II am 24F and my ex-BIL is 35M. He and my sister were married for 10 years and they have a 7 yr old daughter together. The divorce is ongoing and childcare/money has not been 100% sorted out legally, but dad usually picks up daughter after school and she sleeps at moms every night. No child support is involved yet. I have never had a close relationship with him, he’s fine, but the divorce has been a bit messy.

Recently, they had to get their daughter into a summer program so that someone could watch her while they both worked during the day. They’d talked about this program literally since the day she was born, as they both always wanted to continue to work even when they were together. The time comes to start paying for it and boom- he completely ghosts. it’s $1500 EACH, and my sister cannot afford the entire thing. I end up helping her sign up for assistance, and luckily we get the total down to $1000 and I pay his half of $500 as it is a first come, first serve thing. I tell my BIL he needs to pay me back before summer, and we settled this in February. He does not respond to me or to my sister, but tells my mom he is going to pay me $100 every month until July. I really don’t care how I get the money, and I really don’t care that he is too ashamed to confront me about it. I just want the $500 because this is not my kid nor my responsibility.

Anyway, this month (April) I find out he bought tickets to fly out of the country on a trip. He has to let us know because no one can watch daughter at this time on his side of the family. And I’m absolutely fuming, because this is 100% a luxury trip. He flaunts his new job, his new cars, his new pool table, ALL over Facebook, and he cannot scrounge up $500 for his own daughter to go to a day camp. Mind you, this is not a fancy day camp. It’s the YMCA and the most accessible “daycare” we can possibly provide, and the one we’ve been talking about sending to her since she was born.

Mind you, he’s also telling my mom HE and my sister managed to get a really good deal on day camp. I don’t entirely care that he’s taking credit, obviously my mom is in the loop, I’m just angry that he owes me money that he fully stated he would give me and is not acknowledging anything I have done in this situation for him.

I text him and tell him he’s late on paying me literally anything. I tell him he has until July to pay me and if he doesn’t, I’m charging him for the days he goes on his trip where I have to babysit his daughter for him.

My mom said this is unnecessary because I babysit for my sister all the time, but she’s also my sister, who does not ask me for money just to not pay me back, and also is my sister whereas my EX-BIL is not even my family. But I think this is perfectly fair as he’s completely taken advantage of my help.