It can take a long time to pull yourself back together after the sudden loss of a loved one. You might feel a mix of heartbroken, angry, devastated, numb, hopeless, and terrified. Meanwhile, the most basic tasks feel arduous, and you can’t imagine a day when grief won’t consume you.
Yet somehow, after one woman’s husband passed away, her biggest concerns seemed to be his life insurance policy and who would get his house. Below, you’ll find a story that the woman’s stepdaughter shared on Reddit detailing just how entitled this woman became during what should have been the most upsetting time of her life.
The sudden loss of a loved one can put your entire life on hold
Image credits: Pablo Merchán Montes / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
But after this woman's father passed away, her stepmom was immediately interested in his house and money
Image credits: Stephen Andrews / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
Image credits: yanalya / freepik (not the actual photo)
Image credits: benzoix / freepik (not the actual photo)
Image credits: Adventurous_Owl9823
One of the biggest issues that families fight over is money
While we all know of the cliche of wicked stepparents ruining children’s lives, that’s not typically the case in reality. In fact, the Pew Research Center reports that 42% of adults in the U.S. have at least one step relative, and plenty of these families are perfectly functional and happy. 56% of adults with stepparents even say that they feel very obligated to help take care of them.
But unfortunately, there will always be some families that aren’t picture perfect. And one of the biggest topics that causes rifts within families is money. Whether it’s siblings fighting over what they’ll inherit from dad or a stepparent and stepchild duking it out to see who gets the house, plenty of families are familiar with conflicts about finances.
This particular situation, however, has to do with life insurance benefits. According to Western & Southern Financial Group, it’s up to the person who has the life insurance policy to decide whether the benefits will go to one beneficiary, multiple beneficiaries, into a trust, to a charitable organization, or to an estate.
There are also several payout options that beneficiaries can choose from: a single payment, installments, or a retained asset account. But most benefits are paid out quickly to ensure that the beneficiary has one less thing to worry about while grieving the loss of their loved one.
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It's not easy to contest decisions made while a life insurance policyholder was still alive
However, the process can be stalled when someone decides to contest the beneficiary designation. Keystone Law Group notes that the parties who initiate a life insurance beneficiary dispute are typically the surviving spouse, adult children of the policyholder, a contingent beneficiary on the policy, the executor of the policyholder’s estate, and/or estate beneficiaries or heirs.
Now, in most cases, it won’t be easy to contest the decision that a life insurance policyholder made. After all, it’s really up to them to decide where they want their money to go. But Keystone Law Group says there are a few situations where contesting the beneficiary may be valid. For example, if the policyholder had been under duress while designating or changing beneficiaries, the documents may be invalid.
Their decision can also be contested if it was improperly executed, if someone deliberately misled them or committed fraud, if they lacked the capacity to be making decisions of this nature, if they made a mistake, or if their documents were forged by someone else.
But it’s not valid for a woman to dispute her husband’s life insurance policy decisions just because she’s unhappy with what she received (or didn't receive). While it’s unfortunate that the woman in this story has medical bills that she needs to pay, she must respect the wishes of her late husband.
We would love to hear your thoughts on this situation in the comments below, pandas. How would you have handled this family drama if you were in the author’s shoes? Then, if you’re interested in checking out another article from Bored Panda discussing life insurance policy drama, look no further than right here.
Readers called out the stepmother for her awful behavior, and the author joined in on the conversation to share more details
