58-year-old father buys 26-year-old daughter a luxury bag she doesn't want, sends her the bill for it weeks later: 'It's WILD that he's trying to make you pay for a gift he bought you'

Author image for JR Atkinson
JR Atkinson • Writer and Editor
Jan 6, 2026 10:00 AM EST

Is it really a gift if you get a bill for it weeks later?

Sometimes, family has a curious way of showing love. Maybe they don't exactly know how to express themselves through words, so they express themselves through actions. Or maybe they don't know how to express themselves through actions, so they express themselves through gifts. This is a valid way to show your love, but it has exceptions. Certainly, one of them is making them pay for it. Then it's not a gift. It's a burden.

Family is complicated, and sometimes you end up doing things that you don't want to do just to smooth things over. It's called sacrifice, and we're all doing it all the time. Sometimes you say something just to placate someone else. Maybe you attend a function you don't feel like going to just because you know it will make someone happy. Maybe you pay for something that is actually not your responsibility just to make things run a little smoother. There's no crime in that. It's actually part of being a good family member. But an equal part of that is not letting yourself be taken advantage of just for the sake of keeping the peace. This can take some doing on your part. If you're the type of person who is used to being a pushover, taking control over your choices might be incredibly difficult, especially when dealing with problematic family members. And who doesn't have those? It's a part of having a family. 

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  • A man and a woman hold hands holding a big shopping bag
    via Unsplash+ (Curated Lifestyle)

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

  • The young woman in this story was put in that position after a lifelong struggle with her father. He had done things that she wasn't proud of, and it put their relationship on uneven ground. Then, he made a pretty strange request. Gifts aren't really gifts if you pressure someone into getting something and then charge them for it later. But that's what this father did to his daughter, and she was unsure how to proceed. She didn't know if she should just keep the peace or if she should stand up for herself. Read on to get the full picture of what happened in this story.

  • My dad bought me a bag & is asking me to pay for it.

    backstory - my mom recently passed on last year may. my dad has always had this habit/practice of buying her and i luxury bags whenever he travels for his business trips. about a year before my mom passed on, we (my brother and i) found out my dad has been
    via u/crumblynugget
  • cheating on her (not the first time) and she found out 6months later. during the infidelity, we found receipts of him buying and spending money on his mistress. he knows we know about his infidelity on the day of my mom's passing but has been avoiding and acting like he hadn't been unfaithful. he has been going on leisure trips "on his own" recently, but we found receipts and proof that he was with his mistress.
    via u/crumblynugget
  • he [58M working adult] recently went on a trip and asked me to choose a bag i [26F working adult] wanted over video call and insisted i bought it although i didn't really like the design. two weeks after his return and giving me the bag, he passed me the bill, asking me to pay him for the bag he bought for me. AITA for expecting that the bag should be bought by him and not wanting to pay him back for the bag even though i am fully capable of doing it?
    via u/crumblynugget

  • Commenters gave their two cents on the situation.

    Sassy-Peanut NTA-I don't see that you have a problem at all here. Give the bag back to him - you don't want it anyway. He could give it to his girlfriend. It's not as if he can sue you.
    via u/Sassy-Peanut
  • A woman sits on the ground holding paper shopping bags
    via Unsplash+ (Kateryna Hliznitsova)

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

  • DubiousPeople Pl... NTA the easy thing is to just return it and say you didn't want it. The snarky thing would be "oh, so now that mom's gone you can only afford to spend money on your side chick. Guess mom was the one paying for those purses every time. And you just passed them off as being from you."
    via u/DubiousPeoplePleaser
  • HisMisus It's the mistress. Don't pay him and ask him if now that he's permanently with his affair partner are you ceasing to be treated like his kid?
    via u/HisMisus
  • ThisWillAgeWell asked me to choose a bag i [26F working adult] wanted over video call and insisted i bought it although i didn't really like the design. Why did you agree to choose a bag? You're not a child any more. You don't have to do what he asks. He can't make you.
    via u/ThisWillAgeWell
  • If he's insisting you choose a bag, you just insist right back "No, I'm not going to, and if you keep talking about it, I'm going to end this call." You're NTA for refusing to pay for a thing you never wanted, but I don't understand why you got yourself into this predicament in the first place. Just practice saying "no".
    via u/ThisWillAgeWell
  • Select_Camera_9241 Does he ask his mistress to repay him for her gifts? Definitely NTA
    via u/Select_Camera_9241
  • Trevena_Ice NTA - all the information about cheating and so on was absolutly unneccasary. But for the bag thing NTA. Ask him, why he baught a bag that you should pay him back. You never asked for that and wouldn't have gotten yourself.
    via u/Trevena_Ice
  • RagdollsandLabs N/TA. Give the bag back to him, especially if you really don't like it. Tell him that the next time you want him to buy you a bag, you will give him the money in advance and tell him what you want. Otherwise, you don't appreciate being asked to pay for something that you understood was a gift.
    via u/RagdollsandLabs
  • Tangled_H Return the bag to him/ refuse to accept it. It's not a gift if you have to pay for it, and if you wanted it and could afford it, you'd have bought it yourself.
    via u/Tangled_H
  • Lucky-Effective-15... Tell him you don't want the bag and to give it to his mistress.
    via u/Lucky-Effective-1564
  • Trintoz Nta, you both video called so you could choose a bag you wanted, and just like the last few years, you probably would expect him to be paying for it again, him just straight up bringing the bag back and asking for you to pay him back makes him the asshole. If he really didn't want to pay for the bag (and you didn't want to either), then he should have just not got the bag at all
    via u/Trintoz
  • Koquet NTA. Return the item and tell him on his face if he's old and dying, he better pray that his mistress would be the one to look after him cuz it sure as hell won't be you.
    via u/Koquet
  • Vegetable Stuff1850 NTA "Sorry, I understood this to be a gift, like you used to do for me & mum. I suggest you gift this to your girlfriend instead as I don't want it"
    via u/Vegetable_Stuff1850
  • RealTaySmith NTA - it's WILD that he's trying to make you pay for a gift he bought you
    via u/RealTaySmith
  • Lolalilkid he's basically using you as a personal shopper to cover up the fact he's spending a fortune on his mistress
    via u/Lolalilkid

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Tags

dads gifts luxury fatherhood shopping parenting dad infidelity adult children
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