bean29
Senior Associate
Joined: Dec 19, 2010 22:26:57 GMT -5
Posts: 10,191
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Post by bean29 on Aug 20, 2015 11:13:28 GMT -5
I thought she indicated he would retire here/move here maybe after his current contract ends or 1 more renewal? I don't know, maybe, but maybe he won't? Having two kids myself, I wouldn't feel right expecting one to look after the other after I died. Now, maybe he will want to and just do it, but if I was Pat, I'd rather be sure DD was taken care of without burdening DS. Well even if there is a trust, we have said before, people who have visitors/family checking up on them usually get better care. Hopefully he will maintain some contact/level of oversight.
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happyhoix
Distinguished Associate
Joined: Oct 7, 2011 7:22:42 GMT -5
Posts: 21,521
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Post by happyhoix on Aug 20, 2015 16:57:14 GMT -5
Ever since I had kids - they became the favorite to my parents!!! j/k I am the only child so can't comment. I wonder how my IL's feel, though. they consider my DH their rock, while they give everything they barely have to their daughter. I don't think it upsets my husband at all, I think he feels sorry for his sister. It completely breaks my heart reading some of your stories. I worry about this a lot with my kids bc I can already see how different their needs are going to be and who knows if they will think I favor one over the other. I do tell each of them that they are not the sun, so may be they won't expect much That's actually one of the reasons I only had one child - growing up in a crazy dysfunctional household where Mom had a clear favorite and a clear goat made me afraid that I would repeat that mess. I will say, my dad tried to keep things level. When anyone asked him about his kids, he would go through the list of them and say something positive about each. He always tried to be fair in how he punished us, how he rewarded us, how much money he gave us. I honestly don't know which of us he liked best, or if he even had a favorite. So it absolutely can be done.
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milee
Senior Associate
Joined: Jan 17, 2012 13:20:00 GMT -5
Posts: 12,344
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Post by milee on Aug 20, 2015 17:36:12 GMT -5
That's actually one of the reasons I only had one child - growing up in a crazy dysfunctional household where Mom had a clear favorite and a clear goat made me afraid that I would repeat that mess. I will say, my dad tried to keep things level. When anyone asked him about his kids, he would go through the list of them and say something positive about each. He always tried to be fair in how he punished us, how he rewarded us, how much money he gave us. I honestly don't know which of us he liked best, or if he even had a favorite. So it absolutely can be done. When you describe your experiences, they sound similar to some of mine. My younger sister was the favorite and also the "goat" that was groomed from birth to be helpless and trained that she was always going to stay home and be the caretaker forever. And, like yours, it messed her up royally. My mom actively pitted sibling and relatives against each other, I think it was interesting for her and the manipulation kept her in the center of things. Not fun.
So, like you, I worried a lot about being fair and tried hard to make sure they understood I did not have a favorite kid. Although I am very clear with them that fair does not mean absolutely equal (they both understand that different ages = different ability to do things and sometimes more time or money gets spent on one, etc.) I still worried a lot that they'd think one was the favorite over the other. But I've relaxed a little and stopped worrying about it in the past couple of years since I've overheard them having funny mock disagreements about who is the "golden child." Since they both think that they're the favorite and are able to laugh about it, I think they're OK.
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Post by mojothehelpermonkey on Aug 21, 2015 14:47:25 GMT -5
I am definitely more of an overachiever than my brother, and I have had my "poor responsible me" moments. A lot of it relates to the handling of my dad's estate, but it's not that I think I deserved more money. It just frustrates me that even though I live in another state and was in grad school at the time (brother was working PT in a gas station), I had to do pretty much everything. I just didn't think my brother could handle all of the paperwork, and he agreed with me. He probably would have agreed to let me pay myself for the time I spent using the estate money, but I didn't really think to ask for that. My mom (divorced from my dad) also suggested back then that I give my brother more money from the estate because my dad had helped me pay for school. I guess it touched a nerve because I broke down crying and told her that my dad had given me around $10,000 total for school, whereas my brother not only received help with school until he dropped out, but also had a free place to live for several years while my dad was alive and now he can continue to live in that house for the rest of his life. The house was paid off, and my monthly rent payment was about the same as the yearly tax bill for the house. My mom apologized, and our relationship has gotten a lot better since then. I hope she lives forever, but I wouldn't mind if she left him more, since he is more likely to need it. However, she seems to be really going out of her way to make things equal now. She is even trying to give me a house. She is getting married soon, so they have an extra one. It's hard for me to resent my brother too much. I always felt like my parents were stricter and scrutinized my behavior a lot more than my brother's, but looking back, I think they let him slip through the cracks in some ways.
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