Your Elderly Mom Sent Money to an Online Romance Scammer. What You Can Do Now

Finding out that your mom or grandmother has been sending money to someone she met online can feel like the ground shifting under your feet: shock, frustration, fear for her safety, anger at the scammer, and a deep sadness you may not know how to put into words. You want to help her and make the scam stop, and yet nothing seems simple.

Romance scammers know exactly how to target older women. They build trust slowly, create an emotional bond, and over time, pull their victims away from family. Many smart, loving women fall for these scams, whether they’re lonely, recently widowed, divorced, or simply craving companionship. But it also damages long marriages or decades-long family ties. No one is truly immune.

When an elderly mom falls into a romance scam, the whole family feels it. The money matters, of course, especially when the losses affect everyone, but the emotional weight is often heavier. She may refuse to believe she’s being manipulated, even if you have spent hours gathering evidence, tracing accounts, talking to banks, or trying to find the scammer, hoping that proof will finally convince her.

This is one of the hardest truths families discover: finding the scammer or proving he’s fake doesn’t always break the spell.

Some victims reject every piece of evidence. Some would rather pull away from their children or grandchildren than let go of the person they believe loves them. Families end up standing on the sidelines, watching someone they care about be pulled deeper into a story they cannot escape.

This article is for those families, for the sons, daughters, and grandchildren trying to help someone they love through a situation that feels both impossible and heartbreaking.

Different Stories, Same Heartbreaking Themes

If you read through the experiences families share online, you start to see the same painful pattern repeated again and again, especially in scams where the criminal pretends to be a celebrity or a public figure.

In one story, a grandmother spent nearly a year talking to someone pretending to be a famous podcaster. The scammer used AI-generated video calls so convincing that she sold her home, her heirlooms, and ended up living in her car with her daughter, all because she believed he was waiting for her in California. Her family tried everything, from empathy and gentle conversations to confrontation, but nothing worked because she was certain it was love.

Another family watched their 70-year-old grandmother drain her savings, borrow thousands from her children, and sneak conversations behind their backs with a man who claimed he was in a war zone, had a sick child in the United States, and couldn’t access his bank account. When they blocked him on Facebook, he simply resurfaced through email and WhatsApp. When he disappeared for a few days, her blood pressure spiked so dangerously that she ended up in the emergency room.

In another household, a 79-year-old mother fell for two celebrity scams in a row, first someone posing as Kevin Costner, then a fake Jason Momoa. She handed over gift cards, personal documents like her Social Security number and driver’s license, and waited for him to “fly out to meet her.”

When the family locked down her phone, she used a friend’s phone to continue the romance. The emotional pull was stronger than her 35/year marriage.

When “Love” Blinds Her and Leaves You Helpless

Many families know these scams exist, and yet they never imagined one would happen inside their own home. When it does, they begin searching for the scammer, looking for clues, tracing phone numbers, hoping proof will end it.

In some cases, families do find proof and expect that once they show it, their mom or grandmother will finally see what’s happening. But this becomes one of the most painful parts of the experience: logic rarely breaks through.

Conversations become exhausting, and none of the messages land. The victim is certain she’s right, certain the money is just “a loan,” certain that the love is real and the future they discussed is waiting for her. Some look away intentionally, because the relationship fills an emotional need no one else has been meeting.

And when you try to set boundaries or simply protect her, she may twist the situation and make you feel like you’re the bad guy. It’s a terrible place to be: feeling lost and out of options while the situation keeps escalating, and she continues sending money.

Why Logic, Proof, and Confrontation Don’t Work

Most families approach the conversations with empathy at first, then firmness. They sit together as a group, show examples of nearly identical scams, highlight contradictions, and beg her to stop sending money.

But none of it works, because scammers prepare their victims in advance. They tell them that family members won’t understand, that people are jealous, that loved ones want to control them, or ruin their happiness. They warn them that others will say the relationship is fake and instruct them to ignore it. They position themselves as the only person she can truly trust. They even claim that enemies might impersonate them, so if something feels “off,” she should come straight to him.

That’s why she might lie about conversations, hide messages, become defensive, or accuse you of being unkind or controlling. She may blame you if you block him or take financial risks she never would have considered before. The scammers built mental cages around their victims, carefully designed to keep everyone else out.

Why Blocking the Scammer Can Backfire Badly

Often, blocking the scammer feels like the obvious solution: cut off the contact, and the spell should break. But for someone who is deeply attached, it can trigger the opposite reaction.

When the scammer disappears, she may panic. The sudden silence can feel like abandonment, and instead of relief, she may go into withdrawal. Rather than seeing the block as protection, she may blame you for taking away someone she believes she loves. Some women immediately look for another way to reach the scammer: a different app, a new email address, another device, or even a friend’s phone. The secrecy grows because the emotional bond is stronger than any warning. In her mind, you are taking away the one person who makes her feel understood, even if that person isn’t real.

In some cases, she may turn against the family entirely, convinced that you are the ones standing in the way of her happiness.

What to Do When Convincing Her Fails

At some point, many families reach the painful moment when they realize that explaining and reasoning simply don’t work. If you ever get there, the goal shifts from “making her see the truth” to protecting her and protecting the rest of the family from further harm.

1. Accept that you cannot argue her out of the scam

This is the hardest step for most families. But once you accept it, you can stop pouring your energy into conversations that only drain you and start focusing on what you can control: safety, finances, and boundaries.

2. Stop more money from leaving

If she still has access to savings, credit cards, loans, cash assets, or the ability to sell property or borrow from relatives, she is still vulnerable. You can protect her by reducing her access to large amounts of money if the law allows, involving a trusted family member in every financial decision , and notifying her bank that she’s at risk of fraud.

3. Contact her bank

The sooner the bank knows what’s happening, the better your chances of stopping or reversing transactions, especially if money was sent by card, wire transfer, PayPal, Western Union, MoneyGram, or crypto. Banks deal with this often, and they can freeze pending transfers, block suspicious accounts, guide you through a fraud report, and flag her account for future activity.

4. Protect her online accounts before the scammer misuses them

Many scammers go far beyond asking for money. They often request passports or ID photos, collect family pictures, or try to gain access to her Facebook or email accounts. Some even persuade victims to install apps that give them more control.

This is why it’s important to secure her online accounts as quickly as possible if she lets you. Start by changing the passwords on her main accounts and turning on two-factor authentication wherever possible. Review her Facebook privacy settings and make them stricter. Check her email recovery options to ensure only trusted information is listed. Remove any apps that look suspicious or unfamiliar and install reputable security software to add extra protection.

5. Protect yourself and other family members

Think about yourself and try to financially unwind from your mother. If she’s sending money, taking out loans, or sharing personal documents, she could unintentionally drag others into debt as well.

It’s wise to:

• place a credit lock or freeze on your credit

• warn close family members to do the same

• watch for attempts to open credit cards or loans in your name

6. Report the scam

Reporting the scam is an important step, even if it feels discouraging or you’re not sure anything can be done. It serves two purposes: it helps authorities track and connect criminal networks, and it provides your mom with official documentation, which may matter if financial recovery ever becomes possible.

Where you report depends on where you live. You can start with the local police, your country’s national fraud center (such as Action Fraud in the UK or the FTC in the US), her bank’s fraud department, or even the platform where the communication began.

7. Watch for signs of identity theft

If she shared personal information such as passport details, ID photos, utility bills, or bank statements, the risk goes beyond losing money, she may become a target for identity theft. Keep an eye out for anything unusual: new credit card applications she didn’t file, unfamiliar charges, missing mail, accounts appearing in her name, or unexpected password reset emails.

If something doesn’t feel right, take action quickly by placing a credit freeze, setting up credit monitoring, or activating alerts for new loans or credit checks. Identity theft can continue long after the romantic scam ends.

When to Involve Professionals

There comes a point in some families where love and patience aren’t enough to keep someone safe. If your mom has emptied her savings, sold her home, or is living in unsafe conditions, the situation has moved far beyond a private family matter. The same is true if she’s borrowing money, hiding transactions, refusing all help, becoming aggressive when questioned, showing declining judgment, or being targeted again and again by different scammers. These are signs that the situation is a genuine safety and wellbeing concern.

Depending on where you live, this might mean starting with her doctor to check for cognitive changes or emotional distress. A psychologist or counselor may help her process whatever is driving her into these relationships. Elder protective services or social services can step in when someone is unable to protect themselves. In some cases, families explore financial guardianship to prevent further loss. And of course, the police or a fraud specialist can advise on reporting the scam and recovering what you can.

Legal professionals may also help you understand what options you have if she’s putting herself or the rest of the family at risk financially.

Families often hesitate because it feels extreme, but romance scams can genuinely destroy lives if left unchecked.

Prepare yourself emotionally; this is a long process, but you are not alone.

Helping a parent or grandparent through a romance scam isn’t something anyone is prepared for.

To get through it, you’ll need patience, boundaries, and emotional support for yourself. You’ll need clear roles among siblings, the willingness to take turns, and permission to step back when you’re overwhelmed. Progress will be slow, much slower than you hope for, and healing won’t happen in neat stages. It takes time for someone to detach from a relationship that felt real to them.

As you work to rebuild safety and trust, consider giving your family extra protection online. A Bitdefender Family Plan can help everyone, younger and older, avoid dangerous links, spot scams earlier, and keep devices more secure.

It’s designed to protect your family before a scam reaches them, but it’s just as valuable even after something has already happened. It can help minimize further losses by monitoring your loved ones’ digital identities, alerting you if their personal information appears in leaks, and reducing the risk of them being targeted again.

It can’t undo the emotional damage, but it can give your family a safer foundation as you move forward and a little more peace of mind in a situation that has already taken so much.

Find out more about your family safety plan, here.