Hi all. Sorry this is long.
My brother has been a long term coke addict. We were best friends and partied together when we were younger, which slowly fizzled out as everyone moved on over the years, but my brother always had a love for coke and never stopped, which went from casual use with a few pints at the pub, to before doing the washing up. This went on for years. His behaviour started to change drastically, becoming cold, bad moods, started ignoring and pushing away his old friends but hanging out at random pubs on his own. He always put on a front with my dad and other people, but I would see the mask slip. He had a trade which he had always been reliable with, but started switching jobs a lot. This coincided with our dad (who we’ve always been incredibly close with) falling ill, which brought me back to support my dad, which is when I started to see the extent of his drug use and mental health and made the fatal error of calling him out in moments of anger and begging him to get help in moments of complete worry. I didn’t understand it at the time. I couldn’t understand why he treated dad so badly when he was ill, I naively thought that alone would make him return to my old brother. I would end up exploding after the exasperation of trying to deal with my brothers mind-games and nasty/unfair behaviour alongside my dads ill health but then flip to complete worry. My brother never stopped reminding me how crazy and horrible I was for shouting at him. Because my dad was so ill at the time I didn’t tell him how worried I was, and I also think some weird misguided loyalty, as my brother was always my hero, stopped me from telling anyone. Again naively I thought begging and pleading him to get help would be enough. I became enemy number one, and now I’ve learned more about addiction, I realise I did everything wrong and became the villain in his story. At this point he had his head deep in the sand, his mental health was terrible, but he would manage to dapper himself up and go out and put a front on to people but come home to living in squalor and turmoil. Fast forward a couple of years, he ended up moving in with a very toxic girl who also had addiction problems. She cut him off from everybody but that suited him. My elderly dad was getting bailiffs round as my brother had registered things there and I was having to go through his g/f (as me and my brother were no longer on speaking terms) to plead with her to get my brother to deal with it and to get my brother to see my dad as at the point I wasn’t sure if he would miss his chance. I can see now how much he manipulated her as being the victim in his family, as much as she manipulated him with her coercive control, and after I called her out for not helping my brother with his problems I became in the line of fire from both of them with lots of blame, emotional blackmail and they went on a campaign in my old hometown to badmouth me and make out I was crazy. He messaged my dad out the blue saying he was going to gas himself because of me and loads of madness which went on for a couple of years until I realised I had been an unwitting player in their games and cut all contact. This is when he started targeting dad who obviously now was aware of his problems but always responded with love and didn’t bite which seemed to riel them up more when they didn’t get an argument. Again I now know he needs the angry reaction so he can play the victim. Fast forward more years and there’s been more bailiffs, my brother had become unrecognisable in the vicious messages to my dad, and the grand finale of a police visit about a missing persons report, us thinking he’s going to kill himself, him getting arrested but ultimately ending up with a restraining order against his g/f after she had lied about him straggling her, but thankfully for him she had previous records with ex boyfriends of her abuse.
One of my best friends who was also friends with my brother before he pushed her away years ago, ended up getting involved and finally forced my brother to see her. Turns out the house was smashed up, and turmoil and police visits and lots of coke and other drugs have been their staple for the last few years. My brother is destroyed and the level of turmoil and lies in his messages are terrifying showing his state of mind. Anyway, he recently made contact again with my dad and laid on the emotional blackmail and my dad offered him to move in an annex above him (owned by dad). I already knew this was a disaster, but it ended up blowing up before it even started after lots of lies and blag and then dad trying to discuss some nominal rent, which sent my brother on a mad one saying he’s been cast out the family (which is the story he had started a couple of years previous) and how unfair he’s been treated (he’s late 30s). This is the one time my dad snapped after the thousands and thousands he’s lend him and all the bailiffs he’s paid off and everything he’s put us through. We’ve since found out the level of debt he’s in. My dad reached out and said he wanted to help him start getting on top of things, which was met with abuse. Anyway, he’s since moved in with my close friend, and although I was initially pleased he was finally with a positive influence and had some hope he could start to get better, he has laid the lies on thick to the point she has taken his ex g/f’s place and has become his new spokeswoman about how terribly he’s been treated by his family and how he’s been cast out and all the wrongs to him. She said I’m wrong about his addiction problems and he only likes a bit of coke at the weekend, and that his been so honest with her about his mental health (so many lies and all blame towards me and my dad). She’s started putting little references to it in any messages we have, which leads to how awful my family is to him which forces me to defend my family, and ends in an argument with her refusing to hear any of his behaviour over the years which she wasn’t around for, especially towards my dad. I’m absolutely devastated that I should even have to defend my family to one of my close friends and can’t believe his level of manipulation and lies and I’m gutted this is starting all over again with his campaign against us, but closer to home now. Whilst she is entertaining his lies and victim stories, as well as housing him, he has no need to face his demons. My brother sent me a message at night recently saying he wanted to kill himself over and over again. I ended up messaging him that we love him and dad wants to help him etc, and was obviously worried sick. I told my friend he needs professional mental health support and this led to another argument making out I’m crazy and if she was worried she’d get him help. I don’t know how to play this now. I just want my brother to get better but selfishly I’m also so done with it all. I don’t want to lose my friend. My brother is the master manipulator and I can’t take much more of his abuse and games, but I’m most worried he’s going to miss his chance to make amends with my dad, which is heart-breaking. I guess I’m just looking for advice on how to approach this and if there is any way to get through to my friend without coming across as the bad guy. Or if I just need to walk away for good. Thanks for listening.