My sister was the caregiver for my aging dementia mother.my mother passed. My sister had an attorney help her thru the process. All siblings was not made aware of my mother's debilitating state nor were all made aware of the estate change until after my mother past. my attempt to have my mother and father's will read was told to me by probate representative to be fruitless due to the fact my sister had my mother's estate changed before my mother past even though my mother was in the her last stage of dementia which was not known by the rest ot the siblings because my sister did not share this information with all of the remaining siblings. at this point life insurance plicies, property ,and my mother's bank accounts and personal property has and is in the sole possession of the one sister which was the caregiver. pretty much an hostile takeover on her part when i know my parents worked hard to leave an inheritance for all their children and children's children. both my parents were very organized people and would have never meant for one child out of 10 to inherit what they worked so hard for. greed was not a characteristic of my familyalthough sharing definitely was. prominient people in the community
Talk to an attorney and see what can be done. What your family is experiencing happens allll the time.
Unless you and your other brothers and sisters were there relieving the caregiving sister on a regular basis, you should be happy for her to have whatever there is left over. Perhaps if you guys ask her for a memento, she would be willing.
I am sorry for your loss. It is difficult to lose a father, but even more so to lose your mother. She must have been some woman to have raised 10 children. Please don't make their memory be all about the money.
This is just my personal opinion and like Maggie says, there would have to be lots of proof (hard to prove after death, though) and there would be lots of hard feelings. Not worth it in my opinion.
How on earth can a family that has 10 siblings, where 9 siblings had no idea of their mother's condition, but were fully aware of Mom's life insurance, property, bank accounts, etc. That says volumes.
"my mother was in the her last stage of dementia which was not known by the rest ot the siblings because my sister did not share this information with all of the remaining siblings" - I just have to wonder where all of you were when your mother was going through the earlier stages of dementia.
Perhaps your sister was too busy and overwhelmed caring for your mother to provide regular updates.
"both my parents were very organized people and would have never meant for one child out of 10 to inherit what they worked so hard for"
Maybe they decided to leave it all to the one sister who helped them.
Seriously, where were the rest of you during all this time? Did any of you even help out your sister?
Did your sister taking care of your parents free you from having to worry about them? If it did, perhaps you could see it in the same light. A family caregiver serves the entire family in letting the non-caregiving siblings continue with their own lives.
We don't know how close to death your mother was when she signed the will, but the attorney must have felt that your mother was acting on her own wishes. If you choose to challenge the changes, you will need to get documentation that she was not competent.
Another thing that may surprise you is that there probably isn't as much inheritance as anticipated. I remember my brother used to tell me my mother and father had some millions. He thought they did. The truth was that they had enough to live out the remainder of their lives if everything goes okay. There won't be a whole lot left over. I imagine this is the situation when it comes to many families these days. Elder care is horribly expensive.
If you hadn't been close enough to your parents to know that Mom had dementia, how can you be sure that "they never meant for one child out of 10 to inherit what they worked so hard for"? Things may have changed substantially while you weren't paying attention.
You caregiver sister might be a greedy monster. She may have coerced your parents into rewarding her with their estate. If so, I am very sorry for the nine of you. We are all just reacting to the information you provided, and as caregivers ourselves, many of us totally abandoned by our siblings, we are seeing this through a different perspective than you do.
It might help if you can explain how your sister kept you from knowing your mother's condition. Were you all on different continents?
"sister had my mother's estate changed before my mother past....... which was not known by the rest ot the siblings".
I also, however, wonder how may years sister gave up to take care of her mother, and how much compensation the rest of the family feels she deserves for that.
When you say "greed was not a characteristic of my familyalthough sharing definitely was" I wonder why not sharing the money is greedy, when you were apparently not sharing the caregiving but that is apparently OK?
You all said it very well and I appreciate it. To borrow a phrase from Jessiebell, a well-thought out, carefully-worded post serves us all who would like to be able to say the same things.
It would be very nice for you if you could work out an arrangement with your stepdaughter (his daughter?) and she could help with her father's care. Maybe then she could see the need for rules.
Not everyone in a family can see things the same way.