'Entitled' Son Forced To Shop At Goodwill Sheds Tears, Says Mom

AUBURN, GA — Cierra Brittany Forney is a mom from Auburn, Georgia, who said her 13-year-old son has been acting "a little entitled" lately, so she took him shopping for school clothes at a Goodwill store. Forney posted the episode on her Facebook page Sunday and the story went viral with 257,284 shares and more than 691,000 reactions as of Wednesday.

"I didn't do this to punish him," Forney said in a followup post Tuesday. "It wasn't to show him that Goodwill isn't a good place to shop ... I DO NOT care what anyone has to say about my post because I SOLEY did this to help my son become a better man."

In her original post Forney said her son was acting too good to shop at Walmart and made "snarky comments" about kids at school who shop at Goodwill.

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"I don't tolerate that," she said. "Today, he took his own 20 (dollars) to Goodwill to buy clothes to wear the entire week to school. Whatever he found is what he would have to wear. He isn't happy and shed a few tears but I firmly believe in 15 years he will look back and laugh at the day his Mom made him shop at goodwill. I want to teach my kids that money isn't everything and if you have to degrade other people because of where they shop, then you too will shop there. Side note, I love the goodwill!!"

After her post — complete with a photo of her son dragging the clothes through the aisle at Goodwill — went viral, Forney was shocked about the response and comments she received and dove deeper into why she did it when she made her followup post.

"When I made the post about taking my son to Goodwill, I made it to share with my family and friends on my own Facebook," she said. "A few people asked me if they could share it since they, too, agreed with the lesson I was trying to teach my son. People share my stuff all the time and it never ever goes beyond maybe 30 shares? I had NO idea this would happen. Before I agreed, I FIRST asked him if he would be okay with that. He was completely fine with it and still is."

She said her son learned a valuable lesson.

"I believe it is just another story we can add to our lives memory to look back on," continued the post. "I didn't do this to punish him. It wasn't to show him that goodwill isn't a good place to shop. I did this to teach him that money and name brands don't change who we are as people. He can still be the amazing, adorable, loved kid that he is WITHOUT the expensive stores!

"I do realize that we are partly to blame for his expectancy of always having name brands," Forney said. "My husband and myself had our son when we were VERY young. We always strived to give him all the things we never had and because of that, he has grown to expect these things."

Forey went onto say she love's Goodwill.

"I got my first pair of amazing sunglasses there for 50 cents!! All the public shaming and saying my son will grow to hate me, sue me and later kill me are just awful. My son and I have an amazing relationship. He tells me everything and trusts me whole heartedly. I DO NOT care what anyone has to say about my post because I SOLEY did this to help my son become a better man. All the positive feedback and comments have brought me to tears and so have all the negative ones. All that matters is my son is completely 100 percent okay with what happened. My son has learned a valuable lesson from this AND my son is rockin' his button up shirt he bought from the Goodwill with PRIDE today!!!"

Photo courtesy Goodwill Industries of North GA