NCed for this as it’s very outing but I’m at a loss with what to do in this situation now.
Lost both my parents by early 20s and have 3 younger siblings. I’d basically brought them up as kids as mum was an addict.
When my DF died, one sibling went to foster care as under 16 and one already had her own place.
Now, my issue is with my brother. He has on and off lived with my DH and I for 5 years. It’s been HARD and caused so many arguments between DH and I. Over these 5 years we have worked out we have given/lent/spent around £10k on him.
The last time he came to stay we asked him for rent and then put this aside so that he had a flat deposit. We finally thought he had things together and he moved out just before Covid struck.
Over the last 4-6 months things have got progressively worse with my brother. He has made attempts on his life (or threatened them), hasn’t been paying any rent or bills for his flat, doesn’t have a job, lost his girlfriend who was paying his bills (because she said she felt used), and his flat was an absolute pit that me and my sisters went over to clean up as it just seemed unliveable.
My DH and I have tried to set boundaries and help where we can. We have dropped food and toiletries over, cleaned the flat, given him a few days paid work (through my DH business), and lots of other bits that don’t just involve giving him money as he’s an ex (so he says) gambling addict. I did give him £2k at the beginning of this year after receiving a payout for something that I split between all my siblings, but other than that we have refused to help with money. I simply don’t have it to give anyway!!
During these hardest times we have had long conversations about how to move forward from all this. I’ve suggested he signs up for UC so he gets some money, talks to the council about getting on the housing list, seeing a GP/therapist about the depression, getting ANY kind of job to help himself.
He’s basically said we are wrong, that he knows what he’s doing and that he doesn’t need to do any of those things. He’s just moved in with one of my sisters as he couldn’t afford the rent at his flat anymore and she offered him a place to stay. Although they don’t always get on very well so it’s unlikely to last long.
He’s told my sister that we offered to help him move with DH’s van, that we offered him somewhere to store stuff, and that he’d asked DH for work and that he would get back to him. NONE of these things are true, he hasn’t spoken to us at all.
He’s point blank refusing to ring up UC or get any kind of job, so he ended up telling my youngest sister a lie about how he needed £20 for a PAYG phone to do that and went out to buy meal deals and chocolate with that money instead (not even enough food for a few days). My youngest sister is the one who has been through the foster care system, is now on UC and has two babies - not really someone he should be begging for money.
I appreciate this is insanely long but I’m just at a loss as to what to do. I’m having frequent panic attacks about it all, because on the one hand I don’t want him to end up homeless but on the other he’s point blank refusing to do anything that would help himself. As someone who has suffered manic depression and PTSD I know that it can be difficult to get help, but this has been a cycle of relying on his sisters for so long now and I feel like every time we save him he becomes less independent and thinks we’ll save him forever.
AIBU to not want to deal with it anymore?