How to deal with a thief in the family.

[Demosthenes_]

                In early April I had discovered my debit card was missing. A few days before I had let my brother borrow the card. He wanted to borrow it and had 3-4 times before, with me, to cash cheques. He would not go to his bank because he said someone was taking money out of his account. I eventually found out he had overdrawn and did not want to pay it back. We would typically go to an ATM, deposit the cheque and then I would take out the amount that was deposited. This was typically done at night because that is when he claims to have free time. The last time he needed to cash a cheque I had a fever and did not want to get out of bed but he pushed on that that he needed the money. I told my brother my pin and gave him my card. He was gone a normal amount of time. When he came back, he told me he cashed the cheque and then asked me stuff about how I was doing. I did not suspect anything but I was also disoriented from being sick.

 

   5 days later I went to buy something online and found that my card was not in my wallet. I began to search and had no luck in finding it. I assumed my brother left my card somewhere in my room if not in my wallet, but it was nowhere to be found. I checked my balance online and found a great deal of money had been missing from the time my brother had cashed his last cheque to the day I found the card missing. After I cancelled the card I tried to contact my brother. I messaged him via Skype and he responded saying "word up home skillz" when I asked him about my card. He would not respond afterwards to any messages or phone calls from myself or any of the family. This is not normal since he is close with most of the family, including myself. After 3 weeks of trying to contact him, I said, "if he actually took the card he probably would have at least given it back and would talk this out, so he must not have the card", and I called the police. The bank would not handle this matter since someone other than myself knew the pin (my brother), so it was all in my hands. I waited the 3 weeks because my brother has a history of going to jail and deep down I knew he did keep the card. If he was found guilty, he would surely have a have a terrible punishment for fraud and theft. His wife would not be able to support their child, pay rent, and support my bed ridden sister who lives with them, so I want to avoid severe punishment since it would hurt more than my brother.

 

  There were some technical difficulties with my phone when talking to the officer which would lead him to not calling back. Before I figured out the issue with my phone, I was told my brother was in jail but not for stealing my card. He was in jail for something he had done years ago, though he already served for it, it was in the system that he had not. After 2 weeks he was out of jail and I was still timid about calling the police because I  sympathetic when I heard he damaged pelvis while in jail and was/is suing. I would be in contact with my brother again once he was out of jail and this time in person. While talking to him, I showed him the balance report and where the withdraws were taken. Before talking to my brother in person I knew for a fact my brother had kept the card since his wife ended up finding the card, while he was in jail, in their car. He told me which ones he did and pointed out some of them which he did not do. Considering he had the card while the withdraws were happening and over a month and a haf after, I know he did all the withdraws. After we talked he told me he would pay me what he confirms he took and we would investigate the others.

 

  My intentions in this is to get my money back. However there are people which depend on my brother and I do not want to see them go down a bad path because my brother is a thief and I and vengeful. It has been almost 3 weeks since I last spoke to him and we are playing the game of me attempting to get in contact with him and he ignoring me, again. I feel I have 3 options. I can call the cops again, I can go to his house, which he will likely tell me everything I want to hear while not paying me, or I can threaten him with a contract stating he needs to pay me X amount a month or I will bring this to court. However, people depend on my brother and I do not want to hurt them since they didn't steal money from me and do not want to hurt them by my brother going to jail, unable to provide for them. I do not  want to keep playing the attempt-to-communicate game since it is getting me nowhere and my brother has made it evident he is okay with lying to me. And the third option, I feel is coercive because I am threatening him to give me something, assuming the contract would be effective. I know I am compromised in this decision simply because he is my brother. Some non-compromised advice would be appreciated.

[thelizardking52]

Hi demosthenes_ 

 

I'm sorry that you are in this bind. I too have a brother who I consider troubled and for seperate reasons than yours, I don't keep contact with him. I'd like to give you my perspective as I don't have the answer, but maybe I can help you to reach the answer that is best for you. 

 

First of all, your brother sounds very troubled and misguided in life. I assume that there was abuse somewhere. I can definately relate to this, but you probably had similar experiences as him and we don't all become thieves or criminals from them.

 

He may actually care about you to one degree or another and may feel some amount of shame about what he has done.  You probably will have a very hard time knowing this or if he ever feels any remorse or is just trying to keep your relationship alive ( to later prey on you in the future).

 

If he is avoiding you clearly he has no intention to pay you back, probably ever. I really don't know what amount of money you lost but I assume it's a big enough amount that it has caused you some amount of stress or trouble.  

 

Now, your sister is bed ridden and living with someone who isn't financially responsible and has criminal tendencies. Are you or someone else in your family able to provide care for your sister whether it be long term or short term?  I mean, maybe that isn't the best environment for her and she may actually not want to be there.  I don't know the whole situation but I have to ask this on her behalf.  

 

You likely don't want your brother's kid to lose his father due to you calling the cops. I don't recommend you have your brother go to jail over this, as you said you don't want anyone else hurt over this. You probably won't get the money back. I do want to ask you this, do you think your brother taking the money would go to bad activities like drugs or something else destructive or actually to something unselfish like groceries or paying bills? This is an important consideration. It still doesn't clear your brother of blame.  If he did this to get some kind of a fix for his own selfish purposes I'd be inclined to cut off ties to him either forever or until he VOLUNTARILY decided to pay me back because the money wasn't worth losing a brother over and more importantly  it's the right thing to do. If he did it to pay the light bill for his wife,kid, and your sister, then I'd consider not even stressing him about it and actually telling him " pay me back, when you can. I still love you, but you hurt me greatly and lost my trust and I don't know when or what it will take for you to earn it back."  

 

These are only my thoughts on the matter and not at all a guide for you to go by. I certaintly don't know enough to tell you what is right in this situation but  definately feel for you and wish you the best.  I hope I helped you somehow with this post. 

[Dylan Lawrence Moore]

How much money are we talking about here?

[Demosthenes_]

How much money are we talking about here?

I will say that it is near a grand. I am also a college student, so this amount of money does mean a lot to me. However it wasn't necessarily the amount of money which bothered me the most, it is the fact that he ignored me and then lied to my face about it. It is very possible that I did not communicate to him well enough that this money is important to me, despite his own financial problems. However, I have lent him money in the past, so he would be used to asking me for money rather than stealing it.

 

Hi demosthenes_ 

 

I'm sorry that you are in this bind. I too have a brother who I consider troubled and for seperate reasons than yours, I don't keep contact with him. I'd like to give you my perspective as I don't have the answer, but maybe I can help you to reach the answer that is best for you. 

 

First of all, your brother sounds very troubled and misguided in life. I assume that there was abuse somewhere. I can definately relate to this, but you probably had similar experiences as him and we don't all become thieves or criminals from them.

 

He may actually care about you to one degree or another and may feel some amount of shame about what he has done.  You probably will have a very hard time knowing this or if he ever feels any remorse or is just trying to keep your relationship alive ( to later prey on you in the future).

 

If he is avoiding you clearly he has no intention to pay you back, probably ever. I really don't know what amount of money you lost but I assume it's a big enough amount that it has caused you some amount of stress or trouble.  

 

Now, your sister is bed ridden and living with someone who isn't financially responsible and has criminal tendencies. Are you or someone else in your family able to provide care for your sister whether it be long term or short term?  I mean, maybe that isn't the best environment for her and she may actually not want to be there.  I don't know the whole situation but I have to ask this on her behalf.  

 

You likely don't want your brother's kid to lose his father due to you calling the cops. I don't recommend you have your brother go to jail over this, as you said you don't want anyone else hurt over this. You probably won't get the money back. I do want to ask you this, do you think your brother taking the money would go to bad activities like drugs or something else destructive or actually to something unselfish like groceries or paying bills? This is an important consideration. It still doesn't clear your brother of blame.  If he did this to get some kind of a fix for his own selfish purposes I'd be inclined to cut off ties to him either forever or until he VOLUNTARILY decided to pay me back because the money wasn't worth losing a brother over and more importantly  it's the right thing to do. If he did it to pay the light bill for his wife,kid, and your sister, then I'd consider not even stressing him about it and actually telling him " pay me back, when you can. I still love you, but you hurt me greatly and lost my trust and I don't know when or what it will take for you to earn it back."  

 

These are only my thoughts on the matter and not at all a guide for you to go by. I certaintly don't know enough to tell you what is right in this situation but  definately feel for you and wish you the best.  I hope I helped you somehow with this post. 

About my sister, my brother's family depends on her because she receives disability cheques and my sister-in-law is paid 8 hours a day to take care of her. There has been talk of keeping my sister in nursing home, but she has made it clear that she hates it there. She has never directly said why, but I believe it is because the nurses are not always quick to respond, as my sister has said, and when she is in a nursing home, people visit her less often. My sister has stated that the place she would prefer to be is living with my brother, even though she also complains about being constantly neglected - I have a feeling more than if she were in a nursing home - such as only eating 1-2 times a day with meals consisting only of a bagel w/ butter or some orange juice and crackers, showering once a week, and they no longer taking her to the bathroom and just giving her one of those metal bowls to do her business in. This is only what she has told me and lying runs in the family, so it may not be the case all of the time or even the majority of the time, but it is a credible story knowing my brother and my sister-in-law.

 

As you guessed it, I do not want to call the cops because I do not want my nephew to lose his father and be raised by his questionable mother alone. Both of his parents are not the best, but they do keep each other in line about what is right and wrong for the child like making sure he reads a book a day or brushing his teeth. My nephew is 3. On the flip side my brother lives a dangerous life with some illegal activities which I cannot completely confirm them all, I do have my suspicions. I know my brother does buy and smoke marijuana for recreational reasons, his wife also partakes and encourages it. It bothers me knowing that my nephew may grow up having a father in his life who is constantly in and out of jail while his wife simply says, "oh, your brother is in jail again", and then goes on with her day.

 

For the most part, though I know my brother does buy weed, I feel like the majority of the money goes to supporting their life style. My brother is a freelance software developer but I have a feeling he works no more than 15 hours a week. I know this because I often see him on Steam (a digital video game distribution and social network software) before I go to work/class and come back and still see him online. After I ask him what he did, he often responded with "relaxed" or "played X game." His wife has much of the same condition. She proclaims to work 60-90 hours a week, yet they often go on vacations to see her parents which is 3 states away, as well is always at their house whenever I try contacting them. If the neglect my sister states is true, I would be impressed if she actually works more than 20 hours a week. It is most likely they used the money which was taken to allow them to keep living a more lax lifestyle.

[thelizardking52]

It sounds to me like your brother and sistern in law have their priorities screwed up. It sounds as if they care more for their fun and free time than the well being of your sister and nephew.  Maybe you can spend a few days to a week at your brother's to see how they are treating your sister. At first they will be on their best behavior so you may have to  stay a prolonged time so you'll get an idea of how they treat her to see if she needs to be in a better environment. They will fight this if it's income to them and the well being of your sister will probably not be on their minds but rather the money they stand to lose.  Doing this may sever your relationship to them as well.

 

About the money you can only decide if you want to keep a relationship with a brother that would rather steal from you than work full time to take care of his responsibilities. He sounds like a lazy, selfish, and dishonest person to me.  You could call the cops but it's not really going to help your nephew or sister. You might be able to use the card stealing event as leverage if you decide to get your sister out of there. 

 

If you act as if nothing happened then it's likely to happen again or something like this. Honestly, if I care and love someone then I wouldn't steal from them or do harm to them. That, more than the money, is what would hurt me the most.  I'd think real hard how you want to handle this and be ready for consequences because what you do may likely change your relationship with them forever. Make sure your ready to take that step if it's what you decide and try to evaluate your sister's condition over there first if you can.  

 

You'll have to figure out what you think is best and no answer will be easy.

If it wasnt your brother that stole your money but rather a classmate, what would you do? I know the relationship isn't the same but just because he's your brother doesnt mean you are obligated or owe him anything. Just something to think about.

[Demosthenes_]

It sounds to me like your brother and sistern in law have their priorities screwed up. It sounds as if they care more for their fun and free time than the well being of your sister and nephew.  Maybe you can spend a few days to a week at your brother's to see how they are treating your sister. At first they will be on their best behavior so you may have to  stay a prolonged time so you'll get an idea of how they treat her to see if she needs to be in a better environment. They will fight this if it's income to them and the well being of your sister will probably not be on their minds but rather the money they stand to lose.  Doing this may sever your relationship to them as well.

 

About the money you can only decide if you want to keep a relationship with a brother that would rather steal from you than work full time to take care of his responsibilities. He sounds like a lazy, selfish, and dishonest person to me.  You could call the cops but it's not really going to help your nephew or sister. You might be able to use the card stealing event as leverage if you decide to get your sister out of there. 

 

If you act as if nothing happened then it's likely to happen again or something like this. Honestly, if I care and love someone then I wouldn't steal from them or do harm to them. That, more than the money, is what would hurt me the most.  I'd think real hard how you want to handle this and be ready for consequences because what you do may likely change your relationship with them forever. Make sure your ready to take that step if it's what you decide and try to evaluate your sister's condition over there first if you can.  

 

You'll have to figure out what you think is best and no answer will be easy.

If it wasnt your brother that stole your money but rather a classmate, what would you do? I know the relationship isn't the same but just because he's your brother doesnt mean you are obligated or owe him anything. Just something to think about.

This has happened once before. A friend in middle school wanted to borrow a dollar for potato chips. About a 3 days later I asked him about the dollar. He said he paid me back already and acted insulted about it. I know he did not pay me back since we only talked 3-4 times between those days and we never talked about the dollar. What I did is I stopped talking to him and he did the same. I brushed it off as it was just a dollar lost and a friend. I feel the same result is happening with my brother that him and I are just disconnecting from each other and when I try to talk to him about the money, he ignores me or acts defensive when he is forced into the conversation.

 

               If a classmate who had a child, wife, and bedridden sister, then stole money from me, I would try to talk about it. But I also feel I would not think twice about threatening to call the cops. If the classmate were to act the same way my brother is, I would feel guilty about doing it thinking about what it would do to those who depend on him, but I would call the authorities. For a long time the feeling of family has given me a sense of security. For example if I were selling a car and a stranger said, "I will give you 5% now and 5% each week" versus a relative making the same offer, I would likely accept the offer to the relative. I do not expect a family member to cheat me for the sake that we are family. It does sound foolish, but we are two people who will likely know each other for the rest of our life, so we have incentive to not cheat each other whereas the stranger may only know me until the debt is paid or until he runs away with the vehicle. I believe I understand what you are saying though. If my brother felt the same way as I do, he would not have stolen from me. In the very least if he needed money and did not believe I would accept to borrow the sum stolen from me, he would have given the money back voluntarily and not ignored me, much like my middle school friend did.

 

  Associating with my sister and my brother's family is tough. Whenever I am visiting my sister, my brother often asks me to watch his son while my brother and his wife leave the house or all three leave so I am with my sister alone. The only time my sister, my brother and I are together is on holidays. What they are doing when they leave is beyond me. Whenever I ask, they usually just say, "just out." I do feel concerned, but they do not appear to be intoxicated. This leaves me to believe they do not value my sister very much, despite how much my sister would prefer to live with them.

 

  I believe being around my sister gives my brother more incentive to not be around me since he is still ignoring the topic of the money owed. Knowing how my brother's family acts around my sister is not something to happening until my brother pays me back. But, as you know, my brother has no intentions of paying me back, so I may never truly know how they treat my sister. She is still alive after all, so I have that to consider about how they treat her. My sister's health condition is of no sign on how they treat her since she became bed ridden due to drug use and has never shown motivation to become better/healthier. She is still pale, but she has been pale since she became bed ridden. I believe if my sister is in an unhealthy state that it is 50/50 between my siblings. My brother has incentive to lie so his family can keep receiving cheques via my sister; my sister has incentive to lie about her living condition so she does not have to go back to a nursing home. And a thought occurred as I was writing this. It is possible that they are giving her drugs since she has no signs of getting better and would account for my sister not wanting to be in a nursing home.  However my brother has no history of holding or using hard drugs like my sister had

.

  While my sister was in a nursing home, all she would ever do is watch tv, eat, and talk about how painful her physical therapy is, not that there is much happening in her life when your day consists of those three things. Nothing too positive came out of her mouth while in the nursing home. Since she started living with my brother, she appears happier, though no thoughts of becoming physically active. It is not a case that it is impossible for her to be physically active again because she does still have feeling in her legs and several  physicians believes with good therapy she could walk again.

 

  You've given me a lot to think about, thelizardking52. I hope I didn't misinterpret any of your thoughts because you spent the time to read and respond to what I said. I feel when I do the same, I usually like to know the result of what I said. What I believe I will do is attempt to contact my brother one last time. I will contact him via phone unless I find out he will be at a relative's house, which I will have to visit them unexpectedly. If contacting him via phone or in person doesn't work, I will just take him out of my life. My brother has a lot to lose since I am not alone in this. My family (father, mother, step mother, and half brother) are all well aware of what is going on and most of the rest of the family knows my brother stole money from me, but that is all. If telling the whole family in detail about what my brother has done to me, likely resulting in my family ignoring him as well, would not make me feel guilty. The downside I feel to this is if my sister is in serious danger, the only ones who can help her is the family. The direct contact to my sister is through my brother and his wife. If none of the family are willing to talk to them, it could mean bad news for my sister's life. It is only a thought that they are giving her drugs and I am more convinced that they feed her the bare minimum than feeding her bad habits. Even that I am skeptical of due to her weight gain and stagnation over the months.

[thelizardking52]

I had a cousin that I grew up with and we were pretty close. One day she needed money to pay her car insurance and I paid it for her. I was nieve at the time and paid the whole year's insurance which was $600, assuming she was actually buying insurance which I have my doubts at this point. She was someone I trusted, as I grew up with her and she was always closer with me than other family members. She would even stick up for me when my brother bullied me.  After I lent her the money I only spoke to her about two more times and she would keep mentioning that she wanted to pay me back and I reassured her it was alright and I wasn't concerned. After that pair of times that we talked briefly together, I never saw or heard from her again. She avoided me like the plague, purposely not being around if I visited her mother. She must have thought I wanted to get the money but I told her mom that I just wanted to see her and I didn't care about the money.

 

It's been about 12-13 years now and I live in another country and likely will never see her again. My conscience is clear about this, but I bet she can't honestly say that.  I stil have no ill will towards her. Myself and a few other people I know, say this: Don't lend money to a person if you aren't willing to part with the money forever. Don't tell the person not to pay you back, but don't expect it to get paid back, otherwise you will open up an opportunity to lose much more than the money you lend. 

 

Sadly, I went by that principle and didn't try to retrieve any money, yet she is gone from my life forever. It is what it is, and I've moved on.  This isn't the same thing you have as your money was stolen outright and not offered, but it was the closest experience to yours that came to mind. 

[Demosthenes_]

I had a cousin that I grew up with and we were pretty close. One day she needed money to pay her car insurance and I paid it for her. I was nieve at the time and paid the whole year's insurance which was $600, assuming she was actually buying insurance which I have my doubts at this point. She was someone I trusted, as I grew up with her and she was always closer with me than other family It's been about 12-13 years now and I live in another country and likely will never see her again. My conscience is clear about this, but I bet she can't honestly say that.  I stil have no ill will towards her. Myself and a few other people I know, say this: Don't lend money to a person if you aren't willing to part with the money forever. Don't tell the person not to pay you back, but don't expect it to get paid back, otherwise you will open up an opportunity to lose much more than the money you lend. 

 

I may be derailing from the original post, but would you say that when you lend out money to a person it may be like paying them to find out if they are virtuous or not? If they do not pay you back, then you have your money's worth and you find out they are not a person worth keeping in your life. If they do pay you back then you also get your money's worth by not spending any money at all but you spend the time in finding out that the person is worth spending more time with. If I'm acting on this in accepting that I may never see that money again, I do not think this view of lending money would be too far off. It is a tough topic for myself and likely most other people on the subject of family and betrayal. Do you believe that family offers security is a fallacy? You could use my previous example of selling a car to a stranger vs relative as an example of what I mean.

 

Now that I look back on it, I would say more of my family members have lied to me than my friends. I feel this is because I choose my friends and not my family. If I play soccer, some of my friends may also play soccer or have some interest because I chose them and we have a common interest. My family may not have any interest in soccer despite my interest. Yet the only thing which keeps my siblings together is that we all came out of the same womb and have spent some of our early years together, but did not choose to. To be more direct, my question is, how much weight does family actually have? Is it all about choosing what I feel is best for me? At the end of the day my siblings are just people like everyone else. It is a tough concept to mull over because I feel I have been propagandized to think family is the utmost important thing. Some of my family members act on that concept and are virtuous about it in they will do things for me and I will do things for them to meet them half way. On the flip side, family members understand this concept and exploit it.

[thelizardking52]

wow, great questions and I think  you should start a new conversation topic with them. 

 

I've had that same idea about lending money. That well, it was a cheap way to find out they weren't deserving of my time afterall.  I don't know totally because I lent a very good friend 1000 dollars (before I lent my cousin in the previous post any money) and he paid me back every dime, then 5 years later or so he avoided me purposely after I lent him only 140 dollars.  So, I guess it's kind of hard to say, maybe it was his value of our relationship more than mine on his…. or maybe I valued him more as a friend than he did to me. In my mind, a true friend doesnt have a money value, it isn't something you can translate from one to the other. 

 

Back to family. I've learned a lot from FDR, that is to say, a lot of my previous beliefs have been confirmed where there may have been doubt and, yes, I still learned  many new ways of thinking.  I had already cut off many family members but I was born into a very screwed up family. I think I would've put up with abuse a lot more had it not been so severe to begin with. For example, I know countless times i've been told as a teenager that I had to love my mother, that I had no choice in the relationship simply because she gave birth to me. This normally came from people who barely knew me and had no idea as to my personal situation.  I am very happy that now having found FDR I've already put the people into my life that are good to me and treat me as any human should be, with mutual love and respect, that I don't have to wrestle with the idea of kicking abusive people out of my life. I already did that a long time ago. 

 

i believe you are correct regarding family members having the ability to be way more abusive and manipulative than friends. Friendship isn't something we are preconditioned to accept, it's voluntary. If your friend does you wrong you feel no obligation to stay in an abusive relationship. Family is unfortunately considered obligatory, and this is where the concept of family is screwed up.  It's one thing if it's a husband and wife, but a whole different matter for children and siblings amongst each other. Husbands and wives picked those relationships. We don't choose our brothers, fathers,cousins, uncles, etc.  Now, that is where many people get trapped into abuse. A large majority of abuse comes from within family members, namely, those we never chose.

 

All this said, we should never try to paint all family members the same color. I loved my father who raised me. A great man he was. He passed away years ago but I'll always love him for being such a wonderful caretaker of me, my brother, and all the other kids he allowed into his home that had screwed up situations. My grandparents too, they were very kind people ( my mother's parents), it was just unfortunate that their daughter was manic deppressive and  schizophrenic w/ drug problems.  I don't blame that on them even if they raised her, since, they didn't abuse her. 

 

I've enjoyed sharing these thoughts and our family history.  I feel no shame in discussing the good or bad regarding family matters, nor should I, as long as it wasn't myself who did something shameful.  

[Demosthenes_]

I'm starting to feel the question, "how to deal with a thief in the family" was  not the reality of this thread. I do feel the question itself is a valid one to ask, but was not the true question I was asking. The other day my brother had visited my parents while I was there. I knew what to do but did not do it; I acted as if nothing happened when something did. I spoke with my father today to ask him about his early life. I already know some of it, but his age 18-24 years are pretty vague because these are the years my father had moved to the US, met my mother and married her. In short, I am my father. I believe this because through his life he often knew what was right, but did not act on it because of X excuse as to why it was not best for someone else. For me, this is not calling the police because it is not good for my nephew even though I'll let myself and others to continue to be hurt by my brother. 

 

The real issue I feel like it is not how to deal with a thief in the family. I think I knew all along and was possibly hoping someone would tell me otherwise so that I did not feel contempt against this person and against how I was brought up by my family, but more importantly, that person. Much of my life and to those I am expected to look up to end up acting in a altruistic way. My mother often needed money to feed whatever she was doing while on her errand runs. In return, my father gave her money for this and took up a second job. My father often spoke of how much distrust and how violent my mother would be to him even though he continued to give her money. She never worked until they divorced and even then forced my brother to do certain things such as take care of his siblings or clean the house on his own when he was 5-9 years old. In the same, I feel I have been trained to be silent to not offend or hurt anyone. My cousin's family depends heavily on the state; they are a household of five and all collect disability, though their disabilities are in question. It was only today I found this out, but all of the family knows of this fraud and scorns it, but does not act on their morals as well associates with their family regularly. I have grown up to not be virtuous in what I believe in because I am expected to be walked on and be sympathetic to the other person because they were in the right.

 

The real question I should have asked was how to accept yourself when you need to get people out of your life. I know what needs to be done, but I do not know how to bring myself to do this. Such as I know how to run a marathon, but I do not know how to train to do that marathon. I have to say that this post is a serious derail from what readers may be expecting in the comments, but it is the truth of the problem. When we see a problem from the outside, such as when you, LizardKing52, asked if a classmate had done this to me, how would I act? I do not think seeing the problem from the outside opens the door to the answer because I know I knew the answer, and very likely others do as well. It is a feeling like being religious, finding a contradiction in your religion but then ignoring the contradiction because it is what you are to believe in. I have done the same thing my relatives have done; they recognize the issue but act as if it does not exist so that they do not offend and put up with being hurt or letting others be hurt while justifying it with "they are family." 

 

Now all of this may be an over reaction to my inability to confront my brother. I know my brother will never pay me back as well I know I cannot easily bring myself to get my brother, and possibly much of my family out of my life. It is true that there is good in my family, but much of them do not live virtuous lives. Outside of this, it is a question of what else is true. Do I really act like my parents or my family for that matter? heck, how applicable is this to others because if this is actually a specialized situation in that I am actually just an apathetic apologetic person, then it would require me to accept myself and change this instead of blaming others around me for my problems.

 

I do not believe anyone wants to be bad (maybe .005% people do) yet still do bad things because of excusing themselves or others for the violence on others. I do not think the people in my family do intend to do me wrong and when they do, they very likely feel shame about it. If there are not direct repercussions such as I do not confront them about it, shame can be an easy thing to over look when you feel power over others and do not accept that is what you/they are doing. In the end, I feel I am my father and my brother is my mother. It isn't that I need to divorce my brother, it is that I need to stop being my father and not make the same mistakes. My father did divorce my mother, but he also did end up marrying a woman much like my mother and in some ways was worse. I can only see the same future for myself. 

[thelizardking52]

First off, you are totally right that in thinking your actions may hurt your nephew, but in the end, could actually help him a great deal. If your brother is a terrible dad and must either change to become a better father due to you calling him out, or your nephew unfortunately has to be in another environment because your brother is that bad, then you may end up helping your nephew/sister and not hurting them. If he is abusing them in some way and you helpe stop that, then, you've done something good. It's tough love, as they say.  

 

I think it is very, very hard to hold people accountable DIRECTLY for their actions, especially people that we expect to be loved by and try to love, ourselves. To blame yourself, or find fault or weakness in your own character, due to having problems in confrontation with abusive people is similar to blaming a victim for feeling the pain from their abuse. In this case you are the victim and blaming yourself, at least partly, because you didn't confront your brother. Don't beat yourself up about it if you struggle in this regard. 

 

I know this isn't quite the same but it's my current reality. I don't call my boss out for not treating me like a human being because he is my boss, and if I want my job I must conform to his abusive world.  He holds some power over me, at least in the moment. He probably doesnt realize how he speaks to us, yet when he is in front of his superior, he too suffers the same treatment that he deals upon us. It's a chain of abuse. Thankfully, it's a very small part of my job and I rarely have to hear from him but I never feel comfortable around him because of it.  I won't blame myself for not acting upon it though. 

 

Confrontation is never easy, and painful to deal with before any positive effects of the confrontation can be felt. Akin to ripping off a band-aid fast. 

 

As per my question to you of how would you react if it were another person doing this, the purpose in asking you this was to make you want to deal with the reality, and not excuse your brother since he is "family". You may have had the answer right there but you weren't happy with that answer so you ruled it out as a possibility. I totally get this and I still have this problem in some facets of my life. I have confronted family members being abusive to me and it was extremely difficult. 

 

I can tell you it's totally different than a boss or other relationship that is unequal. Unless you have some other dependence on your brother I don't know about. Then, if your brother loves you as you love him, when you confront him, you should be on the same level.  Don't feel that he is better, or has a morally higher position, or some resposibility to others,  that gives him the right to his abuse. Demand a fair resolution or else he will have to deal with the fact that it is he who is destroying the relationship, not you. Ultimately, it should be his choice, whether he wants to throw away the relationship.  You have to put your foot down and show him the choices, but that a choice that doesnt exist, is for him to abuse or take advantage of you. Because  people who truly love you wouldn't  do that to you anyways. Either he loves you and wants to make it right, or he doesn't. This is very hard to do, but you can do it. 

 

You don't have to repeat the mistakes you saw your father make. Especially since you are aware of them.  If you want resolution then you must do things the hard way and not ignore the problem.