I've name changed for this as it is very outing. Sorry this will be very long.
I have a complicated relationship with my mother, who is nearing 80. She left me at the age of 14 with my alcoholic, emotionally abusive father (failed to pick me up from a school residential trip actually) and disappeared for two weeks. She never prioritised my needs and there were periods in my teenage years where there was no accomodation for me. I moved in with my then boyfriend's parents at the age of 17. From the age of 15 I was pretty much financially independent of her. She has continued to let me down ever since. It's not that she does things which are malicious more that she is so insanely selfish, it does not occur to her to put the needs of others first or even consider them.
She lives local to me but I don't see her regularly or speak to her regularly. There is no real point - she shows no interest in my life nor that of her grandchildren. She chooses to live a certain way which alienates us (she's a hoarder and her house is dirty and disgusting) but won't have a conversation about that. In any kind of confrontational situation she will shut down. I can go months without talking to her and she wouldn't ever consider to make the effort to contact me.
Along with the emotional side of things she also has an ability to turn everything to shit. She will always try and find "the bargain" version of everything or do everything on the cheap which ultimately results myself and my sister having to sort things out when a crisis occurs. She buries her head in the sand until everything is ten times worse and then more complicated to sort out.
She is terrible with money. My parents business went bankrupt when we were children. She never opened any letters and got into lots of debt (even went to prison for two weeks for failing to respond to a court summons as a civil offence). The house was repossessed and as far as I am aware she is on an IVA. She is still a compulsive buyer - her house is rammed full of purchases. Despite this she is (or should have) a relatively comfortable income. She receives a full state pension along with a small private pension and my now deceased step-father's pension. It is not a huge amount but she lives in a brand new council bungalow (which she has managed to trash already since she moved in 3 years ago) with few outgoings so she is comfortable. In fact she is currently enjoying a 2 week holiday abroad in a private villa with it's own pool.
Three years ago she received an inheritance of around 50k. Not a huge amount but enough to support the extras she needs (or so you would think). She bought a car, naturally off a dodgy local guy she knows, on the cheap, which has now cost her a significant amount to repair. She went on a holiday but as far as I can see there is nothing else to show for this money.
Along side this inheritance, another 50k was put aside into trust for any future care needs. My step-father did this as he didn't trust her with money and was worried about her capacity to financially manage these in the future (he suspected a potential gambling problem). My DH, BIL and her are all trustees. Technically, money can not be withdrawn without the agreement of all the trustees. About three months ago she asked them to withdraw money. She said she needed it for her MOT. She didn't have the conversation with me, only my DH and BIL who both said they would talk about it. To me this money is not meant for that. She should have enough money from her own pot and monthly income to cover this normal life expense. My concern is that she will whittle away this money and when the time comes, there will be nothing left and yet again my sister and I will be expected to pick up the pieces and sort it out. This money is not hers, it was not given to her.
Our intention (mine and dsis) was to have this conversation with her and to understand where her money has gone. Like I said though, this is tricky as she shuts down in any kind of conversation where she feels under threat. For whatever reason, we have not been able to meet up all together so the conversation hasn't happened yet (dsis lives some distance away). She had stopped mentioning the money too and has now gone on holiday for nearly 3 weeks expecting me to look after her cat in her shit hole of a house (she had wanted my DC to stay there but understandably they said no although she will have no insight as to why).
Yesterday we realised that she had withdrawn £1000 from the trust account, in secret, without the permission of anyone else (apparently with it being on line, she can do this although it "is not in the spirit of the account"). I am so livid. From my perspective, this is not her money and she has stolen it. This was one thing we could control so that, when the inevitable happens and everything goes tits up , it wouldn't necessarily cost us and we would be able to manage things like normal people.
I am so angry at her deception. She 100% knows this was wrong. She is hiding something and rather than having any lines of communication, she does what she always does, hides and shuts down. Her ability to ruin things is quite incredible. I actually hate her.
I have two weeks to wait until she comes home. I have always trodden on egg shells around her as I know it is pointless any other way (nothing ever changes, she has no insight to her own behaviour or certainly makes no indication that she does) but actually I will confront her this time and she will know how angry I am. The issue with this is that she will walk away and that will be then end of our relationship. I will not reach out again and I am happy to not have to deal with her again. However, I also know that I will be left feeling guilty and shit.
Not really sure why I have posted this as it's not really a solvable problem but it's been cathartic to write it down. Apologies for the length of post!