toxic sister.... AIBU??

[chonkylegs]

Okay let me start off with a little back story first... i cut out my entire mothers side due to them enabling my mothers behavior's. I was always the ugly duckling she would demonstrate it in many ways but the one behavior that disturbed me the most was the time my mother took myself and her boyfriend to Tunisia (i was 14/15 at the time) and she engaged in sexual intercourse less than a meter away from the single bed that i was sleeping on, merely divided by a small drawer. She excused her behaviour with "its only a bit of fun" and "don't be so ungrateful, i saved and worked overtime for this holiday and you've been nothing but ungrateful"

Another way was when my sister wanted to go into a dead end job she received nothing but support but as i was in my later teen years doing a carpentry apprenticeship she was robbing tools that i paid for myself through my apprenticeship (note she was charging me £250 a fortnight in board as "your sister does it, why can't you? further, note that i was on £4.75 at the time) so those tools were more than just the money. As my sister is older than me i confided in her and told her about the things that were bothering me as another dreaded holiday was up and coming and i was having nervous break downs all the time.

fast forward to the present, i met the love of my life and managed to beat my mental health issues all thanks to my wife and we had a beautiful daughter and she is our pride and joy. I gave my sister the benefit of the doubt and let her back into my life so maybe we can reconstruct our relationship for the sake of my daughter. Before my daughter was born my wife and i met with my sister on a couple of occasions which made me think "okay, shes changed, she's a lot more mature now i have absolutely no problem with her meeting our child"

Fast forward to 2 weeks after giving birth she starts showing a bad side to her, a side that was all too familiar to me. Questioning our parenting skills and being really condescending with her advice even though her experience with children has been only as a baby sitter for her best friends kids (they co-sleep even now at the age of 7 so i don't trust this woman's advice especially with it has been gleamed from another person) my sister suggested to give our daughter tap water at the age of 2 weeks so her advice was shockingly bad.

A month or so ago we had an argument over the same sort of thing, sister came to visit and everything was okay until our daughter started moaning and complaining so i said "here give her here ill try to work some daddy magic" and she went on to say "i've done this for a lot longer than you have" and "how dare you question me when i'm only trying to help" " i've been around kids for years" to which i said "yes but baby sitting supervised is a lot different to being a parent, you'll never have to wake up 4 times during the night just to change her nappy or put her dummy back in", i saw my wife was getting increasingly upset with the atmosphere my sister had created so i dismissed the argument until later on the phone in private.

long story short i said something along the lines of " don't you ever bring that sort of confrontation to our house again especially when it concerns our daughter, advice is good but when you start interfering thats when we have a problem, i let you in out of the benefit of doubt but don't push it, you're on thin ice" to where she hung up and called me back 15 minutes later crying her eyes out (normal defence mechanism for her) saying she's sorry etc etc. This was erratic and irrational behaviour so i dismissed it straight away. But i gave her a 3rd chance and now she seems to not even be bothered in the slightest, saying nothing or replying with just emojis after sending her a video of a recent milestone. So my question is, do i even entertain her? and also..am i being unreasonable?. I know this is a long one so thank you for any replies but this is a story that relied on the back story being told.

Thank you.

Children are considered to be victims of abuse if they witness domestic abuse towards one of their parents. Why would it be any different if the abuse they witness is towards a sibling?

My sister has ways felt an immense strain to be perfect because she was brought up with the fear of not being the golden child any more. And she knew exactly what would happen if she ever failed any tiny little thing, by witnessing the abuse I got.

It's not the same, but it doesn't mean it's not valid.

You don't have to stay in contact with your sister if you don't want to. It might be better for you both if you didn't. You appear to want to blame her for not being abused and refuse to recognise the effect her childhood has had on her. And she appears to want to be seen to be more important and knowledgeable than you and doesn't seem to recognise the effect your childhood has had on you.

My sister and I have a strong relationship. But that's because we both recognised that the perpetrators of our abuse and the enablers were the adults in our life and that we are equally victims of that.

I thought that was the sister telling the OP he was making a fuss when he was describing his mother's behaviour?

Still understandable as a reason to cut his sister out of his life either way

Whatever happened.. your sister is not your responsibility. She has to seek help rather than poisoning everyone around her. You cant lead a horse to water.
Personally id stop sending pictures or texts etc. Let her message you but don't over text/ talk. Tbh i put up with massively dysfunctional family and when my grandson said why dont they like you, i realised he had also been affected, i broke that cycle asap and went NC

No a later post (drip feed) he said his sister inappropriately touched him when they were younger.

@chonkylegs

Its just as shes in the wrong... am i meant to be trying for her to have contact or should that be down to her and her alone?

She's entitled to her opinion, just as you are. The issue of 'right or wrong' doesn't come into it. What DOES come into it is "Do I believe that this person is a positive influence in/addition to my (and my family's) life?". That's what you need to decide.

I have had people in my life who simply did not add to it. There wasn't anything particularly 'wrong' with them, they just didn't 'walk the same path' as I did and felt they had the right to 'influence' me. Therefore they weren't really 'positive' in my life. Those people I 'faded out'. But I've also had people in my life who didn't walk the same path but could offer a 'counterpoint' without being negative or argumentative. We could just 'agree to disagree'. Those people were a positive in my life so I 'kept' them. Do you see where I'm coming from?

You know, it sounds as if you've had some really bad experiences when you were young. These things leave their impressions on our souls whether we see those scars or not. Have you ever considered counseling? It can help us take out all that mental 'junk', examine it, and then put it in its 'right place'. In a box on the top shelf of the closet in our brains. It never really disappears, it may rattle about a bit, but we simply close that mental closet door when it does.

Yeah if he had led with that I'm sure the responses would have been different!

I think I read that post wrong and misinterpreted

I get it my sister and I are from a toxic family I had kids she didn't her "advice" all stems from babysitting others she tells me she practically raised other people's children (honestly I don't believe this she doesn't have the time for a start) I refuse to take her advice to such a degree I only get duty visits now and I've no doubt she tells people she practically raised my children too she has literally babysat 10 times in 20 years (and never overnight) she loves giving unsolicited advice on things she knows nothing about I grey rock her or tell her I will think about it her latest advice is that I work night shift....who will take care of the children? Oh well I can't sort EVERYTHING out for you!!! Runs off to tell my mother how awful I am ......I'm literally a single parent with no support? Night shift? How fucking stupid is that?

But yeah low contact grey rock and don't listen to dangerous advice

i've had years of therapy but its just never seem to have gone

Have you explored EMDR? If not it may be worth doing.

My father was the biggest inspiration for letting her back in my life, obviously he doesn't know every single detail but he would constantly state "life is too short to have enemies" and all of that sort of stuff, i've never even told anyone about the thing that happened to my sister so its becoming a bit of a revelation to me right now and its upsetting me quite a bit now i've come to think about it.

it's a therapy for people with PTSD, i never got recognised as someone who suffers with it, i had an evaluation and he implied nothing bad had happened in my life and i have no reason to feel the way i do. I did try to get diagnosed as PTSD as recommended by my therapist at the time and to try out other forms of therapy like CBT but once the person who evaluated me said what he said i just lost hope and regressed.

she wasn't on the holiday. it was a one room. 1 single 1 double.

I don't blame myself considering what happened

Yes, but you are calling sister toxic over matters which happen even in non dysfunctional family. From all the incidents you mentioned, only your mother's behaviour is toxic.
You know your sister better but the way you interacted with some posters here, you seem to be very irritable and low on tolerance

thats how id describe it honestly. im a functioning walking mess, ive had therapy for years to try and combat what happened in my teen years but as you say the doors closed but it dosen't stop rattling... i think im going to cut her loose. I never even considered what she did was SA until today.... so im very confused at the moment. deep down utterly confused.

i suggest you read further and think about what you've just said.

I don't understand how this relates to Mt post?

You and others seem to think she was a victim of my mothers 'abuse' when the abuse was only dished out to the 'ugly duckling'

But what's that got to do with who was on the holiday? I feel like I am missing your point and I'm genuinely not trying to

But my point was that as a child witnessing abuse of someone else, whether that's a parent or a sibling, is also a form of abuse. You seem very unwilling to accept that

yet another skim reader.

because she didn't 'witness' anything

she wasn't there to witness anything

because she didn't 'witness' anything

So there was no abuse or toxic behaviour outside of this one holiday when you were 15? The rest of your childhood was completely normal?

I think people were making the point that if your sister sexually assaulted you she may well have been assaulted herself (whether within the family or not) as it’s often linked.

I am sorry for all the trauma you have experienced- it must be very hard to navigate life after that sort of treatment especially now that you’re a parent yourself and can see it all from a different angle. It sounds like it would be worth continuing the therapy with a different therapist - perhaps you haven’t seen the right person yet.

So you mother was abusive to you your whole childhood but your sister never witnessed it?

And you talked to your sister about it, and you say other family members were aware and enabled it but your sister was still unaware?

She may have witnessed things you know nothing about.

Realistically, have you told your sister all about the abuse you went through?
If you haven't, it is highly likely that she hasn't told you about all the abuse she went through.

And witnessing abuse to a sibling counts as abuse in itself.