Reddit Stories - Lily was SWINDLED out of $75,000 by a phony PHYSICIAN, ATTEMPTED to market

Episode Date: January 24, 2026

#redditstories #askreddit #aita #scam #fraud #moneyloss #trustissues #healthcare Summary: Lily was swindled out of $75,000 by a fraudulent physician who attempted to market fake medical services. This devastating experience left her questioning her judgment and trust in others, highlighting the dangers of scams and the importance of thorough vetting before engaging with professionals in the healthcare industry.Tags: redditstories, askreddit, reddit, aita, tifu, scam, fraud, moneyloss, healthcare, deception, trustissues, financialloss, victimstory, personalfinance, legaladvice, consumerawareness, medicalscam, onlinefraud, safetyfirst, awarenessBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/reddit-stories--6816713/support.This episode includes AI-generated content.

I hope you enjoy this story. Lily was swindled out of $75,000 by a phony physician, attempted to market her residence valued at $550,000, and upon our confrontation she cast a spell on us and is convinced her online lover is real. Mother-in-law lives in Lausa developing country in Asia, I was born there too, but left when I was 10 months. Mill had fallen victim to romance scams in the past,

but only losing maybe 2 to 5K U.S.D. We knew she had in the past six months fallen for another romance scam, but didn't think it was serious. My wife has in the past four years completely renovated her mother's house, new backyard, new additions to the house, even left her still relatively new car for her mother. My wife also sends her mom about $700 U.S. dollars a month for expenses, the same amount she sends to her father, and he says it's more than enough. Mill is not cash-rich, but has access to properties. We would then hear things like how Mill is very frugal, lives like a destitute person.

Mill would constantly be asking my wife for advances in her allowance. Then we would hear from others that Mill told people that we had never sent her any money at all not even one dollar in an attempt to convince that person to lend her money. Then we start getting calls from village elders and family members that Mill is trying to pawn properties for loans, some successfully. She has no intentions of paying these loans, for the papers. we could get, they take the property after six months of backed payments. Mill thinks she will be living in the U.S. by the time the loans are due, and her great lover will pay off the loans. She's been able

to pawn things that aren't even in her name. She has pawned in the past month, jewelry 10K, 4-acre plot 12K, real value 50K, scooters, 1K, rental advance from a business property she owns 1-6th of 20k, my wife's car 3k, real value 15k. The roughly 50k she received from the loans, she's already given away to the scammers. She has also attempted to sell, but were stopped by officials, another four-acre plot 18K, real value 100K, her own house in the capital, right in the central business district 100K, real value 500K, her one-sixth plot for family business property 50k, real value 250k. My wife's family is not used to confrontations, I think it's actually a cultural thing. So despite everyone knowing what needs to be done, no one is leading. So I guess I am. In three weeks, we will be landing in Laos.

I will lead an intervention, around 10 people, victim impact statements, etc. I got my sister-in-law and mill ex-husband to talk to the officials to make sure the second farm plot, own house and family business cannot be sold, as the village officials have to sign off. on it. We will pay off the car loan, and then sell the car. We cannot get back the plot of land, without Mill helping, as she has the loan papers, and these loan people are shysters, so unless Mill is convinced she has been scammed, that plot is gone. If Mill comes to her senses, we will use the car money, and put in our money funds to buy back the land. We stopped sending Mill money money last month, we pay her utility bills directly, and pay sister-in-law to buy groceries to put in her

fridge. Issue with the house she's trying to sell is, two of her daughters, and quite often one or two grandkids also live here. Losing the house will not just affect the mill. If you've read this far, holy, thank you. I need help with this intervention, I've never even done one before and need some guidance. We plan on taking her smartphone and replacing with one of those brick Nokia's. I am expecting the intervention to last five to six hours. Also think of the first. Also think of not letting her leave the house even for days or weeks until she gets it. If she doesn't wake up and realize what's happening and pawns the house she lives in, we will not help. I will not put up 130K for this bats hit crazy lady and risk my own family's financial future,

so this intervention, as serious as it may get, has to work or we will be cutting mill completely from our life. I guess what I am asking is, for those who have successfully got then family members to realize they were scammed, what did it? How were you successful? How was the process like for someone this deep in? Edit, my wife just approached me with a solution that her sister looked into. I think we're going to check Mill into a mental health addiction clinic. A hospital referred us to them.

We have spoken with police who will take her to the clinic. Curious what people here think of this solution. Update 1, March 29, 2025. I never thought there'd be a part two, because I didn't think there were would be a point, but here goes. So the first few days we arrive in Laos, my mother-in-law has nowhere to be seen. On day three we get one of her friends to ask her to meet up casually. She says she can't, she's in another city for a funeral of her friend. We then figure she's hiding out in her country farmhouse an hour away. So now it's harder to get a lot of people in my

planned intervention. Still, six people pack a van. Her brothers, her daughter, her daughter, including my wife and me. We head out. We park and one of her daughters approaches the farmhouse. She calls out her mom, and her mom answers and tells us to go away. We surround the farmhouse and everything is locked. We keep telling her that we just want to talk, but we'll break down the doors if she doesn't unlock the doors. Mill refuses to answer. There are two doors inside, one is boarded up and impossible to get through, the other we use a crowbar to wedge open the door. We get through the lock, but this woman has also used coat hangers wrapped around the door knob attached to something to keep us out. So now we spend 10 minutes getting through that.

We go through the house, and she's locked in the bedroom. So now we start to crowbar this door. As we do so, she's screaming that we're coming to kill her, great. We get in, and she's an absolute mess, hair all over the place, just general unkempt. Her older brother tries to talk to her, really, really calm. Like good guy, being nice, calm. He gets a punch from her. She's also a heavy-set woman, probably hurt a little, even if she's elderly. So I sit down, and I totally think I got this. Right? I've seen some screenshots of her phone that people have managed to take and was able to piece the possible story. So I lay it out to her, common enough romance scam. Scammer sends her something, gets stuck at customs, she sends money, but it's still stuck. Then story escalates

to scammer coming to visit her, then is arrested and needs bail. Now it's her fault, and she needs to send money to bail him out. It's okay, though, when he's out, he will pay whatever cost she incurred, and they'll fly away to another country and live happily ever after. I spend three hours over logic and reason, like why can't this guy call him embassy if he's stuck? She doesn't say a word, but does look at me when I talk. Finally at hour five, as everyone is tired and giving up. I give her a hug, and she absolutely breaks. She starts crying, telling us she believes us. Everyone hugs each other, which does not happen in this country. People are crying.

I am like, yeah, I got this. She wants to spend another night at the farm, though. I get that, she's lost someone. This lover that no longer exists and who never loved her, needs to grieve. I ask for her phone, but she doesn't want to give it that night. She will give it tomorrow, but promises to not contact the scammers. Everyone leaves in good spirits. People seem happy and dinner is had.

Next day, mother-in-law returns. I see her for maybe five minutes, everyone seems good. I decide to go the route of starting on the family recover part, then a few days later go for the financial part. We are staying in a hotel, not with my mill. So next day, small family dinner is had, people are happy to have their mother back. Two days later, bigger family dinner,

Mill seems happy. She agrees to talk about the financial. part the next day. This whole time, I did not get that phone back from her. I was so focused on getting the family part back. Mistake. At the table sit myself, Mill and her daughters. I start with a simple you do still believe us and not this scammer Kevin right? She replies with I don't know what you're talking about. There was never a Kevin. So yep, she's still talking to the scammer. Now everyone is pissed. One of her daughters throws photocopid text conversations between her and the scammer while yelling at her mom.

Oh yes, that Kevin. I can't believe this shit is happening. I try to keep everyone calm, but everyone is upset. What's crazy is that she seems to realize it's a scam, but at the same time still believes the scammer. We asked for property titles, so she can't pawn or sell things and we can recover some things, but she only gives us partial actual documents or photocopies. Everyone is more pissed. She keeps denying having any loan papers that the loan sharks kept them all.

We don't believe it. She takes out her phone and starts to go through it to find one of her loan contacts. My wife decides this is it and lunges at her mother for the phone. My wife may be slim, but she's active at the gym, and I, of course, I naturally have to go at it too. So now three people wrestling over the phone, which we do manage to take. My wife quickly goes over conversations from the scammer and loan sharks. My wife reads aloud the messages and confirms that it was the same scam story that we thought. At this point, everyone seems calm.

Mother-in-law seems resigned to the fact that we now have her phone and going through it. The rest of the family is bewildered at how obviously fake the lies and images that the scammer sent to her were, though, but no one is yelling at her. The scammer is apparently an American, head of medicine at some Boston hospital. Of course, why wouldn't a 40-something head of medicine want my elderly, nearly obese mill? At one point, my wife sees that my mill

asks the scammer why he didn't go to the embassy for help. Scammer said that there were no embassy from his county where he was being held. We questioned the mill, but she's not really talking much, but finally says he's in Germany. Everyone is still calm, though. I show my mill that there is in U.S. Embassy in Germany, a half-dozen consulates, dozens of offices.

She replied that she's going to have to let Kevin know about these options that he didn't about. She still believes this dude. I show her that the plane tickets they sent to show he had a jet-set life didn't exist. The images were so ridiculously fake that anyone could Google and see why. A non-stop ticket from Kazanstan to Tennessee on UA-134. Everyone is still trying to convince her and calm, though. My wife scrolls to the lone sharks. Financially, we are mostly where we think we are.

Except she has managed to pawn the country farmhouse. We didn't think she could because her ex-husband is on the title, and he did not agree to that. People are furious, and I am tired of holding them back. They verbally lay it on her. We put down on paper what the debt is, and I don't think she flinched. We did when we totaled it. 70K for properties and items worth 350K we try for two hours to talk cents into her, but she's still fully committed to believing the scammers.

There is just one property left not pawned. The one in the we're currently in, the one that only has her name, but is actually her ex-husband's childhood house. Everyone leaves frustrated. My wife and I tell her that she would never see us again. She asks for her phone back, our reply wasn't very nice. My wife worries her mother is going to commit suicide, she doesn't. Next day, we meet up with the father-in-law, whom I always thought was a stand-up guy.

Everyone thought he would be upset, but he was just disappointed. He goes on to explain that he removed his name from the house title and the capital because he didn't want his children or grandchildren to think he would try to kick them out in any way, as his ex-wife had repeated said it was something he would do. He was in tears and said he just wanted good things for his family. We agree to meet up again the next day to start a plan to get the police to arrest mill for selling the farm property that Phil did have his name on the title. Wife goes through the phone and we get an even clearer picture.

Turns out those lone shysters weren't nearly actually as bad as we thought, even the one that accepted a property as collateral knowing that Phil wasn't involved. There were two main loaners, each loan to them started typical enough for the two properties, but then Mill started asking to see if they would take a loan for the house and the capital. Both said no, stated that they didn't want any of the properties, they just wanted the interest from the loans. They started questioning if she was being scammed, telling her to talk to her family. She kept it telling them she was fine. They kept insisting she gets her family. They kept insisting she gets her involved, she said her family was why she didn't have anything and needed the loans.

We call the loan people, they seem amicable, and actually concerned for Mill. One only wanted the principal back, the other seemed willing to accept the principal and a month's interest instead of everything's that's accrued. My wife asks me if I remember the jewelry gifts we got for our wedding, I replied that I didn't until she mentioned it now. Good, then you won't miss them. Next day, my wife plans to pay the loan to get her car back. There's already a buyer. The sale of the car, and the jewelry is enough to cover not everything, but at least the two farm properties. I guess I shouldn't be annoyed at losing the jewelry, definitely annoyed at Mill though. Sure enough, midday, we get a text message from the scammer on

my Mill's phone, which we have, asking why he's getting texts from another number claiming to be my Mill, and that is the new number to call. We throw a few curveballs at the scammer, but yep. Mill had a backup phone, which explains why she wasn't wrestling us back for the phone, and is retalking to the scammers. Yay! Two hours after this, my sister-in-law puts her phone up to show me and my wife a live scene from the security cameras at the house. So a lot of people in this country still believes in animalism and spirits, etc. Conversations goes like this. Still, she's opening up all the windows in the house.

wife, that nasty bitch. Yep, she's got them all opened. She's got some incense now. She's lighting them outside the house and waving them. Oh, fuck her, I am so out of her life. What kind of mother does that? Me, scratching my head, what's going on? She just wished all the evil in the world to come to you and your wife.

Oh, wonderful. Thank you for reading my rant. Well, we're here for another week, let's see what crazy shit happens now. Hoping my mill does get arrested, I think it's likely but maybe not before we leave. If you guys actually read this all the way through, and the next part is interesting, I'll put it up. Comments where Op has replied, commenter, the picture you paint is one of a person who is not mentally well.

She needs medical intervention. Oop, that is the picture we get as well. I have suggested this to the family. before. They declined it, seems a good idea to suggest it again. Edit. NM, I recall now why they declined. Mental health treatment is non-existent here. The one place that would take her is for drug rehab, and it's pretty grim. Mini update in comments, March 30th, 2025. Commenter, I would not bail her out of her loans with your money, she'll just do it again with the same scammer or a different scammer.

I would move on with your life and stay out of hers. Boop. The deed for the farm, that has my father-in-law as well on it, will be transferred entirely to my fill. Apparently, this can be done without Mill consent as long as officials agree, and it looks like this will agree. Other farm that is entirely in Mill's name

will hopefully be transferred to my wife eventually, as she is the one who actually paid for it, but we need Mill to agree. Seen she won't agree anytime soon. However, we actually get to keep the title from the loaner after the debt is paid. So she won't be able to anything without the title. As for the house and the capital, Phil's childhood home, Phil, along with the entire family, will be meeting with officials to have the title changed to be only under Phil's name.

Plan is going to get Mill arrested and put away until she regains her senses. Can't believe it's come to that, but I don't see any to get her to her senses. Apparently, she's throwing garbage all over the house. Unplugging laundry if someone is using the machine, just making the lives of her daughters still they're miserable. The whole time screaming at whoever is there that soon she will have everything, and we will see she's right. I had previously told the daughters to go easy on the mom,

but today I told them to go at it if they want. These are not defenseless women, they've just been holding back. She's going to be put away it seems one way or another. Update 2, April 11th, 2025. This update isn't as exciting as the previous update where we were breaking down doors with crowbars, and my mill putting a hex on us, but that's probably a good thing. I pushed getting her arrested, but apparently in Laos it's not that simple. You have to go to the village elder, they have to get the village police involved,

and then an actual arrest can be made. I am not sure if it really was this complicated, or if the family just didn't have the appetite for it, Of all the things she had pawned, we were interested in resolving four items that were pawned or suspected to be. My wife's car, two farm plots and the house and the capital. We paid 3K to get the car back, which included the loan and interest. We then sold the car. My wife also sold the wedding jewelry we received many years ago. This together with the proceeds of the car was enough for us to pay back the loan and interest for the two farm plots.

The papers were all signed. in front of village officials. We had no idea where the deed to the house and the capital was, turns out of the lone people had the deed all along. My mill was so desperate for money that she offered to take 5K for a house worth $500,000 U.S. dollars. The loner declined, but held on to the deed, which was given back to us. The laws and lows don't make any sense to me, and I am not sure how we're able to do the things we did after. The first farm plot is six acres, and co-owned by Mill and ex-husband. Mill managed to pawn the property without her ex-husband knowing. So now we are going by the official judgment from their divorce.

1.5 acres will be given to Mill, but Title will be given to one of her daughters to hold. The second farm plot is five acres, it was 100% in Mill's name, but was paid for by my wife years ago. Title will now be transferred to my wife. As for the house and the capital, a 100% in my mill's name even though it was my Phil's childhood home. This was because she had repeatedly accused him of in the future selling the house and leaving the grandkids with no place to go. Funny how it was actually the opposite. We're working on putting Phil back on the title, while one of my wife's sister holds on to the title. My wife used to give her mother a $500 to $600 monthly stipend, but stopped a few

months ago. She has told her sisters that she will still help pay for utilities and putting groceries in her mother's fridge. Wife's niece and nephews also use the house. We have to pay utilities directly now, as the lights were just turned off recently because Mill didn't pay utilities for four months. However, we have cut off all contact with Mill. She won't see our son again either, and she has numerous photos of him in her house. We knew she had promised the scammers to get him money in April, so we tried to get ahead. of that. She traveled to Thailand to ask some relatives for money, but we told them ahead of time not to give any money. In the end, she begged them for bags of rice to take home, which they gave.

She also recently went to visit her son to ask him for money, he wasn't home, so she asked for $5 from her daughter-in-law's mother. She's going to several friends, asking for financial help, telling them that her kids abandoned her. So now we have to call those people and tell them that Mill has been scammed, but we still put food in the fridge. Mill still believes the scammers, she wants to desperately believe she did not give the scammers our final tally of 70K, she really wants to believe her lover is real. She has nothing left to pawn now since we have all the documents. I can only hope that within six months the scammers will stop talking to her once they

realize she has nothing left and maybe she will come to her senses. It's been exhausting, but I am glad we were able to get all three property titles back so at least mill and niece and nephews don't end on the street. I was born in Laos too, but left when I wasn't even one years old, but I get the culture. We had planned a five-week trip, but spent almost four weeks cleaning up this scam mess. The whole point of the trip prior to realizing my mill was being scammed was to do a baby blessing ceremony, to be attended by hundreds of people, it's a very wholesome positive event, something my wife has been looking forward to for a year. We didn't do it since there was so much bad energy.

It wasn't until we flew to Bangkok for a few days that we felt we were on vacation. My wife used to fly back to Laos once a year, sometimes twice. She's made it very clear she won't be going back for a while.