Woman Dumping Man After 'Destructive' Step-Kid Ruined Family Photos Backed

With family photographs among America's most treasured—and irreplaceable—heirlooms, losing them is an understandably heartbreaking experience. One woman took to Reddit to share her pain after her boyfriend's nine-year-old daughter destroyed her precious childhood photographs—including pictures of her deceased friend.

Posting to Reddit's Am I the A******? (AITA) forum on September 3, user u/PoloPurr asked if she was wrong for throwing out her boyfriend and his daughter, after he called her an "a******" for ending their relationship over the debacle.

Treasured possessions

A 2021 study by One Poll and Shinola found that family photographs were America's most-prized family heirlooms. Some 65 percent of the 2,000 people surveyed said family photographs were one of their most treasured possessions, while seven in 10 said that looking through photo albums with grandparents was a favorite memory.

The heirlooms respondents most wanted to inherit included wedding and engagement rings (26 and 31 percent) or another piece of jewelry (29 percent), as well as watches (26 percent), wedding dresses (25 percent), and the family home (18 percent).

Destroying Things

In her post, PoloPurr explained she'd been dating her boyfriend for a year and a half, but they had only met each other's children three months ago. Since then, the couple has been trying to integrate their families, with the boyfriend's daughter doing weekend visits at the house she shares with her 11-year-old son.

However, the poster has been finding the transition tough due to the girl's destructive behavior. In a short time, she ripped holes in the mattress of the guest-room bed, drew all over the walls and windowsill and put a hole in the wall. When asked what happened, she said: "They were already there."

"She even takes my new feminine pads to her room and will cut them up," she wrote. "I can buy a brand new thing of shampoo and conditioner and it's 100% gone and in the trash by the end of her shower, which lasts 45 minutes every single time."

The child also "stomps her feet and slams doors" whenever the poster tries to talk to her, knocking items off the walls. She said her boyfriend had repeatedly delivered the "You know you can't do that" talk, with no punishment and with little effect.

The situation reached breaking point at the weekend, when the woman came home to find that the girl, while unsupervised, had destroyed irreplaceable photographs from her childhood.

She wrote: "When I got back she was sitting at the kitchen table with all my photo albums laying in front of her, cutting out the faces and everything else on these photos and gluing them to her 'scrapbook.'

"Photos that I cannot get back, as they were printed out YEARS ago when I was in foster care and those were the only copies I had. Photos of my dead friend as well."

The woman found her boyfriend sitting outside on his phone. She told him that it was over and that he and his daughter needed to leave.

"Those photos, as stupid as it may be, were a huge part of my childhood and now they are destroyed," she said.

"I told him I was done speaking to him about his daughter destroying my s*** and it was time to go.

"He thinks I'm an [A******] for throwing a year and a half down the drain over some pictures. Am I?"

Reddit users reassured the poster that she was not out of line, with her story receiving over 15,000 upvotes and almost 2,000 comments.

"He sounds like a bad father," said EnderLFowl. "If he doesn't respect your property he doesn't respect you."

NonSequitorSquirrel agreed, writing: "This child is being deeply let down by a father who isn't addressing his daughter's clearly problematic destructive impulses.

"He needs to take this kid to family therapy to even start to know what's going on."

Poverload237 commented: "She needs boundaries, rules, and some active parenting, and it doesn't sound like she's getting that at all, at least not with her dad.

"Honestly, do you want to spend the next 8ish years with him when he's letting this behavior slide, especially since it'll likely only get worse in her teen years?"

While one kind user explained how she could possibly get her photographs restored.

Competitive-Abies-63 said: "I had a similar destruction happen (it was a baby cousin). I took the pieces to a photo shop and they restored them all for me! You can't even tell.

"You may well be able to get at least some of those photos restored."

Newsweek, which has reached out to u/PoloPurr for comment, couldn't verify the details of the case.