How long will the threats and accusations continue?
I was a caregiver first for my dad, who died in Jan.13,2011 due to Pulmonary Fibrosis. I then cared for my mom who had multiple co-morbidities associated with a 20 year history of Rheumatoid Arthritis. Medications basically destroyed her body. She got sick with Flu like symptoms and died a week later, in March 11, 2012. She died emotionally the day my dad died and did not want to live.
I am an RN, and quit my job in the Emergency Room to care for my parents. (We had 3 sons in college at the time.)This way they could be at home with each other. Hospice helped with dad, but I was the caregiver, and managed both their lives while still encouraging their independence, and preserving their pride. I had siblings but they focused more on their inheritance than the responsibility that I had. I was the only daughter and the youngest. My parents moved 250 miles and relocated in the town we lived in, 6 months after we moved from them. They wanted me to care for them.
My biggest regret is that on Dec.31, 2010, my 50th birthday, I chose not to go over to see my dad that evening because I knew it would be my last birthday with him in my life.It was just too hard for me.He was in a state of transition from this world to another but he had a goal to live until his 80th birthday..Jan.11,2013. The next day, the nurse who spent that night with my dad, said he sang Happy Birthday to me. I cried then and still cry now.I should have gone over there.
Now, I am still defending myself from my brothers who have made false accusations about my intentions. They are on their third lawyer and third executor.
I was Executor but they didn't believe anyone so I resigned the position. In a way, I regret that I agreed to take on the responsibility, but my parents asked me to and my dad had everything set up for me, including contact names and numbers for events that would occur. I even helped him plan his funeral. I never expected my siblings to behave in this way. There were no thank yous, just criticism.
So, I too live with regrets, but I know to focus on the positives and everything I did for my parents. I loved them very much and we got along wonderfully til the very end.
Do you think they are holding it against you that you did not go over that last night, or let them know, or some other thing they only found out after the fact? Could someone else who had something against you have successfully stirred up something between you, tellign them "I hate to tell you this but your sister...." ? Or, maybe THEY are just covering up the regrets and guilt they have that ught to be much, much deeper than yours!!
Maybe you need a second legal opinion or maybe a public prosecutor would help you. Maybe, maybe - there is a medical person who would go over the records with them and be able to explain that everything that should have been done was done. I was once able to do that for a sister of a patient who died with Leigh syndrome, who apparently honestly thought something must have been neglected. Hopefully you are not on the hook for the taxes, and if you are not, paying them anyways might or might not even stop this vindictiveness aimed at you! So sorry that ongoing strife has to compound your grief, and you are in my prayers.
You have to stop feeling guilty about not visiting your dad's on your birthday. You did the best you could. You have to look at all that you did and not the one time you didn't do what you thought you should do. Give yourself a break! You were obviously there for your mom and dad and they knew it, which is why they wanted to move near you. Your brothers sound like bullies who have ganged up on their sister because they didn't get what they wanted from their parents' estate. I'm sorry you have to go through this!
Equitable Remedies
Judges can use an equitable remedy to require the losing side to pay attorneys' fees if they believe it would be unfair not to do so. (In law, equity generally means "fairness," and an equitable remedy is a fair solution that a judge develops because doing otherwise would lead to unfairness.) This type of equitable remedy -- granting attorneys' fees to the winning side -- is often used when the losing side brought a lawsuit that was frivolous, in bad faith, or to oppress the defendant, and the defendant wins.
In addition, once in a while a judge will grant attorneys' fees in cases of extreme attorney misconduct, to warn the offending attorney.