Woman finds out husband has been secretly charging her for her engagement ring. AITA?
"AITA for demanding my husband returns my engagement ring to the store because he is making me pay for it through our joint account?"
Throwrapaidforring
My husband (30M) and I (28F) have been married for just under 3 months and have been having a huge argument about my engagement ring. We got married 1 month into him proposing to me.
It wasn’t a fancy wedding and we had our honeymoon right after we signed the papers at the courthouse. He gave me a diamond engagement ring that’s close to 8K - a 2 carat lab diamond. He didn’t have funds available readily as we are saving for a home so he put this ring on a payment plan.
I found out after we married and merged our finances that he has been withdrawing funds from our joint account (we make roughly the same) to finance this ring. I was just taken aback and honestly put off by the fact he is making me pay for a GIFT he gave to me.
We have been having some arguments lately and he feels that ring is a wedding expense and it’s only fair that I contribute towards it too, and that as a woman of this day I shouldn’t hesitate to be an equal partner. I call bullshit and shared my thoughts on this whole thing.
First, you don’t make the recipient of a gift pay for the damned gift. An engagement ring is considered a gift in most modern societies even today and I don’t care if you disagree with that it’s just what the cultural expectations are and we never discussed if he had any issues with that.
MAYBE if he was an adult enough, I would’ve had a discussion about how it makes him feel and see if his values about tradition align with mine. Second, I’ve unintentionally partially paid for 2 installments now which makes me a part-owner of the ring.
If I knew my husband was going to be making me pay for the ring, I wouldn’t have agreed to “buy” it. Mutual consent is essential when a couple is deciding to invest in an asset.
Owning a house or a car jointly requires two “yeses” and I wouldn’t certainly have said yes to jointly owning a ring he was SUPPOSED to give to me as a gift. So I can retroactively decide now I never wanted to own it and have been demanding that my husband returns the ring to the store if paying for the ring hurts his pocket so much.
Clarification because I anticipate a lot of people might wonder: I’ve always wanted a nice ring and I’m not going to apologize about it since we never had a real wedding party and I knew I deserved a quality piece symbolizing our love.
However my then fiancé also knew about the expectation I had of him and was upfront about things from the get go. He could’ve discussed things with me like I mentioned earlier in my post and we could’ve seen if we were truly compatible like that.
What I didn’t know was that he was plotting to “get even” with me by taking out a payment plan and using our funds to finance it. This caused him to flare up and he berated me for being sexist towards him.
I put my foot down not because I can’t afford it or I refuse to financially contribute or give my husband a nice gift, but my husband’s sheer stubbornness and tackiness about wanting me to pay is what angers me.
I don’t mind splurging for him, but this whole situation has left a very bad taste in my mouth. He expects me to apologize to him because I called his actions tacky and decisions scammy and in bad faith. AITA?
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
Hot-Interaction6526
Nobody pointing out 8k for a 2 carat lab grown diamond is insanely expensive?!
Farrishnakov
You got married after being engaged for 1 month... How long have you known this guy? And why are you rushing to set up joint accounts with someone you don't trust? And, if your accounts are joined, how else is he supposed to pay for things? This sounds insane on all levels. Nobody is making good decisions.
I8urmuffin
Do you guys have separate bank accounts and just a joint account, or just a joint account? Because if you only have the joint account, you are technically gonna be partially paying for every gift you receive.
ghjkl098
Firstly, What did he do with the rest of the money? Because I don’t think it cost $8k. I would be getting it valued and working out options. Secondly, if you (i mean you as a couple) can’t afford it, why on earth is he spending $8k on a ring??? That is an absurd amount of money for a ring.
Lari-Fari
"Saving for a home“ "Put a ring on a payment plan“ What is wrong with people? Just get a nice ring for 300-500 bucks. If rich people can spend thousands on a ring yay for them. But going into debt for a ring? Just wow…
Edit: I’m going with ESH.
BigBlueHood
NTA, return both the ring and the husband.
elbowroominator
I'm not really sure I understand your reasoning. If paying for something out of your joint account means you're paying for it indirectly, and that makes it not a gift, then neither of you can ever give each other gifts again. Your finances are MERGED. What's his is yours and yours is his. That's how my wife and I function anyway.
Because what he did seems relatively... normal? Buying the kind of ring your partner wants and financing it if your saving up for a house seems pretty standard, definitely not a "plot to get back at you." It seems like he's trapped in a no-win situation here.
If he got you a less expensive ring, it might not be what you feel you deserved, and you'd be upset with him for that. If he spent a chunk from the house savings, you might be upset with him for dipping into that.
On a one month engagement it, he didn't have time to finance it by himself before your finances merged, and afterwards all his money becomes your money, and is suddenly off limits for this purpose.
What am I missing here? Because it honestly seems to me like you two got married on a whim (1 month engagement), and you're starting to have second thoughts, possibly about his income or financial standing ("compatible in that way"), and you're channeling those feelings into this as a proxy.