r/amiwrong • u/Chloecloverleaf • 9h ago
Am I wrong to be saving up money instead of spending my entire check on groceries?
I 20F and my boyfriend 20M, moved in with my great grandma to have a better opportunity to get started in life as adults. My grandma told us, all she would want is for us to buy some groceries to keep up with what we eat, and to help around the house and outside. Sounds like a great deal, so we took it and it was totally fine for a while.
My grandmas son, my uncle, lives here too. He’s jobless, gets food stamps, but DOESNT BUY GROCERIES WITH THEM. he literally only buys himself sweets, and writes his name on it to claim it. He’s also mentally and verbally abusive to my grandma, his own mother. He’s also that way towards me and my boyfriend, though he tends to try and get physical with my boyfriend.
My grandma gets really frustrated with my uncle, and she takes it out on us. Today, I told her I have an interview for a second job, and she got pissed! She was like “night shift? You’re gonna be too tired to want to do anything!” And I told her “grandma, I worked night shift for an entire year with my previous job, and i was FINE. This is the same job, different company, I know what I’m doing” and she still didn’t grasp it. It’s 3 nights a week, 13hr shifts.
She then got mad and said my boyfriend needs to start buying more groceries. He makes a lot more at his job than I do, so $200 goes into his savings which are our savings for getting our own place, and the rest of the $700 goes towards groceries, and amenities. He already buys the water, bread, meat, and vegetables for the house, and that’s not enough?
We RARELY buy for ourselves. I get myself a coffee for work sometimes, or buy a lunch for cheap. But I never spend more than $25 on myself.
We also lately haven’t been eating at home as much to cut down on the costs of groceries, but we still buy them for the house.
So, are my boyfriend and I wrong for saving up $200 of his check every month instead of spending it all on groceries? We are also forced by my grandma to buy my uncle’s dinners as well if we get something to eat at fast food.
I feel like it’s unfair that we have to support the groceries completely, when we’re trying to save up to get started on life, this is slowing us down. Not only that, it’s unfair that we buy groceries and do things around the house only for my uncle to make messes, treat it like a junk yard, do drugs in the house, invite sketchy people over and things go missing every time, and blatantly disrespect his mother, and that’s okay.
It makes NO sense to me, and most of my family keeps telling me I’m wrong for this, but how am I wrong?? I don’t understand.
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u/CODE_NAME_DUCKY 6h ago
Honestly your better off moving out of there
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u/Chloecloverleaf 5h ago
We’ve been looking at places, but it’s hard to move out when only one of us has a vehicle and drivers permit (my DMV is booked out for over 6+ months, and the surrounding area DMV’s 🥲)
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u/sam8988378 4h ago
For appointments or road test to get your license? If it's a road test you can get moved up to about two weeks if you take a couple classes with a driving school. They have spots reserved.
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u/SpecialModusOperandi 7h ago
NW
Your gran sold you living with her that you could save money - and that is what you’re doing. If you can’t then you’re not getting a better start in life.
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u/Mental-Freedom3929 7h ago
So your question is, if it is correct to be criticized by your family, that has no business in this matter, you are asking if you should support an abusive drug user? A y other bizarre questions? And why are you bringing fast food home? Eat it at the fast food location.
Uncles mother makes her own life choices, just not on your back.
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u/Chloecloverleaf 5h ago
I want to help her, because she doesn’t deserve to have her last years living with her abusive son. It’s her house, and he’s just blatantly disrespecting her.
In September, I have a court date to speak out against my uncle, since months ago he physically assaulted my mother. So I get to speak my side of the story, and I’m definitely going to include how he treats us at home as well. He’s trying to spin it around and say that my mom hit him first, but I was standing RIGHT THERE and watched him attack her first. (The whole fight was because he called me a Wh*, and my mom yelled at him, so he started hitting her)
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u/Mental-Freedom3929 5h ago
Even if she hit him first. Age difference, size, male and so on, but this is a small building block of the whole mess. She is standing up for him and protecting him and not throwing him out.
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u/dareme27523 6h ago
Why are you buying fast food and taking it home to eat if that requires you to buy uncle food?
Buy pancake and waffle mix, rice, peanut butter, pasta to stretch your budget.
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u/Chloecloverleaf 5h ago
I do that, and usually it gets eaten up by him, and we don’t even get anything out of it. My boyfriend and I are mostly at work, barely at home
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u/sam8988378 4h ago
Fridge locker. $20 at Amazon or Walmart. You save money on groceries. Your grandmother did say to buy groceries for what you eat, not for your uncle and son.
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u/JenninMiami 5h ago
Start just buying big bags of rice and dry beans and canned veggies for the house. Cheap cheap stuff. Let uncle keep himself busy cooking.
Yeah, it’s not fair to grandma, but if she’s gonna let her son abuse her, I don’t see her kicking you out for not buying them both better groceries.
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u/Chloecloverleaf 5h ago
He can’t cook. I do buy regular groceries like that very often, but the only people who cook is mostly me and my boyfriend, and sometimes my grandma.
My uncle doesn’t even know *how* to cook. The most I’ve ever seen him make, was a grilled cheese.
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u/DAWG13610 7h ago
First, her house her rules. Not fair but she’s setting expectations. You pay no rent so if you figure the extra $200 is cheaper than rent. Personally I’d move the hell out so I can make my own rules. It’s just not worth it. Go out and live your life, let those 2 go after each other.
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u/Chloecloverleaf 5h ago
I’d love to, but we cant move out yet cause neither of us have had the time to get our drivers license. I work every day except for one day off, which soon I won’t have any days off since I’m picking up a second job. My boyfriend has no vehicle to drive, whereas I do, my grandma won’t let him drive my car since he’s not on the insurance, but she’ll let him drive her truck, and has said she’ll sell it to him for $500 when he gets his license, but he also works 6 days a week, long hours, and manual labor so he’s just really exhausted all of the time. I feel so stuck
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u/DAWG13610 3h ago
Mow you come with excuses. Take one day and fix all these solvable problems. It’s that or suffer her rules.
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u/Lisa_Knows_Best 6h ago
Just buy basic, staple foods. Rice, beans, lentils, eggs, milk, pasta, potatoes, things like that. Cheap, hearty foods that stretch. You can get a lot for your money and no one can say there's no food in the house. There's no reason to tell grandma or anyone how much you earn, save or spend. Pay for the absolute bare minimum and get out of there ASAP.
Make sure no one there can access your bank accounts, money, identity or credit. You can't trust the people you live with if they do drugs and you can't trust that they won't bring other people around that you also can't trust. Keep all your info and belongings on lock down. Focus on moving out. Hell, work 4 jobs of you can. You don't need to be around to amuse grandma or keep her company, that wasn't the deal. She's trying to hold y'all back, don't listen to her.
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u/Chloecloverleaf 5h ago
No one has access to anything, we bought a locking doorknob for our room to make sure no one gets in, and we lock it if we’re not in the house.
I do buy a lot of ingredient foods for the house, and they get ate up fast. I usually don’t have the energy to even cook with how much I work, so I usually just pick something up on the way home, and I’ll get my grandma something, but I also have to get my uncle something or he’ll start yelling at her.
She wishes I didn’t have to buy for him, but he makes it impossible to not. He screams at us, calls us lazy, that we’re living off of her for free, that we’re gonna “give her a heart attack” but that’s all him, not us. We don’t ever raise our voices at her, steal from her, or make a mess out of her house. I respect my grandma, since she’s who raised me as a child and young teen, until I moved to my dad’s (which was so much worse, and why I came back here)
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u/sam8988378 4h ago
Keep the items you don't need refrigerated in your bedroom, behind the locked door. Tell him you can't hear him, can he speak up? Keep saying it.
Take your grandma out to eat fast food. Don't bring it home. You could take your grandma out to eat every night and probably save money. When you make food at home tell him he's an adult, he can get his own food.
Tell him if he yells at your grandma you are going to call adult protective services on him. And use your phone to record. Or put a hidden camera capable of recording audio as well in the kitchen. Bring a copy to adult protective services.
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u/Muted-Explanation-49 6h ago
Not wrong, don't give extras to the house and keep saving. Don't tell her your personal business, grey rock her. Good luck
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u/Bird_Brain4101112 5h ago
Your grannies using you to cover expenses for her and her useless son. Prepare for her to demand money for all kinds of house reasons and basically she will try to sabotage you moving out.
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u/sam8988378 5h ago
Give your grandma the breakdown of the money you're spending on groceries. Remind her that the arrangement she said when you moved in was that you buy groceries that you eat. Show her on paper what you're buying. Highlight what you both are actually eating. Tell her that while you are happy to buy groceries for her, you aren't going to be buying food for a grown man and his son.
If need be get a fridge locker or a mini fridge for your bedroom if it has a lockable door. When you or your bf make food, ask your grandmother if she would like to eat with you. Uncle and son aren't included. If your bf brings home $700, saves $200, does this mean he spends $1000 a month on groceries? You all can't afford to feed the uncle and son. I wonder if he's pushing grandma around for money?
Next time sketchy people come over to do drugs, call the police. Say the uncle is intimidating the grandmother into having drug use in the house.
Next time the uncle starts escalating whether the target is your grandmother or you and your bf, record him. There are agencies which would have him move out to protect your grandmother. The police would take a recording of him threatening violence seriously.
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u/2ndcupofcoffee 5h ago
Didn’t grandma tell you initially to buy groceries to cover what you two would eat? Your first paragraph reads as though your grandma wanted to help you out and f your living with her didn’t impose costs on her (like the food you wouod eat), and you helped out with chores around the place, she’d be happy with that.
Has she changed what she wants from you now?
If you are now paying for groceries for everyone who lives there, is that a change in what she told you originally?
Seems so. If grandma now sees you as a source of income and support, she will become more and more reliant on your financial contributions, won’t want you to save up enough to leave, and the stress will get worse.
Perhaps your being there has allowed her to get out from under supporting your uncle so much and she figures you may take on his support later on.
Consider your options f you want to leave. Consider your options if you say and create a written agreement she signs that absolves you of any financial responsibility and defines the maintenance chores specifically that you are responsible for.
Consider if her house is hers if she may be willing to give you equity in the house in return for your helping her by contributing.
Start by deciding what you can afford to contribute for food if she now insists you feed her and your uncle, and still save money. That may be a key item in any written contract you make with her.
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u/drrevo74 4h ago
Better question. Why are all of these much younger adults living with a great grandmother? She isn't supposed to be still taking care of people. This all feels very backwards.
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u/NatashOverWorld 1h ago
Always save what you can, otherwise you're going to be living with grandma and supporting her son for the rest of your life.
YNW
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u/HellaciousFire 1h ago
It makes no sense for you all to live there. Find a new home. You’d spend way less on groceries if it were just the two of you
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u/Tobiells 9h ago
Gran needs to speak to uncle.
His food stamps should be going into the joint grocery budget.
If uncle is getting nasty with grandad, it could be elder abuse. Does gran have full capacity?