“He overdrew his bank account again,” Lori, my dad’s former business associate, told me on March 3, 2020.
“Thanks,” I replied, grateful for her help. Their business had closed years earlier, but she and my dad had kept their old email addresses—and remained close friends. Lori still had access to Dad’s inbox, so she could see the alerts about his overdrawn accounts.
I hung up the phone and stepped away from the stove, where I was making a breakfast of scrambled eggs for my 76-year-old dad, Vlad, and his 52-year-old girlfriend, Iryna.
About a year earlier, I had moved back into my childhood home in Queens, planning to stay just long enough to figure out why my dad, who I call Pa, was forgetting things. Eventually, a neurologist diagnosed him with dementia. Because of his growing confusion about money and his frequent trips to the bank, I was too worried to move out. Especially because I had begun to realize the source of his financial distress: Iryna.
I ran upstairs and knocked on Pa’s bedroom door, telling him he should go to the bank after breakfast to sort things out. Then I hurried downstairs to the living room, where Iryna slept whenever she came over. She was getting up from the couch.
“He took out $1,800 yesterday and overdrew his account,” I told her. “He can’t fork over that kind of cash.”
“It’s between him and me,” she replied.
“Not when he has dementia,” I said. “Stop taking advantage of him.”
“I’ve been with him for years, and I have nothing to show for it!” she cried.
