Dear Amy: I am at a loss when it comes to my brother. He is 34, divorced with no kids and has four DUIs. He lives with our parents rent-free, and even though he has no driver’s license, he drives to and from work. He gets drunk on the weekends.
My parents won’t say a word to him. Over the weekend, my husband and I went out of town for the day, so our 7-year-old son and 9-year-old daughter stayed the night at my parents’ house. I was told that my brother would be gone that night.
I have since learned that he and a guy friend, whom my parents do not know, came home at 3 a.m. drunk. He allowed his friend to stay the night. My mom didn’t see it as a big deal.
I am furious. I trusted that my children would be in a safe environment. To find out that a strange man slept 20 feet from my daughter upsets me more than you can imagine. I have told my parents that until my brother is gone, we won’t be going over there. Am I asking too much? — Upset in Fresno
Dear Upset: You aren’t asking too much — you’re being a concerned and responsible parent. Unfortunately, your own parents seem blind to how your brother’s drinking is affecting the whole family.
You might use this incident as a way to emphasize to your family how harmful and potentially dangerous your brother’s drinking is. Tell him directly and then repeat to your parents that his drinking problem has interfered with your life to the extent that you no longer feel comfortable leaving your children with them.
You can urge your brother to get help, urge your folks to develop a backbone and hope that they take this issue seriously enough to do something about it.
Dear Amy: I work for an airline. Each year I receive 10 free passes that I share with my adult children and their families. My son has a 3-year-old son whom we don’t see as often as we’d like. They live in the Southwest; we are in the Midwest. Our daughter-in-law’s family lives in the South.
For the past two years my daughter-in-law has used our allotment of passes always to take the grandchild to visit her family, never ours.
Am I being a crank, or am I reasonable in thinking this situation stinks? — Gramps
Dear Gramps: You have generously provided airline passes with no strings attached, but if your daughter-in-law’s travel choices are making you cranky, you might attach a condition before you hand out the next allotment of passes.
Simply tell your son and daughter-in-law that you would appreciate it if they used at least two of their passes to visit you and your wife in the Midwest.
If you frame this in a positive way (i.e., “We’re dying to show our grandchild our corner of the country”), your daughter-in-law might not notice that this issue has made “Gramps” grumpy.
Dear Amy: I read with great interest the letter in your column from “Wondering Sister.” Wondering knew that her mother had been unfaithful many decades ago and couldn’t decide whether to tell her brother after their mother’s death.
My advice to her is, “Let sleeping dogs lie.” I had a similar experience in my childhood. My mother had her first marriage annulled. Under the pretense of going to the penny arcade, she would take me to visit “Jim.” To this day, I have never revealed this to my two younger brothers or older sister. What would the point be? Why hurt their image of our mother!? That all happened some 65 years ago! — Joan
Dear Joan: This is a tough call — and several readers responded as you did. I can’t help but wonder if your siblings have similar memories of trips to the penny arcade that they, too, have decided to keep to themselves.
Send questions via e-mail to askamy@tribune.com or by mail to Ask Amy, Chicago Tribune, TT500, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611.
