'AITA buying my stepdaughter a used bridesmaid dress?' 'I’m spending about a grand on dresses.'

YTA

Your reasoning was totally sound. Weddings are expensive so save where you can. The dress you found is in like-new condition and the correct size. Like you said a total steal.

Too late now but why did you inform Kiki you found it used? Did she really need to know? She obviously feels singled out by her stepmom to be. Everyone else is getting a new dress, and she gets a used one. Then instead of seeing her position you tell her she can pay $150 to get a new dress. I get you are being practical, but this isn't a great start to fostering a good relationship between you and Kiki. You coldly disregarded her feeling excluded.

Okay, I am a thrifty person. My own wedding dress was also used, so I absolutely support that. **However**, in this particular situation, YTA. You are blending families. This child is already stressed out and worried about what is coming. This makes her feel less important than your daughters and makes her fear for what the future holds. That really sucks for her.

Buy her the new dress OR make sure you go and buy used dresses for your daughters. Simple.

 Otherwise you're just singling her out as less-than and her father should really assess whether this marriage is right. 

Is $150 worth the relationship between you and your step daughter? If it is to you, then go ahead. People remember how you make them feel. She will remember for the rest of her life how shitty you make her feel. And over $150? Pst

YTA
You are thinking like an adult trying to save some money instead of a 15 year old. I mean you are leaning right into the Cinderella evil step-mother trope. Giving your 2 girls new things and she gets used, good-enough, thrifted clothes. I get the urge to save some bucks but you've made Kiki feel like she's less-than and that sucks and is a really crappy way to start a marriage and your step-parenting relationship.

YTA. You want your new stepdaughter to be excited for this wedding and to feel like she is part of the family? Then buy her a new dress. You tipped the scales on the AH behavior when you told her that she could pay the difference between a new and used dress. You told her she could get the dress she wanted within a certain budget and then when she has selected and was excited about it you decided that used was okay.

Again, do you want her to be excited and welcoming? Do you even want her to attend?

Everyone saying Nta is thinking like a grown up on the outside not a 15 year old whose outnumbered by her dads new family and the first real family event the stepsisters and even moms friends get everything new and you don’t just to save some money I mean her dad has 2 new daughters now too so she’s the oldest the cheapest and wondering if this is gonna be life from now on sister getting new things and her getting cheaper used cuz it “looks fine” you might have done a very small thing in your mind but you just told that little girl she had to pay to be treated the same in her eyes even on her dads wedding day

You would not be the A H for being thrifty. But YTA for being so dismissive of how this feels to her. Even when lots of people here are telling you, it feels like you’re glossing over it. You could’ve asked her to look at and consider the dress before purchasing, you could have offered to get her something nice with a bit of the money saved.

But - how did you manage to find the exact dress in the perfect size on the big ol’ internet? Pretty sure you went searching high and low for it

“No stains, no smells” for step daughter and brand new for bio daughters. Regardless of cost, that’s fucked up.

YTA unless your kids are getting used shoes and accessories while Kiki gets new ones. If everyone is getting new shoes and accessories then your comment to Kiki would be pointless. It isn't about nit getting anything new. It is about the stepchild getting treated less than the biokids. Even if you didn't mean it that way. It is not a good look.

Can you figure out what the budgeted amount is that gives each kid 1/3rd of the total? Then, maybe let Kiki use her extra amount saved on the dress to buy nicer jewelry? 

She is of an age to start appreciating things and something she can wear often would be special for her to remember the day her family grew.

So essentially you decided your stepdaughter isn’t worth $150.

YTA for being a "cheap ass" like your family member told you.

A used dress is still a used dress. Is the bride also wearing a used dress? Are your daughters also wearing a used dress. If you're not buying a used dress for anyone else then you are the AH to your soon to be step daughter.

Are you buying your own daughter’s dresses used? If No, then YTA. Your argument for new shoes & accessories doesn’t work because EVERYONE is getting new shoes and accessories. In her 15 year old mind, this is not about the money saved but how you value her. Do better. I can already read the resentment in your post and you guys aren’t even married yet. I hope your future stepdaughter has a FAIRY GODMOTHER somewhere!

ETA: And then you tell her to pay the difference for a new dress when she stayed within your ORIGINAL budget request? Are you kidding me? How do you type all this out and still wonder if you are TA? *scratches head*

I think you're being cheap, and there is symbolism here since she's the stepdaughter. It's $150 in what sounds like a five-figure wedding budget. Why pick this hill to die on?

Now, you're right that *all else being equal,* your stepdaughter would be being unreasonable. But all is not equal. This wedding is a symbolic ceremony in which this girl becomes your stepdaughter, and everything you do in regard to that is weighted with symbolism. What does it say to this girl that you chose for her to spend her first moment as your stepdaughter wearing a secondhand dress, while your natural daughters wear new ones? What does it say to her that you find the the painfully obvious symbolism so totally unmoving?

YTA - maybe not intentionally, but nonetheless you are. fix it.

YTA - not about the money, about the principle. In doing this (whether you say you would have done the same for your bio daughters or not) you’ve essentially said “you’re worth less than the the other two”.

I get it, weddings are an expensive game, but this wasn’t the place to make a saving; consider the 150 as being an investment in equality throughout your blended family, you’re going to set the scene for how the family dynamic will work.

I’m going to tell you a story about myself.

The year I was 14, my dad started dating - and quickly moved in with - my now-stepmother. She wasn’t my first stepmother - he married my first stepmother when I was 5, and she never liked me (I wasn’t invited to the wedding), though she learned to tolerate me better after my younger sisters were born when I was 7 and 10, because I was really good at childcare.

Anyway. My first stepmother really didn’t like me, tolerated me at best, so I didn’t have high hopes for number two.

New stepmother came with two daughters, four and six years older than me respectively, and we did Christmas at the new house (my younger sisters stayed with their mother). I didn’t ask for much, because I never asked for much, but I made a list with a few things. That year, because things were new, my dad bought the presents for me and my stepmother bought the presents for her daughters. They got lovely things - fashionable clothing, CDs, trinkets, pyjamas and lingerie from shops that young women like, the kind where they gift wrap your items in tissue paper with scented beads and put it in a gift box and a nice bag. Even seeing the bag under the Christmas tree is a thrill.

My stepsisters are also slim and beautiful and extroverted, and being several years older, they were also in relationships with guys with good jobs. One of them got a Gucci watch from her boyfriend that year, and the other got a diamond tennis bracelet.

I got two sweaters, a couple sizes too big for me, from Marks & Spencer - a store that I shop at *now* but considered an old person shop when I was 14 - and three burned CDs, that my dad had copied from one of my stepsisters, since she had the CDs that I’d put on my Christmas list.

I should clarify: my father is not a mean person. He’s incredibly practical. He’s affected by what I call *engineer brain*, as well as *Capricorn brain* (I don’t even believe in horoscopes, but I find it curious that all the engineers I’ve known have been Capricorns, and all of similar personality) and I suspect he’s autistic, as I am - though he hasn’t learned empathy as well as I have, probably because he never needed to. He’s a basically kind person. But he’s not able to understand how other people feel unless you tell it to him straight, and even then he doesn’t really *get it*, but he does what he can to ensure people feel better even while not understanding why they feel bad.

It would not have occurred to him that a teenage girl would feel othered by getting burned CDs (it wasn’t a question of money, he was loaded), or that there were such things as fashionable shops and unfashionable shops, or that buying his plumpish daughter clothes that were too big might be seen as offensive - or even that dress sizes were a thing. To him, what he gave me was the practical choice. Why waste money on CDs that my stepsister already had? Why buy fashionable clothes that I might grow out of when he could buy me large, warm sweaters from a solid, quality store?

I thanked them politely, because that’s what I was raised to do. I didn’t cry, yell, create a fuss in any way. But my stepmother? Bless her, she *noticed.* She didn’t say anything at the time, didn’t draw comparisons, didn’t tell my dad off in public. But a few weeks later, she declared that she needed a new dress for a performance (she was an opera singer) and that my dad and I should come with her and give our opinions on dresses. We went into the city, and *somehow* my stepmother ended up with her performance dress…and I ended up with basically a new wardrobe. Fashionable things that fit properly. Skirts, tops, a dress, a couple pairs of pants, a hat, sportswear. A few books. A couple pieces of jewellery. And that year my dad “remembered” to send my mom extra money for personal things, and I got a few new spring clothes, as well as my first bra. I’d needed one since I was 9 (and was a D-cup - a very saggy one - by the time I was 14, when this happened) but I’d never had one. My mom was poor and mentally ill, and I was her carer for most of my life, and things like the need for bras and personal hygiene were never taught, and I had to pick them up piecemeal.

And *that* is why I am close to my stepmother, at 40. She notices things, and she has the empathy to put herself in another person’s place and understand how they feel, and she *cares* about how they feel. She could have shrugged and done the bare minimum, and after my first stepmother’s disdain and my mom’s abuse and my dad’s unintentional neglect, I wouldn’t have held it against her. Hell, I might not even have *noticed*. I was used to not being treated well, although I didn’t recognise it as such, at the time. But she didn’t. She made the choice to treat me like one of her daughters, and to do her best to make me feel included and part of the family. Even now, she puts in the effort.

I don’t think you’re necessarily the AH for buying second-hand. That’s a practical choice. YTA for digging in after it was clear that Kiki felt othered and unequal and unloved because of it. You handled everything wrong here. You could have had the dress dry-cleaned, and presented it to Kiki in a dress box, wrapped in tissue paper and covered in scented beads or miniature roses. Or you could have been upfront with her about a used one being available, and offered her the money you saved if she was OK with her dress being used. Or after you knew she was upset, you could have decided that your relationship with your new stepdaughter was worth more than a couple hundred bucks, and apologised and got her a new dress, *even if you think she’s being irrational*.

Stop expecting her to act like an adult, with an adult’s reasoning. She’s not an adult. She’s a teenager with a teenage brain, which means more extreme emotions, poorer impulse control and less ability to see things rationally than an adult has. (That’s a feature of teenagers, not a bug. Those things frequently come along with more compassion and more passion than adults have.) She probably already feels alienated and not good enough, because most teenagers do, and you’ve just given her what will appear to her to be a very clear sign that you see her as less-than, even if that’s not the way you intended it. Apologise, and do what you can to make it right.

YTA. I believe you should buy Kiki the new dress since the price of the new dress is within the budget you suggested. It’s not fair that she is the only one getting a used dress while you’re getting everyone else a new dress. Otherwise, if you truly want to save money, you buy used dresses for everyone.

YTA: You most likely could’ve skimped on something else. I definitely would’ve felt singled out by being the 15y/o step daughter and the only one that wasn’t worthy of a new dress!!! You picked the wrong time to be frugal and most likely f$caked the relationship you are going to have with her.
Congratulations on becoming the “wicked step mom”

Congrat! You’ve successfully alienated your step-daughter. You have a few rough years ahead of you, but can probably kick her out at 18. 

YTA. My 10 year old, when I read him the story and asked how he thinks the stepdaughter must feel being the only one not getting a new bridesmaid dress, summed it up perfectly I think: unwanted. I know I personally would feel like I clearly don't matter as much as her other (biological) kids and yeah, it would hurt.