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Helping family can feel generous until the people living under your roof stop treating your home and belongings with basic care.

One 23-year-old supports her mother and brother, but when repeated messes and broken boundaries pile up, would you keep absorbing it or set firm rules?

Her brother’s latest mistake leaves her questioning how much responsibility an adult guest should take for the home he depends on.

Read on and see why one ruined carpet became the final straw.

AITA for enforcing boundaries on my adult brother and mother that live with me?

I (23F) have a brother (18M) and my mother who have been living with me for two years.

My brother recently dropped out of HS didn’t get a GED.

This is a very reasonable deadline.

After he decided that he would not finish school I set a deadline of him finding a job within a month.

Another month passed and I informed mom of me limiting the privileges I give him, which is the internet.

A bad day came when I asked if he could take my dog outside in the morning and he did not do it until very late so my dog peed all over the floor and dragged it on the new carpet. He did not let me know because he wanted to keep playing games so it soaked into the everywhere.

This infuriated me and I let him know that everything costs money and I am sick of him not being considerate of the things that are around him.

Actions have consequences.

I informed him that I would be removing his internet and I did.

When my spouse was back we discussed a solid plan to get him to start doing better and set him up for success which was that if he got a GED I would give him back the internet for 3-4 hours a day and once he got a job all privileges would be returned to him.

When my mom was informed of this she immediately got mad at me and threatened that they would move out.

Another month passed and I just thought maybe he is studying or at least applying for a job, but he was doing neither.

I started to get a bit more frustrated at this time because I see no progress and started to blame me for his depression because he has no internet.

This kid seems very entitled.

Today he decided to come to me after being rude to me all week and refusing to do any chores I give him, to ask if he could be on the internet to get some limited edition stuff on one of his games.

I told him he couldn’t because he has had a lot of time to get at least a GED to have some internet and that consequences are consequences so he would have to miss out.

He began walking away calling me names.

Once my mom got home I told her what had happened so she could at least tell him to respect me.

And she said that I was in the wrong that it was just a bit of time he would be on the internet and proceeded to tell me to return it to him to which I informed her that consequences are consequences and he had full control of gaining internet access once he did the right thing.

Mom just wants to enable him.

My mom exploded once I told her that and once again started to threaten me saying she has no say in anything that happens in the house or even control over her kid. She said she would just find a place to live and that I was very hard on him and my consequences are just like Nazis. My mother said that she is just trying to protect her boy from me.

And once she said this I was upset and told her I am not a Nazi for enforcing boundaries to him trying to financially and emotionally take advantage of me.

I told her to do whatever she wanted to do and that if she thinks leaving is best she should do it.

AITA?

To me it seems like both mom and the brother need to grow up and take accountability for their life.

Let’s see what the people in the comments on Reddit have to say about it.

Kick them both out.

The husband has to be tired of it.

This seems more than reasonable.

It is his house, he can make any rules he wants.

If you enjoyed this post, check out this story about a student who did the math and figured out he was better off skipping school than serving detention if he forgot his ID.

Mom moving out would be a real blessing.

She had spent two years housing her mother and brother while repeatedly asking for more care, responsibility, and respect around the home.

The dog incident pushed things further when her brother delayed taking it outside, then failed to mention the resulting mess soaking into the carpet.

At that point, firmer boundaries were less about punishment and more about making two adults contribute to the household they relied on.

Free housing is generous enough without adding complimentary carpet replacement to the package.