I had to move in with my mother to take care of her. My brother had been staying with her, but had went to jail. She is 77 and has dementia. She gave me Durable power of attorney and I am her payee. My brother is now out of jail and living back in my mom's house. He is insane and on drugs. He won't clean his room. You can smell it down the hall. He let his drug friends move in. I had to evict a lady that was here. She had two unauthorized people here. They have tore up her house. Kicked holes in the wall and even put a whole in the floor. He doesn't want me here. He has convinced my mom that I tricked her into power of attorney, which is not true. My mom thinks she can take care of herself but forgets to pay her bills. She forgets to bath and eat. My brother won't work. He does side jobs and then stays gone for days and comes back drunk or high. My mom thinks she has to take care of him. I've called the police on him twice since I've been here. They refuse to make him leave. I asked for a restraining order but the judge won't give me one. He has hit me in my face while I was driving about 8 years ago. He has thrown hammers at me. He hit me in the head with a screwdriver. Years ago he was in prison for shooting a guy in the head. He steals my mom's money and he got her car impounded. Now she doesn't have a car. She doesn't drive but she owes them $2000. My mom blames me ever time my brother freaks out. She says what did you do to him. My mom treats him like a child. My mom is scared of him but thinks she needs to take of him. She can't even take of herself so now I feel like I am taking care of two children. I want to leave but I can't leave her here with him. I was told by two people on two different occasions they had to pull him off of her when he was freaking out. Because she won't admit he is like this to the police they won't do anything. I am trying to get guardianship but am having trouble with getting her doctor to fill out the form. He won't give it back to me. I think he is afraid of being sued. As I am writing this it is 3 in the morning because I can't sleep. He has his TV on all night long ever night. Then he will sleep most of the day. He will get up to eat then go back to bed. This is a living nightmare.
But the trouble is that, as things are, it's not going to stop if you stay. So the question is what should you do to force change in the situation?
Your mother loves her son. Perhaps she feels partly, in some way, responsible for what he's like, do you think? And naturally she wants to protect him, I don't think that wish ever goes away. But in any case, she is not going to do anything that will make trouble for him, and the difficulty with that is that she won't do anything to co-operate in protecting herself.
And yet, she's terrified of him.
I'm stuck. I don't know what to suggest.
I don't mean to pry into family business, but I am finding it difficult to understand what kind of risk there is to fear. Your brother was jailed for a driving offence (reprehensible, but it's not going to hurt your mother) but, what, he wasn't jailed for shooting someone in the head? Has he ever been prosecuted for drugs-related offences?
And you're pretty sure he's using at the moment. That could bring all kinds of undesirable people too close to your mother for comfort, and it also will make your brother's behaviour unreliable at best. And you can't get *anyone* to take an interest in your mother's welfare in all this?
Eviction is the only way
I just did this.
I told my brother he needed to move over 1 and 1/2 years ago. I gave him info about low income housing, informed him of who to call, what to do.
Come to find out he tossed the papers I gave him.
Finally it came to the point where I needed him out so I went to him with a witness and told him face to face that I am POA, you have one week if you do not start moving out in one week I will serve you with eviction papers then you will have thirty days once those thirty days are up the Marshals will be here.
He was out in 10 days.
If you have witnesses to Brother abusing Mom you need it in writing. They may need to testify to this when getting guardianship.
How do you get mom to sign I am not sure, but I do know some landlords have people they know to handle the evictions by signing the power over to them as "Property Managers" than that person can sign the eviction notice and go to court in place of the Landlord. You could see if mom would sign that over to you. Or just call the lawyer and see what your options are. (Could hurt!)
You also could get 'Personal Protection Order" against your brother.
This really is not that expensive!
If you do go this route change all the locks to the house.
Why don't you call the police on him when he threatens you?
Don't know if this helps. It is just an idea!
It has to be awful to live that way.
Good Luck.
It sounds horribly as though the various authorities in your area are treating you as if you are "guilty by association," combined with a reluctance to get involved in your brother's volatile atmosphere, combined with the difficulty of your mother's refusal to co-operate.
Supposing you go back to APS, update them, and tell them you feel you have no option but to resign your DPOA. If the DPOA is in effect because of your mother's supposed incapacity? which has made you her authorised payee? then, logically, on the face of it, if you remove yourself your mother must become their responsibility.
If they threaten you with H3ll and high water in response, tell them that without any support or any power to influence your mother's living conditions you cannot continue to have any responsibility for her, and ask them what they would do in your position.
By the way, if you were to walk would you have anywhere to go?
I think the point the officer probably meant to make about the needles is that because of how you found them they're not useable evidence. In that respect, I expect he was right.
If you are now your mother's payee, how is your brother getting hold of her money?
How long has your mother's doctor kept you waiting about the guardianship application, and what makes you think he is afraid of being sued? - by whom, for what.
I'm sorry for the situation you're in, it must be absolutely miserable. How long have you been living with it?