Mom Wants To Stop Paying For Daughter’s Leukemia Treatment So She Can Afford Younger Daughter’s Ivy League Tuition
The situation is really even worse than it sounds.
Alina Matveycheva | Pexels Your mom is supposed to be the one person you can count on, no matter what, whose love is always unconditional. Of course, not all moms are created equal, and this isn’t everyone’s experience. Some moms are absent, physically or emotionally, and some just don’t have their kids' best interests at heart.
One confused and concerned daughter shared her own experience on Reddit’s r/AmIOverreacting forum. (And, no, she was definitely not overreacting.) At just 19, the woman is battling leukemia, and her mom has decided that the fight is over and the money she had been using for her treatment should go to her younger sister's college tuition.
A mom told her daughter she wants to discontinue her cancer treatment to pay for her little sister’s college tuition.
“I have leukemia,” the young woman explained. “It’s been a few months since I started treatment and it’s been rough, but I’m still fighting. Yesterday, my mom texted me basically saying she can’t afford both my treatment and my sister’s future. My sister wants to go to Dartmouth.”
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She shared screenshots of the text messages between her and her mother. “My love, I think it’s very important to be rational and seriously consider what I brought up,” her mom began, before quoting a Bible verse, John 15:13: “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”
“This also applies to family, my love,” she argued. “Your sister desperately wants to go to Dartmouth. I cannot afford your treatment and her future.” She went on to urge her daughter to “be practical” and “come around and understand.” She even called continuing to put money towards her daughter’s cancer treatment a “fool’s errand.”
This woman doesn’t understand why her dreams matter less than her sister’s.
The daughter’s response was incredulous, and rightfully so. “Is this why you had me update my life insurance policy?” she asked. “Is this why you’ve been pushing scheduling my follow-ups? I’m not gone. I have dreams. I have goals. I’m only one year older than Michaela. Why is she [a] priority over me?”
This daughter continued to assert the fact that her future was just as important as her sister’s, and just as likely to occur. “I’ve only been in treatment for a few months,” she said. “I can win and I’ll spend the rest of my life … paying you back like I promised and agreed to with the contract you had me sign.” She concluded, “I’m not going to … smile and say, ‘Okay, yeah! Kill me for my sister!’”
In case you’re confused by this whole “contract” the daughter had to sign, she explained it … not that it made much more sense with clarification. “A few months ago, she had me sign a contract about financial stuff ‘for medical security,’” she explained. “To repay her when I got better. I lowkey thought it was a joke at first but realized no, it’s not.”
The woman should seek out help to fight back against her mother's neglect and abuse.
Reddit commenters were understandably shocked. One asked the woman how old she was, to which she responded that she was 19 years old. After finding this information out, multiple people urged her to seek help from her doctor and available social workers, and to remember that she is old enough to control insurance policies, beneficiaries, and the like.
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Although at 19 she is considered a legal adult, her mother's behavior still seems to fit the description for emotional abuse. The Mayo Clinic defined child neglect as “failure to provide adequate food, clothing, shelter, clean living conditions, affection, supervision, education, or dental or medical care.” Emotional abuse includes “injuring a child’s self-esteem or emotional well-being.”
To truly heal, this young woman needs support and love. This mother is not offering that. Instead, her well-being has been limited to a financial obligation. This mother is essentially proposing that she choose one daughter’s life over the other. That is completely unacceptable. Hopefully, this woman will get the help she needs from medical providers, social workers, and other trusted adults. She deserves better than this.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
