Dear Auntie Linda, My father died last year.Β He and my mother owned two homes.Β Mother doesn’t want to live alone in a distant city since Dad died.Β She moved into the apartment attachedΒ to my home in rural Tennessee.Β She gets along really well and my family and I enjoy her company.Β My three small children love having their grandmother here.Β Mother is only sixty-two and in excellent health.Β She wants to sell her two homes, one in New York and one in the Bahamas and build a house nearby.Β Β Two of my siblings are furious that she wants to sell “their inheritance.”Β They are both single with no children and believe I am using my children to influence Mother.Β They are making her miserable.Β How do I convince them I don’t have a finger in the pie? Spoiled Siblings
Dear Spoiled, Your mother will have to handle this.Β If I were in this position, I’d remind the all my children that I planned to live awhile and need home now.Β When I am dead, they will get whatever I feel the deserve in my will.Β Auntie Linda
Dear Auntie Linda, My husband has started attending aΒ bizarre fundamentalist church.Β He contributes way over what we can afford.Β I have attended this church and feel it is cult-like.Β I told him I want nothing to do with it.Β Last Sunday, he came home telling me he is entering the ministry, selling our house, and moving into the church compound.Β He has always been too dominant but now he is moving toward irrational.Β What do I doΒ I don’t work and have small children.Β I don’t know if I can make it on my own.Β Not Churchy
Dear Not Churchy,Β Talk to a lawyer.Β You can go to legal aid if needed.Β Sounds like you need to have a plan.Β Women make it all the time who think they can’t.Β Best the heck out of trying to escape from a cult and then figuring out how to make it on your own.
Email Auntie LindaΒ lbeth1950@hotmail.com