My brother said, “I can’t heal if you’re happy.”
So, my parents banned me from gaming.
Then, I caught him taking cash from kids playing my PS5.

My foster brother believed that I was humiliating him for his difficult background by playing video games, and our parents agreed.

Travis spent the first 12 years of his life in one of the city’s deadliest crack houses. Despite this, he said that it did not cause him any trauma or PTSD. He was proud of his ability to remain unaffected… until one year when he discovered that my Christmas present was worth $15 more than his own.

Suddenly, he was a devastated victim suffering from profound PTSD.
And witnessing younger children get good things “triggered his buried memories.”

When my 9-year-old cousin received LED lights for her birthday, he destroyed the controller because he “grew up without light.” He urged my aunt to stop buying Christmas presents for her children and insisted our parents give him monthly surprise gifts.

When I bought a PS5 with my own money, he said it was “emotional violence.”

I told him he could play it too. I even offered to buy him a custom controller, but he declined. My parents allowed me to play only while he wasn’t in the living room per his request. I tried using headphones, but they “weren’t enough.”

Travis “didn’t feel secure walking around the home while his suppressed trauma was pushed in his face.”

Within a week, I had moved the PS5 to my bedroom, where the display was running at 25 frames per second.

That pleased Travis for three days.

I came home from school to find Mom holding him on the bathroom floor. He was shaking, tears running down his face. When he saw me, he backed away like a mouse seeing a cat.

After 15 minutes of sobbing, he explained how he had seen the PS5 menu while walking past my room.

“All those other kids,” he cried. “They had bedrooms and games. I had nothing.”

Mom chose a side. She looked at me like I was the one who had raised him in that crack house.

The new guidelines were implemented immediately:

Travis goes to his room at 10 p.m.

I get only two hours of PS5 after that time.

Minimum TV brightness so the light doesn’t shine under the door.

When I objected, Dad said:

“He’s never had what you have.”
“Are games worth ruining his recovery?”

They made me feel like the villain.

So for three weeks, I obeyed every rule. I played quietly. I followed everything.

Then Travis started documenting my “violations.”

Photos of the light under my door, saying it “reminded him of what he missed.”
Recordings of my controller clicking, taken from the hallway.

After enough “evidence,” my parents gave me an ultimatum:

Give up the PS5 or move to the basement.

I chose the basement.

There was no heating. Spiders dropped from the ceiling onto my head. The old TV had three working pixels. But at least I could turn up the volume and play for as long as I wanted.

That lasted until Travis failed his midterm.

He’d been skipping class to hang out with college students and smoke weed.
But of course… this was still my fault.

He told our parents he could “hear the PS5 through the floor during his study sessions” but “didn’t want to burden me by saying anything.”

So I “got to experience what he never had,” according to my parents.

They viewed him as a martyr.

The next day, they moved my PS5 into our garage—unused for years—so “Travis couldn’t hear it.”

The garage was full of old open paint cans, dead wasps, cockroaches, ants, and creatures science hasn’t identified yet.

That’s where I spent my Saturdays.

Gaming was banned on weekdays again.

This lasted four months.

Nobody complained—until Travis needed something from the garage. He walked in, had “full-body shakes,” collapsed on the floor, and needed help.

That was when my parents decided they were done.

The “only viable option”?
Sell the PS5.

“He can play mobile games,” Travis said, acting like Mother Teresa.
“That’s what poor kids do. That’s what I did.”

My parents nodded.
Mom opened eBay to search for used PS5s.

That was when I snapped.

“Shut up.”

The words erupted before I could stop them.

“I offered to share. I did everything you asked.”

Travis immediately switched into victim mode.

“I’m sorry I was poor, okay? It’s my fault I’m traumatized! My parents beat me! I’m a failure!”

“It’s okay, Travis,” Mom said, hugging him.

He smiled behind her shoulder.

“He’s going to sell that console, honey. Don’t worry.”

I snapped.

“I’m done,” I said. “Do you want to see what your precious traumatized sweetie actually does?”

I took out my phone, connected it to the living room TV.

I had installed a camera after my controller went missing four weeks ago.

Travis’s face went white.

He lunged toward me, but his sudden panic caught my parents’ attention.

“What’s going on, Travis?” Dad demanded.

“Nothing!”

“Every Sunday,” I said. “While we’re at church, Travis has been charging neighborhood kids $8 an hour to play my PS5.”

The footage played.

Travis collecting money from the two Miller brothers around the corner.

Mom’s jaw dropped.

“I’m not done.”

I opened his text messages:

“Don’t worry. My foster parents believe anything if I cry.”

Dad stepped closer. “Travis, explain the money.”

Travis panicked.

“I—I was creating a safe space! For kids whose parents can’t afford gaming systems! I was helping them!”

Mom softened immediately.

“So… you were helping them?”

Travis nodded quickly.

“They needed somewhere to play without being judged.”

As they argued about his “charity work,” I unplugged the PS5 and changed all my passwords.

Dad stopped Travis from grabbing me.

“No one plays anything until we talk about this.”

I carried the console upstairs.

“This isn’t over!” Travis shouted after me.

In my room, I backed up everything.
All videos.
All texts.
Three cloud services.
I even emailed the evidence to Dad.

An hour later, Travis knocked softly.

“Can we talk?”

I opened the door but blocked the entrance.

“I was monitoring those kids to make sure they played age-appropriate games,” he said calmly. “I was going to donate all the money to charity.”

I stared.

“You don’t believe me,” he said.

I kept staring.

“Fine. Be that way.”

He stomped off.

Dad spent that evening calling the Miller parents.
They confirmed everything.

At dinner, Mom ignored the theft and berated me for “invading Travis’s privacy.”

Spying on family was “unacceptable.”

I wanted to shout that Travis had recorded me for weeks.
But I stayed silent.

Later that night, Travis posted online about being “ambushed and betrayed by family.”

My stomach twisted.

He was controlling the narrative again.

Kids at school began whispering.
Screenshots circulated.
Counselor called me in.

For once, an adult listened.

She helped me set up evidence folders, boundaries, and cloud backups.

When I returned home, Dad was in my room hooking up the PS5 on my desk.

“It stays here now,” he said simply.

Not an apology.
But it meant everything.

That night, Travis apologized through my door—loudly, so Mom would hear.

I shut it.

He “silent treated” me for three days. It was bliss.

Then, Saturday morning, our neighbor Patricia arrived demanding the $60 her sons paid Travis.

Mom turned ghost-white.

Dad pulled security footage:
Kids entering the garage every Sunday we were at church.

Mom couldn’t deny it.

That night, the four of us sat at the table.

Dad said Travis needed to repay the money and new rules were required.

Mom ignored the theft and said the “real issue” was me “violating privacy.”

I was exhausted.
I stayed quiet.

The next day, I bought a lockbox for my controllers and cables.

Mom called it “hostile behavior.”

I ignored her.

Travis texted me paragraphs about how I was “destroying the family” and needed to “delete the recordings.”

I saved screenshots.

Then came church.
Sandra—the neighbor—asked Mom why kids kept going into our garage.

Mom looked humiliated.

But she worried more about embarrassment than truth.

Then the social worker came.

She wrote everything down, made a behavioral contract, highlighted repayment, and warned:

If Travis violates again, he may be removed from the home.

Mom paled.

Dad took it seriously.

Travis glared at me like he would kill me in my sleep.