Guilt and Shame After Inheriting
Guilt and Shame After Inheriting
I’m Katherine. I’m a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER®, a financial advisor for inheritance, and a fellow inheritor.
Each week on my Instagram page I create a quiz for current and future inheritors to test their knowledge.
Now, I’m bringing these quizzes to the blog.
Read here to test your knowledge and see how you did compared to my 10,000 Instagram followers.
Posted on July 24, 2025 by Katherine Fox.
Why do so many inheritors feel guilty?
Most of the inheritors I work with carry some form of guilt.
Usually, this guilt is difficult to untangle.
Often, it starts because of the reality of unearned privilege.
It’s hard not to feel guilty when you started life ahead of 99.9% of the global population just by being born.
Inheritance-related shame and guilt aren’t always easy to untangle.
It isn’t just unearned privilege.
Guilt and shame may be tied to your relationship with your parents, the stories you learned about money growing up, and the relationships you value in your life.
Most importantly, you aren’t free to discuss or explore these feelings.
They aren’t something you can bring up with anyone who grew up without wealth, because then you’re trying to play the “poor little rich kid” card.
So the guilt and shame continue to live inside you, where they’re free to grow unchecked.
You need a safe space to explore these feelings and shine a light on the root causes of your discomfort with wealth.
That’s what I’ve created at Sunnybranch.
I’m an inheritor, and I’ve done this work myself.
I know how powerful it can be to say these feelings out loud for the first time and to have someone tell you that you aren’t crazy, or wrong.
Want to try it? Book a call and see for yourself.
You’re just trying to find your way in the world as a person with money, resources, and privilege.
You’re worried about saying this out loud to anyone.
Maybe you tried once and it didn’t go well.
What should you do?
First, think about which of these root causes of guilt and shame resonates most strongly.
Which would you choose?
A.lHaving unearned, insane privilege
B. Not knowing what to do with your inheritance, feeling stupid and incapable
C. Survivor’s guilt that you have your parents’ money and they aren’t here to enjoy it anymore
D. Discomfort/disgust with how your family made money (oil, guns, drugs, whatever)
“growing up rich doesn’t mean you had a good life, or an easy life. It doesn’t mean that money wasn’t an ugly, complicated issue in your family. It doesn’t mean you had your needs met.”
What did my 10,000 followers think?
Did they get it right?
It’s complicated.
I accidentally made a trick question, but they did OK.
Option A is the root cause of most inheritors’ guilt and shame. It’s the base facts of inheritance - by being born into a family with wealth, you ended up better off than 99.9% of the world’s population. The amount of privilege you had access to is something about which most people can only dream.
That being said, growing up rich doesn’t mean you had a good life, or an easy life. It doesn’t mean that money wasn’t an ugly, complicated issue in your family. It doesn’t mean you had your needs met.
While this is an important topic to explore for inheritors looking to address their guilt and shame, it almost never tells the whole story.
If unearned privilege is the root cause of most money guilt and shame, feeling stupid doesn’t help.
Option B is a source of shame I hear often, especially from female inheritors.
It’s not your fault you were systematically excluded from financial education that makes sense to you.
Maybe your parents introduced you to their investment advisor and he waved a bunch of charts in your face.
Maybe they didn’t even try.
Whatever your (lack) of financial education has looked like to this point, it is nothing to apologize for.
I don’t want you feeling guilty or shameful because your family failed to educate you, or because you don’t understand the techno-babble older male advisors like to spew.
What you need is education tailored to your interests and situation, in a language you can understand.
You’d be amazed how empowering even a small amount of knowledge can be.
Option C sucks. If you’re feeling guilty because your parents died too young and didn’t get to enjoy their wealth, I feel for you.
This guilt and shame is wrapped up with grief, which makes it one of the hardest root causes for inheritors to address.
Building a plan that aligns with your parents’ legacy can be a salve, but often this guilt will only fade with time and may resurface along with later periods of grief.
Option D requires some soul searching. If your family built wealth in a way that you find morally objectionable, whatever objection you have, it can feel like you’re being suffocated by blood money.
Some inheritors solve this problem by giving away all their money, often with a focus on the communities that were most harmed by their family’s extractive fortune.
Most inheritors aren’t ready to go that far.
Building a plan that finds your vision of “enough” and focusing on giving your excess wealth away through philanthropic, personal, and political giving is the best way I know to deal with this embedded conflict.
Taking this step requires building your knowledge, deep soul searching, and, often, working with a financial advisor who can help you define “enough” and build a plan to give away money on whatever timeline feels right for you.
Are you ready to start tackling your money guilt?
Book a FREE intro call to start unpacking your guilt, creating a positive association with your inheritance, and building a plan to use your wealth to create positive change. You don’t have to be burdened with these feelings forever.
Let’s take the next step together
Understanding how to create a positive impact with your inheritance is not easy. Inheritors can encounter a wide variety of different situations requiring knowledge and finesse to manage. If you need more help, you can download The 20 Inheritance Terms You Need to Know, or reach out to Katherine Fox, CFP® and CAP®, a fiduciary, fee-only financial planner to learn how Sunnybranch can help you build a plan to align your inherited investments with your values.
