<p>I don’t understand why you guys are accusing me of being a ■■■■■. I guess this isn’t the right forum to ask for advice. My story is a bit far-fetched but w.e.</p>
<p>I will give you guys a follow up, if I have any more trouble.</p>
<p>This is the right forum to ask for parental advice. You tend to get advice when people care. While your story is far fetched, those of us who believed you were sympathetic to you as a young adult losing their loved ones because of the emotional trauma that was thrust upon you. I think if my wife and I disappeared, my daughters would be concerned for our welfare in addition to their own. I sympathized. Once you made it clear that your worries were strictly about losing the cold cash that your parents provided, you became much less sympathetic. </p>
<p>I don’t like it when some posters call other posters a ■■■■■ either. It doesn’t help anybody.</p>
<p>That was well said, ClassicRockerDad.
My feeling on questions that seem suspicious is that even if they are not real, maybe there are some useful suggestions for another real kid somewhere out there.
If we disappeared, I would hope my children would start by calling the police.</p>
<p>I’m not really sure why everyone finds it so incredibly hard to imagine that someone could have a home life so very different than their own. I’m not saying the OP is a ■■■■■ or not (he could possibly be) but I just find it rediculous that people can’t imagine that not everyone has the cookie cutter family life they feel is the norm. Some people really don’t communicate with their parents after they move out for whatever reason. It doesn’t mean that they wish ill will toward them or even that they don’t like them. You would be surprised at how many people grow up in a household full of people that they feel don’t really know them and when they leave the household they simply move on. The OP said he didn’t wish for anything bad to happen to them, he just wasn’t close to them jeez. People are acting like he said he wish they’d been hit by a train. We don’t know the circumstances that lead him to feel the way he does toward his parents. I’ve gone long periods of time without talking to one of my parents (divorced) since I was a pre-teen. I once went to one’s house and they had moved without a word. The house was completely empty and I had no contact with the particular parent for a year and that was in high school. It happens, we don’t all have the white picket fence family vision that others have. While the OP’s story is not your standard story it’s not entirely impossible.</p>
<p>dtucker73, if your parents disappeared, would your first concern be next year’s financial aid package?</p>
<p>So even if you believe that the OP has no relatives, doesn’t know neighbors or friends of parents, thinks a house can change hands in two months, just happened to take everything he owned, got a phone call from dad’s boss, believes his parents got a quickie divorce just out of the blue, etc., you have to have a problem with this paragraph.
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<p>Exactly, siliconvalleymom.
He doesn’t seem to wish them ill will because then the gravy train would stop. Apologies for being harsh, but really, if one reads the thread carefully, there are things that don’t hang together as well as things that make the OP rather unsympathetic. This has nothing to do with different upbringings. It has to do with incredulity.</p>
<p>**** cross posted with toledo</p>
<p>But I would like to hear more from our regular poster, DougBetsy. I can’t imagine anything “similar” that could have happened to her (him). Would you mind sharing?</p>
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<p>Quote: “I don’t like it when some posters call other posters a ■■■■■ either. It doesn’t help anybody.”</p>
<p>Maybe not. However, when a story is so far fetched, it is well within the implied etiquette of this type of message board to challenge it.</p>
<p>So far, the poster has not been able to explain all the discrepancies in this ridiculous “story”.</p>
<p>Sure. </p>
<p>My mom walked out on the family when I was 16 and sis was 14. She said she was “tired of being June Cleaver and wanted to find herself.” </p>
<p>I went away to college at 18. When sis graduated, she was 18 and I was 20. Per the divorce agreement and since both kids were adults, Dad sold the house immediately and hit the road with his share of the house $. I didn’t hear from him for 18 months. This former bank VP bought a Chevy conversion van and visited nearly every thorobred track east of the Mississippi. He figured that since sis didn’t want college and I was 2 years in, that his parenthood responsibilities were fulfilled and Mom could chip from that point, if she felt like it. </p>
<p>It was at this point that I had no one’s help or support. (Sis chose to move to OC Md, wait tables, and live with boyfriends.) I had to take a semester off to avoid being homeless. </p>
<p>Eventually, with financial help from my paternal grandparents I was able to return to school. Meanwhile, my maternal grandparents were counseling Mom on how she could find a way to help. She eventually came through and funded my last 3 semesters. It was a hardship to her and her new husband. But, her willingness to come to my aid demonstrated remorse over the way she left 2 teenage daughters when they needed her the most.</p>
<p>Thank God for grandparents, DougBetsy!</p>
<p>^ Unfortunately, in the OP’s story the granparents moved to another country. ;)</p>
<p>(See Edit noted in post # 14)</p>
<p>OK, why are people judging and/or trying to play psychologist on an online forum? </p>
<p>No-one knows why this kid wasn’t close to his parents/didn’t love them in the traditional sense, and no-one can find out from a few internet posts.</p>
<p>OP’s parents could financially support him (to some degree) and still be absentee at best or abusive at worst. </p>
<p>I think the best thing people on this forum can do is take OP on his word and provide advice based on that. The question posed by OP is not “why do my parents not love me/why do I not love my parents” but is “how can I pay for college now, when I expected my parents to pay because they told me they would and I made no plans to do otherwise.” </p>
<p>Enough garbage about believing the kid is a ■■■■■, entitled, or something else. If you believe this things and don’t think him worthy of advice, why post? </p>
<p>OP - parents are not legally obligated to pay for tuition. If they’re MIA I don’t think wasting money and time on figuring out where they are is going to help. They seem to have made a decision to abandon you…and you should spend most of your time on figuring out how to make college work financially without them. You seem to be in a pretty good position - job, scholarship, etc. If you need to reduce to part time make sure you can still mantain Bright Futures money. Good luck, I am sure can do it - lots of people put themselves through college. It’ll be tough but you seem to have the motivation.</p>
<p>Chicagobound,</p>
<p>You appear to be a new poster. Welcome to cc. However, many of us old timers can spot an outrageous story PDQ and usually question a poster about it. Our questioning the veracity of the post is, IMO, not really much different than the judgemental quality of the first few paragraphs of your post above, where you question the intent of the posters. Your last paragraph is helpful. The ones above it, not so much.</p>
<p>It goes without say that we can only go by what is posted here. But, generating hypotheses is not unreasonable, IMO, even if they are limited to what info is shared or what we’ve seen on these boards before. When posters give their time and energy trying to be helpful here, it is, IMO, ok to blow the BS whistle when a post, or series of posts just don’t seem to pass the smell test.</p>
<p>Perhaps as a student you are wanting to come to the OP’s defense. But he posted in the parents forum, and he is likely to hear feedback from parents-- which he may or may not find helpful. And so it goes.</p>
<p>To the OP…this is a parents forum and as others have said, the parents here are a very helpful group. They are more than willing to give advice to students in need and I’ve seen many times when the posters on this forum have given tons of time and suggestions to posters in need.</p>
<p>Having said that…I’m a parent. Your comments about hating your parents and not wanting to live with them but wanting their money…well those comments were disparaging to me at best. </p>
<p>Go and discuss this situation with the folks at your college. I don’t think they are going to be able to put much in action for you now as your parents HAVE funded this years’ schooling. The school might be able to tell you how to document that you’ve been abandoned…if indeed you have been. And the school will be able to tell you what your next steps might need to be.</p>
<p>In the meantime, I do hope that your parents are healthy and have found safe places to live and other jobs. And most of all, I hope you find it in your heart to want to know about their well being.</p>
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<p>I agree with your sentiment, up to a point. </p>
<p>When one has the feeling of being abandoned, life boils down to Maslow’s heirarchy. Meet the needs of food and safety. Then if there’s any energy left, try to focus on love, belonging, esteem, etc. </p>
<p>Consider a wife who just learned hubby has run off with the nanny. She’s been abandoned, yet society allows her to hate the cheating jerk and go after his money. It’s only natural for a child to experience similar emotions when his support has run off. Expecting an 18 year old to matter-of-factly search for his parents with love, longing and forgiveness is asking a lot. </p>
<p>You know what, I wonder if it’s a cycle of DABDA. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. A family is dead here. The survivor needs to grieve. It’s not pretty, but it’s not shameful either. </p>
<p>(disclaimer: I’m still not convinced this is a true story. I’m just proposing what might be motivating Lurker’s attitude if it is.)</p>
<p>DougBetsy, I’m thinking along similar lines (I too faced a problem like this in the 70’s…the school came through with a scholarship-- otherwise I don’t know what I would have done.) I think an abandoned kid is likely to spout lots of “tough” sentiments, for fear of acknowledging the reality.</p>
<p>I don’t know if Lurker is on the level…if he is, I’d say get straight to the Dean of Students. Nobody cares about tuition as much as a college does-- and they don’t let people slip out of their grasp very easily.</p>
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<p>I agree, if he really doesn’t care about them then that would be expecting a lot. </p>
<p>What bothers me is he sounds VERY willing to search for them for the purpose of getting money. I guess my opinion (ready to be flamed) is that if this relationship is THAT poor, and hates these people THAT much, he should be looking for ways to finance college without their help. He should not deal with them at all. You know…his parents (actually all parents) are under NO obligation to help him with college costs, provide him with information, etc. And if he’s over 18, they really don’t need to provide him with a home. They actually set him up in an off campus apartment…thus providing him with a home at least for the short term.</p>
<p>I will say…this story is disfunctional to the nines. And I’m not sure I believe it at all. BUT I think the mercenary attitude of this poster is…well wrong. Sorry…if he doesn’t want these people in his life, he should be prepared to live life without their money too.</p>
<p>It’s unhelpful to say that the OP is a legal adult and should move on alone if all he cares about is his parents’ money, because the financial aid system isn’t set-up that way. A teenager who submitted parental financial information prior to his first year of college will not be considered financially independent from his parents without some significant hoop jumping, which will at minimum require contact information for his parents. Some people who are parents should have been prohibited from breeding, and if the OP exists I commend him – for making peace with his circumstances (which some of us who are parents still have not achieved,) and for focusing on the practical means to continue pursuing the education that will help him rise above his circumstances.</p>