My Sister Needs Help

Living Conditions

My sister is a sweet and kind 75 year old lady. She will give you her last dime if you tell her you need it, regardless of her needs.

She was a long time school teacher and is, as a practical matter retired from the profession. She holds out hope of getting employment in a public school that will allow her to officially retire and get a pension. She has been pursuing this outcome for two years without success. She tries very hard and doesn't give up easily. She has hope, but as far as I know, no real prospects.

She currently lives by herself in a three bedroom, one and a half bath townhouse. It could be a nice place, but as you will see in the videos below she likes to accumulate things — books, old newspapers, old documents, memorabilia, old VCR tapes, DVDs, and old mail, lots and lots of mail. The overwhelming amount of stuff makes it impossible to organize her home or keep it clean.

You can barely walk through her townhouse. The entire floor is covered, both downstairs and upstairs.

There are many, many towels lying on her kitchen floor that have been there for over a year. There are many dirty clothes lying on the floor in her bedroom. The time I was in her bedroom it appeared that she slept on a bare mattress with a cover sheet.

One thing you cannot see in the videos is that her home is infested with bed bugs. You can often see them crawling on her. This has been going on for at least three years. I spoke to an exterminator with her listening in. He said she had to declutter her place before they had any chance to treat the bugs. According to the exterminator her bed was infested. She agreed to declutter, organize and clean her place, but nothing has changed. She did buy a new mattress without treating the bed bugs, so it has to be infested now as well. Luckily the bed bugs don't bother her. She wears a filthy trench coat that is covered in bug excrement, there are hundreds of dark brown spots. Needless to say her personal hygiene is poor.

Last Thanksgiving she attended a church event the night before. On her 30-mile trip back home she took a wrong turn and ended up running out of gas another fifty miles further from home. She evidently wondered the streets all night and was eventually picked up by a good Samaritan. They spent several hours together. My sister had no money, did not remember my phone number or that of any friend. Eventually the police got involved and they figured out I was related and called at 5:30 AM on Thanksgiving morning. My wife and I drove up, put gas in her car and I drove her and her car home. There are a few videos below that I made when we got back to her place that morning.

Financial Scams

She is very gullible and routinely taken in by various scam artists. In the past she has been taken in by vanity book publishers and fraudulent contests. Most recently she purchases gift cards for people running unknown rackets. For example, her electricity was turned off by TXU and she went to the local Dollar Store to purchase a gift card to pay an electrician to "fix her electricity." This is according to the Dollar Store employee that followed my sister to her bank to tell the bank manager that my sister is always buying gift cards for apparent scams.

I've met with my sister and her bank manager many times and I regularly speak with the manager on the phone. The bank will no longer issue her a debit card because it always gets compromised. She's had thousands of dollars credited to her account from fraudulent transactions. On the last card there were numerous charges from the Google Play Store for smartphone games. My sister can't really use a smartphone.

I did give her a simple flip phone. It took months before she would even try to use it. As she was getting comfortable answering calls someone pretending to be law enforcement called. He told her he was investigating cell phone fraud and he instructed her to send him her cell phone. She mailed it to him.

I was in her place one weekday and her land-line phone rang constantly. I didn't think to keep a count, but I was there for about 30 minutes and I know she got 20 calls. Once the phone rang immediately when she hung up from the previous call – she didn't even take her hand off the handset! I was in a horror movie. Some she appeared to know and others were cold calls for Medicare insurance. I really believe she has Stockholm Syndrome and some of these scammers have become her "friends."

Automobiles

Her church donated a Nissan about ten years ago and within a few years she destroyed it. There are photos below of that car. About fours years ago it was no longer repairable.

At that point I gave her an Acura. It took her four years to destroy it. I spent thousands of dollars repairing it in that four years. On both cars she would tear the front facade off the car and severly damage the suspension by running into things. She also tore the mirrors off both cars on multiple occasions. In the end the headlights on both cars were inoperable.

During the time she had the Acura she was involved in at least one wreck and received one speeding ticket. She also ran out of gas numerous times with police officers literaly pushing her car off the street. I realized later that the car had been out of inspection for over 18–months and not one police officer wrote her a ticket for no inspection. For the past two years I've been telling her that I won't be a party to getting her a new car once this one is no longer repairable. In addition to the expense, I'm afraid she will injure someone or herself, or I will be found lible by enabling her reckless behavior.

However, she has somehow purchased a 2020 Nissan Rogue from Burleson Nissan. With this purchase she now has financial commitments of roughly three to four times her income.

Update - June 2025 - My sister went to a Burleson collision repair facility looking for help with repairs to her Rogue. Apart from the side-swipe of April she has now pulled the front bumper facade loose and it drags or flaps while driving. While trying to get to the collision center she turned into an adjacent unoccupied warehouse parking lot and could not figure out how to get to the collision center lot. A person from the collision center said they watched her drive around in a confused state for 15-minutes or so before finally parking and walking to the collision center. They thought she was behaving very strange and called an ambulance. The EMT found my number in her purse and called me. The EMT thought my sister was incoherent and might be suffering from a stroke or cardiac event. They transported her to Huguley Hospital, where she stayed for three days of tests and observation.

They decided that she did not suffer a stroke or has any cardiac issues. They said she did have a deficit in mental capacity and was in a euphoric manic state.

She has misplaced the Nissan Rogue and has not made any payments since she got it in January. As of late July 2025, she is in arrears to the tune of $2700, with a payoff of more than $18,000.

Regarding her townhouse, she has not made a rent payment since February, 2025. As of August 1, 2025, she is in arrears $8,400.

She is behind on her electric bill for over $400 and has been subject to disconnection since 7-8-2025.

The landlord filed for eviction and the court ruled she must vacate by July 29, 2025. As of July 26, 2025, she was still there and insisted she plans to stay. I left six large plastic tubs and told her that she should put her most prized posessions in them and I will pick them up the following week, before she and her things are forcibly removed from the townhouse. I explained in detail how the process works and that a constable will remove her from the townhouse and a crew will have two hours to bag and place all her possessions and furniture in the front yard. The landlord must let them stay in the front yard for 24-hours before he can dispose of them as he pleases. I told her I'm not going to transport more than the six plastic tubs I left. (I told her in the past that I would store most of her items in a storage facility, but that offer has expired.) I also heard from an officer of the court that groups of people follow these eviction actions and come pick over the items.

She is still in total and complete denial.

Update - 4/14/2025 - I received a call from an acquaintance today asking me if I knew my sister wrecked her new car. She was surprised that it was drivable. I did speak with her the previous week and she told me she would have driven off a cliff if another car hadn't run into her. She said her driver side mirror was damaged. I asked several questions, but her answers were incoherent. She's had this car for a little over two months.

Moving Forward

My goal is to reduce her overhead and move her closer to her long time church and family. She currently lives about 30-miles away. I have leased a nearby apartment in Bedford. It is fully furnished and is shown in the photos below. It is across the street from the Bedford Public Library and adjacent to Generations Park at Boys Ranch. She enjoys spending time in libraries and walking.

I can see her voluntering at the library helping children and adults learn to read. In the past she used to do story time reading at the Hurst Public Library. She really seemed to enjoy those days. Her current existance must be dreadful. All she does is worry about asking people for money and support. Instead of being a burden on her friends and acquaintances she could help others and make her community a better place. I wish I could convice her to make a positive change...

I stopped paying her rent and utilities on March 1, 2025. As of late March the landlord told me he sent her an eviction notice.

She has a small Social Security pension that is about 25-percent of her recent overhead. Unfortunately most of her monthly income of late goes to scammers. I would like to open a bank account to receive her meager pension and transfer a portion each month to her account for her personal use. It seems no matter how much cash is in her account she or her scammers will consume it. For example, not long ago she had a few thousand dollars deposited to her account and within a month is was gone. As far as I can tell it mostly went to scammers.