began noticing strange things at home-objects moved from where I left them, things not in
    via u/lotusflowern
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    their usual place. At first, I almost convinced myself that I was just misremembering, until I recalled that my grandpa has a spare key to my house. That's when everything clicked—my grandma had been entering my house when I wasn't there, without even asking me. I was so frustrated that I called my dad, but he just
    via u/lotusflowern
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    tried to calm me down. I considered confronting her but told myself that maybe it was just a one-time thing, that she was only there to clean up or something. But as the weeks passed, it became clear that she was coming in more and more when I was out.
    via u/lotusflowern
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    At first, I tried to justify it-maybe she just wanted to maintain the house. But then I realized something even worse: she was going through my things. My drawers, my closet, every single room, my fridge, even my bathroom-everything. I caught on when she started making
    via u/lotusflowern
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    via Annie Spratt

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    comments about my house, giving me advice on where to put things-things that were inside my drawers. I was furious but held it in because I'm not confrontational. It's one thing to enter my house without permission, but snooping through my belongings? That's a
    via u/lotusflowern
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    massive invasion of privacy. And she's so shameless about it! Even my younger cousins seem to know details about my home that even I don't notice. Just because she occasionally feeds me doesn't give her the right to do this. Even my own mother doesn't invade my privacy like that.
    via u/lotusflowern
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    Living through this has made me remember the stories my mom used to tell me about when she first married my dad. She experienced the same thing-my grandma, uncles, and even their wives would enter the house when she wasn't there, going through her belongings, including her clothes. She told us countless
    via u/lotusflowern
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    stories about their behavior and how she never liked my dad's side of the family because of how they treated her. But whenever she confronted my dad about it, he gaslit her into thinking she was imagining things. And now, experiencing the exact same situation myself, I believe every word she said.
    via u/lotusflowern
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    The fact that my grandma never asked for permission, never told me afterward, and continues doing this like it's completely normal just shows how comfortable and used to doing that. This has been going on for over a year, and I had assumed she stopped until she recently brought up something in my house that made me realize she's still doing it.
    via u/lotusflowern
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    I've brought this up to my dad multiple times, but he either brushes it off, ignores me, or we get into a fight whenever I say I don't want his mother coming into my house. (He's clearly a mama's boy, even though he refuses to admit it.) So, AITA for telling my dad I don't want my grandma coming into my house?!
    via u/lotusflowern
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    via Ryan Antooa

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    RB1327 my grandpa has a spare key to my house. INFO: Is this your grandparents' house that they're letting you stay in for uni? Or this is your place and you gave Grandfather a key for emergency purposes? Or something else? No one should be going through your personal things regardless, but if this is their house then you've got an uphill battle telling them to stay out altogether.
    via u/RB1327
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    lotusflowern OP It's my fathers old house that we don't live in anymore, I'm just staying here for uni. Im not even sure why she had a spare key, I'm guessing it's because we don't live there anymore so sometimes she gets a lady to clean and maintain it. As well as a key for emergencies
    via u/lotusflowern
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    ohemgee0309 NTA for wanting your privacy but you buried the lead with the original post. So―you have a couple of choices here. 1-Get a cabinet that has a lock on it and keep all your personal items in it. I'd also get a ring camera as some others suggested so you can address her coming in and let her know that you're not home and she is invading your privacy.
    via u/ohemgee0309
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    2-You can ask to go on a lease, paying rent, even if not market value, and effectively making your father a landlord and therefore responsible for protecting your privacy. This way, granny can't come and go as she pleases as you have rights as a tenant. 3-Or you can leave, get a job and roommate/s, and pay rent somewhere else and have your privacy guaranteed. And if your dad asks why tell him the truth, preferably with ring camera footage to show.
    via u/ohemgee0309
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    RB1327 It's my fathers old house... brought this up to my dad multiple times, but he either brushes it off, ignores me, or we get into a fight whenever I say I don't want his mother coming into my house. Well, that seems like a relevant detail to have included in the post, no? You have no real standing here, and the owner is perfectly fine with his parents coming over without your permission. Your father may have even asked them to do so. -->You're right about the invasion of privacy. You may ne
    via u/RB1327
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    PikaV2002 6h ago Just because something is legally correct doesn't mean it's not an ah le move. Redditors seem to think that if a deed doesn't have your name, anyone can come in and do whatever to you and it wouldn't be wrong. Just because she isn't the owner of the house doesn't make it a not-ah le move to go through her belongings.
    via u/PikaV2002
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    andromache97 I agree with you about grandma and dad being regardless of the legal perspective. That said, I can't help but roll my eyes about a 19 year old going on and on about "my" house when it's pretty obvious that being able to live in it alone is simply a privilege from dad who up until now had empty house sitting vacant (during a housing crisis no less).
    via u/andromache97
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    PikaV2002 6h ago Thank you for covering another one of my annoyances of this community: people taking out their own life frustrations with teenagers that dare get the tiniest more than they consider normal. People here start coming out with the “you're an entitled kid" card whether it's justified or not whenever they see a 17-19 year old taking even the slightest help from their parents. The OP is responsible for literally none of what you mentioned. She isn't responsible for dad's property purc
    via u/PikaV2002
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    ranchojasper 4h ag Yeah, just because she's lucky enough that one of her parents has a place she can stay in while she's in college doesn't mean that she doesn't deserve any privacy. Give me a break here. Acting like she just has to put up with someone who doesn't live in the house literally just coming in whenever they want while she's gone and going through her stuff is frankly absurd
    via u/ranchojasper
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    Mean-Spinach 1728 Booby trap the house. Put fake snake in the drawers that will pop out when she opens them. Put loud alarms around house that are motion activate. Hid halloween decor that's motion activate that creepily laugh. Have fun. You're welcome.
    via u/Mean-Spinach1728
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    saintandvillian⚫ 5h ago hole Aficionado [14] Why do you keep telling him if he's doing nothing? You need to tell her and change the locks. You're in college and need to fight some of your own battles.
    via u/saintandvillian
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    PikaV2002 Just because OP's dad owns the house doesn't mean it's not an a_h_le move to invade OP's privacy. This subreddit keeps confusing legality with morality. Just because OP's dad can do something with his house doesn't mean it's morally correct. People on here have a really warped concept of who is "obligated" to do what. NTA.
    via u/PikaV2002

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