the long-awaited spreadsheet
The last thing that I wrote about my mom and her financial situation was that her guardian had sent bank statements to Good Sister for some CPA crunching. GS received the statements this past Saturday and has done a whole lot of crunching on them, producing a spreadsheet that she's shared with the United Sister Front, her guardianship lawyer K, and the fellow we hope will be the lawyer to get Mom's house back, A.
I had a long chat with GS from the bus this morning (Thanks, AirPods!) wherein I learned all sorts of stuff about the situation, pleasant and otherwise. It's complicated. I'll try to summarize:
GS is genuinely heartbroken that Mom is letting scammers feed her delusions. She even asked K, "Is this how you would want your mother to go through life?" To tell you the truth, I don't care what's going on in Mom's head anymore. As I told GS this morning, we don't control that. GS didn't want to hear it, but I'm willing to let that slide for now. All three members of the United Sister Front have concluded independently that the veneer of education & civilization that Mom fought to maintain throughout her adult life is peeling off, revealing the nasty hillbilly she always was at heart. Why, no, I didn't lock this post.
And what of the third member of the USF, Evil Sister? She helped us find A, but she says she wants no part of guardianship; GS doesn't think ES could handle the aggro anyway. Sheeut, I'm not sure I can, but I'll try if I have to. The other two of us are ambivalent enough about it ourselves that we don't hold it against her. ES only left Florida in '17, and still has one minor child and a husband who travels a lot, so we're willing to cut her a lot of slack.
Oh, and what of the reverse mortgage, the end of which was supposed to be the rationale for all this in the first place? GS has restarted discussions with A. Some of the value of the house may be recoverable, but that means we'll have to pay back the remainder.
I had a long chat with GS from the bus this morning (Thanks, AirPods!) wherein I learned all sorts of stuff about the situation, pleasant and otherwise. It's complicated. I'll try to summarize:
- The spreadsheet is a portrait of advancing dementia painted in numbers. Mom's credit card bills ballooned as early as '13; GS pointed out plenty of evidence that much of that activity was fraud.
- Before we put Mom in guardianship, she liquidated some of her retirement plans to pay credit card bills. This was long a low-level fear of mine, but now it's been confirmed; Mom really is that addled, and has been for some time. This may be the answer to where she's been getting money to pay for "psychics". That makes it all the more important for us to get the house back if we can.
- The guardian didn't send the statements for '18, so GS has requested those via K. GS suspects the guardian of attempting to cover his butt.
GS is genuinely heartbroken that Mom is letting scammers feed her delusions. She even asked K, "Is this how you would want your mother to go through life?" To tell you the truth, I don't care what's going on in Mom's head anymore. As I told GS this morning, we don't control that. GS didn't want to hear it, but I'm willing to let that slide for now. All three members of the United Sister Front have concluded independently that the veneer of education & civilization that Mom fought to maintain throughout her adult life is peeling off, revealing the nasty hillbilly she always was at heart. Why, no, I didn't lock this post.
And what of the third member of the USF, Evil Sister? She helped us find A, but she says she wants no part of guardianship; GS doesn't think ES could handle the aggro anyway. Sheeut, I'm not sure I can, but I'll try if I have to. The other two of us are ambivalent enough about it ourselves that we don't hold it against her. ES only left Florida in '17, and still has one minor child and a husband who travels a lot, so we're willing to cut her a lot of slack.
Oh, and what of the reverse mortgage, the end of which was supposed to be the rationale for all this in the first place? GS has restarted discussions with A. Some of the value of the house may be recoverable, but that means we'll have to pay back the remainder.