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My brother's story (long) (self.becomeaman)

submitted by [deleted]

Have you seen "My Idiot Brother" with Paul Rudd? I think my brother will be Paul Rudd when he gets older. My brother is 24 years old, I'm 26. It's just the two of us (besides our half-siblings). When we were growing up, we spent a lot of time together because we were close in age, and we had a lot of the same friends. As a child I remember him as creative, playful, fun, generous to his friends, and agreeable/diplomatic. He never got into fights (except for me of course!) He was popular in school and within our extended family as well. When he was younger, he was athletically inclined, but he was a late bloomer so he couldn't compete when the other guys his age hit puberty. Thankfully, around this time time he realized he was musically inclined as well, he started playing the guitar and going through that classic rock discovery phase. He thought it was cool to be a hippie, he grew his hair out. He could sing too, so he started going out for musicals, and because boys in musical theater are so valuable, he would get all the big parts and then he was popular with the theater girls too. Seemed like he always had more girls in love with him than he even knew.

He was/is very intelligent, but unfortunately not in that way that schools encourage. In first grade, his teacher would report that he was "spacing out" in class, which no one in the family took seriously as a problem. It seemed normal for a little boy with an active imagination who just loved dinosaurs and Star Wars to be bored in school. I had the same "problem", although I wonder if it wasn't as noticeable to my teachers because what I would do was just draw all the time. When we got older, we both started doing badly in school. But somehow, and this never seemed fair to me, I always passed my classes and he started failing.

Our parents divorced when we were in 7th/6th grade. Our dad financially abandoned us, and our mom had to work really hard. I could go on about how my dad is a joke of a man and my mom is inspirational in the way she was a RedPillWoman and a single working mom at the same time, but this isn't the place. Neither my parents' marriage nor the broken home was an ideal family to grow up in. Maybe I was old enough to be responsible for myself by the time things fell apart, but I think my brother was too young, and as the baby of the family he was used to being coddled. Other kids' parents knew when they had projects due or exams to study for, our mom wasn't able to stay on top of him.

We both worked minimum-wage after-school jobs in high school. When I graduated, I quit and moved away to go to college. When I would see him again, he seemed angry and angsty. He spoke to our mom and I less and less. I tried to understand, knowing I had gone through my angry-teen days and came out a more mature person. But then, he barely graduated high school. Almost failed his senior year. Definitely not going to college. I became frustrated at my mom's lack of ability to parent him. We were on our feet financially by then, the business she started had grown. There was no reason she had to be so neglectful. On the other hand, I also wanted to see him take responsibility and be a man, not a boy who needs his mommy! I don't know if he ever really thought he was going to be a musician or something, even his rocker buddies seemed to be forming bands, recording music and publishing it on MySpace while he just stood by. Seeing him work that job was good, he knew he had to be on time or there would be consequences.

I don't really know what happened, but after high school and during community college, he was fired from his job. After three years of working there! Maybe it had something to do with his mistakes catching up to him, but I don't think it was one big thing. It was a big faceless corporation, I assume it was some unfortunate three-strikes thing. Anyway, I think that hurt his self-esteem a lot. So then he started doing really poorly in community college, failing his classes. He decided to quit, and I guess our mom didn't know what to do besides support him as an adult who can make his own decisions, even if he was still living under her roof and completely relying on her.

Around this time, we were both given a generous financial gift from one of my mom's clients. It was intended to be used for school, it helped me do a study abroad program. My brother had been trying to find another job, but this was right after the 2008 crash and that made a good excuse for what was probably him not trying hard enough. Everyone also seemed to agree that the problem was our SoCal suburb. He wanted to move to San Francisco where some of his friends moved after high school. So the deal was he could use that money to move, assuming he would eventually find a job. Also, the hope was that living on his own would teach him responsibility.

That was a huge mistake. He didn't even try to look for a job, I know because I talked to his friends. Even his girlfriend dumped him because he was being such a loser. My mom started to write him checks, which really pissed me off because I was in school and I really needed the money. In return, he would ignore her attempts to contact him. He fucking missed my college graduation. Worse, when our mom got sick and hospitalized, she didn't want to try and contact him, but I did, and you know what? He didn't even try to call back. I'm going to have a hard time ever forgiving him for that time in our lives. Eventually, me and my mom had to drive all the way from SoCal to San Francisco to confront him and help/force him to move home since no one was going to pay his rent anymore.

So he's back home with mom, and apparently still trying to find a job, which I doubt was happening. He complained of anxiety/panic attacks, but he wasn't interested in getting professional help. Time seemed to move slowly. My mom by then had fallen for a great guy and they were ready to move in together. So that made my brother's place in my mom's life a big question mark. Sometime around then, my brother discovered WWOOF and started taking off on trips to volunteer. I thought that was really good for him. Everyone used to say he should join the military, and this was basically as close as it gets to the military for a hippie like him. It's not a job, it's not even job training, but it's got him out and about instead of trapped in his room on the internet. But still, after two months on a farm in Oregon, he comes back home, with his hand open to mom.

It's weird for me to look at him these days. I've been working consistently ever since high school, I don't need mom's helping hand anymore and I'm really proud of that. With all the financial hardships we faced, it was my only goal after finishing college to not need my mom anymore and let her live her life. I think my mom has handled it with my brother the best she could, though it's been really hard for her. She refuses to give him money unless it's for a specific purpose. Still, I don't see my brother taking responsibility for his life. He doesn't have any friends anymore, certainly no girls. The weirdest thing is, he doesn't drink, smoke pot or play video games, which people always assume when they find out I have this man-child brother. It's like he's just stuck, not knowing what to do with himself and hoping someone will tell him what to do. My mom always says it's hard that he will do or at least attempt to do tasks she assigns him, but it would be so much better if he just knew that he needed to clean his car out without having someone tell him it's disgusting.

I think to end on a positive note, I'd like to say one thing that gives me hope. Our parent's divorce was tragically timed. A lot of unfortunate things happened around then, including our family cat finally dying of old age. I wanted a dog, and my mom "let me" have a dog that was ostensibly "my dog". But of course, I went off to college and couldn't take the dog with me. My brother really steps up and takes responsibility for the dog when he's living at home. I think that shows he's possibly more of a man than he even thinks he is.

I just miss that kid I used to know when we were young. Strange as it was, I looked up to him even though he was my little brother. I always seemed to be getting into fights while everyone loved him. He was so intelligent, he had a big vocabulary and was a geography expert. Not to mention his singing and guitar playing. Yet here I am, typing this up on a computer I fixed for myself, in an apartment I pay for with a paycheck I earned and worked for. I know my brother has never had this sense of pride in himself. Sometime I joke that adulthood is knowing that you could go to the grocery store and buy yourself a birthday cake for dinner, but choosing not to. It's been 6 years since he finished high school, and he's never even got to that point of having a choice.


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