No one who is happy in his/her life treats others like that, especially a family member. With toxic people, especially one you can not just cut off, you need to work on how to have boundaries. It’s one thing to support a brother who is having some life struggles. It is a completely different thing to allow him to harass you and criticize your decisions. You definitely don’t owe him answers at this point and should not engage any further about what you are doing with your life. Like others said, keep your distance when you can, and change the subject when you have to be around him. I hope that if your parents are advising you to have a relationship with him, they are also advising him about how he should be treating you and the role of an older brother. Best of luck this school year - it will get better!
Is it possible for you to call him out on his disrespect for his parents immediately? I know family dynamics can be hard to overcome - I see it in many of the families I work with.
I really like posts #12 and #13. Limit contact to the extent possible.
But in order to appease your parents, you can’t completely limit your contact with your brother.
You can give him what he needs, by acknowledging his comments, and maybe even go so far as thanking him for his concerns. The old standby of sandwiching a hard-to-deliver message between positives might help. Praise-critique-praise. Initial praise/thanks help him to be receptive to more of what you need to communicate. Then get to your message-"let me live my life, please stop being so disrespectful to daddy. Then go back to hammering him with praise/thanks. It really works.
Something along the lines of -
I know you mean well, and that you love me, and you are genuinely concerned about my future. I am so grateful that you respect me enough to understand that I value my education and my own choices. I am glad you want to help, and I have learned a lot about myself because of your influence. I have faced my share of struggles - and for a while a part of me felt like I was blaming everyone but myself. I am grateful that some of your advice led to my own realization of a few things like how I need to take better care of myself physically, as not eating properly and not working out in part contributed to my depression. You may not realize how I have always looked up to you, big brother, you’ve been a hero of mine, and that probably wasn’t always fair of me to put you up on such a high perch - you have your own life issues to deal with as I have mine. But because we both value and appreciate our family, I am really glad you respect me enough to let me find my own path. Thanks for always being there for me.
Thanking someone who is otherwise seen as toxic, can be very disarming to them, and it can be effective in getting your message across - you need his behavior towards you to change, you need him to respect you and your choices a lot more.
I hope this helps, or that you can find a better solution to this situation. Best of luck
^^^ Ooooh, @3puppies, you’re good!
OP, just keep in mind that you have your own life and do not need to let him tear you down. If he can’t be appeased, avoid giving him ammunition to use against you.
I disagree with 3puppies. I think that’s exactly the wrong thing to say. I think that just feeds their ego and makes their behavior spiral further out of control. If OP tells his brother he’s “grateful” and that he’s been helpful, why would he believe OP really wants him to stop giving advice?
I think that trying to appease that personality is a mistake. OP’s brother has been verbally abusive. Would we tell a woman whose husband treated her that way that she she should try to appease him by saying she knows he “meant well,” that she was “grateful” he respected her, and that she wasn’t shouldering “blame” for her decisions? I wouldn’t.
I think the key is to set boundaries. The phrases I would suggest are “Thanks for the advice,” “I’ve made my decision,” “I don’t care to discuss my personal life,” and “My decisions aren’t up for debate.” I don’t think people behave the way his brother’s been acting because they’re trying to be helpful and I wouldn’t flatter him by saying his verbally abusive behavior came from a good place. I’d quit discussing my life with him.
I have dealt with a close family member who was toxic. It is a tough place to be. Ultimately the only way to avoid being harmed by a toxic person is to cut them out of your life but I totally get how that isn’t always possible (due to need for family support) or desirable (due to desire for connection and approval of other family members).
The important thing is to recognize the following (as already stated by some people above): you can’t change his behavior or your parents but only your own. Trying to persuade him is extremely unlikely to work and trying to persuade your parents is highly unlikely to work. Time may change this but it may not.
I highly, highly recommend the following:
- Avoid the person as much as is feasible. Be as subtle about this as you can. Don't announce it or call attention to it just do it.
- Don't engage in conversations about your choices/schooling. This is way easier said than done. Choose a bland, non confrontational stock phrase or two (lots of good ideas upthread such as "Thanks for the advice", "Interesting point",) and repeat that ad nauseam. At all costs resist the temptation to argue back no matter how outrageous his statements or how easy they seem to refute. As much as possible mentally tune out what he says.
- Find someone you can reliably vent to about him later. This helps keep you sane in the moment. You want a friend or a family member who will reliably have your back and will hear you out and agree that your brother is toxic. This is the person you can make all the counter arguments to that you are hold back while actually with your brother. This type of person can be hard to find. If you can't find someone in real life find a safe internet place to vent. Reddit has some good forums on narcissism.
- If at all possible see a therapist.
@austinmshauri - I respect your opinion, especially as it relates to a verbally abused spouse. What neither you or I know if exactly how toxic the OP’s brother has been towards her. I try to take the glass-is-half-full approach and positively assume that her brother is not completely a lost cause. It is far easier for us, in an anonymous forum, to say the brother should be completely cut out of her life to the extent possible. And that may be for the best. We don’t know.
In reality, I choose to believe that most people are redeemable, and sometimes, with help, they can work together to solve problems and resolve differences - I would not volunteer if I didn’t believe this.
I choose to believe that OP’s brother may be exactly the type of person who hasn’t had much praise in a while and is lashing out at younger sibling because of it. Older brother may be resentful of some of his own choices, and projecting some of his own personal failure onto others. Especially if Older Brother got into Brown, and graduated, even if he got accepted as a URM hook, he still had to have the academic chops to get in. It may be a while since Older Brother has gotten any positive attention. So Older Brother tries to tear down others because his own situation sucks.
OP clearly values her family - most of us do - so despite all the crap that goes along with families, it is in her interest to try to help older brother at the same time as taking steps to protect OP’s own sanity. Only OP will know whether my advice makes sense to try, or if it makes more sense to simply try to avoid her Older Brother.
It may be that Older Brother hasn’t realized what a jerk he has been to OP and the rest of the family. If OP can find a way to get the message through that more respect is needed, but still stressing the desire to improve the family dynamics, hopefully they can all learn and grow.
Older Brother is still young enough, and the family has a long time ahead of them, so that I understand if wouldn’t want to write him off completely yet, but has been too hurt to come up with a way to address the situation so that it improves.
Yelling back at Older Brother may not be in OP’s personality. But persuasion may help gain the respect needed - and I mantain it is sometimes easier to gain respect by thanking someone for respecting them, than it is to simply demand respect.
Even if that’s the case, OP IMO isn’t and more importantly…SHOULDN’T be obligated to take on the role of “helping” the older brother.
That’s the duty of parents, older relatives, and if available, older siblings. NOT those of younger siblings/relatives UNLESS they VOLUNTARILY take it on AND they have not been subjected to rude/verbally abuse treatment as OP has been.
And I say this as someone who has volunteered to help out older cousins and friends…and regretted it considering the fact my being younger…sometimes much younger than them is always used against me even in situations where it’s clear I have much more experience in a given area/context than they had.
I really get the sense that your poor relationship with your brother (which, by the way, means HE has a problem) is beyond the point where saying “just ignore your brother” will be enough. I suspect you always looked up to your brother and trusted him, and your self esteem has taken a beating because someone you love and trust has made you feel badly about yourself. I think at this point you would benefit most from getting some therapy to learn how to get your self esteem back and how to constructively engage with your brother going forward.
Your parents relationship with him is their problem. You can’t fix him. You have to look out for yourself and find a way to maintain a healthy relationship with him that works for YOU. The good news is that you now realize that none of this is healthy. You may find that just a few sessions with a therapist will be tremendously helpful. I had three sessions with a therapist when I was in college and it changed my whole mindset. Work on finding your own self-worth. Your brother has to find his own happiness. You may think your parents need to intervene or stop funding him, or whatever, but I am sorry to say that you can’t control anything that the others do. Your parents love him too, and they will have to make their own decisions about how to deal with him. Focus on you, and congratulations on finding a college that will work for you. The only thing that matters is what YOU think.
It’s unbelievably hypocritical of your brother to be criticizing your choices when he himself is, frankly, a bit of a loser.
Next time he starts, look straight into his eyes, and ask, “Who are YOU to be judging me?” – and then walk away. He’ll get your point.
@3puppies, I didn’t say OP should cut his brother out of his life. But he’s not required to continue conversations when his brother starts one of his tirades either. All I know about verbally abusive spouses is what I read, but it sounds like that’s the type of behavior that OP is experiencing.
There are some mental issues that surface as people reach college age. We can’t know if OP’s brother has one, but we do know that what OP is experiencing isn’t normal behavior. Whether or not his brother is redeemable isn’t his issue, it’s his parents. He can’t change his brother, he can only change how he reacts to him. I don’t think trying to mollify him will work, and I don’t expect that yelling at him will either. Any attention, even negative, is still attention. I just wouldn’t engage. When he starts in, OP should calmly end the conversation and walk away. I agree that counseling may help him develop useful strategies for dealing with the situation.
Fine, but OP’s parents haven’t been all that successful with teaching the older brother, nor have they been successful addressing OP’s needs. OP’s parents are old dogs and this is a new trick, so it isn’t likely that they will step up and rise to the challenge. This is sad, but it is real, and not all that uncommon. Family relationships are messy sometimes. While I am not saying that this is the OP’s job to figure this out on his/her own, I am saying that the Older brother might not get the kick in the pants he needs if this is left to the parents.
OP should know whether or not the Older Brother would be approachable in the way I described above, and/or OP should have a sense as to whether repeated attempts at walking away will bring out more bad behavior from the Older brother.
I agree that OP cannot change Older Brother - but depending on the situation, OP might be able to help the Older Brother to help himself, to help him see how his behavior, which was likely intended to be helpful, has actually been taken as toxic (at least sometimes). For the sake of their future relationship, OP needs to be respected. OP doesn’t have to help Older Brother, but OP might want to anyway.
In some communities, getting advice from a therapist is difficult, at best. Counseling is stigmatized as a luxury for rich people, or lumped in with mental illness and all of those stigmas.
I am hopeful that OP will be able to resolve this amicably with Older brother, one way or another.
One way to think about this is to take a behavioral approach. If you don’t like the way your brother is acting toward you, ignore the behavior – negative responses as well as positive ones can encourage a behavior pattern to continue. Don’t be obvious about this – a stony silence IS a response. If you do it well, he won’t realize what you are doing. So don’t react to provocative statements-- change the subject, and get away from him or pay less attention to him, and – importantly – give him lots of positive attention when he is not doing stuff that upsets you or is being nice. The less response he gets to his critical comments, the less rewarding they will be to him, and you should gradually see them decrease and hopefully stop.
I don’t see that you can or should do anything about his relationship withyour father, though.
Gee, this is a brother, not a parent, grandparent, or other relative to be honored. I’d say to my brother (and I have 4 of them) "Hey, you went to Brown. Good for you. I’m going to XX. " Say it in front of your parents, cousins, grandparents. If you are alone, I’d also add that he should shut up about Brown until he gets a job.
Since it is your brother (and its likely you wont be able to avoid him) my advice would be instead of going along with what he says as the truth, challenge his authority.
When he tells you the only way to succeed is through a prestigious university, hit him with “says who?” then proceed to tell him about the many success stories from state schools or less prestigious schools. (Why even Bill Gates and Steve Jobs dropped out of school- no one can argue they weren’t successful) Research it, I’m sure you can find many examples online of stories where people have followed non traditional routes to success. There is a saying “just because my path is different doesn’t mean I’m lost”.
There is no one right or wrong way to do something. There are multiple ways and many paths. Sometimes the journey is more fun than the destination, sometimes our greatest successes comes from our biggest failures, what works for some doesn’t necessarily work for others. The key, I think, is to learn to listen to your own voice, find your own truth.
In some family cultures, an older sibling is considered to have the entitlement to be treated with nearly as much respect as one’s parents,or other older relatives.
One illustration of this was an account by an older friend who recounted how after his father died when he was ~14-15, his oldest brother took charge of the household and acted in the father role despite them being only 3 years apart.
This included ordering him to stop spending so much time playing basketball at the expense of his academic studies in HS and that authority was respected by neighbors in their working-class area of Hong Kong.
Though the oldest brother left school early to start working to support the family, he insisted his younger siblings including my friend stay in school and to not worry about academic related expenses as he took full responsibility for them and was good to his word…sometimes to the point of sacrificing a meal or few for himself at times. Through his oldest brother’s guidance/mentoring, my friend turned his academic record around to the point he ended up obtaining an outside scholarship which covered all expenses to MIT.
The fact he was able to attend/graduate from MIT with flying colors and without debt, have a 4+ decade long successful engineering career, and being a comfortably full-pay parent for 2 of his sons to attend US private colleges was thanks to the guidance, mentoring, and financial sacrifices his oldest brother made on his behalf. Incidentally, all his younger siblings are also college graduates who ended up attaining similar levels of professional and personal success. .
Granted, in my extended family, this only holds if the older sibling/cousin is behaving/acting as befitting that status. If not, the younger siblings/relatives have the right to no longer view him/her as the older sibling/relative with the associated entitlement to respect.
I agree with @cobrat’s helpful cultural illustration. I would treat the older brother like a bad parent. With respect, but not letting him sway my choices. I don’t argue with my elders, but as an adult, I can chose not to do what they say. OP’s going to have to get outside help to deal with his toxic behavior but once in college, OP will be mostly out of his grasp. Arguing with the big brother is not going to help. There is something in him that needs to be fixed.
This is one aspect where my extended family and I will disagree.
If the older sibling/relative is acting like a bully or an idiot, s/he has forfeited any respect due him/her by virtue of his/her seniority.
I certainly don’t accord the older cousin who’s 10+ years older than me much respect on the few times I see him…and with the exception of his mother…everyone else in the extended family agrees that is appropriate.
In some cultures, the older brother would be paying for college. Not the case here so until he earns the ‘older respected relative’ honor, he gets no say.
Stop sharing the details of your life with your brother. Don’t tell him what classes you’re taking or what opportunities you’ve missed out on.
Stay busy. When brother talks, imagine it’s just hot air.
I don’t agree with the advice to simply ignore your brother. I had the same situation with my father, and it’s impossible to ignore a family member like that. You need to physically avoid him as much as possible. Consider transferring to a school outside of Colorado.
BTW - I went to my dream school and ended up hating it enough to transfer after my freshman year. If you go to a place with high expectations, it’s very easy to be disappointed.