Today we were served papers from superior court. J is in default of his student loan (think BIG money) and because my husband stuck his head in the sand so are we. Who knew co-signing a loan for my bright son to go to the college of his choice would be such a bad idea? I am shaking. I tried to warn my husband but he wasn’t hearing any of it, so I guess I buried my head in the sand too. Our credit is now in the toilet and we can not co-sign for my daughters college loan. My daughter is the most responsible and wonderful person a parent could wish for. This addiction thing is just the gift that keeps on giving. Today it does not matter how much I long to detach from this mess…it just ain’t gonna happen. I am just so PISSED.
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A Mom's Serious Blunder... 
That’s the constant reminder that keeps slapping us.
We co-signed on Alex’s student loan too. Although it wasn’t that much only about $5000 it is a monthly reminder. I knew Alex would never pay it and in my eternal optimism I always thought maybe he’d get back to school so I kept paying. I hated writing a check especially when he was using so to help relieve my pain and discomfort I opened a separate bank account and had money direct deposited from my paycheck to that account and set up automatic withdrawal. Everything got painless that way. No more writing checks and no monthly reminder/torture. The good news Salle Mae sent me an account update notice last month and it is down to about $250.
I can understand your pain. I won’t get into about $100,000 worth of hospital, emergency and doctor bills. I DID NOT co-sign those. I advised Alex if they ever come after him just file bankruptcy.
I seriously believe that without experiencing it most people have no understanding of the cost of addiction to families and society.
That’s what should have happened….got on a payment plan and paid it off but my husband could not bring himself to pay a penny more towards J’s debt. I really don’t know what he was thinking? I am also VERY angry at my husband. How could he think this would not come back to bite us all in the ass?
I feel for all of you on this site. It seems the addiction is always our problem. Have 2 addicted children; have bought car after car, paid school loans, kept them out of jail, paid for rehab, and I also am angry. You do everything with optimism and out of love for your kids, but the thing that gets me most is that they seem to have no love or respect for either of us. I am learning to say no, but its so hard when you see they don’t have groceries. But I guess when it comes down to it, they’ll buy instead of eat.
You just reminded me that our forbearance must be up as well. I’m gonna pay 15,000 back for a semester in Tampa where he laid in bed high the entire time. Do not have a picture of the dorm or a name of a roommate. I called and emailed that school more times than you can count saying something is wrong. They said he was not a minor and therefore could not discuss anything. However, we can certainly be responsible for the tuition. How is this possible? In any case, perhaps you can make arrangements and work this into your daughters loan. I hate reminders of the addiction. I really do. It rears its ugly head at every corner and puts that knot back into your stomach….
That’s exactly the feeling, That dreaded knot, hard to swallow thing.
Good advice as usual from Ron. I can understand your frustration. Thankfully, I never co-signed anything with my daughter but my ex did and he got stuck with a bunch of broken apartment leases, cell phone contracts, etc. I bought her a car and she paid me back a $100.00/month for it. This lasted about 3 months (every payment was late). I finally told her to get a loan from her credit union (her credit was still ok at that time). She got $3,000.00. I paid $10,000 for the car. I did not care, at least I recovered some of my money. Well, a few months later the bank came and repossessed the car because she did not pay the loan back. Go figure…. I am sure the bank got its money back on that deal. I lost $7,000.00. We all learn the hard way. I trusted her then to tell me that she was clean and would never do drugs while she told me if she WERE doing drugs, the dark tinted windows in that car would sure come in handy!
I hear you. We have not co-signed loans, but we have paid many many bills for her. We have used all of our money so there is minimal if nothing, left for the others. So I work constantly to fund my last two kids expenditures….like college and books. I have also been thinking about detachment….is it my form of denial? My form of sticking my head in the sand? If I don’t have to deal with her addiction, then my life is ok. But there is always that shadow hanging out int he background.
I don’t know. I found it hard to get a few dollars out of my parents to go to the dance on Friday nights. And we are shelling out 1,000’s to our addicts just to give them a lift and a smile and a half way out only to kill our own retirements. We need to stop the madness. I have been asked to cosign more times than I can count. ‘I will get an apartment if I just have a reliable car’. It’s tempting to get him out….but my future credit is very important. Of course, I’m all talk. A day before we left on a much anticipated vacation we shelled out over 2000 to pay his car insurance in full so it wouldn’t cancel for past policy history. I just wanted to insure he would be driving so he would be out of this house 6 days a week for his job. Thankfully at least he is doing that and my piece of mind that he is not sitting down in his room using all day (albeit could be at work) is worth it. We have to fight the devil every two weeks for the payment of course…but I digress
So I am not the only one. No school loans but hospital, rehabs, tickets, warrants, Attorneys, an expensive truck WE BOUGHT HIM that is now gone, on and on. Yes it sure is the gift that keeps giving. We drained every account, IRA, 401k EVERYTHING we had is gone. My perfect credit is now gone as well. It will take at least another year to even be at the point where perhaps we could start saving again and that right now is doubtful. My Mom also owes a ridiculous amount of money and barely makes it every month.This is a sore spot with me.
So now although I am still “supporting” him, I can’t buy him a car, I can’t co-sign for anything either. I learned my lesson, hopefully and if I didn’t it wouldn’t matter because I couldn’t get a loan for a Hot Dog Cart right now. He asked if I would help him get a car and I told him when he had money to let me know and if I had the cash I would. The good news is I can’t go any further in debt so I don’t have to think about it.
My Husband looks at it differently. He said we were the Parents who choose not to have a College fund ready for him so if he went to College we would be trying to figure out how to pay for that and it would have cost us way more money so we need to let it go. And had we save money for his education we could have used that to help him vs. all of our savings. Part of me thinks he is right but the bottom line is I would have much rather gone borke for his education than his addiction. Yep, the gift that keeps giving.
I always play that replacing game in my head. For example, I pay 500 a month for my car that he uses very day to go to work. That’s 6,000 a year for a car that I barely drive HOWEVER I justify it with ‘well one month of rehab would cost _______so letting him use a car costing 500 a month keeps him working and somewhat clean and payin his fines meeting his PO and hopefully keeping clean enough for his testing etc. UGH the justifications are nonsense aren’t they? But we are all guilty at one time or another 😉
I am sorry to hear about your financial predicament. I am sure that you know first and foremost that your son get healthy. I got clean and sober with the help of a sober living. After getting clean, all of the other areas of my life seemed to fall into place. Best of luck for you and your family.
I see a bit of ranting here. So good too, I ranted for like years. However, I should venture carefully into this new pool of people with a somewhat different perspective. Please, be kind as I am a bit wounded of late. Thanks in advance. Well, money, hummm…, I was a bit more careful early on and refused the credit signing. The kid just never proved to me that he was responsible. However, many others succumbed to his power of persuasion. I did shell out a couple thousand when he called me from jail and needed to keep his job. Oh well. A whole lot less than the cost of raising the kid. I would so pay that over and over and over again if given the chance to undo the harm that a fateful trip to a doctor for a toe infection did. Hindsight, unforeseen, unfortunate, fate. However, I did spend 15K on his funeral, 10 K on his granite monument, and a whole lot trying to get his possessions back from the authorities; he died as a result of illicit drugs and they had to impound his things and make me jump hoops to get back his personal writings. So, if I may interject, if I had to do it again I would do this: stay really close to everyone he knew. Invite them over, show up here and there, be ever so kind and exceptting. Why? Well, these are the confidantes, the ones who care and will care to say what is going on. I know this means a bit of mud, a bit of low-brow circles. However, how much would you be willing to do that really matters? I would suggest to stay close, really close, even if that means hanging out in skanky places. Also, by doing this you may be showing your son/daughter how much you really, truly love him/her. One of the big things addicts miss is love. I am not saying that you are not giving it, however, I will say that they do not believe they deserve or receive it. So, I will boldly inflict myself on this wonderful group. (I so wish I knew you all about 4 years ago! )But, anonyimouty will allow me this: don’t worry about the bucks. What would you spend if he/she had brain cancer? Heroin is a lot like brain cancer, deadly. You would pay 20 fold to get your child back once gone. instead I would suggest to invest the value really sought by your child: listen, love, laugh, offer, consider, and hug. Then, once you got them loving you again, throw their butt into a long rehab program and sell your house to do it.