Background: Last fall, I was hit by a car while walking and I fractured an endplate in my spine. I filed a lawsuit to be compensated for both damages and my pain and suffering. Turns out the car that hit me was uninsured, which means the pain and suffering portion would be on my car insurance (I live in a no-fault state and policies are expensive but it means your car insurance covers accidents even as a pedestrian). The insurance company is not paying, citing an arcane law that two family members cannot be on the same policy unless they live in the same house. My father and I live separately but bundle our cars to save money.
While this is a legal softball, I decided to not persue the punitive damages because the situation was so infuriating and my mental health was at stake. When I told this to my mother, she said “if you made more money, you could have had your own insurance policy and this wouldn’t have happened.”
I am considering total estrangement, as this comment was not only singularly offensive but is indicative of her draconian worldview, which is “got mine, fuck poor people.”
Does anyone have a secret for how to deal with a parent this shitty? Should I even bother?
some parents assume that you will always be the subordinate in the future, as that was the initial dynamic when you were a small child without a fully developed brain and limited rights/autonomy.
these people are objectively stupid and in for the rudest awakening in the world. filial piety ain’t really a thing in the west, because if it were, the “bootstraps” line of our elites wouldn’t be one of our enduring myths.
just know that it can take a long time for a really thick person to realize they aren’t the boss anymore. to realize that the position was originally granted due to temporary expediency. they were not, in fact, appointed for life. and this loss would not be formally announced or recognized, but it would be felt when the role had lapsed and they attempted to exercise the power of the office.
though you should make sure you know what minimum legal responsibility you have to them first, which already murky, gets truly murky if you end up in different states.
i think it really only tends to come up if a parent is disabled prior to social security age and ends up becoming a ward of the state and put into a facility, that facility can pursue restitution for services provided if the child is pretty rich with some other conditions. i don’t really know how frequently it is enforced, but the point is if you stay in contact with them, are publicly living pretty large without intervening when you provably know they are disabled and destitute, you might be on the hook for some costs associated with housing them.
a lot of these laws are holdovers from the Great Depression and civil (not criminal), so it’s clear as mud to me how it works with parents reaping what they’ve sown from adult children. just something worth keeping in the back of your mind if you’re thinking of having a nuclear conversation.
ultimately though, the power dynamic will be the total opposite of what it was the day you were born regardless of any laws. most parents go through this with their own parents at some point, or they just sort of understand the implications of biology, legacy, and mortality after thinking about them for a few minutes. they start to back off being a swollen asshole as their kids transition into adulthood.
it takes someone special to miss the signs and do zero introspection in 20+ years.