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Dear Prudence: LW expected to care for her brother after mother's death
Older column, but hoo boy. Note: Letter is second in the column.
Dear Prudence,
My husband and I are in our early 30s and hoping to buy a house and start a family within the next few years, but we’re having trouble figuring out how to fit my brother into our plans. My brother has mental health struggles—primarily anxiety. My mother, who has similar struggles, has never wanted to force him to do anything that makes him anxious. Unfortunately, that has included never requiring him to see a therapist, so he is largely undiagnosed and untreated. He is 30 now, has never finished high school and has never had a job. He still lives with my mother and their relationship is unsettlingly codependent. She cleans up after him and is generally at his beck and call. That has always been their dynamic.
My issue now is that she expects me to take over for her after her death. I’ve always known that his care would be my responsibility eventually and my husband and I have discussed it extensively. Our position is that we will make sure he has a place to live, but if he lives with us he will need to be willing to move to wherever we live, coexist with kids if we have them, and maintain a reasonable level of cleanliness. (Ideally, we would also like him to go to therapy and register for disability.) If he doesn’t want to do that, we will happily help him find somewhere else to live. My mom thinks this is selfish of us. She doesn’t want him uprooted after her death and thinks we should move home to be with him. She also thinks he should have a say in whether or not we have kids. To us those feel like ridiculous asks, but her position is that he is family and as his sister I should prioritize him over our careers and any hypothetical future children.
I’ve attempted to talk with him directly, but he refuses to discuss it and will physically walk away from any conversation he doesn’t want to have. Our mom is in her 70s now, and the need to have a plan in place is feeling increasingly urgent. I worry that her complete unwillingness to put any expectations on him is going to make living with him miserable, and I am scared that her opinions (which she shares with him loudly and often) are going to color him and leave us living with someone who resents us. Am I being selfish here? Is there any hope for making our future living arrangements less of a mess?
—Selfish Sister
Dear Selfish Sister,
Your mom loves her son very much. Also, she is being ridiculous. Your willingness to let your brother—who has anxiety, which is treatable, and not a condition that makes him unable to care for himself—live with you if he meets certain conditions is extraordinarily generous. And … maybe unwise. Simply put, it sounds like he’s going to make you miserable. Think of the way he walks away from conversations that he doesn’t want to engage in? You realize he’s going to do that when you ask him to help with the dishes once a week, right?
You’re buying into the idea that responsibility for your brother will automatically transfer from your mother to you. By not questioning this, you’re being almost as codependent as she is. And you’re letting two people whose decision-making you don’t respect shape your family’s future. What if, instead, your mom’s eventual passing is a moment for your brother to take responsibility for himself? If you jump in and house him and take on the mother role—the role that you think has held him back so much—he is never going to have a reason to do the things you wish he would do.
Tell him (in writing if he refuses a conversation) that you’ve thought it over and because he is not in therapy and has not applied for disability, you’re not comfortable having him live with you. You can include information on all the resources he might need in his journey to independence, from sliding scale counselors to job training programs to support groups to local nonprofits that might help him identify affordable housing. And then stop. Don’t push. Don’t ask for updates. Don’t go back and forth with your mom. Your mantra is “They are both grown-ups. They’re making their choices and I’m making mine.”
I’m not pushing tough love as a full solution to your brother’s problems, I’m not naive, and I know that it’s really hard to survive in this country and you probably won’t be able to live with yourself if he doesn’t have a roof over his head. But he should try—and come to you, adult-to-adult, with a proposal about how living with you will look, if he’s unable to make it work—rather than being handed over like a small child in a custody exchange.
Your mom’s role as his caregiver obviously doesn’t look appealing to you. So taking it on should be an absolute last resort.
Dear Prudence,
My husband and I are in our early 30s and hoping to buy a house and start a family within the next few years, but we’re having trouble figuring out how to fit my brother into our plans. My brother has mental health struggles—primarily anxiety. My mother, who has similar struggles, has never wanted to force him to do anything that makes him anxious. Unfortunately, that has included never requiring him to see a therapist, so he is largely undiagnosed and untreated. He is 30 now, has never finished high school and has never had a job. He still lives with my mother and their relationship is unsettlingly codependent. She cleans up after him and is generally at his beck and call. That has always been their dynamic.
My issue now is that she expects me to take over for her after her death. I’ve always known that his care would be my responsibility eventually and my husband and I have discussed it extensively. Our position is that we will make sure he has a place to live, but if he lives with us he will need to be willing to move to wherever we live, coexist with kids if we have them, and maintain a reasonable level of cleanliness. (Ideally, we would also like him to go to therapy and register for disability.) If he doesn’t want to do that, we will happily help him find somewhere else to live. My mom thinks this is selfish of us. She doesn’t want him uprooted after her death and thinks we should move home to be with him. She also thinks he should have a say in whether or not we have kids. To us those feel like ridiculous asks, but her position is that he is family and as his sister I should prioritize him over our careers and any hypothetical future children.
I’ve attempted to talk with him directly, but he refuses to discuss it and will physically walk away from any conversation he doesn’t want to have. Our mom is in her 70s now, and the need to have a plan in place is feeling increasingly urgent. I worry that her complete unwillingness to put any expectations on him is going to make living with him miserable, and I am scared that her opinions (which she shares with him loudly and often) are going to color him and leave us living with someone who resents us. Am I being selfish here? Is there any hope for making our future living arrangements less of a mess?
—Selfish Sister
Dear Selfish Sister,
Your mom loves her son very much. Also, she is being ridiculous. Your willingness to let your brother—who has anxiety, which is treatable, and not a condition that makes him unable to care for himself—live with you if he meets certain conditions is extraordinarily generous. And … maybe unwise. Simply put, it sounds like he’s going to make you miserable. Think of the way he walks away from conversations that he doesn’t want to engage in? You realize he’s going to do that when you ask him to help with the dishes once a week, right?
You’re buying into the idea that responsibility for your brother will automatically transfer from your mother to you. By not questioning this, you’re being almost as codependent as she is. And you’re letting two people whose decision-making you don’t respect shape your family’s future. What if, instead, your mom’s eventual passing is a moment for your brother to take responsibility for himself? If you jump in and house him and take on the mother role—the role that you think has held him back so much—he is never going to have a reason to do the things you wish he would do.
Tell him (in writing if he refuses a conversation) that you’ve thought it over and because he is not in therapy and has not applied for disability, you’re not comfortable having him live with you. You can include information on all the resources he might need in his journey to independence, from sliding scale counselors to job training programs to support groups to local nonprofits that might help him identify affordable housing. And then stop. Don’t push. Don’t ask for updates. Don’t go back and forth with your mom. Your mantra is “They are both grown-ups. They’re making their choices and I’m making mine.”
I’m not pushing tough love as a full solution to your brother’s problems, I’m not naive, and I know that it’s really hard to survive in this country and you probably won’t be able to live with yourself if he doesn’t have a roof over his head. But he should try—and come to you, adult-to-adult, with a proposal about how living with you will look, if he’s unable to make it work—rather than being handed over like a small child in a custody exchange.
Your mom’s role as his caregiver obviously doesn’t look appealing to you. So taking it on should be an absolute last resort.
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For the love of God, LW, do not let your brother move in with you. Just do not. I know it's hard to let someone you love sink or swim, but there is no way this ends well for anyone but your brother, who will continue his current behavior if he moves in with you.
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LW: do NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT move in with your brother. There are options out there for him. From the sounds of it, even kicking in money for a once a week housekeeping service to a very basic apartment so that he's not living in total squalor would be a preferable option to cohabitation.
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Anyway, LW needs to grasp that if her brother moves in her marriage is doomed in the long run, and not ruin her own life.
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I said WHAT aloud when I got to that part.
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LW needs to put her foot down hard on this expectation now. Just No. There's no argument, there's no conditions, there's no negotiation, it's No. And walk out if there is an argument, conditions, or a negotiation. No.
If this fails, LW needs to go extremely low-contact with her parents and move. Just drop an occasional email.