So in October, my brother got a new girlfriend. He hasn't had a serious gf in five years, and his last serious gf nearly destroyed our family. This new gf is a super sweet young woman, and we all love her! There are just a couple of things that about their relationship that are issues: 1) She's legally separated from her husband, but not divorced, 2) She has no place to stay so now she's living with us, and 3) She has two kids that live with us off-and-on now. Here why the three points are problems-

1. He's an abusive immature butt (I have far worse things I can call him, but because Subeta IS 13+ I won't), and has tried to spread rumors about my brother being a hard narcotics dealer. He also has broken multiple laws multiple times (including: California Penal Code § 647(j)(4), child abandonment, slander, harassment, etc just to name a few). He's left their children on a casino floor, left the grounds, causing the gf to take the kids and leave work early, then called at 11 pm threatening to call the police on her for kidnapping if she didn't bring "his" kids back. He's tried to avoid blocks on social media and contact her anyway. He acts like a 12-year-old in the body of 24-ish year-old. She doesn't want to press charges against him, even after multiple people (my mom included) urged her to.

2. Our house is small a 3 bedroom 1 bath house. Prior to her moving in, we had four people living in the house (my parents, my brother, and I), five when my sister came back from college to visit. Four people were a comfortable fit, and five was a bit cramped but livable- when the fifth would only be here for a few days. Now we have a permanent fifth and it's permanently cramped. Also prior to this my brother was doing laundry once a week, my dad would do his once a week, Mom would do her's and I's at the same time once a week, then household laundry (towels, cleaning rags, non-clothes, etc) once a week. But now my brother is doing laundry once every other day. Where we live has super high water-rates (minimum $200 a month, plus water use), so none of us are looking forward to seeing the water bill.

3. the children. The older child is 3, the younger child is almost 2. They are LITTLE kids. Our house is NOT set up to house children! I'm the youngest in my family and I'm 22! That's the youngest my house is set-up for! Maybe 16 (my mom's close friend's son house sits for us and he's 16, and is fine here). One of our dogs (Luna, a 10-year-old American Bulldog mix, we adopted her a little over 3 years ago) isn't a huge fan of kids. The youngest she really likes is 5, maybe 6. So she has to stay in my room with me almost the entire time the kids are here. She doesn't mind (she likes sleeping on my bed), but she lived here for longer than either child has been alive! She should be allowed to walk around her house if she wants to without fear of having small children, that have 0 dog experience, jumping in front of her face.

Housing where we live is hard to find (Thanks, Rural Northern California) and to add insult to injury the court has already ruled that in order to get custody of the kids, my brother and his gf have to get a two-bedroom place, which are few and far between (especially if you consider most are $1700+ a month). My brother says they've applied to multiple places but hasn't said a word about it since. This is a problem because he has a tendency to shut-up about things in the hope we all forget about it. I have a sinking suspicion that's what's happening now.

"Wow Kira!" you might be thinking, "Shouldn't you be more supportive as his little sibling?" I've tried. But like everyone I only have so much patience. My mom is also at the end of her rope. We are both introverts, we want to come home and relax in the quiet peace of our home. Small children aren't conducive for that. Mom also, despite having three kids, isn't a huge fan of kids.

"But Kira!" You might start, "If he's living with you guys, why not just charge him rent!" My dad refuses to charge any of us rent. He lived at home until he was 29, without rent, and he feels like he'd be a hypocrite if he charged us rent. Mom is fine with the idea, but Dad has said he wouldn't allow it.

"Wait Kira" you might interrupt, "Why isn't the girlfriend filing police reports against the ex?! He's scum!" Because she's too good of a person for her own good. Also, he legally has custody right now, and until she gets a new place, ordered by the court, she's considered "unfit" to have sole custody of the kids. It's already hard for her to fight for divorce, she doesn't want to have to fight for divorce AND get custody of her kids back from the state.

"Once second Kira," you might state, "isn't a bit privileged to say a 3-1 isn't big enough for 5, 6, 7 people?" I lived in a 3-1 with six people (myself included) until I was 9, and with five until I was 18. That house was larger, though not "large" by any means. This one is significantly smaller. We downsized for a reason. When we started renting this house, there were three of us- My parents and I.

The house we grew up in was set up for kids to live in. There was a yard, the streets surrounding the house were safe to walk, there were sidewalks. We lived in the middle of town, so we had some room to explore. This house doesn't have a yard suitable for play, the street isn't safe to walk and there are no sidewalks. Town is 5 miles away, and the only thing directly around the house are other houses and dense forest. All the friends I have that grew up in this area say it sucked to live here as a child because until they were old enough to explore the forest (7-10 years old) there was nothing to do.

"Holy cow Kira!" you might gasp, "Why is it so expensive to live where you live?!" Because California sucks, rural California suck more, and we are considering moving out of state because of that.