So a couple of days ago I get a phone call from my estranged sister - the one who brought me down under false pretenses in 2017 when my dad lay dying to say that my mom needed to be taken out of the will because of dementia. I was not looking forward to hearing her voice, as the only reason to call me would be that something happened to mom. When I picked up the phone, I found I was right.

Mom was in the hospital for influenza. She's alright as of now - they held her a few days for treatment and observation. But during that time the bank had tried to contact my mother about a low balance. Not able to reach her by phone, or her caretaker Anna, they reached out to my sister, who then set out to her own investigation. Tried to contact Anna to no avail. So she went over to mom's house.

The house was robbed. Anything of value was gone. Anna was nowhere to be found. She called the police, and found it was even worse. Over 40 thousand dollars was embezzled from both mom's account and the animal shelter's. That bitch Anna had stolen over $50k from my mom, and fled the city. Possibly the state.

Mom had given Anna the right to assign funds to help run the animal shelter she was running, as well as her own bank account, mainly because Anna was pushing her to do so, constantly telling my mother that 'none of her other friends would take care of her', and that 'she was the only one who would'. Mom's social health was deteriorating as a result.

Anna pulled the wool over all of our eyes, and now she's gone. The animal shelter is going to shutter up as a result - the animals that Mom was taking care of have been relocated to another shelter. So not only has Anna destroyed the faith and financial health of my mother, but also an innocent non profit no-kill animal shelter.

Yesterday I was on a zoom call with the family lawyer, who gave me the rundown - the police have notices out on Anna, but they are not optimistic, and... because it wasn't a violent crime, not as important to them, apparently. Anna has apparently fled the state. There is nothing we can do but pick up the pieces and try to rebuild.

The good thing to come out of this is that Mom is staying with a friend who Anna said previously 'Hated her guts' - and found nothing could be farther from the truth. She's starting to come out of her shell and socialize more, and despite the loss, she's feeling better about things. Thank God for her other friends, and... I admit, thank God for my sister, too. We were all fooled, so I'm working on reconciling things with her, too.

And that whole thing about my sister's treatment of her in 2017 - seems Mom, under the influence of Anna, did not tell my sister that my dad, in his own last months of life, was physically abusing her. So putting him in a hospice home was protecting herself as well as him. Had my sister been told the truth at the time, she would never have pushed for my mom to be removed as head of household. It was Anna that poisoned my mom against her, threatening her, and insulating mom against her. We surmised she was only kind to me because she felt she needed an ally in the family to drive a wedge between us all.

This is why I've been kind of morose over the last few days. Seems like every year needs to outdo the last one in how fucking suckful it was. This year we had an election that destroyed my faith in America, and now I'm finding more reason to hate my fellow man. I'm thankful my mom is improving as is the relationship with my sister. But I am so angry and feeling so impotent about Anna. There is a special place in hell for that greedy lying bitch and I hope she sees it sooner rather than later.

My mom, my sister and I will recover. But it is not going to be a very merry Christmas or a happy new year.

Thanks for reading. Just wanted to let everyone know what was happening.