lostnfound1961

I am 45 and have a ******** brother who is 7 years older than me. My mom died about 16 months ago and now my sisters and I are intrusted to take care of him. I love him dearly but he is making me crazy. His retardation is mild so he is someplace between a man and a little boy. He also has issues with obsesive compulsave behavior and is codependent.

We had him in an appertment and I did all his shopping and stuff for him but it got to be too much and the people around him were taking advantage of him. He also seemed to be getting hurt a lot (heavy things he stacked too high falling on him) and he was getting sick a lot because he wouldn't let us clean in his appartment and he didn't do it either. (Ditry dishes and counters and piles of stuff everyplace) He Would use toylet bowl cleaner on his counters when he did clean them and and not wipe the cleaner off. He has issues with braking things and having a major fit if you don't come over right now or call the cable company to get right over. This stems from my mom giving into what ever he wanted so he would stop rocking the boat.

We put him in a group home about three months ago and this has been a good thing. He has made friends and gone from calling me 15 times a day to 3 or 4 and in some cases, not at all. I am not keen on the spacific place he is, in because I don't feel they care about the people they house. I noticed since he moved in he has not been sick (that was a lot of the calls) Now his calls are about how bad the place is and how the other people are treating him bad. My sister goes over and he is having fun with another client and then he calls me and tells me how this person makes him nuts and he wants him to go away. He will go over the same stuff over and over as if it just happened and work him self into a major lather. He will go from one person to the next trying to get us to agree with him and if we do then he makes more out of what happened.

I'm going nuts here.... Can someone tell me if this is the right place to be for some help or does anyone know of a site for support of siblings are ********?
Help!
D

laurenrt

I don't know of any specific sites but I bet a caregiver support group is out there.

Your brother sounds exactly like mine. I'm 38, he's 43 and lives with my mom. I will be taking care of him then. He has diabetes and is always sneaking junk food so it will be a handful.

Lauren

lostnfound1961

Thanks for the response. My brother too has diabetes and sneeks junk. He sneeks a lot of stuff. Most days are ok but sometimes I just need to talk to someone outside our little world here. My sister and I have been so hoodwinked by him. He has learned how to play the gilt game from my mom sooooooooo well. See we come from a family of Alcoholics and people with Mental issues. My mom and her mom had angziaty issues and unfortunatly we all got caught up in her angziaty (I know I am spelling that wrong) so much that it's a learned behavoir for us kids. We all have buttons and push them.

Off topic,
I love to sing and do Karaoke a lot, mostly at home. I have a song I am working on that I know I can do real well but can't seem to get through without crying. It's by Emmylou Herris and called Bang the Drum Slowly. It's a beautiful song about her dad who had died and it makes me think of my dad who died back in 1988 and even more so, my mom who died less than two years ago. I broak down big time last night. I have a lot of guilt about the day she died. She was in a lot of pain and they drugged her (per her request) into la la land untel she passed the next morning. Growing up, I was the one who put her back together when she fell apart, and I was the one who got her to laugh when all she could muster was to cry and here I was on the day she died, not able to do anything. I could hardly speak to say I love you mom. Once she was under and I knew she would not regain conchesness, I took my brother home and I too went home. I couldn't stand to just sit there and I didn't want to watch her die. I didn't think she would know I took off. NOW...... I feel extream gilt. OK, I just needed to get that out. I better move on and get some work done before I turn into a blubbering mess here at my desk.
Thanks again for the response and have a great day.
D

splendra

I have worked with ******** people. They are indeed people not so different from non ******** people.

I think it sounds like your brother is in a pretty good place for him. He is going thru his process of grief too. Do you talk about your parents death with him?

One thing I love about ******** individuals is their simplistic mind they come with some amazingly clear insights. They do not miss a thing. I wish more people were like them. To me it seems your brother is acting more like a normal person and less like a ******** individual with his ocd and co-dependency self....

Not tooo long ago a ******** person told me they were going to pray for me I can't tell you how much gratitude I feel for that.

lostnfound1961

We talk about mom and dads deaths a lot. He also talks about how much he worries about my sisters and I. He talks about how he would be lost without us. Yes in a lot of ways my brother is normal person messed up than ******** person who doesn't get it.

I spent a lot of time trying to proteect him in my life and I think I did not do him a lot of good by doing that. I used to get so mad at my oldest sister and my dad because they could almost try to hide him out of shame and so I would try to let him be as free as he could be with others because that is his right as a person but...... I have also said, Oh that wont work, he can't do that.... After mom dies he amazed me at what he could do. He much more of a man than I ever thought he could be.

I told my sister (the one who helps me with him) that I am going to try to go with her insight because she is a mom and see's so much more than I do. She seems to have a better understanding of what his needs are and how they can be met without us being 24/7 with him.

It's funny, we grew up not talking much because we were all devided by our own pain and now..... she and I are so close. She told me they other day that she was afraid that once things with my brother were cool, I would back off and not be so close. I made sure she knew that would not happen. It's like I have this family now that I didn't have before.

My sister and I agreed when my mom died that my brother came first and we needed to work together for him. No matter how much we may disagree or get mad or what ever else happened we MUST work together for my brother. I agreed and at first she and I were afraid of each others reactions to speeking out and being open with our feelings. She was more scared than me. (that saprised me) I thought I was the only messed up one because she had a husband and kids and what looked like the perfectlife. She is a bigger mentel mess than me. She worried so badly that I would get angry at her for wanting to put him in a group home. I was real worried about doing it but she was so sure this would be a good thing. I told her she needed to be totaly honest with how she feels and even if I get mad not to worrie. Sounds funny but we grew up with a lot of anger and at least I felt that being angry ment you did not love someone. Well.... I felt they didn't love me. I think she felt the same. We have worked things out and you know what..... I hardly get angry with her and when I do, I don't act out in anger, I talk to her about how I feel and we move on.

My only wish is that my oldest sister would/could join us in this closeness but she is living in an alternet univers. The world of drunken fantacy of the world being just the way you say they are and not the way they are.
Anyway. Thanks for the response.