Dear Prudence,
My mother and I are not rich, but we make enough to put food on the table and a roof over our heads. My mom’s co-worker, “Deb,” has been struggling since her car died, so my mom offered to take her two daughters on a shopping trip at the local thrift store. My mom has a full-time job but makes minimum wage, and she couldn’t afford more than that. It’s perfectly nice stuff but pretty cheap—it’s where we buy all our clothes. I drove us there. The older girl didn’t say hello and never looked up from her phone. The younger one was excited and grateful. When we arrived, the older girl yelped in disappointment because she “thought we were going to the mall.” She never stopped sneering and commented loudly about how tacky and awful everything was. My mother was almost in tears. She’d told them she could spend $50 on each of them. The older girl grabbed a leather jacket that cost $40 and refused to put anything else back. My mother started to apologize to the little brat. I grabbed the clothes out of her hands and told her to go to the car. She started to protest. I told her to shut her mouth or I would shut it for her. We drove back in silence.
As soon as we pulled up, the older girl started “crying.” I told my mother to wait in the car. Deb started to defend her daughter and how “dare” I treat her baby that way. I told Deb her daughter was an ungrateful brat and her parenting was a disgrace. She took advantage of my mother’s good heart, and she’d better make herself right with the Lord. The younger girl piped up that her sister had been “very mean.” I told Deb to never ask my mother for a favor again. Later, my mother scolded me and told me I shouldn’t have acted like that. She was only a “little girl.” I replied that if I’d acted like that at 4, I wouldn’t have been able to sit down for a day. This girl was 14. Deb isn’t talking to her. My mother is in her 60s and has too good a heart. She will drain herself dry for a stranger and then apologize for not having more. I am frustrated. My mother has been taken advantage of in the past, and that is why she lives with me. My own sons never would dare act like this girl. I don’t know what else I could have done.
—End of My Rope