Alcoholic brother

[peetieswie]

Hi. Just wondered if anyone had any advice. I'll try and summarise.

Brother has always been selfish and I suspect a narcissist. Doesn't ever ask questions, self important and shows no interest in others.

He's always been a big drinker. Had numerous affairs before he and his wife separated. They have one daughter and she's since had a daughter with someone else.

He moved from abroad to the UK. He owned a business that wasn't doing that well but now makes nothing. They sold their house in the divorce and he lived off the profits and then when that ran out he borrowed money off my mum. He became increasingly hostile and demanding, stopped seeing us and once he'd borrowed £31,000 she said no more. He has been aggressive and threatening.

He tried to get me to agree with him that she was mentally unwell, cruel and unkind. I didn't and then when I told him he had to stop asking her for money and get a job himself he cut me off and I haven't seen my niece since. Last November. She suffers with stomach aches and this can be a sign of stress so in January I made an anonymous referral to social services. They made it really obvious it was me.

He did go to AA for while but then started drinking again. He never really showed much progress but used AA as something to show off about for a while.

He rents and has debt. We know because mum got letters for him to her house about huge debts.

I really miss my niece. If mum dies he will also inherit half of her house. I'm worried my niece will get nothing. I've told my mum to put his daughter to inherit instead of him. I imagine he's taking out loans assuming he can pay it off when she dies (she's old but not ill)

Any advice? I contacted his ex to no success. My niece is missing out on knowing my children. I don't know what's happening with his rental or loans. I don't know how this will play out and how much to push my mum on changing her will.

Sounds like the alcoholism is just a small part of it,your brother sounds like a total nightmare. Theres not much you can do as an alcoholic has to realise for themselves that theyre an alcoholic and want to change. If they're forced into rehab when they dont want to they'll just either come out and take up where they left off or do it secretly. Good luck.

Thanks for your response. It's so frustrating but you're right about not being able to help. He isn't open to any help unless it's giving him money

You didn’t cause it
You can’t control it
You can’t cure it

The mantra of Al-Anon.

Either an alcoholic hits rock bottom and decides to go to rehab or they carry on drinking,mess up their lives and probably die from the effects. No one should be lending / giving money - it’s the same as for drug addicts and only tough love will do. Please try to step back from this situation as you will only make yourself ill.

Thanks. It's just so hard when I don't get to see my niece. He has 50/50 care of her. I'm so worried about the impact on her and I'm so sad that I won't have a relationship with her. Also, if my brother does inherit I don't know what will happen. I guess he will stay home and drink all the time and fritter the money away.

1. You can't do anything about his drinking and behaviour (which is all classic addict behaviour, btw) now or later. You didn't say how old your niece is, but really all you can do is care for her from afar, for the time being. Let her know you are there. Perhaps yu can see her when she is with her mother.
2. You do realise him trying to get you to agree to your mother being mentally unwell, etc was/is his attempt to have power of attorney and/or control of her finances. Also known as "elder abuse".
3. It seems to me the priority is protecting your mother. She is elderly, not ill, but she will probably become ill or injured in the future. Depending, this can be a very emotional and bumpy road, which would also put you in contact/conflict with your brother. And once she passes, there will be her estate to deal with, and trust me, no matter the size of the estate, this situation can bring out the worst in offspring. More emotional and bumpy road.
4. One way to keep control of this and protect her is to have the right legal docs in place: Does she currently have a power of attorney for her finances and also one for her health care? These will be very key. If she was unable to make medical decisions for herself, it would fall to one of you, as her offspring. Same for her finances - if she is in a state where she can't manage them herself, someone has to. If she doesn't have these, I suggest you pursue getting these documents together and getting her to appoint you for both power of attorney agreements - not both of you. Or if she has a trust of some kind, these might already be part of this. And she might have appointed other people. If you don't know, please find out. Not always an easy discussion, but a very necessary one. Keep in mind there are a lot of steps, ups and downs, and things that will happen before you get to "who actually inherits what".
5. You might also look into if he has used your mother's name and credit illegally. Like, why are his bills coming to her address? That's suspicious.
6. Just be prepared as alcoholics and addicts don't abide by societal or common sense rules. They have their own set of rules or ways of doing things which have no boundaries or morals. They are exceedingly selfish. More addict behaviour.
7. And lastly, get yourself to an Alanon meeting. Go to a few, find a group you like and keep going, just listen if need be - as I think you will need the insight gained and the support offered valuable. al-anonuk.org.uk/

My sympathies op, my brother was also an alcoholic . As a pp said you can’t control or cure him. You could consider having a relationship with your DN via her mother . He won’t like it but he’s not talking to you anyway.
Try and support and protect your mother. It will be so hard for her to see her DS behaving badly and she will want to give him the benefit of the doubt. I tried to explain that it was the illness that made my DB behave so badly, and thag we had to protect ourselves from that.

Thanks for these responses. I have tried to contact my niece via her mother but got a firm 'I don't want to get involved' She seems to think he is a great dad and her priority is his relationship with my niece and she doesn't want her to go back to him saying she's spoken to me so she's unwilling to help.

I've really tried to get mum to give me power of attorney and she just says 'I'm not ill' and that she needs to think about it. I think she doesn't want to tell someone else and she is worried about what people will think which is ridiculous. She also doesn't want it to look like she's favouring me. I also suggested she write him out of her will and leave his half to my niece as otherwise she won't get any I expect, but again was shut down. As you said, I think it's likely to her unpleasant and messy down the line and I'm truly dreading it.