What would you do in my situation?

[Alwaybkind]

My brother left rehab yesterday as he wasn’t able to sleep for 7 days he finally cracked and left after being there for over two months. He has lost his place at the rehab now. I went and found him and now he is in an Airbnb 5 minutes from me an hour away from our hometown where he usually lives. Mum is staying with him too to keep an eye on him.

Im willing to commit and allow him to move in with him whilst we get him back on his feet. DH thinks I’m wasting my time. Our life is stressful as it work and kids. But I don’t feel like I can just abandon him.

But I think if we both pull together and support him we could do it.

Am I being completely bonkers? I’m willing to give him one chance.

Really pleased to hear that @Locutus2000. It gladdens me.

I think it's really important to humanise addiction, whilst also separating the person from the addiction.

BUT when a person is engaged with active addiction, that is a choice they make every day.

The whys and wherefores are secondary, because it may have started as an escape, but now it's become The Thing.

And you can't sort the reasons out until you address The Thing.

It's so cyclical.

And it's why alcoholism and drug addiction are known as 'family diseases'.

Because it affects everyone in the family, down to a mirroring of the use of substances to escape from the effect of the use of substances.

Protect your home at all costs. It is a safe place for your children and a haven for you. Whatever action you take to help your brother, do it out of your home. Your first responsibility is to your children not to disturb their safe, stable home. They don't have the option to leave and go elsewhere, they're completely dependent on you.

I completely understand your desire to help your brother but your first responsibility is to your children and your husband. I think you'd be wrong to bring your brother into your home against your husband's wishes. He is rightly being protective of his children's safety.

Can you go with your brother to your local council and try and sort out housing for him? Could he stay with your mum? It sounds like he might be wavering in his sobriety if he has left rehab and he is at high risk of relapsing. He needs to get support quickly from local addiction services, however they will take a dim view of him leaving rehab. Is there any way they'd take him back if he agreed to return?

Am I being completely bonkers? I’m willing to give him one chance.

@Alwaybkind Yes - you are completely bonkers, although I understand how much you care for him and want to help. The thing is, he has already had 'one chance' and he walked out - or perhaps more likely was thrown out for using again? You can't ever know whether an addict is telling the truth. He walked out, because he wasn't 100% committed, either way. It needs to come from him.

It is well known ( and there are posters on here, who have much more intimate knowledge of addictions, who are saying this too) that trying to help him is actually the opposite of helping. It is enabling him to stay as he is. Every addict has to reach their own 'rock bottom' before they can start to really want to change things.

Your thoughts do you credit, but you really must not offer to put him up. (Neither should your Mother, for the same reasons), which not a few posters are suggesting. You have to think of your children and your DH. point him in the direction of the Council or other help, but you can't do more

If you want to wreck your marriage and turn your family home into an emotional (and possibly financial) wasteland then go ahead. I speak through bitter experience. You will, without a shadow of doubt, regret the day you let him live with you. You're beyond naive to think you'll get him back on his feet and you'll never get him to leave your home. Your children will suffer and your DH will walk out. I see your future. Please don't do it.

Please don’t. You cannot cure an addict. The only person that can do this is the addict themselves.

This could do untold damage to your children. Don’t do it.

But OP may not feel or respond to situations in the same way as you and not all addicts will act in the same way.

There may be a deep history as to why OP feels she needs to help. She has to do what she feels is right and what professionals advise. Not what an anonymous forum advise who know nothing about the situation.

You admit you have never been in this situation. Plenty of us on here have. There are some very common themes if you look carefully.

No professionals worth their salt would advise anyone to take on something or someone who potentially exposes their young children to an alcoholic or drug abuser, for all the reasons others have explained.

Anyway, she said that her brother had walked out on the professionals, not that anyone had advised her to take him on.

I've been in precisely your situation, OP. My brother is an alcoholic, now in recovery for 18 months. Our parents are dead, and by way of family I am all he has.

I did what you did. Put him through rehab, making a massive hole in our bank accounts in the process. It didn't work, of course. Only when he was in an advanced state of cirrhosis and practically at death's door, spending over a month in hospital whilst they detoxed him again and nursed him back to health, did he see the light. Sometimes, this is what it takes: a straightforward choice to die or to live.

Of course, as loving sisters we go into rescuer mode. That's understandable. But you have to keep yourself at a distance to preserve your own and your children's wellbeing.

Our father was an alcoholic too. I saw a lot as a child that I shouldn't have seen. Please, OP, do not expose your children to this. It can become a pattern within families, sadly.

An addict will steal. An addict will lie. An addict can become abusive. An addict will stay in denial in the face of all evidence to the contrary. It's the nature of the disease. The only thing they care about is their next fix. And there comes a point where, if you're not careful, you will end up enabling their addiction. Sometimes tough love is in their own best interests because they really do need to feel the consequences of what they do if they're to have any hope of change.

I feel for you so much. It's a rough road to travel when a loved one is an addict. Are there any local family support groups, such as those run by the Forward Trust? They helped me no end.

Sending all positivity to you. You are allowed to look after yourself as well.