so i am 34M, i am married and own a home with my wife (26f) in Los Angeles. my younger brother is 32M and he has never lived on his own.. lived with my dad until around 24, he then moved into his girlfriends parents house until he was like 28 maybe, they broke up so my dad gifted him a condo that was above his business. he got a ton of free passes with my dad, he trashed the condo, didnt take care of anything, and my dad finally decided to retire and sell it because he couldnt take it anymore. my brother is also on his 3rd car, all bought by our grandfather.
about 3-4 months ago was when he got kicked out, he came to our door begging and i knew exactly how it was going to go. i told him he had one month to get his shit together, and kept caving.
my wife is an actress, and she only books about once every 6 months. she does auditions/classes daily for an hour or two, she mostly does "housewife stuff". I told him right off the bat she was not doing any of it for him, i don’t care if hes working 5 jobs he is doing his own laundry, cleaning, and cooking.
of course he left messes, threw his laundry on the floor, made the argument that he is working full time and she’s not.. i was like, this is HER home? then when i told him he’d have to pay bills 2 months in, he got mad and said she does not pay bills.. she is my wife and she takes care of our home. Anytime i told him to stop making extra work for her he would say "she’s a housewife, she’s doing it for you so i don’t understand why she cant for me". he even asked why i get to have my laundry done, and meals cooked for me but he cant and "works as much as me".
It drove me crazy, he also would make noises while my wife was in auditions which was frustrating for her. not even accidental, like screaming watching a sports game 5 seconds after we told him she was going on zoom.. this was one of my breaking points. she has dedicated her whole life to this, since she was like 9. when i started making good money the first thing i was excited about was that she could focus on her dreams.
she finally got a good agent, her auditions she gets are huge and she is on cloud 9. as soon as he started doing this i noticed she was getting stressed, one of the main issues is he works nights.. he was there all day while i was at work and if she asked him to be quiet he did not care. he said he didn’t consider it a career and he didn’t think she’d make it so he didn’t feel the need to care. as if her making it or not changed anything about it being her home, and her dreams. if i was home and told him to shut up, he would. however during the day he did not listen to her and made her cry. That was the day i told him to get out, he’s had enough free passes. its time to grow up. my other brothers got mad, said i’m heartless because he’s struggling mentally… but the guy has been struggling mentally since he was 16 and has never attempted therapy, meds, anything. he just cries and relies on everyone to do everything.
NTA – the only reason your other brothers are upset is because they know he’ll be knocking on their doors next.
NTA
If your other brothers have a problem with it, they can take him in.
YTA to your wife, he sounds like you knew exactly what was going to happen, you told your brother at the start he had a month, you laid down the rules and let him break them all. You let him stay longer and it took him making her cry for you to finally kick him out.
This!
He owes it to her to remove the brother a month ago, at the very least immediately.
You knew exactly how it was going to go and it did go exactly how you thought. You owe it to your wife to get him gone now.
Your other brothers are only mad because he’ll come to them next.
For kicking him out? NTA
For letting him move in at all? That was the AH moment. It’s like the Scorpion and the Frog story.
YTA for letting him stay there.
NTA. Mental health issues are an explanation, not an excuse. Sounds like your brother’s issue isn’t mental health so much as being an AH who also happens to have mental health struggles.
Does he even have a legit diagnosis? No diagnosis, no treatment, no therapy? That’s a no go.
no diagnosis. for years he has threatened our family/his ex with suicide if they didn’t help him. after i kicked him out he texted my wife saying he was going to go drive off of a cliff. Thats how he kept his ex around for years, every time she tried to leave he threatened to end his life.
i didn’t know about him doing that to her at the time or i would have stepped in, but as soon as i saw that text i was done with him completely. not only is he kicked out he is blocked, i know he texted her instead of me because she’s my weakness and he assumed if he upset her enough id tell him to come back
i even offered to pay for his therapy while he was staying with us and he got mad.
That’s it? The whole family is convinced he has a mental illness because he uses the threat of suicide to manipulate people into doing what he wants?
He’s not mentally ill. He’s an AH who figured out the words to use to get his way. He doesn’t want therapy because he knows what he’s doing and it *works for him*.
The people who still fall for his BS can be the ones to provide him with shelter. You already opened your home and he abused the privilege. It’s their turn.
Mostly YTA because you let him move in. Then when it got worse, you waited months before kicking him out.
She got an agent! FFS what an accomplishment! He actively sabotaged your wife’s auditions. Your wife suffered due to your procrastination with mishandling your brother.
i agree, i have a ton of regrets. i thought maybe it was my chance to help him down a better path, but i should have kicked him out sooner.
It’s so hard to cut off family when you hope they might finally turn around. When mental illness takes over it’s often after great memories were made in childhood and it’s complicated.
I hope things work out for you and your wife and for her professionally. Ideally your brother chooses to get the help he needs. In my opinion, NTA. Your brother needs an in patient mental health rehabilitation. Hopefully he’d go voluntarily.
YTA for exposing your wife to this mess.