My brother is a deadbeat and my parents enable it

Do yourself a favor and stop worrying about it right now. You can't make your brother shape up and you have no right to tell your parents how much support they should or shouldn't offer.

Seriously, this is doing you no good. My dad had an identical situation with his little brother, and guess what? No matter how logically he argued or how much he worried, no one changed. People are gonna be who they're gonna be.

My older brother is 32 and has 3 sons from 3 ex-girlfriends. He raises none of them and pays no child support. He remains unemployed and living in my parents basement. My anger and resentment has led me to have virtually no interaction with any of them. I wish he was on drugs to explain why he was so useless. He's sober, just the laziest, most worthless piece of human garbage alive.

Your brother is a saint compared to mine. Consider yourself lucky. Your brother can sober up and turn his life around. There's nothing my brother can do.

Kitten! wrote:

Do yourself a favor and stop worrying about it right now. You can't make your brother shape up and you have no right to tell your parents how much support they should or shouldn't offer.

Seriously, this is doing you no good. My dad had an identical situation with his little brother, and guess what? No matter how logically he argued or how much he worried, no one changed. People are gonna be who they're gonna be.

This may be true but it does seem a little pessimistic. If the OP is really worried about his brother, he should go to his parents and other family members and get the brother in treatment or at least an intervention. Getting him off drugs should be the top priority, especially if the brother is as smart as the OP indicates

two cent$ wrote:

Kitten! wrote:

Do yourself a favor and stop worrying about it right now. You can't make your brother shape up and you have no right to tell your parents how much support they should or shouldn't offer.

Seriously, this is doing you no good. My dad had an identical situation with his little brother, and guess what? No matter how logically he argued or how much he worried, no one changed. People are gonna be who they're gonna be.

This may be true but it does seem a little pessimistic. If the OP is really worried about his brother, he should go to his parents and other family members and get the brother in treatment or at least an intervention. Getting him off drugs should be the top priority, especially if the brother is as smart as the OP indicates

If the OP has never had a heart-to-heart with his brother (or with his parents, for that matter), then he absolutely should arrange one. But judging by his frustration it seems safe to assume that he has tried, and repeatedly failed. If that's the case I'll stand by my original statement. People live their lives the way they want to and we as individuals are basically powerless to change them. The sooner the OP accepts that, the sooner this will stop tearing him up inside.

I know a thing or two about drug addicts and at some point you just have to let go. they dont care about anybody else so long as they are high and it sounds like your brother stopped caring about you and your family a long time ago. it doesnt matter if hes dumb as nails or smart as sin, drug addiction will keep him from caring about everything else.

my advice is to let go like others have said and worry about yourself. people can change, but only if they really want to. your parents need to learn this too

Sprintfreezer wrote:

It's resentment, not concern. You're disgusting. I hope your brother wins the lottery.

_____________ _______________________ ________________

Seems like he already has

Google "Prodigal Son"

-parents tend to love their kids regardless of the choices they make. Would you want it any other way? You are the one who is living an upstanding, responsible lifestyle, you cannot possibly be jealous of a drug addict. Google the Prodigal Son.

You sound jealous

Get over it. They are going to support him forever. They have a guest house, they can afford to. Did they build it just for him?

You have a choice. Either ask your parents to build you a matching guest house or continue to man up and take care of yourself.

There is some good news. My brother was like yours until he was 44. Then slowly, my parents started needing him and he has been there for them. Its been a few years and he still doesn't have a real job but we have reason to believe that he will keep the lawn mowed, food in the house and make sure they go to their appointments.

Not that we still don't have other worries...

It sounds like you are pretty lucky that you are doing well and that your brother is not a personal drain on you.

Some of us have family members that put a strain on our own lives by their struggles.

And letting a family member dangle and go homeless is tough to watch and causes personal pain even if they deserve it.

Be thankful for your situation.

flameon wrote:

My older brother is 32 and has 3 sons from 3 ex-girlfriends. He raises none of them and pays no child support. He remains unemployed and living in my parents basement. My anger and resentment has led me to have virtually no interaction with any of them. I wish he was on drugs to explain why he was so useless. He's sober, just the laziest, most worthless piece of human garbage alive.

Your brother is a saint compared to mine. Consider yourself lucky. Your brother can sober up and turn his life around. There's nothing my brother can do.

Is this lpd?

My sister is a drug addict, and does prettymuch all that too. She's 4 years older, and basically jumps between friend's houses and does drugs without a job or direction in life.

My parents, gave up on her after more than 10 years of this going on. Few prescriptions went missing, money, and other stuff to pay for drugs. She's still around, but to me, she's a walking corpse. I can't change the fact she does what she does, and my parents took forever to cast her out, but I know they still talk and support her in other ways. It becomes more complicated when you have kids, and there is that one Aunt or Uncle you don't want to talk about or have them around for the better. Like the poster replying to you, forget it, and just deal with your life. It's drama, just keep them out of your life. If you're parents bring it up, just tell him "Well kick him out" and just leave it at that. Eventually, after X amount of years, they'll figure it out, but don't go out of your way to take on added stress because you have a messed up family member. I'd say 99% of the time no one wants real help, they want help as in drug money and other stuff to enable them to keep their lifestyle.

There is one ONE technique that works with situations like this. The cops, goverment etc. use it and properly done it WILL work! It is the ancient "good cop-bad cop" plan. ONE parent be the good cop and the OTHER parent is the bad cop.I recommend the mother be the bad cop. Anyhow the good cop is ALWAYS happy up beat and positive, UNTIL it is time for the bad cop. The better the good cop is at his job the MORE FEAR the "victim" will have of the bad cop. So pore on the good cop till it is time for the bad cop to put the hammer down! Alternate the cops properly and it WILL work.

sorry but.... wrote:

I know a thing or two about drug addicts and at some point you just have to let go. they dont care about anybody else so long as they are high and it sounds like your brother stopped caring about you and your family a long time ago. it doesnt matter if hes dumb as nails or smart as sin, drug addiction will keep him from caring about everything else.

my advice is to let go like others have said and worry about yourself. people can change, but only if they really want to. your parents need to learn this too

You obviously don't know about drug addicts by your first paragraph. Most drug addicts care too much about other people. They don't care about themselves. You shouldn't beat on an addict by telling him everything he's doing wrong. You should be there to support them and encourage, not force your opinion of him at him.

Most drug addicts feel like no one cares about them and you only reinforce this by constantly criticizing them and their lifestyle. I have been down that road and know the feeling of self-loathing. Offer support to an addict and make them feel welcome. Any criticism will come across as an insult and knock their already diminished self-esteem.

Unfortunately, you won't understand your parents' compassion until you have children. Also, tough love can have very disastrous consequences on someone with a serious addition problem. It is really amazing how fast people will go from being the lazy dead beat-good for nothing son to a very dangerous criminal in order to support a drug habit. My cousin did 3 years on attempted murder when he beat his roommate unconscious after he stiffed him on a drug buy. This was not more than a year after he got thrown out of the house in a tough love move. Prior to that, the guy had never even been in a fist fight.

But your feelings do count and you should let your parents know that you think your brother is taking advantage of them. It is not your place to tell your parents what they should do, but you can tell them what you think. You should also make it clear to your brother that you told your parents how you feel and want something better for him and will support him in getting help and finding direction in his life.

I imagine this must be real tough on your parents. Maybe they could do more to get your brother to develop more goal directed behavior. No parent wants to see their kid waste their life.Continue to focus your energy on treating your parents well. Your brother won't.

the good son wrote:

. For reasons I can't understand my parents continue to give him more chances and don't understand that they're not helping him.

Co-dependency is insidious. It's a given that you're contributing to the dysfunctional dynamic, as well. Figure out your role in the web of interdependency and upset the balance in the most ethical/moral way possible.

You have control over only one thing in life: your actions and behaviors.

There's nothing you can do, so you have to let it go.

You may want to suggest to your parents that they make you their executor in case of incapacitation. If your parents are of sound mind and want to piss away their money on this jerk you have to bite your tongue. It's their money.

Just take the high road and try to keep your distance.

Probably a good time to go for a long run and forget about your brother and his issues and focus on the good things in life...like the waves of nausea that hit you 17 miles into a 20 miler when you are really only in shape to run 15.