how to help mentally ill brother, his wife who is sick of it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok again, he is literally homeless though _ his disability benefits are being used to fund a home he's not allowed to live in and he has been hotel_hopping since Friday.

He is on day 2 of intensive outpatient program _ I don't want to enable but do people really advise just cutting bait and hoping he figures out a place to stay? Better to tough love him and hope he gets the picture or help him find a sublet etc? Also how does one get their money back from spouse in this situation? Both names on lease etc.

It is a condition of outpatient programs that he have housing. If he doesn't have it, they will either help him find it or they will have to transition him to inpatient. You don't need to be involved in it.

[Anonymous]

No worde of wisdom, except I'm in a similar spot with my brother except:

1. He definitely IS an addict. He sees a doctor that I refer to as a drug dealer who need to have his medical license stripped and put put behind bars. He gets prescription for 90, yes NINETY klonopin a month for years (it's a highly addictive benzo). He pops them like tick tacs and then guzzles beers.
2. He has spotty employment
3. He's emotionally abusive to my SIL
4. He's emotionally abusive to my mom when she doesn't cater to him
5. He's "diagnosed" with anxiety, but has moments of psychosis. I think he has some sort of severe personality disorder.
6. He owns dozens of guns.
7. He calls me crying all the time about his life, but won't seek help except from his drug dealer doctor.

My SIL is at times just as frustrating because she stays. I feel very very sorry for my niece who is only a toddler. She is fuc&ed with a father like that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok again, he is literally homeless though _ his disability benefits are being used to fund a home he's not allowed to live in and he has been hotel_hopping since Friday.

He is on day 2 of intensive outpatient program _ I don't want to enable but do people really advise just cutting bait and hoping he figures out a place to stay? Better to tough love him and hope he gets the picture or help him find a sublet etc? Also how does one get their money back from spouse in this situation? Both names on lease etc.

You lost me at “money back from spouse” - are you saying that since he’s not “allowed” to stay at the house and is incurring hotel costs, the wife should pay him hotel costs? Or that she has to buy him out of the lease? Or that he will continue to pay half the monthly rent (as a lessee) and wants that money back? If that’s the case, it sounds like they are headed towards separation or divorce. There’s more on the marital problems front going on than just the financial difficulties and MH treatment part. Is your gut telling you they will divorce?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think this thread shows the stigma of mental illness. Telling OP not to offer to help, to not offer support, to say out of it, to not engage, to not get involved in any way.

Listen to the poster who suggested contacting NAMI - they are much better suited to connect you to services and to help you navigate this than a board of people who are acting like mental illness is a horrible character flaw.

Any serious illness can be very difficult on a couple and it isn't strange or a lack of effort or poor character that are the reasons why SIL or brother are struggling. Mental illness (especially with no family support) is really, really hard on families, couples and individuals. You don't just man up and get over it.

The main priority should be getting brother a proper thorough assessment / diagnosis and getting into the treatment program that is best for his condition to figure out how to best manage / treat whatever he has. If your parents can help financially, it can go directly to treatment.

Selling the house in the middle of a mental health crisis would not be a good idea. Nor would taking the child out of stable child care.

OP please contact NAMI or other mental health for family resources in your area.

I also have a brother with mental illness. He is now properly treated and is employed in a stable low stress, still married and a great dad - although it wasn't always that way. We stuck by him through it all, just like we did when my sister had cancer. He still needs to live life in a way that allows him to manage his illness and we support him in that. Remember your brother didn't choose to have a mental illness and isn't just being a difficult, weak person

So, I'm the first PP to suggest NAMI. I've also suggested holding firm boundaries. If you look at my and a few other PP's posts, we're not at all telling the OP not to help, but we're telling her to be cognizant of the help she provides and how that affects her and her nuclear family. This stuff is very, very tough, and it's easy as a sibling to get sucked in and take on more than is your role to take on, to the extent that it severely negatively impacts your health. Now, the OP (or anyone) could reasonably say, this situation is a crisis, I'm going to lean in and then lean out as need be. Fine; easier said than done, and it usually requires assistance (be it NAMI or her own individual therapy) to navigate. Also, it would be different if the OP's brother were, say, grossly psychotic and literally could not function. That doesn't seem to be the case.

Stigma around mental illness may well be the biggest problem people with psychiatric disorders face. It's grossly unfair. Maintaining boundaries does not necessarily reinforce stigma, though. I have a mentally ill sibling who is local, and completely dysfunctional parents, who are also local. I am clear about how I will help and how I will not. As the one in my family who's been responsible for everyone's mental health since I was a kid, I'm not willing to sacrifice my life or my family for them. That doesn't mean I stigmatize mental illness, it means I prioritize my own mental health *while also helping my sibling*. It's not black and white.

I also have a mentally I'll sibling and my hand does not extend very far when my brother does nothing to help himself. I'm not going to be an enabler in his life. Plus he's dangerous and unstable. Many mentally I'll people are. Unless he's under a doctors supervision, I'm out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would fly to CA. Ask your brother to schedule an appointment with the doctor so the 3 of you can sit down and talk face to face. Ask to speak with the doctor alone too, if necessary. Forget about his family issues, his mental health should be the focus.

From one of the pro-boundaries PPs, do NOT do this. It establishes a terrible precedent. Moreover, you can't speak to the doctor alone about your adult brother's health issues, in that the doctor won't disclose anything unless your brother signs a disclosure form. You don't even necessarily want him to do that; he's a reasonably functional adult, not someone over whom you have guardianship. If anyone should take him to this appointment, it's his wife.

Hold. Those. Boundaries.

You speak as someone who has never dealt with mental health issues. It is scary and isolating for the patient. Risk of suicide is real. OP’s brother has reached out to her for hell. It is not the time for boundaries. It is time to help him get a diagnosis and meds.

It is ALWAYS the time for boundaries. There is never a time not to have boundaries with a mentally ill person. If someone commits suicide that is not the fault of anyone, but the person killing themselves.

OPs brother is not a child and is not her child.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think this thread shows the stigma of mental illness. Telling OP not to offer to help, to not offer support, to say out of it, to not engage, to not get involved in any way.

Listen to the poster who suggested contacting NAMI - they are much better suited to connect you to services and to help you navigate this than a board of people who are acting like mental illness is a horrible character flaw.

Any serious illness can be very difficult on a couple and it isn't strange or a lack of effort or poor character that are the reasons why SIL or brother are struggling. Mental illness (especially with no family support) is really, really hard on families, couples and individuals. You don't just man up and get over it.

The main priority should be getting brother a proper thorough assessment / diagnosis and getting into the treatment program that is best for his condition to figure out how to best manage / treat whatever he has. If your parents can help financially, it can go directly to treatment.

Selling the house in the middle of a mental health crisis would not be a good idea. Nor would taking the child out of stable child care.

OP please contact NAMI or other mental health for family resources in your area.

I also have a brother with mental illness. He is now properly treated and is employed in a stable low stress, still married and a great dad - although it wasn't always that way. We stuck by him through it all, just like we did when my sister had cancer. He still needs to live life in a way that allows him to manage his illness and we support him in that. Remember your brother didn't choose to have a mental illness and isn't just being a difficult, weak person

So, I'm the first PP to suggest NAMI. I've also suggested holding firm boundaries. If you look at my and a few other PP's posts, we're not at all telling the OP not to help, but we're telling her to be cognizant of the help she provides and how that affects her and her nuclear family. This stuff is very, very tough, and it's easy as a sibling to get sucked in and take on more than is your role to take on, to the extent that it severely negatively impacts your health. Now, the OP (or anyone) could reasonably say, this situation is a crisis, I'm going to lean in and then lean out as need be. Fine; easier said than done, and it usually requires assistance (be it NAMI or her own individual therapy) to navigate. Also, it would be different if the OP's brother were, say, grossly psychotic and literally could not function. That doesn't seem to be the case.

Stigma around mental illness may well be the biggest problem people with psychiatric disorders face. It's grossly unfair. Maintaining boundaries does not necessarily reinforce stigma, though. I have a mentally ill sibling who is local, and completely dysfunctional parents, who are also local. I am clear about how I will help and how I will not. As the one in my family who's been responsible for everyone's mental health since I was a kid, I'm not willing to sacrifice my life or my family for them. That doesn't mean I stigmatize mental illness, it means I prioritize my own mental health *while also helping my sibling*. It's not black and white.

I also have a mentally I'll sibling and my hand does not extend very far when my brother does nothing to help himself. I'm not going to be an enabler in his life. Plus he's dangerous and unstable. Many mentally I'll people are. Unless he's under a doctors supervision, I'm out.

That's the stigma talking. Some people with mental illnesses are dangerous and unstable, but most are more likely to harm themselves or be victimized than to harm other people.

I also don't do a ton when my sibling isn't taking steps towards improvement, but I do have empathy for them and don't perpetuate stereotypes.

[Anonymous]

OP, do NOT give these people money.

I feel terribly sorry for their child. Would your parents take the baby for a while so they can sort themselves out?

No money. Focus on concrete ways to support the baby. Get yourself to therapy if it will help...BUT...this is beyond you. You cannot fix this. Do not even try. And do NOT enable. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

OP again _ to the person who asked about what I meant by money back from spouse. Both names on lease, his 5k/month disability payment goes to their joint account but she's cut off his access to it _ I just wonder how he's supposed to get food/find a place to live with zero access to any money, even his disability payments? My limited understanding of family law is she can do whatever she wants with the money but can't kick him out of place without abuse (She says there has been none). He doesn't want to force himself into home if she doesn't want him there but even so _ how is he supposed to live if she's cut off his access to accounts?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP again _ to the person who asked about what I meant by money back from spouse. Both names on lease, his 5k/month disability payment goes to their joint account but she's cut off his access to it _ I just wonder how he's supposed to get food/find a place to live with zero access to any money, even his disability payments? My limited understanding of family law is she can do whatever she wants with the money but can't kick him out of place without abuse (She says there has been none). He doesn't want to force himself into home if she doesn't want him there but even so _ how is he supposed to live if she's cut off his access to accounts?

OP, you know there are agencies and attorneys that will help people like your brother, right? Find them and refer him to them. If you want to make a one-time payment to defray legal costs, go for it. But you have got to point out the resources of which your brother can avail himself. He needs to learn to do that.

[Anonymous]

If the disability checks are written to him she can’t cash them unless they are deposited into a bank account with his name on it, meaning he should have access to his money. So how is it he doesn’t have access? If I were him, tomorrow I’d open a new bank account and then ensure that future disability payments are deposited into his new account that does not have his wife’s name on it.

[Anonymous]

Unless he was awarded disability for mental illness so severe that the judge ordered a rep payee that ended up his wife (common scenario to make the spouse or claimant’s mother the rep payee).

But how did she cut off access to the joint bank account? Doesn’t the bank require your brother’s consent to convert that into a non-joint account? Him getting cut off financially seems to be really bizarre situation, unless she’s some crazy woman set on the path of a destructive and revengeful divorce.

My gut instincts tell me what she’s doing can’t be legal. Get legal advice.

[Anonymous]

I think she simply drained the account. Time
To open the new account.

[Anonymous]

Updates?

[Anonymous]

The good update: he's been going to outpatient program for two weeks and is really benefiting from it. He is staying at a friend's place for a week too which he says is really helping with sadness and loneliness.

The bad update: while spending time with his son, he looked at wife's phone while she was in shower and found a number of disparaging text messages to her bff in which she described him as "legit crazy" and said she's biding her time before filing for divorce, trying to decide when best time is to do so and very concerned about her financial liability for any debt. He is devastated, didn't confront her.

[Anonymous]

back again. i feel like every day there is a new gut punch in this situation. SIL has told my bro she is filing for divorce.

then today my brother learns she told a former coworker/friend of his that he has mental health issues, something he had definitely not shared with him. in my book, this has now gone well beyond decent behavior -- spreading personal health information to former coworkers could affect his ability to find work in the future, right? isn't this slander?