‘Spoiler: I’m not giving them Nugget. It’s my pet. I didn’t get him to be someone’s temporary toy’: Woman refuses to hand over her emotional support Syrian hamster named Nugget to her brother Mike’s entitled kids, suggests he buy them a stuffed animal

Author image for Etai Eshet
Etai Eshet • Editor
May 20, 2025 7:00 AM EDT

Some siblings borrow shirts, others borrow money, but there's a special breed who think "borrowing" can be applied to living creatures with a pulse and a heartbeat. Here's the deal: a grown woman, living her best work-from-home life with her beloved Syrian hamster Nugget, suddenly finds herself cast as the family villain for not handing him over to her brother's sugar-fueled offspring.

Instead of teaching his kids that pets are living beings requiring patience, care, and responsibility, Mike takes the shortcut straight to Entitlement Avenue. The minute his daughters set eyes on Nugget, it's less a teachable moment and more an episode of toddler Shark Tank, complete with shrill pitches and zero actual business plan. Mike, instead of distracting them with a hot dog or, you 

know, basic parenting, decides the best course of action is to demand the hamster outright and then campaign for his case like he's at a family courtroom drama. The idea that pets are not participation trophies seems lost on everyone except the actual pet owner, who has now become the lone gatekeeper of reason in a family gone feral.

If there's a winner here, it's definitely Nugget, still reigning in his peaceful kingdom with an owner who knows that being an adult sometimes weirdly means saying: no, you can't have my hamster.

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  • "AITJ for not giving my hamster to my brother and his kids"

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    via Olena Kurashova

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

  • So a bit of background - I (26F) have a little Syrian hamster named Nugget. He's about 9 months old and I've had him since he was a baby. I take really
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  • good care of him — clean cage, proper food (no, not just seeds), enrichment, and all the stuff responsible pet owners do. I don't have kids, and I work from home,
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  • so Nugget is my tiny little companion and honestly helps lot with my anxiety. a
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  • Cheezburger Image 10507533056
    via Olena Kurashova
  • Enter my brother, Mike (34M), who has two kids - 5 and 7 years old. I love my nieces, but Mike is that parent. The kind who thinks
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  • the world should cater to his kids and that if something can entertain them, it automatically belongs to them.
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  • Last weekend, he and his family came over for a BBQ. I had Nugget in his enclosure in my room, door shut. Well, one of the kids somehow got in, saw Nugget, and the rest is chaos.
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    via Olena Kurashova
  • They were screaming, "I want the hamster!" and Mike comes to me like, "You should let them play with it, it's just a hamster.” I said no- it's not a toy, and they could seriously hurt him without meaning to.
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  • Cue the tantrums.
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  • Later that night, after they went home, Mike texted me:
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  • "Hey, the girls really liked the hamster. Would you mind giving him to them? It would make them really happy, and let's be honest, you're too old for a pet like that."
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  • ...I thought he was joking. I said, "Absolutely not. Nugget is mine and I care for him properly. Your kids are not ready for that kind of responsibility."
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  • He got mad and said I was being selfish, and that it was "just a rodent." Then he tried to guilt me by saying I don't have kids so I don't understand how hard it is to make them happy, and that it would "mean more to them than it does to me."
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  • I told him if he wants to make them happy, he can go buy them a stuffed animal or — I don't know-parent better?
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  • Now he's told our mom, and she's pressuring me to "just let the girls have him" and "be the bigger person."
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  • Nope. Not happening.
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  • It's my pet. I didn't get him to be someone's temporary toy. If anything, this whole thing just proved that they're absolutely not ready to have a pet, especially one as delicate as a hamster.
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  • TL;DR: My brother's kids liked my hamster, so he tried to guilt me into giving them my pet. When I said no, he called me selfish and got our mom involved. Spoiler: I'm not giving them Nugget.
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  • Remote_Bumble I can't stand people who treat animals like they toys.
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  • Taffergirl2021 Wow, your brother is a terrible parent. Stand your ground and protect your buddy. Make sure they can't get to him when you're not home.
    via Taffergirl2021

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family drama inheritance pets brother mother siblings family feud favoritism aunt hamster in laws mother in law emotional support animal
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