Is OTHER wrong in the post ? POST : Throwaway because reasons.   


The nephew in question is my wife's brother's kid. He was dealt a lousy hand from day 1. His father is a deadbeat heroin user and his mother a literal crack whore. Not long after the baby was born they lost custody and it was given to my in-laws. However, this didn't effectively change too much. The birth mother more or less disappeared, but my brother-in-law lived with my in laws, so even though he didn't have custody, he was still there.   


Fast forward 8 years, my father in law died a few years back and my mother in law has dementia. The brother in law's drug habit is severe, and he's been in and out of hospitals for ODs and drug related health conditions. He's become unstable and abusive towards my MIL and nephew. My nephew has been raised in a house of horrors with no real parental guidance and has a lot of behavioral issues. All he has ever known is constantly screaming and violent behavior. He has attacked and severely hurt animals (once stabbing a dog and recently severely beat another with a piece of rebar.) We have three geriatric pets. I worry about their safety with him.   


Social services has been a constant presence in their lives, and the police are called out to the house several times a year for various domestic issues. My MIL has refused to do anything to either move away from there or kick her son out of the house, because through all of it, she still feels like she needs to take care of him. Social Services has now decided to remove the child from the home, and with no one else coming forward, it's come down to either my wife and I take custody, or he goes into foster care.   


Now, a few things about my home situation. First, my wife and I have two older kids, both living at home. One is in college, the other is a senior in High School. Both kids have their own issues, which I'm not going to go into because even with the throwaway there's enough identifying information here that someone familiar with the situation wouldn't have a hard time figuring out my identity. Suffice it to say, there's a lot going on there, and I'm trying to make sure my kids are OK.   


I'm in my 40s, and we've struggled financially. I have a good income, but I just wiped out the last of my savings to deal with a large home repair. I have 0 dollars for retirement right now. For the most part, I'm living paycheck to paycheck. My wife went back to school when the kids were old enough to allow it. After 9 years she just finished with her Masters and is about to start her first real job in almost 20 years on Monday.   


We separated a few years ago. We got back together, but the underlying issues that led to our separation are still largely unresolved. I have concerns about the stability of our relationship with all of these changes. 

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My wife and I are both in poor health for our ages. Even before the custody issue was raised my wife was contemplating whether or not she could hold down a full time job with all of her doctors appointments and physical issues. My physical issues compound my lifelong struggles with depression and anxiety disorder, which is often severe. I struggle to get by day to day.   


When I told my wife I had reservations about taking custody, she told me she'd leave me if I don't agree. In her words "I'm not letting him go into foster care. I'll get my own place. I'm not going to live in my own place and stay married, so I'd want a divorce."  


I was completely overwhelmed by life BEFORE this came up. When I stop and think about taking on another kid, I feel panic. I think "I can't do this. I can barely hang on right now. This will break me." When I try to tell my wife how I feel she says I'm being dramatic and repeats her threat to leave if I don't agree. 

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I don't know how many years I've got left as a functional, mobile person. Pushing back the clock on raising kids ten years feels like it means if I ever am done raising kids, I'll be too sick to do anything. Financially, I'll have two kids I'm trying to support in college by this fall. I barely knew how I'd make ends meet before this, but adding the expense of another kid wasn't in the plans. 

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TL;DR My nephew is being removed from his shitty living situation by social services. My wife says she'll leave me if I don't agree to take him in. I'm in no shape financially, physically, or mentally to do it.  


How about it, Reddit...am I the asshole?