Advice for parents: Reconnect with non-contact family members.

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Dear care and feeding,

My husband (32) and his brother (24) grew up with an addicted mother who was deeply neglectful. From a young age, my husband acted as both father and mother to his little brother. As soon as he was old enough, he got a job and spent most of his money on things for his brother. Despite everything, my husband was accepted into one of the military academies and left home at the age of 18. His brother understandably didn’t take it well. After a few months of trying to support his brother from across the country, my husband decided to call CPS. His brother ended up in a foster family and was also extremely unhappy about it.

Apparently the boy saw his older brother as the villain who first abandoned him and their mother and then spitefully separated his loving mother and son without reason while he lived a carefree life without them and the boy stayed behind with strangers. After high school, the brother refrained from social distancing, although my husband tried to contact him through his mother.

After all that, I met my husband and hadn’t even met his brother until their mother died and they both ended up in town at the same time to settle their affairs. My husband had hoped he would have a chance to speak to his brother and see if they could begin to restore semblance of a relationship. But his brother was incredibly cold and refused to talk about anything outside of business, saying he didn’t know why we were there in the first place, after what my husband had done etc.

Which brings me to my actual question: when I searched my mother-in-law’s phone number to get contact information for people who might need to be notified of the funeral, I saw my brother-in-law’s phone number. You just have to believe me that I only saw it for a second and didn’t memorize it on purpose (same area code + known formula).

Since we got home my husband has been devastated because things have gone so bad and he has been talking about giving a year and then hiring someone to find his brother so he can send him a letter or try to set up a meeting to really discuss things.

What am I supposed to do here? On the one hand, his brother has the right to idolize his neglectful, addicted mother and to disparage and dissociate his older brother, which I find ridiculous. On the other hand, how am I supposed to keep a straight face while the man I adore is looking for information that I already have or that I could find a lot easier and feel like I’m lying to him by not doing it? On the proverbial third page, if I violate my brother-in-law’s wishes and privacy, I’m almost certain it will end disastrously, and then I would feel like it was my fault. But then again, if my husband wants the information, he’ll get it without me, with more money and effort, and the same thing will still happen.

—Why can’t that just fade into memory?

dear memory hole,

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You should tell your husband that you have his brother’s phone number. You are not responsible for what happens when you try to contact him, but there is no reason for your man to bother chasing him when you already have a way of reaching him. I don’t think this is really an invasion of your brother-in-law’s privacy, nor do I think he would be surprised if your husband made contact, even if he is reluctant to contact him again. Don’t sit on this information any longer. Tell your husband the truth that you came across the easy-to-remember number while tending his mother’s affairs. If nothing else happens, you’ll save him some trouble if he’s willing to reconnect with his brother. The brother may react negatively to your husband contacting you, but I doubt his primary concern will be how he got his number in the first place (there are many people locator sites that can give you another person’s phone number or even their address, using little more than their first and last name). What happens after that is up to them.

– Jamilah

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