Investment
It's funny -- how many people get offended for other people. Especially when it's about a situation that they really don't have any background on, or one side of the story.
The relationship between siblings is completely different than just a person you met a few years ago or even a decade ago. You've known these people your whole life, they've treated you a certain way your whole life. You've seen them in pretty much every situation imaginable, flattering and unflattering. You've seen the unscripted moments they let other people on the outside see. You've heard the conversations they've had with others when they thought no one was paying attention to. You've seen how they treat their children, how they treat other people's children. How they behaved in church vs. at home. In other words, family sees it all. You don't know how your mom treated her sister when they were kids living at home together. The trust that was broken, or made. You never saw how they reacted to each other when one was in pain, or hurt, or needing someone to stand up for them. There is so much that goes on before you're born, you're not a good judge of that relationship. You also do not know your mother as well as you think you do. You know her as a mom, not as much a person.
How do I know that? Because I'm a mom. My kids get to see a lot of me, but they haven't seen me as an actual person that is not their mom. They will love me no matter what because I care for them and have been fostering that relationship since they were inside of me. I care for them when they're sick and hurting, I protect them from seen and unseen things. Basically I'm their hero. But they don't know me like other people do because I don't have that kind of relationship with them. I doubt I ever will, maybe when I'm an adult. But even then, at that point I will be a different person than I was before I had them. They'll know that person. Hopefully I'm a much better person.
So when you see people having issues with their siblings understand this one giant fact, you can never understand the full realm of how far back resentments can reach. You have no idea how long the hurt has been festering. The pent up dreams for that relationship -- that were sown and diligently watered hoping they would bloom and it would be this lovely living thing. And then it came up a weed instead. The disappointments are real and they can be pretty deep.
Family is complicated. It isn't that there isn't love there, it's under the anger. And under the anger is resentment, bitterness, and under those is just a long long list of hurts that were never acknowledged.
When people refuse to acknowledge how neglectful they've been to the simple humanity of another it can be devastating.
And I'm sorry you think it's all one sided, it never is. I know personally I have a really hard time showing people I need them, because that makes me vulnerable even more to rejection -- when I'm already feeling rejected.
Being the youngest sibling I always was hungry for acceptance from my siblings and parents. I wanted to make them proud, but I was always the tag along. The annoyance. The one they didn't want around. I tried to be useful and prove I could help and be worthy of their presence. But I will never get those things, they grew up and moved away and I became less and less relevant. No matter how hard you try to make people want you, need you, see you, you can't make them feel that way. And at a point for your own sanity you just have to understand you can't earn their love and respect.
And when you let them go, it's not just anger, bitterness, or resentment, it's that when love is sown into bad soil it rots. And as a mother of 4, soon to be 5, I have to invest myself more wisely now. I cannot afford mentally or emotionally to leave room to put care into a bad investment. And one day when you're a parent, you'll understand.
The relationship between siblings is completely different than just a person you met a few years ago or even a decade ago. You've known these people your whole life, they've treated you a certain way your whole life. You've seen them in pretty much every situation imaginable, flattering and unflattering. You've seen the unscripted moments they let other people on the outside see. You've heard the conversations they've had with others when they thought no one was paying attention to. You've seen how they treat their children, how they treat other people's children. How they behaved in church vs. at home. In other words, family sees it all. You don't know how your mom treated her sister when they were kids living at home together. The trust that was broken, or made. You never saw how they reacted to each other when one was in pain, or hurt, or needing someone to stand up for them. There is so much that goes on before you're born, you're not a good judge of that relationship. You also do not know your mother as well as you think you do. You know her as a mom, not as much a person.
How do I know that? Because I'm a mom. My kids get to see a lot of me, but they haven't seen me as an actual person that is not their mom. They will love me no matter what because I care for them and have been fostering that relationship since they were inside of me. I care for them when they're sick and hurting, I protect them from seen and unseen things. Basically I'm their hero. But they don't know me like other people do because I don't have that kind of relationship with them. I doubt I ever will, maybe when I'm an adult. But even then, at that point I will be a different person than I was before I had them. They'll know that person. Hopefully I'm a much better person.
So when you see people having issues with their siblings understand this one giant fact, you can never understand the full realm of how far back resentments can reach. You have no idea how long the hurt has been festering. The pent up dreams for that relationship -- that were sown and diligently watered hoping they would bloom and it would be this lovely living thing. And then it came up a weed instead. The disappointments are real and they can be pretty deep.
Family is complicated. It isn't that there isn't love there, it's under the anger. And under the anger is resentment, bitterness, and under those is just a long long list of hurts that were never acknowledged.
When people refuse to acknowledge how neglectful they've been to the simple humanity of another it can be devastating.
And I'm sorry you think it's all one sided, it never is. I know personally I have a really hard time showing people I need them, because that makes me vulnerable even more to rejection -- when I'm already feeling rejected.
Being the youngest sibling I always was hungry for acceptance from my siblings and parents. I wanted to make them proud, but I was always the tag along. The annoyance. The one they didn't want around. I tried to be useful and prove I could help and be worthy of their presence. But I will never get those things, they grew up and moved away and I became less and less relevant. No matter how hard you try to make people want you, need you, see you, you can't make them feel that way. And at a point for your own sanity you just have to understand you can't earn their love and respect.
And when you let them go, it's not just anger, bitterness, or resentment, it's that when love is sown into bad soil it rots. And as a mother of 4, soon to be 5, I have to invest myself more wisely now. I cannot afford mentally or emotionally to leave room to put care into a bad investment. And one day when you're a parent, you'll understand.
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