MissMuss

Good morning all,
Thank you so much for your kind words and support. I've been dealing with addictions for, what seems like, my whole life. I'm 32 years old and so you would think when I discovered my brothers vice that I would have been able to deal with it better. His addiction seems to upset me the most. I'll give a little history. My brother and I are 3 years apart with him being the youngest. We are the only children my parents had and so we were very close. My fathers alcoholism became really bad when Stephen was about 5 or 6 years old. Dad was very abusive to him. Not in a physical way, but in a verbal way. As soon as he fell in the door, after work, he'd call out looking for "the brat". He constantly belittled him and told him he was no good. I'll never forget one evening after he had a car accident from driving under the influence (nobody was hurt! Just the car). My mother was furious and had enough of the booze. To retailiate against her he started to yell at my brother. He told him with a snarl on his lips that "he wished he had just got a *******". Of course my brother knew this meant Dad was saying he didn't want him. My mother left my father, with us in tow, many times. It never stuck tho. She always took us back there But that's a different story. I always rushed to be with my brother as soon as Dad came home. I wasn't afraid of my Dad. AT ALL. 10 year old me would face him front on. I would put myself in front of Stephen or I would physically move him to another room while my mother tried to deal with the drunk. I would do whatever I could to protect my brother. And I believe that's the reason we were so close. I cannot explain my love for my brother. It's as tho he is my son. As years went on Bro began to experiment with drugs with his friends. Ecstasy, cocaine, acid.....he started to rebel. Dad wasn't a huge part of his life arctics point. He had taken a job in a different province and would only be home for a few months out of the year. My bro never went too far tho. He never stayed out for more than a night. More years passed and he moved out on his own (I was already gone by then) and he eventually bought a house. That's when everything started to spiral. He was living in his house for roughly 5 months when we(my mother and I) found out that he was having financial trouble and was afraid he was going to loose his house. Because he had been laid off from work for a couple of months and was waiting for the call to go back we decided that myself and my SO would move in and help with the mortgage and utilities until my brother could get back on his feet. It should probably be noted that I was pregnant at the time and excited to be welcoming a new baby. We moved into his house in December. Within a month I knew I had made a terrible mistake. I only heard about crack until moving in there. I have never been in its presence before that point. And still to this day I have never actually saw it. Just smelt it. Such a distinctive smell!! I couldn't believe he would just smoke it, locked away in his room, thinking nobody knew! I was shocked! I used to sneak into his room when he'd go to work and search for clues to find out what he was up to. All the clues were there. The baking soda, the cut up Pepsi cans with residue left on them, spoons. It took me no time to figure out what he was up to, especially since my cousin had just recently come clean about his addiction to crack. Of course I confronted him. Of course he promised not to do it again. This was a cycle I'm sure I don't have to go into details about. It was just always the same lies and excuses. But I stuck there with him. I want to believe he will overcome this. I want to believe I will not loose him! He went to his union about his issues in hopes of finding support in the form of counselling. He was offered many avenues, expenses paid. They offered rehab centres, group sessions, literature, you name it. He went to a one on one session with a councillor twice. He went to his doctor and was prescribed medication to help combat anxiety and depression. He stuck with it for a week. That was it. He didn't have an addiction, he said. He just had mental issues and he didn't want to take pills to deal with it. He wanted to do it on his own. Of course he failed. He's still failing. I love him so much my heart is breaking. He eventually lost the house. In his defence tho, he has been out of work for quite some time. He's only worked 4 out of the 9 months that we lived there. But I know his drug use had a drastic affect on his finances. It affected mine too! Because myself and my SO we're paying for all the groceries, cable and Internet as well as half of the mortgage and half of the light and power. Bro also had his car repossessed so he was driving mine. I had my son in February and so there were extra expenses on top of the regular ones. It was starting to get tight. I was almost relieved to hear that the bank was taking the house. I was under so much stress that I was losing my hair. I wasn't relieved for too long tho because then I was faced with the decision to take Stephen with us or not. He had nowhere else to go. He talked about going to a shelter. My heart broke. He talked about moving in with a friend. Again, my heart broke. I can't sleep at night with the thought that he was living with another addict because I wouldn't take him with me. He had been clean for a month and so after much discussion with my SO, we decided he could come with us under certain terms. He would pay half of the rent and all the utilities and he'd have to stay clean. And if he did slip up, absolutely not in the house. It was also stipulated that he only use my car for work or appointments or to pick up his daughter for visits (he has one child. She's two and I am very much a part of her life. I love her to death). We have been living here exactly one week as of yesterday. Yesterday morning I woke up to find my car was missing. I texted him immediately. He usually texts back some lie about someone who needed a ride or some other bs story. But this time he didn't. I called multiple times as I usually do. It was supposed to go straight to voicemail as he usually just presses the ignore button but this time it rang through. I called 11 times between 7am and 2pm with it ringing through but nobody answering. My stomach was turning. I was sweating. This was not normal. I knew he was out on crack but it was still not typical of him to not reply at all. we lost my cousin one week after my son was born. His body was found on s walking trail. He had a car accident and broke with femur. He was so out of it on drugs that he got out of the car and starting walking up a walking trail where he eventually gave in to his injuries and died. Alone. His body was found by hikers two days after he died and he was my exact age. We grew up together. Yesterday morning all of those same emotions I experienced the day we found out about our cousin came flooding back. I was panicking and thinking the worst had happened to my brother as well. I discovered my bank card was missing when myself and my mother decided to go get coffee in order to continue with our hunt for my brother. Of course when I realized it was gone I knew exactly where it was. This was not the first time he has stolen from me. I was kind of relieved to check my account and see he was still withdrawing money and so he was still alive. Then the anger came. I immediately reported my card stolen. After another couple of hours of recruiting some of his friends and other family members and coming up with nothing I decided to call the police. I sent one last text to my brother pleading with him to text me back and this time he did. He said "I can never face you again". Again, my heart dropped. My stomach done flip flops. What does that mean????? I pleaded with him again. Reassuring him that he can come back from this. That money is money but he is my brother. That I loved him and so desperately wanted him to come home. He relented and told myself and my mother where he was and to come get him. My car had run out of gas and was left on the side of a dirt road. Further down the dirt road, off into a wooded area is where we found him. In his dress shirt from the night before with black dirty hands and scuffs on his knees. He was weeping into his hands. I never saw a more depressing, sorrowful sight in all my life. He couldn't come back to our home yet because my SO was still mad as hell (completely and totally understandable!) so we brought him to my parents place. He's still there right now. I never slept a wink last night. I'm so torn. I want him to come home. I want my brother back. I miss who he used to be and I'm filled with so anxiety and guilt for him. I know he is struggling and he doesn't want to be this way. I feel so badly I cannot stop crying. I know what everybody is thinking too. That I'm an enabler. You're 100% right. I don't know how to help him. I don't know how to support him. I am not strong enough to deal with this. I'm so lost. Why can't I let go? I feel like for the sake of my relationship and for the sake of my son I need to let him go but i just can't turn my back on him. I'm so consumed with guilt for wanting to move on with my life. I hate feeling this way. I'm so sorry for such a lengthy post. I'm feeling so emotional and conflicted this morning. And even though my SO is my biggest supporter, I feel like I can't talk to him yet. He needs time to sort out his own feelings and thoughts about what happened yesterday and I really felt like I couldn't wait to get my feelings out there. I hope I find my way out of this darkness soon. It's becoming too much.