I need advice on what to do about my manipulative sibling. Please help me.
 

Okay I need your opinion on what I should do with this situation I find myself in. I am going to explain it in great detail so bare with me because I really need some advice.

My sister claims she has "chronic fatigue", a disease that causes extreme exhaustion and nerve issues. She also claims to have severe light sensitivity and wears sunglasses all day long.

However, I think she is completely mental and manipulating her situation to not have to do anything in life. For example, she claims to have extreme weakness and low energy. Every day she goes out for 2-3 hours and goes and stuffs her fat face with food after shopping and buying things she doesn't even need. For someone who is "So weak she has trouble moving around the house" to be going outside and being pretty active is extremely fishy. She also claims she "is so exhausted she cannot walk up the stairs." She even pretends when my mom is around and has my mom physically help her up the stairs. However when my mom goes to work she walks up and down the stairs perfectly fine. She shows no signs of exhaustion what so ever. I have even began taking notes on how her personality changes when my mom isn't around.

Another interesting development is the reactions of every doctor she has visited.Every single doctor she has seen recently believes she does NOT have chronic fatigue and is mental. The last 5 doctors she went to looked at her perfect blood work and tests and told my mom she should get screened for mental disease. Of course, my mother believed my sister 100% and bitched out the doctors. My sister played the victim and claimed the doctors are sexist and being mean because she is a woman. This was when I started to doubt her condition

What sealed the deal for me was when the second she turned 18 she immediately filed for disability. My family is extremely well off. We have more then enough money to buy whatever we need in life. My sister has been funneling her back pay into my mom's bank account and spending thousands on things she should not buy according to the guidelines connected to disability in my state. I have watched her spend 1200$ on a computer she doesn't need.

->She claims her doesn't work. It is completely fine as it was my previous gaming PC.

->Due to her "extreme light sensitivity" looking at a computer screen should hurt her eyes, and not enable her to play games anyways.

->Furthermore she had to have "a top of the line PC" for gaming because she is so materialistic.

Another thing she has blatantly wasted tax dollars on is shoes and clothes. In 3 months she has spent about 4300$ on shoes and clothes shopping with my mom at the mall or online. I am talking a LOT of shopping for a girl with no energy.


What really irks me are the following points:

->She claims not to be materialistic, yet has to own the most expensive clothes, computer, everything. I hate how she contradicts herself and is fake.

->She is blatantly lying about her condition to my mom. She has no energy issues and no light sensitivity from what I can tell. She is just an A-rate actress around my mom.

->She is manipulating my mother. My mom will fight to the death for her kids. She is so blind in her caring for us that we can blatantly lie and she will believe us. It is one of her best and worst(in the case of my sister) personality traits. I love my mom to death because after I had lung surgery she never left my bed side for a month. The way she is using my mom to fight off doctors who can see she is bullshit disgusts me.

->The way she plays the victim is the worst of all the things she does. She literally plays the most blatant feminist card there is: men are out to keep women down. Ironically she claims to hate male doctors, but seeks them out to play the "oh they are sexist" bullshit card whenever they call her out or say she has a mental disease. The few female doctors she has had have said similar things. In those cases she calls them a back stabbing bitch or something along those lines. NEVER once has my mom questioned her legitimacy, and she never will. She is blinded by her love for her children.

I have no way to bring this topic up with my mom as she will instantly take my sister's side. I have contemplated reporting her to the IRS because there are people who rely on disability to survive. My family has more then enough money to buy her whatever she NEEDS anyways. It feels like she is using her bogus "health issues" and her disability to buy only what she WANTS. I don't know what to do and really need some advice here guys and girls. What do I do as older brother? As a family member? As a sibling? And most importantly as a human? Do I simply admit its immoral and use that a valid excuse to get her punished?

Personally, I'd keep out of it. If she chooses to behave that way then that's her decision, not yours. You could get yourself into a tough situation if you start arguing that she is 'faking' it, certainly if your mum believes her as that could cause friction between you and your mum too.
Secondly, chronic fatigue isn't something that's easily diagnosed, it doesn't show up in a blood test, it's usually diagnosed once all other illnesses with those symptoms are ruled out. Is this the case for your sister?

I have chronic health conditions.
There's days where I can't leave my bed.
There's days when I can walk miles.
There's in between days.
Even if I feel like crap, I do what I can on my own because nobody is around to give me a hand if I need one.
Don't be so harsh as to judge.

My sister has seen some of the top nerve/infectious disease/etc doctors in the US over the past 4 years. They have dealt with patient with chronic fatigue in most of their cases. Almost all of them have concluded that it is not chronic fatigue and believe it is mental disease. Honestly I just hope they are wrong and she isn't lying. If she is and my mom finds out it will crush her and ruin her relationship with my sister. Oh well though, I just decided to stay out of it.

I have chronic nerve damage from a lung surgery that went bad 5 years ago. I am in level 7-9 pain every day of my life. Regardless of that I have toughed it out and not let the pain get to my head. I would appreciate it if YOU didn't judge me if you don't know my situation. My life consists of trying to make it to the next nerve ablation and praying this one works so I can go back to living a normal life. If it doesn't work I have to wait 6 more months.

I know far too well about chronic pain - I have a condition which is called endometriosis which basically causes bleeding within my pelvis. I have morphine at home for it; there's days when I can still be in agony after morphine; there's been times when I've ended up in hospital after morphine because it simply has not put a dent in my pain levels at all and my heart rate and blood pressure have been dangerously high because of it. My point still stands, don't be so harsh as to judge. The brain is a powerful thing - I'm not going to sit and deny that your sister's case may be due to psychological factors, that doesn't mean that she isn't in pain though - whether pain is caused by psychological factors or physical ones, they're both as real as each other.

Does your sister not need any medical proof whatsoever to claim benefits?

It sounds like a hard decision for you to make, but it looks like there is little that can be done. Unless you're willing to deal with whatever backlash confronting your mum about things will cause your only option might be to just live with it.

I obviously have no way of knowing whether or not your sister is ill, but I understand how frustrating you must feel with the whole situation.
Maybe you can try finding ways to accept things how they are and focus on reducing the distress it causes you as by the sound of it it seems unlikely your sister or your mum will change their position.

I'm not sure how her disability went. I would think they screened her? Regardless I am pretty much just going to try and ignore it. I just need to pretend it isn't there because a confrontation isn't what I want. I just hope when the IRS audits her money spending and sees how she is miss using it they dont go after her.

This.^

Maybe you could support your sister in seeking a mental health assessment, if all physical symptoms have been ruled out?
Like I said, I'd keep out of the is she/isn't she 'faking' it, it'll be unproductive and just cause arguments within your family. Clearly whatever she's experiencing is real to her.

Can you think of ways to help you be less upset about the situation?
It seems like a very distressing issue to you and as you can't change your sister's actions or feelings it might be helpful to see if there is anything you can do to feel better overall.