Freya,
That is a sad story, thanks for taking the time to share it. It sounds like you've been through hell. Your experience shares many similarities with where I am at the moment and I will try to learn from it.
It seems very important that I stick to my guns in defining a time limit in which I'm prepared to help my father. I would be remiss to do nothing, but if nothing works - as seems likely - then I'll sack it off as a bad job before it impinges on my own life too much. I'm not sure how much longer that will be. The stop on financial aid is turning into a game with my dad taking every opportunity to tell me how destitute he is and how terrible that all is. Lets see if he's done anything to improve his situation by next month.
Many thanks for all your comments. You've helped hit home how serious the situation is and I think your combined input is going to save me some serious headaches.
--dac