How can I help my parents deal with my dysfunctional sister?

Anonymous — Fri, 03 Mar 2006 22:08:17 -0800

How can I help my parents deal with my dysfunctional sister? My parents are good, law abiding, salt of the earth people. All their lives they have worked hard and sacrificed so that my sister and I could have a good life. They are now in their sixties, I am in my twenties, and my sister is in her thirties.

My sister has always been troubled. She is not a bad person, per se, but her whole life she has made the worst descisions and associated herself with the worst people. She has been diagnosed with depression and bipolar disorder, and for most of her adult life she has abused drugs. Lately, she has been living in her own apartment (which my parents largely pay for) which is more like a slum because she has no credit due to the fact that she is incapable of holding down a job. She gets a check from the government every month for some disability thing.

The problem is, she hangs out (or, in my opinion, is taken advantage of, but I'm not there so I can't know for sure) with a criminal element and is certainly involved in illegal dealings, involving both drugs and crime, possibly gang activity. My poor father recently went over to the town she is in to help her move because she is getting kicked out of her apartment because the manager was "afraid" of the people always around her, and while he was there the cops showed up inquiring about a wanted felon they had reason to believe spent a lot of time in my sister's place and burglaries that were reported with her car as the vehicle.

Sorry for the long lead up, but my question is that I largely think my sister is a lost cause. Everyone in the family has spent time, money, and done everything they can to help her, but she refuses to help herself. It kills me to see my parents, who are such good people, suffering all the time, and I live fairly far away so I am not around to effect anything directly. Besides, I went to college, I hold down a job, and I just don't have the ability to fight off criminals - I'd probably just end up getting myself hurt or killed. I just want to know what I can do to make things any better for my parents. Is there some legal recourse? I am capable of making the hard choices that may leave my sister imprisoned, where most likely she'll be far safer than she is now.

My father is unhealthy enough as it is just from age and the assorted ills that come with it, and I feel like he deserves a happy life without having to worry himself sick to the point where he needs to take tranquilizers to calm down - which he recently began doing. I feel powerless and I hate to see my family suffer. What can I do?

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How can I help my parents deal with my dysfunctional sister?