I'm afraid for my little sister. My mother hasn't heard from her in four days as of today. She was first supposed to come home on Sunday and then on Tuesday. Here it is Thursday and my mother hasn't heard from her. My mother said outright, "I think she's dead." My mother said she was sitting with the baby one night and the touch lamp on the table beside her started going through the different degrees of light on its own. My mother says she thinks my little sister is dead somewhere. She filed a police report and told the officer my sister had suicidal tendencies; that makes the report more "special" than just a missing persons. She's now considered "endangered."

I'm at a loss. I have no idea what to do. My mother is filing for custody of the baby, but my mother has to think of her health too, and I'm afraid that if she does that by herself, she'll die sooner rather than later. I asked my mother yesterday to consider coming to live with me. She has a dog and another cat that I simply can't have because it's so much money and that would make it four pets and three people in my one-bedroom apartment. The deposits, the litter, the food. I could just forfeit my lease and get a new apartment, but still: four pets? I can't do that. And I'd be giving up $600. It's too much money, for one thing, and too much stress. This is all bad enough. My mother has no emotional support where she is and when she calls us, we're so stressed and frustrated at what our little sister has done that my mother isn't getting support at all. My other sister Jenna is just livid with my little sister. I am too. My mother says things to her like, "She said she was going to call and she hasn't!" [My mother thinks she's dead.] So my sister Jenna is all upset because my mother isn't realizing that just because my little sister says she'll call doesn't mean she's going to. It's quite obvious my little sister doesn't follow through on things, isn't it? Jenna points that out and my mother gets upset because she isn't getting support; she's getting criticism.

Then again, when my mother is so insistent upon being pessimistic and negative and upset and sad and making such huge statements like that, how do we support her? What do we say? We're so overwhelmed knowing that the stress will make her sick, we can't control our own fear and frustration to say, "It's okay." How do we know it's going to be okay? Is there anything at all that we can say to make her feel better?

I wish my mother didn't have those stupid pets to worry about. I'd drive down there this weekend, pick her up, and just bring her home and say, "Listen. This is it." Because I HAVE HAD IT. I can't live with all this to think about day in and day out. I just can't do this all the time. My sister can't and my mother certainly can't. At some point, my mother has to get on her feet. I'm sick of hearing how awful everything is when it's so simple to just MAKE IT STOP. Just STOP already!

And then the money. I have no money. I can barely support myself and have five dollars hidden in my car for gas when I need it and I'm eating all the old pasta in my place and I'm trying to make sure I can buy the stupid litter for the cats and four cans of food for 81 cents, but how could I possibly pay for a more expensive apartment? A two bedroom would be ideal, but man. I can't do all this. I feel like running away and just abandoning the whole mess but I also feel like trying to save it. I want the money to investigate the bastards that have my sister in Atlantic City and just getting it all out of my system. When will life get easy? Why is this always such a pain the ass?