So I had an interesting, revealing conversation with my mother last
night. We were talking about my brother - one of life's classic,
intelligent underachievers.
Jezzy: I heard him yelling at you down the phone earlier.
Mum: He wasn't yelling, he just talks like that.
Jezzy: He was yelling! How was he not yelling? If I spoke to you like
that, you'd give me the silent treatment for a week!
Mum: That's just him, he doesn't mean to do it. He's very sensitive.
Jezzy: Oh right, so he can act all rude to you, even though you still
do his laundry and pay for half his mortgage, but it's okay, because
he's sensitive. He's almost 30!
Mum: He's not like you. You can cope, you take criticism. He gives up
if I criticise him. At least he tries.
Jezzy: He does not try! If he tried, he wouldn't still be trying to
complete an undergraduate degree after first enrolling in University
back in 1995! He still hasn't graduated! Yet if I did that, you'd be
furious!
Mum: We have to encourage him, not criticise him. He gets depressed.
Jezzy: I'm so sick of that! He can go through life, failing half his
subjects, living in a complete mess, asking for money and spending
more than he earns, never getting a proper job, eating fast food all
the time, never returning any calls from family, being rude to all of
us - but we can't criticise him. Because he gets "depressed".
Mum: It's true.
Jezzy: What about me? Do you think I don't get overwhelmed by all the
crap in my life?!
Mum: But you can cope.
Jezzy: Oh right.
Okay, everyone has issues with their dear siblings. Mine is that my
parents continue to spoon feed my brother who takes no responsibility
for his life yet no one can criticise him because he gets "depressed".
I am so sick of him using that as an excuse for not doing anything and
acting like a prick.
And I am sick of my Mum thinking I'm fine just because I don't mope
about, just because I don't talk back to them when I'm criticised,
just because I keep going and get things done and work harder if I
have to. But it's fricken hard for me to keep going!
Do they not realise I want to lie in a heap on the floor sometimes too?
But I can't.
And I won't.
And it shits me that they enable that behaviour in my brother.
It's always "poor him". Yet he has no real problems which prevent him
from doing anything - other than himself.
They let him choose to be that way.
I have no choice.
I have to keep going.
Anyway, just needed to get that sibling-related rant out of the way.
8 comments:
Fine, he's depressed. Give him some anti-depressants, send him to a therapist regularly, and then have the same expectations for him that you'd have of any human being of that age: self sufficiency. I guess this bothers me a lot that somebody would enable their own child like that. I've seen it happen a lot as a teacher--oh, you have to just give Johnny an A because he's depressed, had bad things happen to him, etc. No, Johnny can get an A if he earns it, and meanwhile, stop coddling him! It saps the will out of a child to succeed if he or she knows he doesn't HAVE to do well. The reason why you do well, Jezzy, despite sadness and pain, is that you know you HAVE to do well. If he had that same feeling, he'd succeed too.
My brother spent the better part of two years slacking with my Dad...he dropped out of college, and sat in front of the TV, memorizing the show schedules.
Eventually, he became quite the impressive man, but it took a long time.
I have no idea what to say. but I wish you both well.
Totally can't relate. My sibs are perfect...Oh WAIT! Damn it, I think I AM your brother!!! :)
The rule is, the better you are at dealing with something, the less support you get from others. I've seen this happen with people, with employees, with not-for-profit organizations trying to get funding (how fair is it that the group that operates a deficit every year gets all the funding and the group that is good about balancing their budget gets the shaft?).
I feel you.
SC feels you? Wow, he must have damn long arms!
That sucks through a straw. My family is the same way: if ever I put one foot out of place, my parents would yell and bleat and preach and complain and condemn... my brother, on the other hand, who isn't dumb by any stretch of the imagination (when he's not in orbit) can get expelled from Year 12, total three different cars, fuck his twelve year old girlfriend at the age of fourteen, etc etc - not in that order - all with a minimum of tears and whinging.
It still happens today... but years ago, I confronted them about this and was told something along the lines of "we can't expect as much from him as we can from you, that's why we're harder on you". Which I don't entirely get, but hey, I'm not a parent... and to be blunt, it's no longer a concern of mine. I just switch off when they all start squawking about it.
*hugs*
My mum delivered breakfast in bed to my little sister well into her early twenties... just because she was "delicate" first thing in the morning. Before she'd even awoken I'd chopped 2 days worth of firewood, fed and watered 5 horses, made MY OWN breakfast and ridden my bike to work. But did I ever complain????
;)
Wow - I could have written this post, lol. My brother's almost 30 and still lives with my parents, who have adopted his son because he (the son) was taken away due to violence by his mom (who stabbed my brother during an argument one night).
For a long time, it bothered me. But I guess at some point, I finally just got over it. My brother has a part-time job now, and this is better than anything he's done in years; so, I'm just glad about that. I guess I used to really resent it... well, I know I did. But somehow, it doesn't seem to matter so much now.
I hope you can feel that way eventually. But I know it's tough b/c it's just so unfair.
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