How to support a struggling family member?

kleigh926 · July 2014

Long story short, my brother and his best friend were caught smoking pot on Wednesday night. They weren't arrested but are being charged with possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia. My brother has kinda been hanging with the "wrong" crowd of people for a couple years now. His friends are nice and not necessarily bad people into bad things, but they hang out in places and put themselves in circumstances where I'm sure drugs are easily accessible. He has slowly been backsliding and getting into some questionable things before this (including having parties at my parents' house when they're away, involving underage drinking with his younger friends and things in the house getting ruined due to said drinking).

My parents are devastated. He still lives at home and so even though he's almost 23, they quite understandably told him that if he's living there he must abide by their rules and quit his lying and destructive behavior. I agree with their reasoning and am also upset. I'm not debating the whole "should marijuana be legal" issue, because I don't even know enough about it. The point is, they deliberately engaged in illegal activities and I'm sad about what his recent actions reflect about his character. At the same time, I want to show him that I care about him and want to help him. We are not super close so I'm not really sure what to say. Anyone have a situation like this and have any advice about what to say or not to say?

kleigh926 · July 2014

Disclaimer: I'm not trying to judge anyone who has smoked pot. It's not something I am personally interested in, but the issue here is more about his lying. He's created real trust issues.

DublinMama · July 2014

I can imagine it's hard to know the right thing to do, especially if you're not close. But sometimes less is more and the right thing to do is nothing, if that makes sense. You could just send a short text or e-mail saying you're sorry he's in a rough patch right now, and you'd love to help him get on the right track if he ever wants some support or guidance with that. Even at the tender age of 23, he's still an adult and has to be responsible for his own messes, both the making and the cleaning up of them.

If he's truly on a path of inevitable destruction, maybe your whole family could do some kind of mini-intervention? Even with that, you could just be present and show support without having to say much.

tamarar5 · July 2014

You can support your brother without condoning inappropriate behaviors. Like @verovladamir‌ said, you can let him know you are there if he needs. He probably knows he made a bad mistake, regardless of which side of the marijuana debate you fall on, he got ticketed and is on the hook for broken/damaged things. That's got to feel terrible. IF/When he reaches out to you, you can be supportive as an older sister, and still let him know you don't necessarily approve of his current choices.

kleigh926 · July 2014

Thanks ladies, I texted him earlier. I just said I heard what happened, sorry that things are rough right now, and that I'm praying for him. He thanked me and said he appreciated it. That's all I'm going to say to him unless he reaches out more. Not sure why I couldn't come up with that on my own, I guess I just felt weird and awkward about the whole thing. I didn't know if I should say anything, but by this time he knows that I know, and I also felt weird not saying anything given how serious of an issue this is for him. He really feels bad and knows he screwed up big time. Just wanted him to know that I'm not condemning/shunning him and that I'm trying to be supportive.

TarheelMama202 · July 2014

I think the most important thing and what he wants most is to not feel judged or shut out by his family. You did the best thing.

Rosebean · July 2014

I think it depends on your brother and how serious your brother is to making changes. Back in May, my brother fessed up to getting caught by the pharmacists for moving around from doctor to doctor to get prescriptions for sleeping pills. He has been abusing them, alcohol and some cocaine (according to him). He's completely unbalanced. He's a selfish, self-medicating woe is me individual who can be really cruel and thinks way too highly of himself. He lies to me all the time and thinks I am too stupid to figure him out. He goes through these moments where he suddenly decides to grace us with his presence, then highs off again, mad at me and my mother for god only knows what reason and refuses to talk to us until he want attention. "look at me, I have problems and I want to change sooo badly, but not badly enough to go to AA or dump my alcohol or take you to my doctor's appointment while I fess up to abusing my prescriptions (so that someone could make sure he was actually telling his doctor all the necessary details)". The last time I saw him was just after Mother's Day. He was back to being his high and mighty defensive self and said he wanted help when his tone and body language screamed "F#!& OFF!!"

So I have been avoiding him. We've been down this road with him over and over and over again. I am so tired of it. I refuse to get dragged into his BS again and I have been avoiding him because if it. And my mom has pretty much confirmed that his period of "I need my family around me" is over and he is back to being the same with her again.

I know that if I get into a confrontation with him to express how I am feeling will only end in a screaming match, or where he will just chalk it up to me being "pregnant and hormonal" so I have chosen to keep it to myself. But honestly, if my brother wasn't the way he is, I would talk to him and try to help him put steps in place to get better. Like offer to help him find an AA class, help him find activities to get him to meet new people and go with him to doctor's appointments. But given my brother is just making noise again over something he has zero interest in being serious about, I refuse to go there. I am not being sucked in again. I am not enabling him and refuse to pet his hair and tell him "hush it will all be okay" just so he can feel better and continue pulling the same stunts. If he wants to continue down that path, he needs to know I won't be going down it with him as an enabler.

If you feel like your brother is nothing like mine, please talk to him. I wish my brother was more open and less self serving where I could make an impact on him. Sadly, there's only so much dancing to the same tune that I can do, and I am done. I hope this helps some. I just wanted you to think about if your brother truly wants the help. If he hasn't hit rock bottom, you may need to watch him slide a bit more before anything you say has any impact. So just be prepared that if you do make a move, he may pretend like he has interest in doing something for the sake of serving his own purposes. That's what drugs do to people. And they don't care if it hurts you when months later you learn things haven't changed or are worse. So don't go in with your blinders on.

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