My brother is a heroin addict. It started with pain pills and evolved from there. 

I have given him thousands of dollars in the form of bail, flights to go get “treatment,” Lyfts and Ubers because he lost his license for a while.....you get the picture. He also completely ruined my credit after I co-signed a car loan for him and he allowed the car to get repossessed. I didn’t find out about it until I went to renew the lease on my own car. That was fun. 

Well he was down in Florida until last night staying with my father. He was supposed to seek treatment down there and maybe possibly find a job. He has an in demand skill (HVAC technician) however he can’t find a job because his driving record is so awful that no company will trust him with a company vehicle. He has no home and is totally broke. His drug dealers are also looking for him because he owes them money (however I’m *pretty* sure they don’t know that I exist, but they have called my mom as well as his ex girlfriend looking for him). 

My father is a complete and total asshole and I’m not going to get into that however despite all of this, I can understand why he would want to come back up here (New Jersey). The biggest reason being that he has a son here. 

Well he stayed with me last night and swore that he was going to be entering a sober living home today. 

I just got a message from my mother asking me if my brother is staying with me again tonight. I said no because I thought it was only for one night. She said that he doesn’t have the $600 deposit needed to stay at the sober living home but that he *should* be getting paid tomorrow. I told my mom that he’s not staying with me. I was told it was one night and already that’s turning into two. I feel like if I say yes, that’s going to turn into three nights, then four and on and on. 

The guilt of saying no is eating me alive. However not only am I tired of being an enabler, but I have roommates and as gracious as they were about him staying last night, I can’t ask them to keep doing it. Especially knowing what I know about his drug dealers. 

My husband is currently living in another state. I’m moving there too in a few months and finally getting away from all of this but for right now, my main support system is gone. 

I’ve cried so much about all of this that I busted a capillary under my eye. 