Hellrazor said:
When your brother is living with a person that likes to spend money but doesnt like to work (has been offered employment but turns them down for various unreasonable excuses), does not discipline/mother her child (with severe learning and social disabilities) and is oblivioius to his health (he had heart surgery at 32 last year - aerotic valve needed replacing).... what do you say to your brother after watching this crap for 4 years and trying to accept it.... Its no longer acceptable....
Advice please: leave it alone or jump right in and ask my brother to give his head a shake?
A few questions. You don't have to answer them if too personal.
Any alcoholism in the family?
Is your brother the very helpful type?
The reason why I ask these questions is that I was in a bad relationship for way too long. What finally brought it to a head was that the person I was in a relationship decided that she wanted a child and stopped taking her birth control without telling me. Needless to say I have a very large Child support payment to deal with every month (Massachusetts really bites). That was the last straw I only deal with her when I pick up and drop off my daughter for visitation. The worse thing is that I'm stuck with this woman for the rest of my life because I love my daughter and want to give her a chance in life.
What I later realise was that I was in a codependent relationship with this woman who basically has "Borderline personality disorder" which causes her to be self destructive at times. I grew up with 2 older alcoholic brothers. One of which had violent tendencies when drunk. This caused me to be a Fixer/ helper. Always believing that they will change or get better. They don't and most likely never will. But this doesn't stop me from trying to help.
There is a school of thought that if you grow up in an alcoholic household you will either become an alcoholic or become a fixer. This has caused me to get into situations where I help people to the detriment of my self. Really tough to deal with. But Now that I'm aware of the codependency tendencies I have I can avoid such situations. Or at least try to.
If you think it might be the case maybe you can read up on it.
Bottom line is that you cannot tell someone else what to do all you can do is make them aware of possibilities of what might be going on. The rest is up to them on how they use the information.
I know this is most likely too much info but I figure it might be helpful.
Good luck