Hey reddit so I guess what I’m looking for is advice or if I’m right about how severe the situation is. My brother is now 8 years old. I am 19. Let me give some background. 

I have a sister and we come from the same parents. I have 2 half brothers who we share the same mom but different fathers. I will be talking about the 8 year old and his name is max. 

So this started when my mom stayed with a man for 3 years even though she believed he wasn’t good enough of a person to meet my sister and I. So I don’t know this man but he has given me my 2 brothers, and he’s not involved. I hope this starts to show what kind of person my mom is. 

So over the years as I’ve gained wisdom and I have realized my mother herself more than likely has a mental illness. But she is the type of person to believe, or at least act like, is perfect and nothing is wrong, so no treatment whatsoever. But let me begin about how my brother was brought up. 

My mother has never given him empathy. Or very little. For example if he ever hurt himself by accident she responds with anger and cussing instead of soothing. He was ignored a lot as a baby and toddler because she would be on her phone or lock him out and be with her shitty boyfriend (not their father). Max spent many times crying himself to sleep because she wouldn’t do anything. And what’s ironic is she is a teacher but never herself taught him anything. I never really saw her do much one-on-one quality time with him. As he got older she became more and more angry. She yells at him every day. May I also add he has never been punished for anything, just empty threats. And physical punishment doesn’t work because he LAUGHS and continues being bad. 

Now I’ll explain his behavior today. He is not like any 8 year old I’ve met before. He acts very strangely in a way I can’t really explain. Never having any form of punishment he knows there is none in our house. So he acts as he pleases knowing he’ll just get an empty threat. But believe me I have tried many times to step in and punish him such as taking away tv. But nothing works, he continues acting horribly. What I mean by that is he’ll mock my mom and I, hit/fight back, make nasty faces or sounds at us, throw things, talk back, cuss, or abuse his younger brother. 

I’ll give an example of something that actually happened today. My mother has an online conference for work and asked to help me keep my brothers quiet. They were asked to go outside and they did for a while and it worked. Then suddenly Max started being loud and his brother follows. They scream, run, ring the doorbell, you name it. I gave them, mostly max, a warning to be good or I’ll punish them. Of course he didn’t listen to my verbal warning so I had to give a physical punishment by hitting his leg. (****Before I’m attacked by that it wasn’t too hard but enough to hurt and say I’m not messing around. And his grandpa has warned if they aren’t good he’ll punish them himself the way HIS mom did. I would never resolve doing this to my own children, but my brothers act so bad I’m left with no choice. And this RARELY happens with me. Today they made me SNAP).  The leg hitting worked for a minute and I went back to my room. But Max began slamming on my door, calling me names, and threatening me. Which the threats have started to become too frequent when he gets angry. 

He becomes more angry and problematic by the year and I am very worried about when he is older, like a teenager, He will be much bigger than my mom and I and I’m scared he will have severe problems and harm her or me (his father is a large man). He already hurts his brother. I want to add that as I watched him grow up I was in the background, which I don’t feel too bad about because I know I am not a cause of his horrible behavior and mental/emotional problems. 

TLDR; my mom raised my brother horribly and he is very problematic.