Parent stalls returning a bento box that a teacher accidentally sent home with her kid in hopes she could keep it: ‘She was playing games with me’

Author image for Lana DeGaetano
Lana DeGaetano • "Show me to me please."
Nov 8, 2025 4:00 PM EST

As a parent, providing for your child, especially when you're raising more than one, can be a major factor in your financial struggles. It's not easy covering the costs of a home, groceries, health care, and spending money for oneself, let alone an entire family. That's why it's important to invest in quality items that'll last you for a while and help you make ends meet where it matters.

When the items you purchase for your children go missing, especially if they are items that you've put thought and money into, it doesn't go over well. We're not talking about lead pencils and composition notebooks—we're talking $40+ lunch boxes.

You might be wondering why someone would spend that much on a container that holds food… But the more important question is why a fellow parent would try stealing the item from another family. The parent in this next story tries to sneakily keep their child's classmate's lunch box after the child is sent home with it by mistake. What would you do in this situation? The scorned was unrelenting and took it up with the school, and eventually heard that the other parent intentionally kept "forgetting" the item at home. Scroll to read.

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  • 01
    two closed plastic bento boxes
    via Getty Images For Unsplash+

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • 02

    "AITA for not saying thank you when a parent returned my son's lunch box"

    I (35F) have a son (4M), let's call him Ben. I pack lunch for all my kids and purchased Bento lunch boxes for each of them.
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  • 03
    They go for about $50 on Amazon. I label my kids lunches, lunch box, as well as pretty much everything they own and take to school.
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  • 04
    A few weeks ago when I went to pick up my son from school on a Tuesday, I noticed that his book bag was a little light, and when I looked inside I realized that he was missing his Bento box.
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  • 05
    No biggie - 1 mentioned it to one of the after school teachers and she said that she had accidentally sent it home with another kid (he has a similar name to my son - let's say Ken).
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  • 06
    I should note that I have never met this kid or his parent. Any way, again, no biggie, I just kindly asked her have the parent return the lunch box the next day.
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  • 07
    The following day I inquired about the lunch box and the teacher said that the parent had messaged her saying she would bring it the following day as they are PT students coming on T/Th.
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  • 08
    Alright cool. Thursday comes around and after school I'm like okay, where's my son's lunch box.
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  • 09
    The teacher tells me the parent forgot it but will def bring it next Tues. I'm a little annoyed, but I figure I'll give the parent some grace.
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  • 10
    Next Tue comes, and no lunch box. At this point, I'm properly annoyed. I mention the missing lunch box to my son's daytime teachers.
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  • 11
    Asking them to reach out to this parent so I can get my son's lunch box back because wtf.
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  • 12
    Fast forward to another WEEK. Still no lunch box. Apparently the mother is postpartum and very forgetful.
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  • 13
    She made a joke to the teacher saying the lunch box was getting closer to school because she put it by her front door.
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  • 14
    Needless to say, I'm properly pissed. I really don't understand why this is such an ordeal...just put the lunch box in your car or your kid's book bag to bring to school.
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  • 15
    My husband wants me to find the parent and confront her myself, but the teachers won't give me her name, and I can never catch the kid or her at pick up.
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  • 16
    Sooo I send a very stern email to the principal, admin, and all my son's teachers expressing my frustration with this and explaining that I want my kid's stuff.
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  • 17
    a woman holding her fists up in the air
    via engin akyurt for Unsplash

    Image is representative only and does not depict the actual subjects of the story.

  • 18
    I guess they FINALLY are able to get through to this parent and the next Thursday (nearly 4 WEEKS later), she meets me and brings the lunch box.
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  • 19
    She apologizes and she tried to joke about the situation, but I was so annoyed that I just kind of stared at her blankly.
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  • 20
    Then I just said okay, took the lunch box and left. She apparently told some of the other parents that I was rude to her and that I could have been more APPRECIATIVE that she brought the lunch box back.
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  • 21
    Ma'am...(eyeroll). So anyway, AITA for not saying thank you? EDIT: Soooo last Friday we had a Halloween parade at the kids school and a lot of the parents were there.
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  • 22
    One of the parents who heard about the "hostage lunchbox," was chatting me up and I was explaining the situation, and for those of you who said she wanted it for herself -spot on.
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  • 23
    Apparently her son really liked it and was always telling his mom for it, but she didn't want to get it for him.
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  • 24
    When it was mistakenly put in her son's bag, she thought it was the perfect opportunity to just keep it.
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  • 25
    She thought I would just let it go and she would be able to keep it for her son.
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  • 26
    But no dice on that. Circling back to the folks who were talking about the price of the lunchbox - it's BECAUSE it's expensive that I wanted it back.
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  • 27
    I'm not made of money and I buy quality stuff for my kids so they can last throughout the school year and beyond, so for me to just "let it go," and then have to spend money to purchase another one wasn't going to happen.
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  • 28
    Plus I really did feel like she was playing games with me. Anywho, I'll admit that I wasn't the nicest when she returned it (I'm only human), but when I saw her at the parade I made sure I was polite-ish and showed her the link if she wanted to get the lunchbox for her kid as well as mentioned that there were some less expensive options.
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  • 29
    All's well that ends well.
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school entitled parents entitlement kids crazy things parents say bad parenting reddit story bad parents parenting entitled people karma entitled reddit thread Reddit Parenting Fail parents entitled people Parenting FAILS
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