The Good Samaritan's Nightmare
November 25, 2007 at 9:52 On a recent post, Tj, a commenter, left a list of new traditions to try for Thanksgiving. Most of them involved some sort of community service or reaching out to individuals and bringing them into your home.
Many of those suggestions are activities I’ve embraced in years past. I’ve attended community church services, visited nursing homes, prepared and served meals at a homeless shelter, taken in an abused woman, been a Meals on Wheels volunteer, participated in countless holiday “sponsor a family” programs, made stuff for charity bazaars, bought stuff at charity bazaars, worked in a thrift shop, been a youth group leader, a Sunday school teacher, and done all sorts of other volunteer work for my church and my children’s school. It’s all been good.
But there was one time in our life where E and I’s outreach activities backfired and became a nightmare. We were the Good Samaritans Done Wrong.
It all started when E joined a commuter van pool that took him to work every day. On the van, he met S, a woman in her 30s or early 40s who had had a series of health setbacks and had decided she would no longer drive. S was a chemist and worked for E’s employer. She was also a bit of a self-centered weirdo, which is why most people in the van pool steered clear of her. E didn’t get the memo on S and her personality quirks and being an affable and compassionate man, befriended her.
In the beginning, it seemed OK. Everyday E would bring home stories of what S had been through medically and how she was all alone in the world. We felt sorry for her. We didn’t notice at first that despite living and working in one place for years, S had NO FRIENDS, NO FAMILY, NO ONE who was involved in her life on any level. Y’all, there was a reason for that. We should have gotten a clue at this point.
It wasn’t long before S, who owned a car and had a driver’s license, started asking for rides places. E took her grocery shopping, took her to doctor’s appointments, took her cats to the vet, took her to the bank, etc.
And S never thanked him, never offered money for gas, never offered use of her car, never offered to pay the $3 bridge toll, never did anything to make helping her easier or more pleasant. S just came to see E as her private chauffer.
I occasionally helped S out, but I confess she rapidly got on my nerves. Her “helplessness” was ridiculous. If she didn’t want to drive, she needed to move to a place where she wouldn’t have to. Instead she lived in a rural area that was an hour’s drive from work, 25 minutes from a grocery store. To further complicate matters, S wanted to keep using the doctors, vet, and service providers that she’d used years ago when she lived in another town about 45 minutes away. This would be fine if she was driving herself places, but she refused to either drive there or move her services closer.
I was the first to play hard ball with her, telling her I’d happily take her and her cats to the vet only if she used a local vet (there were several to choose from). She was upset I even suggested it, and couldn't understand why I wouldn't want to spend 90 minutes driving her to and from a vet appointment.
E, tired of receiving constant calls to take S to the post office to pick up her mail, bought her a mailbox and installed it on a wooden post at the end of S’s driveway so she could begin receiving her mail at home. S came out of her house and criticized E’s work and said she wasn’t going to stop getting mail at the post office. We did, however, stop taking her there to pick it up.
The van pool broke up, in part because the driver got tired of dealing with S, who insisted on lying down and taking up an entire bench seat on her way to work, forcing the other van pool members to cram in close together on the other seats. She also annoyed people in conversation and created a lot of unpleasantness and friction.
When the van pool broke up, S was left without a ride to work, and you guessed it, E began driving her, picking her up at her house and dropping her off daily. While she had paid to ride in the van pool, she refused to help E with gas or tolls because E “had to drive to work anyway.” She also got in the habit of asking to stop at a pizza place on the way home. This meant E had to wait around 30 minutes after work with S while the pizza was prepared and boxed for takeout. When E suggested she call ahead from work so the pizza would be ready for pickup in advance she said, “That would be a long distance phone call! Do you have any idea how much that would cost?!”
E signed up to play soccer in an adult league and told S he would not be able to drive her home on practice days because he’d be going straight to soccer from work. S was indignant! She said, “I can’t believe you’d put playing soccer ahead of taking me home!”
Then, not surprisingly, S was fired from her job as a chemist. Actually, she was given “medical disability,” which I’m guessing was the safest legal way to get her off the payroll for being obnoxious and a little crazy.
However, as irritating S had been up until this point was nothing compared to how unreasonable and demanding S would become when she was home all the time. She started calling the house regularly, and I began trying to extricate us from a relationship with her. She’d ask for a ride and I’d grill her on why she needed it and lecture her repeatedly about finding a long term solution to her transportation issue. She either needed to get behind the wheel of her car again or move to a place with public transit. Period. S would have none of that, and I wouldn’t drive her.
E, who had far more patience, still gave her rides sometimes. Once she called in the midst of a major winter storm, when we had 10 inches of snow on the ground and more falling. She “desperately” needed milk, and E went out onto snow covered roads to get it for her. I was furious with him because the roads were dangerous.
Now that she was on disability, she had a reduced income, but she didn’t change the way she lived. She was single, didn't have kids, and lived in a three-bedroom house in a private suburban development that collected homeowner’s dues. She couldn’t afford it, but she wouldn’t move to a townhouse or apartment. She loved to catalog shop and would have all sorts of things delivered to her door. She racked up a lot of credit card debt. Keep in mind that S on medical disability was still collecting more money monthly for not working as a chemist than I was earning working full time in publishing. Yes, her disability pay exceeded my salary. She wasn’t getting a lot but she was getting enough to support herself if she made adjustments.
But S didn’t want to support herself and she was not a woman who made adjustments. With E and I trying to get disentangled from her, she began making the rounds with local church groups, telling them her sad stories and looking for food, monetary handouts, rides. She received all sorts of things from the local food pantry and from area churches. But S being S, she began complaining about the quality of the free food she was receiving and criticizing the people who were providing it. We invited her over for Christmas dinner one year and she spent the afternoon critiquing my cooking and telling me I should have put chestnuts in the stuffing. Soon she’d worn out her welcome with many of the generous souls who had helped her.
One day S called me at home to tell me she didn’t have anything to eat. I started asking her questions: Do you have flour? Butter? Eggs? Rice? Milk? Bread? She had all these things. The problem was she didn’t have her favorite cereal, Fruitful Bran, and that was what she wanted. She told me she didn’t have any cereal at all and she had no money. I looked in my pantry and I had a box of Raisin Bran and one of Kellog’s Fruit and Fiber, unopened. I told her I wasn’t going to take her to the store and buy her cereal, but that I’d give her either of the new boxes of cereal I had in my pantry.
You guessed, she said “No.” She wanted what she wanted and would accept no substitutes. She hung up with me and called the guy who used to drive the van pool, looking for a ride and for someone to buy her cereal. He also told her no. She then started calling grocery stores telling them she didn’t have anything to eat and would they donate a box of Fruitful Bran to her? They all said no, except for one little Mom & Pop store in the area, which I knew was having hard times itself. S called looking for a ride to pick up her free food and I refused to take her on principle. No problem, she got back on the phone, working her contact list, looking for someone who would indulge her.
Eventually, her phone was disconnected because she didn’t pay her bills. Initially I was relieved because she could no longer call us at all hours of the day and night, but then she started appearing at my door in person. This was even worse. I could always hang up the phone, but I couldn’t get rid of her as easily in person. Finally, I stopped answering the door if I didn’t want to deal with her, and when I did that, she began tapping on my windows, peering into the house, and calling to me if she suspected I was at home. She’d come around the back of my house, go into my fenced yard, and try the French door. I’d become someone who was hiding in my own house.
This had gotten beyond ridiculous. At one point I learned that someone in the neighborhood had gotten a restraining order against her, and I thought, "That's an option!" Five years had passed since we’d first met S. FIVE YEARS. Nothing about her or her situation had changed.
Things finally came to a head one weekend when I was hosting a family reunion at my house. I had at least 30 guests. S came to the front door and began ringing the bell. I told everyone in the house not to answer the door. Then she started on the windows, and finally she came around back and walked straight into my house through the unlocked French door.
I completely lost it. All my pent up frustration with her outrageous behavior and expectations made me lose my cool and shout, “You need to GET OUT of my house! This is my family reunion and you are NOT welcome here!”
I physically grabbed her by the shoulders, turned her around, opened the French door, and sent her out. She protested the whole way.
I was seven months pregnant and the outburst gave me the shakes. I had never, ever in my whole life confronted someone that way. I was upset and embarrassed and forced to explain to all my guests the long twisted history we shared with this woman, someone we had tried to be kind to who had completely abused the relationship.
As much guilt as that outburst put on my conscience, it was amazingly effective. S finally stopped coming to the house, calling us, or bothering E.
Sadly, our experience with S made us reluctant to become directly engaged in helping strangers. Since enduring the Good Samaritan’s Nightmare, we mostly work through our church or charitable organizations and don’t directly bring people into our home or our lives (though we have made exceptions).
Have any of you ever played Good Samaritan and regretted it?
November 25, 2007
Reader Comments (13)
Some people will try to abuse any support that is provided to them, lashing out in anger to the very people who supported them.
Although I'm also somewhat reluctant to become directly engaged in helping complete strangers, I've once been more of a "relational Good Samaritan". To be more precise I've supported a partner who in retrospect absolutely did not deserve my time, emotional dedication, money or energy.
At times, there's only a very thin line separating "offering support" and "being abused"
I guess that playing Good Samaritan while (in retrospect) being emotionally abused along the way must be the worst kind of "support experience" imaginable.
I've just posted a somewhat satirical dedication "To All the Gay Men I’ve Loved Before" - a special Christmas dedication to a really very nice man who treated me like an ATM: put in some worthless plastic and run off with the family jewels :-)
Fortunately, I finally learnt where to draw the line.
You never know when you may need a Good Samaritan. You reap what you sow.
Yes, wordgirl, there can be some risk involved. But, if you were in need, how would you feel if everyone first had to analyze you to see if you passed the test and were "OK" enough to be assisted. What a world this would be if we didn't have risktakers. furiousBall and wf have made statements worth considering.
Please, those of you who may consider some of my suggestions -- DO NOT be discouraged! If you are hesitant, please work with your local religiuous groups or community service agencies. Start slowly. If you get into a situation you can't handle, get the appropriate "helping" agency in your area involved.
Since I still live in the neighborhood that you and your family lived in, I am pretty certain that I know who you are talking about. My own husband helped this individual out with mowing her grass, reparing gutters, etc., because he felt sorry for her, but then fairly quickly he realized there would never be enough that he could do for her and that she was taking advantage of his generosity. Luckily, she didn't know where we lived or have our phone number. I am glad that once you put your foot down, she retreated.
I think all of us reach out to others and gladly do so, but some caution is always wise. That's why going through established programs like food banks, feed the homeless, Salvation Army, and such, can often be the safest route in charity giving. Even with those, their can be disappointments. Our family sponsored a family one year for Christmas. I heard the call for help for one last family on the radio and thought that we had so much, that helping them would be such a small thing to do. It was set up so that you delivered the food and presents to the family yourself rather than through a social worker. I drove up to two new vehicles, lots of toys, etc. I tried not to be judgmental, but the family was not welcoming at all. The husband was actually rude. That could well have been embarassment I suppose. It all left a bad taste in my mouth, so since then I've participated in the programs where coordination is done through a facilitator or just tried to help friends and well-known acquaintances who have specific needs, due to illness or other hard times. I also give all the time to our local Goodwill equivalent. Those methods have worked well.
Shirley
In sympathy of you (and as someone who has experienced something very similar, including having to call in the police) I can relate to how upsetting the situation must have become. It's scary when you realize someone you're dealing with is unstable and unpredictable - especially when your home is affected. THAT is the ONE place we all deserve to feel safe.
<< hugs >>
C.
I am crazily drawn to strays of all kinds...
I am SO laughing over here.
No, really. This lady sounds SO much like how BOTH of my parents behave. So. MUCH. It is totally crazy and draining. And embarrassing! My dad just has NO boundaries with people. he would totally just walk into your house like that! LOL *sad sigh*
I get what TJ is saying. It is a Christian attitude, for sure. But because of being a social worker for some time, (and having my parents), I am afraid I think there are far more people like this than we wish there were. People who just milk systems, churches, and people for all they can get. I would NEVER envite a homeless person into my home! Hell no. I would give them money, sure. Or help in some other way.
:)