Dear Prudence,
My boyfriend and I have been together for several years and recently started living together. We both have well-paying jobs and we’d like to get married someday. The problem is my younger brother. He’s 23 and very smart, but he’s lazy, disrespectful, and a slob. He dropped out of college after a semester and has lived in my parents’ basement ever since, relying on them for everything. He also spent most of my childhood making the lives of my sisters and myself hellish whenever we were home—he shoved us around, insulted and mocked us. My parents are elderly and will likely be moving into an assisted-living facility in the next few years. They have two lovely dogs that my boyfriend and I have agreed to take in when that happens (we’re huge animal lovers), but for the last year or two, my parents have been making noises about my brother’s living with us or one of my sisters. I refuse to spend the rest of my life providing for and cleaning up after a lazy jerk, and my sisters feel the same way. The three of us worked hard and were entirely independent by our early 20s; we are happy, functioning adults with good relationships with our parents and each other. We’re all worried that announcing “little brother needs to get a job and provide for himself, because he’s sure as hell not living with any of us” will strain our relationship with our parents (who we love). Do you have any advice?
—Yes to the Dogs, No to the Brother