PART 6 – I Opened My Laptop and Began Looking at Every Dollar I Had Sent to the People Who Called Me Their Holiday Parasite

I reached for my laptop.

It was sitting on the small table near the kitchen.

I had bought it because I needed something reliable for hospital paperwork and personal expenses.

I carried it to the bed and opened it.

The screen took a few seconds to brighten.

I entered my password.

Then I opened my banking records.

My first thought was that I needed to know exactly how much money I had given them.

Not what I remembered.

Not what I estimated.

The actual amount.

I opened my payment history.

The list was longer than I expected.

There were transfers to Mom.

Payments to David.

Money sent to Chloe.

There were also expenses I'd covered directly for family gatherings.

I began going through them one by one.

Christmas dinner.

Grocery purchases.

Gifts.

Travel expenses.

Bills.

I found the $400 transfer to David.

I remembered that one immediately.

The day before my birthday.

I found the $2,500 transfer to Mom.

That one made me stop for a moment.

I remembered the phone call.

I remembered her voice.

I remembered eating ramen afterward.

I continued.

There were smaller payments too.

Sometimes fifty dollars.

Sometimes a hundred.

Sometimes more.

They didn't seem like much when I sent them.

That was part of the problem.

A hundred dollars to help someone.

Two hundred dollars for something unexpected.

A few hundred to make Christmas easier.

Each payment had seemed manageable on its own.

Together, they told a different story.

I opened another page.

Then another.

I checked the payment records against my bank statements.

I didn't want to exaggerate.

I didn't want to count the same expense twice.

I wanted numbers I could stand behind.

The clock on my laptop showed that it was getting later.

I had been awake for hours.

My eyes were tired, but I kept working.

I opened a blank document.

At the top, I typed a simple heading.

Family Expenses.

Then I began organizing the records.

I added the payments I could verify.

I included dates.

Amounts.

Recipients.

Descriptions.

The more I entered, the more uncomfortable I became.

I remembered the occasions behind those transfers.

I remembered missing dinners with coworkers because I needed to save money.

I remembered postponing things I wanted to buy.

I remembered telling myself I would replace my worn-out shoes after the next paycheck.

Then another family request would arrive.

And I would put it off again.

I had always thought I was being responsible.

I hadn't realized how much of my financial life had been shaped around other people's demands.

I leaned back against the headboard.

My laptop was warm.

The room remained quiet.

I looked at the records.

More than sixty thousand dollars.

Over $60,000.

I read the total again.

It wasn't a small favor.

It wasn't one difficult Christmas.

It was years of money.

Years of overtime.

Years of saying yes.

And now I understood why my apartment still looked the way it did.

I had been helping people afford things I couldn't afford for myself.

The number didn't make me feel powerful.

It made me feel tired.

But it also gave me something I hadn't had when I first opened that group chat.

Proof.

Click here to continue reading: PART 7: Every Receipt Reminded Me of Something I Had Given Up While My Family Enjoyed the Life My Money Helped Provide