Originally published in Spotlight Magazine, Community Scam Alerts, October 2026
When I first learned that my dad had sent money to someone he'd never met in person, I was terrified. Fear, worry, and anger blended into one certainty: I had to protect him. As he talked, I recognized something chilling: he was defending the scammers just as I had once defended people who'd deeply wounded me, justifying them the way you defend someone you love. I knew that shape from the inside, and it scared me more than the loss of his money.
I spent a week trying to make him see it. I laid out the timeline, the inconsistencies, the obvious tells; beneath all of it, I was terrified he'd keep answering their calls and handing over money he'd never see again. By that weekend, Dad was looking into the resources I gave him, recognizing his own story in an AARP article.
About six months later, it happened again. This time, before the shock even landed, I knew I couldn't turn it into anger at him. My mom was furious, briefly, but she reined it in fast, and within minutes was steady and supportive in a way neither of us knew she had in her.
Here's what I've come to understand, through all my research and experience: the anger is real, and it's justified; it simply has nowhere useful to go. The people behind these scams are hidden, untraceable, like a ghost, a voice and a number that stop existing the moment the money is gone. So the anger seeks the nearest target: the person you love, sitting across the table from you, visibly and undeniably damaged. We don't aim at him because we think he's the problem; we aim at him because he's the only one we can reach.
I've realized there's a second, quieter reason it happens, too: it's devastating to watch someone you've always known as strong turn out to be this fragile. People who are already vulnerable, because of loneliness, loss, or some other pre-existing situation, are especially susceptible to this kind of scam. There's an intimacy the scammer manufactures, and its betrayal does more damage than the loss of money. And we on the outside would rather be angry at him than sit with how shattered he actually is; anger feels like doing something, while grief feels like drowning.
Marti DeLiema, a gerontologist who studies scam victims, teaches families to treat the conversation as collaboration rather than confrontation. Open questions, she told journalist Bob Sullivan, “really helps protect the person’s feelings from feeling like they’re being attacked or questioned,” so that “you’re really working together.” The fight is never with our loved ones, who were victimized.
None of this makes the fear go away, and because these scams are so rarely caught or prosecuted, I think it may always feel like fighting a ghost.
But you don't have to win the fight with the ghost to help and protect the person across the table from you. The next time your anger and frustration demand an answer to "How could you fall for this?" try asking instead, "How can I help you get through this?"
There's a growing number of support groups for survivors of fraud and their families to process and recover from this specific type of abuse. Give An Hour, a nonprofit serving people impacted by trauma, offers no-cost, confidential mental health support, in one-on-one sessions and online groups.
If any of this sounds familiar, whether it happened to you or to someone you love, you can write to me privately at ScamAlerts@VesperaPress.com.
If you suspect that you or someone you know has been scammed, please contact your local police department's non-emergency line to file a report immediately.
For more information and resources about scams, visit Operation Shamrock or AARP's Fraud Watch Network™.
