I find myself amazed and wanting to study my inlaws family system-is it wrong of me that I find it all incredibly fascinating now that I am not so much caught up in it?

This is a substance abusing, petty theft type family that has been passing these "values" down for generations. My fil's father was an alcoholic who married about 5 different women and spent time in jail/prison. He taught my fil to steal at a young age for food (because he was out drinking and didnt want to mess with feeding the kids). My fil has continued this practice for many years-stealing from HIS brother, people in the community, cultivating marijuana, skipping out on bills, etc. Next generation is dh and his brother and sister. Dh is oldest. Several years of dh's childhood fil is in prison for armed robbery. Dh realizes on some level how messed up things are and leaves home at 17. SIL is 4 years younger and bil is 8 years younger than dh-neither of them effectively ever leave home. BIL is still there at almost 32 years of age. Does not work. SIL has left, moved back multiple times and is out of the home now but remains dependent (financially and emotionally) on them as she does not work either. SIL stole fil's large crop of marijuana and cash when she was 19 and ran off with it and was gone for a year. Blamed it on her then husband who is now deceased. So she was forgiven and accepted back in the family fold.

Next generation is my ss14 and a whole horde of cousins. My sil's oldest, 16, has a big problem with theft and has for years. My bil's daughter, 12, stayed with us for a week and when she left she packed her bags with my daughters' belongings.
My ss14, of course, has stolen cash, belongings from others at school, underwear, etc. My fil, bil, and sil all get high on a daily basis. Marijuana, pills, whatever they can find essentially. My mil, a nurse, works to support all these habits, but then considers herself everyone's savior and expects everyone to kiss her ass. They do all sort of do what she says as otherwise she will stop the gravy train.

I have put up with these folks for almost 13 years. Knowing that they are bad people. I, myself, stopped going around them around 2007 or 2008-stopped attending their 2-3 times yearly family gatherings. At this time I also stopped my kids from attending. Gave my dh full permission to go. He has never spent much time with them since he has always traveled for his job or been overseas in the military. It wasnt until this last year since he has been medically retired and what I feel like was in a vulnerable state that they have all swarmed around him like vultures. My fil asked dh to borrow 2000.00 for his "business". He is also an artist of sorts so that is what the cash was supposed to be for. My sil has been loaned probably 1500.00 that she never bothered to pay back. In addition she opened two credit cards in dh names and charged them up. In addition she stole literally hundreds of items from my home and anytime I question this all I have to do is get on facebook and see her family wearing my family's clothes that she has literally stolen from my house.

My dh gave my bil a CAR. A freaking car-just gave it to him (It was older, yes, but a car nonetheless)and only asked that he help him with rides maybe 1-2 times a week. Dh put ALL gas in the car-not just for when bil took him for appts, but always sent him back home with a full tank, plus cigarettes for him and his gf. He also paid all maintenance, repairs on the car that bil drove daily for whatever purposes he needed it for. Then bil told my dh that he was sick of dh taking advanatage of him.

My mil asked dh for money every time she spoke to him when she had ss. She got paid money monthly plus dh was already contributing above this by buying the kid clothes and maintaining health and dental insurance. Then to add icing to the cake she would tell him each week that she was bringing ss over for a visit then just not show up. When dh would call and ask what was going on, she would tell him "I didnt feel like bringing him"-but not call us to give us the opportunity to go get him before church.

I am so glad I am out of all this mess. So sorry for my dh that his family are such colossal losers. So amazed that he actually turned out as good as he did with this sort of background. So amazed taht people actually live like this.

Thanks for listening to my ramblings. Just wanting to document some of the craziness.