Resentment of what parents did with their inheritance has wrecked our relationship

[MalePoster9000]

Parents are late 70s. I’m mid-40s.

I could go into details but it might be outing.

Anyway my mother always says “family is everything” but this has really not been reflected in any decisions / actions she and my father took with all that they inherited and didn’t need from the generation above them.

Anyone experience anything similar?

Well, since you ask, she had 11 years off work to raise two children, and then retired mid-50s….

Yeah that shark is getting closer isn't it?

And yet you're not working now?

There are a lot of towns/cities outside of London. Most a lot more affordable, many a lot nicer. London basically has it's own economy and most of the time it's only worth living in London if you have a London salary, which I'm guessing you don't as you "don't have a pot to piss in".

Please move out of your parents house, for your own sake. You obviously resent them and they will most likely grow to resent you if they don't already (I don't think many retired people would be thrilled to be financially supporting their adult child). The situation as it is now will just lead to more unhappiness and resentment for all of you.

It's perfectly reasonable of your parents to live somewhere that suits them, op.
As is their assumption that by the time their kids had reached their mid 40s, they'd have moved on and built lives for themselves somewhere that suited them.

That should read '11 years of hard work raising you and your brother'

Well, it’s not every day you see a new twist on the ‘ it’s not fair ‘ trope on Mumsnet.

A farm that has been in the family for generations but is no longer at a viable size because land has been recklessly sold off might have reason to bemoan the decisions of their parents, but to for the OP to expect her parents to have had a crystal ball about house price moves or to have been particularly interested in holding onto a random collection of inherited properties that will have come with a heap of responsibilities, purely for her ( him ?) benefit is something again.

A friend’s grandmother sold off a whole row of houses in a then unfashionable part of London that she had unexpectedly inherited. Not very valuable, as they had sitting tenants and she had no interest in the responsibility of being a landlord. The friend, looking to buy a flat decades later in the same area made a rueful comment about having to pay much more for the flat than her grandmother had got for the row - but she wasn’t blaming her at all for rational decisions at the time.

And the complaint about where her parents choose to live now ……..!

Brother didn’t need any direction and went down a path which led to a senior and well paid job.

By contrast I did need guidance and direction from my parents but didn’t get it. And so I did an arts degree which didn’t turn into a career.

Considering I graduated in the easy days around the millennium, I’ll concede this involved me being a difficult bugger even back then.

This in spades. If you don't have a pot to piss in, OP, that's on you and your life choices, not what your parents do with their money. Rarely have I seen such a selfish and self-absorbed post on MN.

This is a spoof, surely.

OP, who is it that you are really sniping at? Your brother, son, distant and annoyingly entitled friend?

You can see, can't you, that the same way you think your parents wilfully blew their property opportunities, they probably think you blew the opportunities offered by your degree AND MA?

Except you're furious that their financial mismanagement has somehow prevented you from living the life you want, rather than your own decisions. you say you wasted opportunities between 1999-2008, but what have you been up to between 2008 and now?

OP, I'm not totally unsympathetic because clearly there's a lot more backstory here, but you're not going to move forward until you stop looking backwards.

I think the 66% in your brother's favour is maybe a little unfair, but you've said they've now agreed that your inheritance will be 50/50 so that's sorted.

It sounds like your parents weren't the smartest when it came to financial decisions, but ultimately they weren't your decisions to make, and maybe your parents had their reasons for what they chose to do. No point being bitter about it, since you can't change anything now.

As you say, your parents have helped you a lot and you're currently living with them rent free and not having to work, so I'd say that's a fairly big financial contribution. It sounds like you would be emotionally better off with your independence, though. I don't think hanging around in your parents' house, waiting for them to die, is a healthy way to live your life. You're only in your 40s - there are lots of opportunities for you.

Wow you're resentful that they've lived their own life and are 'only' giving you 50%. That is so unfair on them. And actually very entitled. My parents have nothing to leave but it's their life to do what they want with it

It’s being single that’s the killer. Literally being on your own in a property surrounded by families is my idea of hell. At least in London I was able to have a lodger so I’d have someone to talk to, and a bit of life and energy around me.

You're single too, aren't you?

Yet you can't see that this is YOUR fault that you didn't make the most of your life. Unbelievable. You are so entitled it's ridiculous.

For what it's worth, I teach in an inner-city school with some of the worst deprivation in the country. Many of the kids I've taught & teach have had trauma & ACEs coming out of their ears, yet so many have gone on to better things & made such great things of their lives all over the world (I've been there a long time, so know their lives).

Honestly, come here & walk a day in one of my pupil's shoes (they're likely too small)& get some perspective.

You're not working & not paying rent. FFS.

Gosh, you don’t work, live rent free with your parents and blame them for your career woes despite it being your decision to do an arts degree!!! Genuinely gobsmacked at your lack of self-awareness!

You sound really depressed tbh

Yep, I have to agree with this.

I am not trying to be aggressive or nasty but can't think of a better way of asking this than directly.

How have you gotten to the point where you are in your mid 40s and have nothing? What choices have you made to get yourself into that situation?

Because of your anxiety and deafness, were you expecting you parents to continue to provide for you into adulthood? And I'm asking this as the child of a mother who is completely deaf in one ear and was on medication for severe depression amd anxiety. However, my mother made choices to ensure she was financially independent despite those things.

My parents favour my siblings massively. It's obvious to those outside the family. They say their will leaves everything 50/50 but their actions while alive show they think my sibling will need more support of any kind. I've also been told that it's expected of me to support them (they mean emotionally but the financials will fall on me too) if that's still the situation when they're no longer around.

It rankles. But I've accepted it. And I have taken steps to make sure I am financially independent and secure. That I won't need to rely on inheritance because there's always the chance I won't get any.

Why haven't you done the same thing for yourself? Why wouldn't you want to look out for yourself?

I think if I didn't have a pot to piss in in my mid 40s I would stop blaming my parents for the first 18 years of my life and start looking to how I spent the subsequent 25.

I also "have anxiety", AND a job, AND I moved out of London because I wanted to be able to afford a better quality of life.

Your parents owe you nothing. And I say that as someone who never fully understood how little financial support my own parents gave me. Once I went to uni, at 18, I was on my own. They never paid another penny. Well, mum paid for driving lessons when I was 21, but I had to pay her back, and when I was 19 and stranded in Australia again, she paid me 250 pounds to help me out but again, I had to pay her back. Not a penny towards my first home, my wedding, anything.

I really hope OP is having us on.

No one is this entitled or obtuse.

So come on, then, @MalePoster9000 if your mum ‘only’ worked 20 years, how long have you worked?

You are out of work now and bemoan your education and should have done something practical as if that ship has sailed. You have a good 20 plus years to retrain and get off your arse.

You begrudge your brother’s children any of your parents wealth, yet live with them for free. Who buys food? Who pays bills? Who will pay for the driving lessons, car, petrol and insurance? Who will pay for the social life you are bemoaning can’t happen til you have the car?

If anyone needs to be on the lookout as to whose hand is unfairly in the coffers, it’s your brother.

Even without the username it's obvious this is a male poster from comments like that.

"Off work" being a stay at home parent. How lucky for her.

Oh OP. It's time to grow up and start taking responsibility for your own life and your (in)actions that has led to where you are now.

You've complained that you NEED to live in a city so why didn't you move to one? I live in one university city (plenty of night life) which is so close to another university city that the youngsters go to as well. Plenty of 2 and 3 bed homes that you could have rented or bought, close links to motorways and trains.

You've complained about your anxiety and that you need special treatment from parents. No, seek professional help as you need to be self sufficient now, not later. Plenty of people are partially deaf but they can navigate through life single handedly without asking for parental handouts.

You are so full of resentment and entitlement that I suspect you've been on certain websites that are fueling your anger that somehow you deserve better despite not earning it yourself.

Threads like this really amaze me. I’ve never met anyone who talks like this. When I was young, my friends and I used to tell our parents to spend their old age having a good time, and we didn’t want to inherit anything!

That was long ago, and I can understand why people might now be glad of a hand to buy their first home. (Though property was already expensive back then, and most of us lived on a shoestring budget to buy a small flat in a rough area.)

But other than that — why this sense of entitlement? I wish my parents had had enough money to live it up.