When my parents divorced, my father continued paying child support—but when my grandfather died without a will, my father claimed the entire inheritance for himself. As the only child, he said it was his right, leaving me, my sister, and our cousins with nothing. While he upgraded his lifestyle with new properties and vacations, my mother worked two jobs just to survive.
Years later, during college, I learned what abandonment really looked like. When my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer, I asked my father for temporary help with medical bills. He refused. That moment cemented the truth: I was on my own. I finished school, struggled through financial hardship, and built a modest career—without him.
Then everything changed. After my father passed away, we discovered he had left his entire estate to me and my sister. Instead of seeing it as forgiveness, we saw it as restorative justice. I used the inheritance to create Rightful, a nonprofit focused on financial literacy, inheritance law, estate disputes, and legal rights for children from single-parent families. Helping others reclaim what was unfairly taken turned years of pain into purpose—and redefined what family and justice truly mean.
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