Reply to Worried I will be supporting my troubled (adult) brother

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]If he isn't on disability and has never held down employment then i have to assume your parents have been enablers.  I know of a few families in this predicament and the parents often have enabled the adult child's behavior.  This is not your fault.  The best thing for you to do is to communicate to your brother that you will NOT be supporting him or helping him after your parents die.  Make sure he gets you're serious.  He has probably talked your parents into supporting him throughout his life and wont take your talk seriously.  Youn need to make sure to be clear that you aren't your parents. [/quote]

This. Do NOT enable this ridiculous behavior. My family is full of these people. It's insane. My dad just died, and my mom is already talking about buying her sister a house. I just tell my mom that it's her money and she can do with it what she wants, but I will NOT support her if she runs out. [/quote]

Mental illness =/= laziness. That's an unfair categorization. Mental illness can be crippling; chronic absenteeism is one of the first signs of serious depression.

OP's brother sounds like my SIL. SIL is able to work, and has short spurts of work, but inevitably her life tumbles out of control and it impacts her job resulting in her termination.  To boot, she now has a conviction, making it that much harder to get work. It would be MUCH IMPROVED if SIL got on medication, but trying to convince someone off of medication that they need meds is very, very hard to do.

Others have suggested disability. The reality is not that simple. You may need a good lawyer to help you navigate the process, and expect for the SSA appeal process to take about 7 years. Depending on where you live, there may be state laws that hinder or help your efforts to get your brother declared incompetent or disabled. Some jurisdictions are very hands-off, essentially preserving the rights of the individual to self-harm/self-destruct.

DH and I are discussing what we'll do in a similar very similar to what you're facing. We're projecting having to support living expenses. Yes, we are not obligated to provide her anything; neither are her parents. But she's family, and making sure she's not homeless is what we feel is the minimum we should be doing.[/quote]

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