You’re pissed off at the wrong brother. Erick took your money.
I’d be hella pissed at Erick, too. What do you mean, you can’t remember if you paid him or not? Another lesson: not only do you not borrow/loan money amongst friends and family, if you must, pay it back yourself and make a note of the date and the exact amount.
I think you are going to lose your share of the car. But it’s that or lose your brother. I guess you need to make a choice which one you want to keep.
Superdude, take a breath. Take a walk. Skip a couple stones at the nearest pond. Something free and comforting. Come back when you’re done.
You back?
Ok, here’s the issue. You have an unhealthy relationship with money and it’s coming out here in your relationships with your brothers. Your mother poisoned that relationship with favoritism when you were young, but you’ve had many years now to mature it beyond your childhood days. It’s up to you to change it now.
But you’re hyper-focused on the money. You start out the OP with the anecdote about your father and the settlement money, which it sounds like was handled fairly by your stepmother, and literally plays no role in anything else in the entire post. Why? Your memories of Christmas presents are based on estimated dollar values. Why? You remember giving money to your brother’s ex to help out with his daughter’s expenses a couple years ago, which sounds like it was probably a low point in his life(given his disengagement from his family), and remember the amounts. Why? If you couldn’t afford to help, then you shouldn’t have. If you could, then you shouldn’t keep score. It’s family.
I get that things are tough for you right now. I’ve been there myself, but what you’re doing is going to hurt you in the long run. You’ve got a poverty mindset. You focus on what you don’t have and what is owed to you, you keep score when you give/lend money to others, and spend lots of energy on, and stress out over, those aspects of your life. It sounds like maybe your older brother is similar in that respect.
Living paycheck to paycheck is exhausting, and stressful. You end up burned out and unable to think clearly, which leads to further bad financial/health decisions(fast food, delaying maintenance on cars, neglecting your health). You said you’ve divorced in the past few years, and that takes its toll on your living standard even in the most amicable of separations.
So what I hope you can find the strength, and it does require strength, is to forgive yourself your mistakes up until now. Look at yourself and decide the kind of person you want to be. I’m betting it isn’t the person who wrote those texts to your brother about what a terrible parent he is.
I’d start with the comments that Left Hand of Dorkness added. Figure out how you’d manage if it weren’t for the money from your brother/mother’s car and do that. Get your head clear and sit down with your budget and maybe a friend who is very good with money and work out a plan. If you need to hit the library and find some books on how to manage your money better I’m sure there are people on the SDMB who can recommend good books or give tips if you start an IMHO thread.
But as of now, you’re letting your money fixation damage your relationship with your brothers. You need to stop digging. It’s the only way out of your hole.
Enjoy,
Steven
I don’t think you’re in the wrong here, but I also don’t think this is about money.
When you say you want your fair share, the money is a symbol of wanting your fair share of your mother’s love. Now that she’s gone, it has come back to the fore, because now there is no way it will happen; there is no way for your mother to make it right. It happens all the time when a parent dies, and this family dynamic is unfortunately very common when a parent plays favorites. You think getting this money will make it right somehow, but it doesn’t work that way.
I’m sorry for your loss, but here is what you should take away from it:
It wasn’t your fault. What your mother did is not on you, it’s on her. I don’t know her reasons, and maybe you don’t either, but it’s likely she was also screwed up by her own family dynamic when she was growing up.
Accept your loss. Forgive your mother. And most importantly, forgive yourself. You didn’t deserve it. You’re not a bad guy, or a loser, because your mother messed up. You’re allowed to feel bad about it, but not to the point where it messes up your life, or your relationships with others. Let yourself grieve, and try to move on from it. It wasn’t your fault.
I don’t know how this affected your brothers, but I’m sure it did. From the exchange with your brother, it sounds like he has built up resentments of his own. I don’t know if you can salvage the relationships with your brothers, or if you want to, but try to forgive them as well, because they were caught up in the same family dysfunction, and it’s not their fault either.
Again, I’m sorry for your loss, and I hope it works out well for you.
[golf clap] Wow…that’s deep…[/golf clap]
I believe that Superdude just wants his money. The problem is you’re arguing with your brother over $600. Is your relationship with him worth $600 or less. If so, full steam ahead brother! Be the biggest dick you can be to get your money!
If the relationship is worth more than $600, then let it go.
Dealing with family drama after a death is ugly and you have my sympathy. I have no advice other than what others have already said.
But here’s what really deserves a pitting (emphasis mine):
Is it usually your first assumption that people are shallow dicks? Are you basing it on personal experience? If so, you also have my sympathies.
In any case, it’s up to the OP to decide what he is and what it’s really about.
Dr. Phil called, he wants his show back.
This isn’t the forum, or even the message board, for psycho babble, you twit.
You know, you can criticize someone without being a cunt.
I think you need to step way, way back on this. You are both squabbling over (in the end) a few hundred dollars, and then finally increments of $50 or you can’t get by. It’s stunning it’s like you guys are almost homeless if you can’t get some miniscule amount of money.
The main person responsible for this is your super honest brother with the “89% sure” nonsense. No one “forgets” or is confused about whether if they gave someone several hundred dollars in cash. His “uh … duh… did I or didn’t I?” response is not credible to me.
Re your accusing brother you have indicated no prior history of stealing or double dealing with him, and he did pony up your share of the funeral expenses so seeing him as a scheming willful con man or thief does not make sense (to me).
But really it’s irrelevant, he’s being a bit of an asshole, but so are you and you going nuclear with accusations of him fucking over his daughter financially was way, way over the top. You have destroyed family ties over a few hundred dollars and the way it ended was mostly on you re comments about cheating his daughter. You can’t take that kind shit back and it will never be truly forgiven. Money aside you need to apologize for that, sincerely and fast. Even if he did owe you $ 600 saying that shit should cost you at least that sum as a karmic punishment.
Unless someone finds the missing money magically it is unlikely we will ever know what happened to it so drop it. Apologize, forgive, chalk it up and move on. Honestly, the bigger picture is that you need to focus on making non-insane financial decisions like not loaning $600 to the “sister of a friend” when you are apparently living hand to mouth. If you were not so scrambling and desperate for cash it’s unlikely this thing would have gone to the emotional and accusatory extremes it did.
Are you telling me where or what I can post? Interesting.
Some people can’t. They’ve already decided what kind of person they want to be.
It’s the Pit. You and Camille can get right the fuck over yourselves.
As weird as it seems, since it looks like we had pretty much opposite views on the root cause of this situation, I actually agree with a lot of what you’ve written. If these were all financially stable and otherwise healthy adult relationships I’d agree pretty much fully. But it sounds like the OP, and recently his elder brother, is at a bit of a low point financially in their lives. The gift of money for school supplies/clothes a few years ago and the talk of needing money to get through the week, being unable to help pay for funeral expenses, and everyone helping pay for Katrina’s college, etc. are all indicators that money isn’t just a proxy for deeper emotional issues. There are real money problems here.
The mother working at Wal-Mart in her later years and having no funeral plan or more robust life insurance also speaks to the family financial problems, likely passed on to the sons, being at least as big an elephant in the room as the favoritism.
Enjoy,
Steven
No, I was giving you permission, since you can’t seem to do it or your own merits, you fucking cocktwit.
Thanks for saying this. I don’t really disagree with anything you said either; I think we just focused on different aspects of the problem. I agree with you that they have an unhealthy relationship with money, and it’s obvious that financial hardship is a factor as well. Maybe I should have been more precise and said I didn’t think this was* just* about the money.
I do think there is always an emotional/psychological component in situations like this, and a contributing factor for having an unhealthy relationship with money in the first place. The OP also included some personal issues that indicate unresolved resentments beyond money.
I really don’t understand some of the advice here telling the OP not to give up his brother for $600., when it seems that is exactly what his brother is doing to him. A one sided apology isn’t enough to make this right; they have to both be open to resolving it. The youngest brother has only made it worse, and yeah, maybe he’s not as trustworthy as was supposed.
Oh, and** Superdude**, I’m sorry to be discussing this as if you are not in the picture reading along. I suppose by now you’re sorry you ever thought it would help to vent here. I really do hope you are able to resolve it. Is there someone else you all know and trust who can be a mediator?
I DO know someone who is actually a licensed counselor/therapist. But she lives on the other side of the state, and she’s not a family friend. Just mine, so others could argue bias.
For the record, though, I don’t regret posting this. I’m enjoying the insights.
Well, D’Anconia excepted, who can accept my cheerful invitation to masturbate with a cheesegrater.
If I’m reading it right, Erick gave the OP a third of the insurance payout from mom’s employer, even though Eric was the sole beneficiary. Eric doesn’t owe him anything.
I read that differently. For Superdude it’s about the money, and understandably so if he is in such dire straits that he needs $50 to get through the week. For his elder brother, who was able to cover Superdude’s share of the funeral expenses a few months ago, the money seems like less of an issue. The issue is the harassment over the money, including what appear to be unfounded accusations of pilfering from his daughter’s college fund. There is also some long-standing issues bubbling up here from the older brother’s side it seems, c.f. " you’re always right in everything you do and everyone else is a piece of shit."
Thus it would seem that Superdude would be cutting his elder brother out of his life over the mishandling of the reimbursement of the funeral expenses, coupled with not getting an advance on the expected proceeds from selling the car/being bought out of his share if elder brother elects to keep the car.
Elder brother would be cutting Superdude out of his life for the harassment and personal attacks on his character and his parenting.
It’s worth a try. Trust your friend to be professional and set aside bias and trust your brothers to be adults who want to have an adult relationship instead of the toxic sibling rivalry(" shits diamonds out of a platinum asshole") that your mother apparently left you saddled with. Don’t use what they might say as a barrier to making the attempt. That way lies analysis paralysis and you letting them live rent-free in your head instead of engaging with them as an adult equal.
And at this point it sounds like you can’t afford to let people live rent-free anyway. 
Enjoy,
Steven
What is a “cocktwit”?
You’re right, it is. So off topic, you’ve got an awfully pretentious username for someone who’s as dumb as a box of rocks.