My mom’s now threatening me with “legal guardianship”.
I’m absolutely NOT letting that happen. What the hell can I do here?
Update: This isn’t magicing away the massive existential threat towards my own civil rights, but I still want to hug each and every one of you.
The wording is extremely important here. Is she talking about a court ordered conservatorship, or specifically guardianship? Did she use the term Power of Attorney? Without doxxing yourself, you will need to research what these things look like in your jurisdiction and if there is a distinction between these concepts.
If you lived in my neck of the woods, Legal Guardianship is distinct from conservatorship and would mean she specifically wants you to be unable to make your own healthcare decisions. Given the fact that you’re currently in the process of exploring and navigating your gender identity, I assume her attempt is to permanently make it legally impossible for you to get access to gender-affirming care. My mother spent a significant chunk of my teenage years doctor-shopping to find someone that would give me an autism diagnosis (I am not on the autism spectrum) so she could get both conservatorship and guardianship to prevent me from accessing healthcare related to my intersex condition. Nobody played ball with her, but tbh it’s kinda
that not one of the dozen or so mandatory abuse reporters mandatorily reported the very visible abuse.
If your mother is any level of serious about this higher than “person who has never once followed through on anything in their life just sayin’ shit while severely intoxicated”, you need to retain a lawyer immediately. If she’s actively considering doing this for real and is telling you about it, you should hire a lawyer before the end of this week. Hiring a lawyer, even pro bono, and informing them of the situation while lucid can functionally bar your mother from gaining PoA and establish that your judgement is not impaired. Failure to take immediate action can be and has been legally considered a justification for conservatorship, as they can claim you lack the executive function to try to resolve the issue through the courts.
A good rule of thumb for now is to not sign anything for anyone without having that lawyer you need to hire verify what the document says and does. Don’t even sign a supposedly unrelated document for someone trusted, even if you believe your mother is not involved. People get really sneaky about this shit and even trusted allies can be swayed by a lie about the state of your mental health.
The issue is: I am autistic. So she already has grounds right there!
Except how the hell am I supposed to get a lawyer? I have no job! And I can’t drive!
But yes she is absolutely hellbent on this. Not for be being trans (although she probably knows that now), but because I refuse to participate in her dragging me through the beuracratic hellscape in the US involving disability things.
I don’t want to waste more of my short life on this earth waiting. I want my shitty mundane job, and I want my shitty mundane shitbox car! And I want to be a mom!
She’s claiming I’m more disabled then I actually am.
She’s pissed that I’m “”““lying””“” on these psychological evaluation things.
She wants me to lie towards judges and social workers.
If you already have a documented diagnosis of Autism and live in the US, you absolutely need to start contacting local law offices as soon as they open in the morning. Call your local disability advocacy organization (might only be state level if you’re deeply rural in a red state) and/or United Way to get in touch with someone that can help you identify a law office that will help you with this.
You have a very tiny window of opportunity to execute on this and make your desires and intentions clear before you legally lose your autonomy in a way that cannot be rectified. It took Britney Spears’ unbelievably skilled and highly paid lawyers 13 grueling years of uphill work to get the conservatorship held by her father ended, and she only got out by paying $30 million for her father’s legal fees.
The system is powerless to do anything but harm. God, I can’t fucking get the disability system to take my Myalgic Encephalitis or Fibromyalgia seriously. I can straight up explain everything in my life to a judge and they’ll just go “lol those verified symptoms are awful, but this disease sounds fake to me. Lemme go ahead and practice medicine without a license (felony) real quick and just deny ya!”
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I can potentially help if we live in the same state. For the sake of not doxxing yourself just DM me what region you live in.
Also, what others have said about lawyering up is pretty sound advice.
This depends a lot on your location and age, which might be unwise to share here. I’d start with searching “minor emancipation + [region]”
I’m finding it tough to think of more ideas without more details, unfortunately, but maybe other folks will have some general ideas to share
I’m in my 20s so as of right now I’m a full adult.
Ah okay, I just read your other comments. If you’re in the US, you can DM me the state you live in and I can try to find you a cool therapist who’s willing to back you up for free or low cost. If you’re in Florida, I’ll do it
Call around and ask as many lawyers as possible for a free consult. Maybe ask for an ADA accommodation to do it over the phone. Every lawyer that says yes is a lawyer your mom can’t use
If you think shes serious about this, you should look up free legal aid for your area. Specifically the term legal aid. There is a federally funded civil legal aid org covering every geographic area. They may or may not be able to actually represent you, but they can likely at least give you appropriate advice for your jurisdiction. There is a pretty high bar to establishing the legal basis for guardianship in most places, and if you are capable of handling your day to day affairs on your own and are not a danger to yourself or others, she’s likely going to have an uphill battle on her hands. Many places also have a guardian ad litem system where basically the court appoints someone to represent you in the proceedings if she actually files a case. Not saying you have nothing to worry about, but your mom may well not know shit about any of this.
There is a pretty high bar to establishing the legal basis for guardianship in most places, and if you are capable of handling your day to day affairs on your own and are not a danger to yourself or others
That’s… Slightly reassuring? I guess?
what
It’s a legal mechanism for disabled adults. She’s going to abuse this to place me FIRMER into this abusive relationship and use the state to enforce it.
Hey, just checking in to make sure this is being followed up on.
Were you able to get in touch with anyone that can help?
I think so yeah.
Best I could do is smuggle you out, to either a somewhat forgiving yet new and unfamiliar urban environment with job opportunities, or a rural environment where you’d go totally off the radar (also even more unfamiliar, possibly culture-shock level). And either of these would require multiple months of planning and preparation. Take other people’s guidance toward legal representation first.
