Lying brother - don’t know how to respond to this new disclosure.

[inigomontoyahwillcox]

Lying here awake as my head is all over the place.

Some of you may remember my thread a while back about how I was supporting my brother who landed on my doorstep in a mental health crisis expecting me to look after him for as long as it took (he has had depressive episodes before and decamped to my parents for over a year on more than one occasion). I connected him with our local mental health services whilst he was with us but also gave him a deadline as to how long he could stay with us (a couple of months). He eventually told some friends of mine he was going to hurt them and I took him straight to hospital where he disclosed he thought he was going to hurt my DD (16). The hospital rightly responded to this by raising a safeguarding concern.

He was admitted and eventually transported back to his hometown where he was under the psychosis team and eventually admitted to a psychiatric ward for some months where he underwent ECT. I still supported, attending his weekly ward meetings online, liaising with his medical teams, his employer, making practical arrangements, keeping his flat clean (which was a mess due to serious self neglect) and visiting in hospital (it’s a 6 hour round trip so couldn’t go often but when I could).

The safeguarding referral resulted in me being interviewed by children’s social care twice and having my fitness to keep my DD safe questioned; insinuation was that I somehow should have known my brother was a danger - which I didn’t until he disclosed it (I had still insisted to my brother that he couldn’t stay long term as it was having a negative impact on my daughter (who has ADHD and was preparing for her GCSEs) and husband (who had recently gone through his own metal health crisis), but physical danger hadn’t occurred to me). They also contacted my EXH (DDs dad) and asked if she could live with him if I “prioritised my DB’s needs” which he revelled in. They also spoke to DD’s school, and eventually DD. They were ultimately reassured that I was capable of protecting/prioritising my DD and that her and my brother would not be under the same roof again - on that basis they saw no need for any further action. It was a horrible time, with me feeling intense guilt about a) allowing DD to be put in a position of potential danger, not that I was aware at the time, and b) knowing that my brother had nobody else to turn to (parents are now very elderly) other than me for support and I said no (well, no to the support he wanted, which was to stay with us long term). I also had to have some very difficult conversations with DD, her school, my EXH. It also affected DD - only the other day she was asking again why he was going to hurt her and I explained that he was very sick and not himself - and who knows the impact it had on her exams.

He was very recently released from hospital and just this past fortnight has made a miraculous recovery - which I'm putting down to the effects of the ECT taking hold. I was so incredibly happy to see that he was doing so much better.

I got a message from him last night telling me he had made up the disclosure to hospital about hurting DD so they would take him seriously and give him some help/admit him. I don’t know what the hell to feel about this?! I suspect he’s saying this in the hope that say, “ah well in that case you can come back to ours to visit” (he used to spend a LOT of time at ours, in hindsight he was very reliant on us), of course that’s not going to happen, for a start social services would take an exceptionally dim view of this, god knows if he’s telling the truth now, or if he was telling the truth then? But if it was a lie, does he realise what the fall out his original disclosure had??? The shit I had to deal with, the shit DD had to deal with??

I’ve left him on read as I don’t know how to react to him. I’m now in a position where I feel as though I can’t be anything but nice to him about it due to the fear of him relapsing into depression if I do anything other than that. But I’m SO angry with him. I know he was sick when he said it, I’d come to terms with him saying it as I believed he wasn’t in his right mind, and actually came to see his original disclosure as his way of protecting her against himself. But now I’ve been told that he made it up, well, it seems very calculated and with no consideration of the impact it would have on DD and me. There’s no remorse in his admission - no apology, just a statement of fact.

Please OP, listen up- I had a lovely dad who pandered to my less lovely mum. At the end when he was very unwell and her care was shockingly poor, we had to remember this and it’s true about your parents and brother as well-

Every day they live with the choices they have made over the last decades. They chose to prioritise each other and not you. They chose to organise around each other- and they made that choice actively and deliberately.
It is ok to leave them with that choice- it’s what they want.

You can agree to your mum visiting if she chooses to arrange it. You do not have to do anything else as she is living the life she actively and continually chooses now and in the past. Let her. Let him.

This is not your fault, not your responsibility. You can let it go.

Thank you @AnotherHormonalWoman - funnily enough I was just recently thinking the other day about how I used to cook almost every night from scratch (bar the occasional "nursery tea") and over this past couple of years I've just been throwing things together and eating far too much pre-prepared/processed food (DH had a massive breakdown a couple of years ago culminating in a suicide attempt, and his recovery was immediately followed by my brother's breakdown - so I've been stressed for years). This past couple of weeks I've made a concerted effort to remedy that - but your compromises make a lot of sense and will be hitting the frozen veg section very shortly!

And yes, very aware of how draining therapy can be - it's very much a short term pain for long term gain situation. Pretty sure DD will say no when I offer it to her (you can't force a now 17 year old into therapy) but will make sure she knows that the door is always open if she wants me to arrange. I will have a think about whether now is the best time to start it myself.

I’m so sorry if I’ve missed this OP, but your DD is an only isn’t she? I can’t remember from your firsts thread sorry. Only asking as I’m wondering if there are any others who have had threats from your brother

If you are able to cut ties now, you may find that it’s enough- you may want to do therapy later, but don’t underestimate the relief you will feel when you stop managing their situations.

Focus on you, your DD and your DH, and feel good stuff- treating yourselves with kindness.

That’s right - she’s an only.

It may be a shock to have the diagnosis confirmed and you may feel conflicted. Another male family member whose behaviour is perhaps not fully in their control... But you know his underlying personality and that he's an architect of the family dynamics. Try not to waver. This diagnosis removes some of the uncertainty of how to proceed.

People have pointed out that it's not in your interests to move your parents closer. The diagnosis now means it's not in his interest either : this isn't an appropriate time to move away from familiar surroundings, and he's best getting known by and used to his local services (medical, day centres etc).

Having to get used to a new home, location, doctor, optician, walks... It'd be overwhelming and usually leads to family realising that the person is in much poorer condition that thought, as all the supportive routines and habits are removed.

That’s a very good point about routines - the pandemic really exacerbated things for my DF because he lost the habits of eg familiar route to the shops and couldn’t reacquire the knowledge post lockdown

Right - OK. Well it sounds like it may be too late. TBH although he insists he wants to move, he’s already proved to be incapable of making a rational decision and understand the process, and my mother is not capable of stepping up and taking over control of the situation. She’d be happy for me to deal with it//make a decision for them, but he still wants to be in control (habit of a lifetime) - and as he still has capacity there’s nothing I can do about it.

The last thing you need is to deal with that circus of helping/forcing them to move. Acres of grief for you, with the added bonus of no gratitude but heaps of blame every time something goes wrong.

Drop the rope and step away.

Please don't become your father's carer, or your mum's weekend respite. You don't owe it to them, and you'll put yourself under so much stress.

As a pp says, he will be better off in familiar sourondings, with home based care if that what your mum wants for him, until he needs to go into a care home.

My difficult father got Altzheimers, and my mum kept him ay home for far longer than she should have, but it was her call until the GP said he needed professional care.

I realise that my helping out was just facilitating her to keep him at home, he wasn't safe, she was miserable.

Your brother can step up and start to provide some support.

You can't save any of your birth family.