That night, my mom told me she needed $20,000—immediately—or she’d lose her home. I didn’t have that kind of money, but that didn’t matter. I went to the bank and took out a loan. Helping her felt like the only option. There was no second-guessing. It was my mother.
But what happened next left me stunned.
When I visited her days later, I expected to see signs of a woman trying to stay afloat. Instead, I walked into a freshly redecorated house—new furniture, a giant flat-screen TV, and a space that looked more like a showroom than a place under threat of foreclosure.
I asked her, confused and heartbroken, “Didn’t you say you were about to lose the house?” She laughed it off and said, “You’re young—you’ll earn it back. I just wanted to feel happy for once.” I felt crushed. Betrayed. And suddenly unsure of everything I thought I knew about her.
