My Parents Expect Me To Pay For My Brother’s College Even Though They Never Helped With Mine
My parents called me last month and asked for $1,000 a month.
For my younger brother’s college.
I thought they were joking.
They weren’t.
They said I was “more financially stable” and that family should help family.
I reminded them that when I went to college, they hadn’t paid a single dollar.
I worked two jobs.
I took out loans.
I graduated with almost $40,000 in debt.
Their response?
“You were older. You could handle it.”
My brother is nineteen.
He has a new car.
He lives in an apartment near campus.
And apparently, my parents decided his education was a family responsibility.
I refused.
They called me selfish.
Then my mother said something that made me suspicious.
“Your brother shouldn’t have to struggle because of mistakes we made with you.”
I asked what she meant.
She changed the subject.
I started looking through old family financial records because my parents had previously asked me to help organize them.
That’s when I found something.
A college savings account.
My name was on it.
There had been over $25,000 in the account when I was seventeen.
I had never known it existed.
The money was gone.
I asked my parents about it.
My father finally admitted they had withdrawn it.
Not for my brother’s college.
They used it to pay off debts from a failed business.
Then came the bigger shock.
My parents weren’t actually asking me to help my brother.
They wanted me to replace the money they had taken from my college fund.
They had apparently promised my brother that the account would pay for his entire education.
Now that it was empty, they wanted me to become the replacement fund.
I said no.
My brother eventually found out.
He was furious.
Not at me.
At them.
He told me he had been told his college was already fully paid for.
Apparently, my parents had been lying to both of us.
I haven’t spoken to my parents since.
My brother and I, however, have never been closer.
