'We wanted to finally get the last word': Family who wrote scathing viral obituary speak out

The family who wrote the scathing obituary about their late mother have spoken out about why they wrote the ‘world is a better place without her’.

Kathleen Dehmlow passed away on May 31 in Springfield, in the United States, at the age of 80.

However, instead of writing an ode about her life in the local newspaper, The Redwood Gazette, her family detailed how she ‘abandoned her children’ and ran away with her brother-in-law.

Now, her son, Jay, claims his sister, Gina, felt the need to write the blistering note about their mother.

“They’ll never know what we went through but it helped us [to write this],” he told the Daily Mail.

“We wanted to finally get the last word.”

Jay said that the obituary was rejected by one Springfield newspaper, before it was published in The Redwood Gazette.

He also revealed that his friends had no idea what had happened to his family when he was young.

“I’ve got calls from buddies who’ve said, “We didn’t know she’d left you. We thought she’d died in a car crash or something”, he said.

The obituary started by saying Kathleen was born in 1938 and married Dennis Dehmlow 19 years later.

She then had two children, Gina and Jay, before the obituary alleges she got pregnant by her husband’s brother, Lyle, five years into her marriage.

She is then said to have moved to California, reportedly leaving her two children behind, who were then raised by Kathleen’s parents.

“She passed away on May 31, 2018 in Springfield and will now face judgment,” the obituary reads.

“She will not be missed by Gina and Jay, and they understand that this world is a better place without her.”

The obituary was posted to social media by Twitter user Stu, who couldn’t believe what he was reading.

Others were quick to comment on the post, with some conflicted over how they felt about the blistering account of Kathleen’s life.

“It takes courage to tell the truth. Just because someone is dead, doesn’t mean they become a saint, and there’s no rule saying a child must forgive an abusive, unloving parent,” one person said.

“Wow, the pain in this obituary hurts my heart,” another person said.

Another commenter said: “It’s so interesting when people use an obituary as a place to air grievances.”

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