Thanksgiving Give-away

[Rebuilding]

O.K. Here’s the situation. My wife and I have been separated for a little over a year off and on. We’ve both made mistakes (more and worse ones on my part). This is a little story about what happened over the course of the Thanksgiving holiday.

 

Over Thanksgiving I spent most of my time with my wife. She’s staying at her sister’s house right now with her sister and her mother. Her little brother (20) was in-town for the holiday and he had a court case the day before Thanksgiving. Let me begin by saying that there is some animosity for her brother from a past incident which I’ll touch on briefly at the end of this post. So I just want to know if I was wrong and maybe got pissed off because of some suppressed ill feeling I might have.

 

Tuesday night I went to my wife’s sister’s house after I got off work. Her brother was there and instead of saying “what’s up” he asked me for a cigar. I gave him a cigar as well as cigarettes throughout the night. I also saw my wife giving him cigarettes left and right. Both my wife and I continued to supply him with cigarettes throughout the night and I continued to give him cigars whenever he asked.

 

I had a real rough time sleeping that night actually I probably only got an hour or two of some restless sleep before I was asked to give him a ride to court that morning because he refused to take the bus. So, I took him to the courthouse so he wouldn’t get in trouble. Later that night, the same thing happened as the night before with him asking for both cigarettes and cigars all night long. Keep in mind that I had to buy a new pack of cigarettes earlier that day. Then after I had a couple of drinks he asked me if I could take him to the liquor store which I told him “No” because I had been drinking and wasn’t willing to risk a DUI. He begged me a couple more times and I had to tell him “No” several more times before he eventually left it alone.

 

The next day was Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving was nice; I got the chance to see her grandmother who I haven’t seen in awhile. I brought a 6 pack of Budweiser to the house and it only took about 10 minutes before he asked me for one. I guess I should be grateful that he asked. After dinner, we went back to the wife’s sister’s house to relax and eat some more if we didn’t have enough at Grandma’s. We weren’t there for long before her brother asked me if I could give him a ride to the liquor store which I did. After we got back from the store, he asked me for a couple more cigars and cigarettes before the night was over.

 

I went over to the house the next night and my wife, her little brother, and their nephew all ended up hanging out listening to music and smoking on cigars. My cigars. Well that was all good, however her little brother also kept asking me for cigarettes throughout the night until I looked and saw I only had 2 left. Then he told my wife to “Give me a cigarette”. She did and as she was giving it to him told him that she only had 2 left as well. He didn’t care; he took it anyway and smoked it. This pissed me off. Then a little while later he asks me for another cigar. I had already seen that my cigar supply was running thin the last time I gave him one so I told him “No”. Well, that pissed him off. He started going on and on about how it was messed up that I wouldn’t give him a cigar when I had some left, and wouldn’t leave it alone. Finally I had enough and had told him that over the last few days I’ve given him countless cigarettes and countless cigars as well as a ride to the liquor store. He got upset that I brought all that up and told me he thought I did it out of love. Then he said in front of my wife that if it wasn’t out of love that he wouldn’t let me kiss his sister in front of him. I told him that nobody is going to tell me when and when I can’t kiss my wife. He complained a little more then walked away. After he left I turned to her and told her I was pissed off that she didn’t say anything. I told her she should have said something after he brought her into the conversation. And she told me that I handled the situation how I saw fit and that she wasn’t going to get into it because I’m a grown man and should be able to handle the situation like a man.

 

Needless to say that this pissed me off, so I decided to leave. I had given her $20 earlier that day and made a comment about her hanging onto it because her brother would probably borrow it off of her eventually anyway. I had already seen her brother borrow 2 dollars off of her while in the time that I was there. Well that comment earned me a phone call a couple hours later telling me how immature I am. Me? O.K. I also spoke with her mother who then blamed his behavior on the alcohol (I guess I should have mentioned he was drinking a bottle of E&J throughout the night). No, this to me was unacceptable. 1) The alcohol always takes the blame so he doesn’t have to. A couple of years back; he broke his other sister’s side mirror on her SUV and jumped out of the vehicle while she was stopped at a red light because she wouldn’t take him to the store. He then kept blasting her stereo equipment, attempted to leave, and argued with his sister. I had to restrain him from leaving out the house that night and to this day I still think he hit his sister as well, but I can’t prove it. That night ended with him on the bus back to New York.

 

My question is where id I go wrong in this situation? Should I just let him run all over me? Was my comment that bad? Did I have a right to be pissed about the wife not getting into the situation or was she right for not getting into it? That’s probably the mot important part of the whole situation. Because I would never let something between my sister and my wife even come close to reaching a level like that.

[missopinionated]

Ok. So, you're supplying an adult (who has some lack of responsibility problems) with cigarettes and cigars. Great.

 

So, you're driving this adult to court because he refuses to take the bus and you're worried he's going to be in trouble??? He's already in trouble. Why should you worry about it? He's an adult!

 

The problem with this 'adult' is that you all give in and give in and when you don't, he as a little temper tantrum, which makes you all feel bad and so you give in again, so he wins!

 

Your wife was right about what she said. Except for the part where you should have said NO to that 'adult' right from the get go.

 

So, you're pissed of because some 20 year old punk manipulates you for two days and then someone else pointed that out to you?

 

Where you went wrong is when you didn't let that guy get on the bus to NY and where you said yes to him even once. He's an adult. If he wants to smoke and drink and drive, then he should get a job, make his own money and stop sucking off people -- like yourself -- who are pushovers.

 

You are NOT doing him any favours.

 

Learn to say NO. If he loses his temper, breaks stuff and acts like an idiot, so be it. Stay out of his way, don't engage and don't feel bad about not letting him push you about.