I resent my sister and feel so guilty

Molly41

Shopaholic101 wrote: »

After reading comments (ignoring the one about me being sterilised...) I think my issue is spending my childhood being told she's "different", "struggling" and to "understand" and now as an adult shes "achieving", "capable" and "normal". If this is true I dont see why my parents can't just be nice to me and perhaps tell me they're proud or I've done something well that they didn't expect? Or maybe Spend some time with me?

Going forward, she is scary with babies - she hasn't mentioned me once (I was hospitalised for morning sickness), she seems genuinely looking forward to having a living doll!

Btw if my baby has any issues at all I will do my best for them as my parents did for my sister. I'm sure they thought everything they did was best for her, but I know they'd be hurt if I told them how much certain choices they made hurt me. I should really be firm and invite my parents and only them to my house, but the assumption is that my sister is also invited, I would be told to "grow up" if I asked for just them. I know, I've done it in the past.

Sounds like your parents are in denial about your sister and how they treat you.

I have a similar relationship with my parents in that they did not meet my needs as I grew up and I feel a lot of resentment - Im an only child though.

I have had a lot of counselling - for a different problem - but inevitably this came up. I feel more at ease with them now but I am 45.

Pregnancy brings about many changes and feelings - hormones also dont help - this is a period of transition. I wonder if you can ask for counselling at your GP's or afford it privately - it is often means tested so should not be too expensive - I pay 10 pounds an hour. Also focus on your positive relationship with your boyfriend.
I determined to be a very different mother to my own and my kids say they love me and I got some lovely words from them on Mothering Sunday - so you can be confident that you will be a good mum x

lazer

I have in the past resented by brother for the attention he gets from my parents as he moved away to England (we live in NI) for University and never returned and rarely visits.

I on the otherhand, stayed in NI for university although I did move out and lived over an hour away (more by bus!), but I was always expected to go home at weekends, for any special occassions (Parents birthdays, mothers day, fathers day, Anniversary etc), it felt as if my brother was allowed an independent life and I wasn't - and that his rare visits were apprecaited more than my weekly visits. (Note - I still consider his behaviour is very selfish and think he should visit more - for example when my Dad's brother died - my brother came home on the morning of the night before the funeral and went back the next day becasue he had plans to go out the next night - whereas I had given up many nights out to bethere in the hospice with my Dad, and just keep him company and keep him from dwelling on things to much)

However, after much thinking and discussing it - there is one thing to realise - you can't change your parents relationship with your sibling, but you can change your relationship with your sibling and your reaction to your parents relationship with your sibling.

I now find that I have built a relationship with my brother and now I look forward to his visits and not dread them.

OP - you can't change what has happened over the years, but at a guess your parents are very proud of you, you are independent, you are happy with your new family and you don't need them (or at least that is what they think). What you can do is change the way you think about the past - try and see their actions from their point of view, as you are soon to be a parent , this will probably be easier for you now than it has been in the past.

duchy

pigpen wrote: »

I bet if you sat down with your parents, emailed them a letter explaining how you feel they would be horrified. I am sure you love your sister really, you can resent her or even dislike her sometimes you just need to get it off your chest.

I hope you manage to get time to speak to your mum about this.. could you suggest the 2 of you go for lunch and make it clear it is just for the 2 of you..

I wouldn't be so sure -it could misfire.

I did try to have similar conversations with both of my parents seperately and was told I was jealous or didn't understand or that they didn't have a clue what I was talking about .....however in later life (My Dad in my mid 20s and my Mum in my 40s) they did admit it. My Dad volunteered it -My Mum I finally confronted -but it was all in the timing -When I had tried before (when I really needed the validation) I'd got nowhere and they were quite offended I could think like that about them and the conversation was dropped. Odds are if the OP brought it up at the moment they might just tell her she's feeling hormonal !

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

Ribena and sausages? That's what this is about?


Jeez. My older brother has some form of learning difficulties. Most likely Aspergers. There might have been some 'your brother's mental' stuff directed at my other siblings, but the real suffering came from him being tormented by a lad who hated him purely because he was awkward and shy and because, as the eldest boy, he didn't have anyone to defend him for a few years. He works, always has done, but has never managed a proper relationship or moving out on his own.

The person who hates him is our mother. Resenting that he couldn't speak when put on the spot, that he likes certain foods and not others, of his strangeness and vulnerability which veered from very intelligent to unable to understand or cope, that he was scared of a cupboard in the old house because the hinge made a sound. Her solution? Shove him in there and lock it whenever feeling angry, having battered him first.

The fact is, he still needs someone looking out for him in his fifties. Not in everything, just there in case something crops up that is outside his capabilities. Do you want to be complaining about Ribena and sausages when you're a grandmother?


In any case, you might have a bit of a shock when you have the baby. Because very few people are really that interested in the mum, they're interested in 'the Baby', how is s/he? Feeding well? Happy? Healthy? Look how beautiful the baby is, how lovely, wonderful, smells so good, so tiny. You don't like to say to someone 'you look like crap. Have you considered washing or brushing your hair?', you smile and ask how the baby is instead. You've got decades of not being called anything other than xxxxx's mum - so you don't have a name of your own.

You become secondary to someone else's needs, because they are helpless, vulnerable and don't understand things the way you do. Because they need more than you.



Do you want to be resenting your own child because nobody's giving you attention either?

pigpen

duchy wrote: »

I wouldn't be so sure -it could misfire.

I did try to have similar conversations with both of my parents seperately and was told I was jealous or didn't understand or that they didn't have a clue what I was talking about .....however in later life (My Dad in my mid 20s and my Mum in my 40s) they did admit it. My Dad volunteered it -My Mum I finally confronted -but it was all in the timing -When I had tried before (when I really needed the validation) I'd got nowhere and they were quite offended I could think like that about them and the conversation was dropped. Odds are if the OP brought it up at the moment they might just tell her she's feeling hormonal !

So it was the way you presented your argument and the poor timing that was the issue not how you actually felt .. I think given the OPs pregnancy and the changing family dynamic now would be a good time.. rather than letting it boil and bubble over until it comes across as a petulant child having a tantrum and said in a heated moment. I am all for airing your feelings and moving on.. you either learn from it or you deal with it knowing everyone knows how you feel.

My youngest sister is favourite.. and she has been told she is staying a spinster to look after our mother when she is old and even more cantankerous than she is now.. I did my share looking after my sisters when they were small.

Mojisola

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

Ribena and sausages? That's what this is about?

I think that's unfair. Those are just examples that, at the time when they were children, were important.

It's a bit like trying to explain bullying to someone - "You're making a fuss because someone called you a name/bumped into you/stares at you?" - each small example sounds like nothing but it all adds up to a very hurtful situation.

londonsurrey

pigpen wrote: »

As the 'neglected child' I understand but the over excited behaviour of your sister is probably part of her lack of social skills.

I agree about this. Whatever congenital problems the sister has, it's not going to be helped in this respect if her parents have always taught her that interaction with Shopaholic is not ever about putting Shopaholic first as an individual.

So in the absence of her ability to think it up for herself and no one to tell her otherwise (e.g. "This is not about you, this is about Shopaholic, ask her how she is, what she would like"), she's doing the best she can. Therefore I'd blame the parents!

duchy

pigpen wrote: »

So it was the way you presented your argument and the poor timing that was the issue not how you actually felt .. I think given the OPs pregnancy and the changing family dynamic now would be a good time.. rather than letting it boil and bubble over until it comes across as a petulant child having a tantrum and said in a heated moment. I am all for airing your feelings and moving on.. you either learn from it or you deal with it knowing everyone knows how you feel.

My youngest sister is favourite.. and she has been told she is staying a spinster to look after our mother when she is old and even more cantankerous than she is now.. I did my share looking after my sisters when they were small.

No it's all in the timing -Trust me I am more than capable of expressing myself but it has to be a time when the person you want to hear is in a place where they can listen and hear emotionally. My Dad -it was when he lost his sister and my brother was less than supportive and my Dad voiced feelings he'd always suppressed out of loyalty to my mother and their agreement to always stand together. My Mum -it was after she had gone through a difficult time with her health and I think was evaluating things.... I didn't ask any differently to how I'd broached the question before....but she heard the question differently -and gave me (finally) an honest response.

It's a hard thing to even imply to a committed parent that the way they parented wasn't as good as they'd like to think it was or that fairness wasn't always present. With the OP's Mum pregnancy may bring them closer so it'll be the right time -but equally it could be the worst time if she's remembering how vunerable and in need of protection a baby (and the sister may still be *her* baby) is.

Dunroamin

Shopaholic101 wrote: »

Uh huh... There are years of "unfairness" which could have easily been sorted but werent. E.g we always had black current squash because she liked it, I hate the stuff, but we were only allowed one flavour, so it was hers. Her favourite food is sausages, so we had them every other day, mine is corned beef but we rarely had that, whilst I went hungry as I didn't eat the sausages. Both are so easy to fix, I don't understand why she was never made to eat and drink things she "didn't mind" but I had to live things Id rather starve than eat.

It's really rather sad that you still remember and resent such small things and actually rather scary that you're going to have a child of your own.

Own_My_Own

Dunroamin wrote: »

It's really rather sad that you still remember and resent such small things and actually rather scary that you're going to have a child of your own.

Small things aren't small when you are young. I don't think it is the things that the OP remembers, but how they made her feel at the time.
I can see no reason to be scared that she will soon have her own child.