How can I help my sister?

[Lemonylemon]

My sister was the golden child. I was the scapegoat/black sheep. Mum was at death's door a few years back. Mum always made excuses as to why she couldn't do things. My sister tried all sorts of practical things to help Mum along. Mum still makes excuses. My sister and her have fallen out. I am the girl wonder which I don't accept and I rather resent my Mum for tagging me with it now.

Anyway, my sister is really, really struggling with what she has referred to as my Mum having been on a pedestal and having now fallen. I don't have the problem as my relationship with my Mum was not close during childhood, nor particularly close over the ensuing years. She has been shockingly behaved when my DD was born. But this isn't about me, it's for my sister. She's not that far off of a nervous breakdown.

You mean your sister placed your Mum on a pedestal and is now upset because Mum is falling short? Or is she upset that she's no longer on a pedestal? How old is your sister? Is she independent or have her own family?

People from dysfunctional families end up playing roles, this sort of dynamic often goes on where one or even worse both parents are narcissistic.

For yourself, I sincerely hope you keep both yourself and your DD away from your mother. She was not a good parent to you and is not a good grandparent to your DD.

Your post is precisely why I write that the golden child role is a role not without price; the golden child who has a narcissistic mother can fall out of favour all too quickly. Such roles too as you are seeing are interchangeable; your mother sees nothing at all wrong with her actions.

Can your sister though set her own self free from her mother's malign influence?. The only way your sister will find her own peace is to set herself free of her mother's influence.

This is very tricky if she was the golden child - may not even have realised how much you were the scapegoat?- and is now firmly Out Of Favour.

I think the main thing you can do is listen. Make time for your sister, ask her round and give her space to talk if she wants to. Not necessarily drive it in how you were the unloved one, though that realisation may dawn on her.

Has she got a loving partner or a close, trusted friend outside the family dynamic too?

it says a lot for you that you want to be there for her. mothers who play faviourites often sow discord among the siblings.

(In dealing with your mother, do you find you adopt a dry, wry tone now? being showered with love isn't the same when you know how fickle that love is!)

I don't think these people necessarily damage grandchildren. IME little kids are quite capable of seeing the older generation for what they are and treating them as a curiosity rather than getting all emotionally bound up. I remember my DM warning me off listening to any of my late and never lamented, rather nasty grandmother's promises and tall tales.... but she needn't have bothered. To me she was just some crazy old woman that looked a bit like my Mum. Fascinating rather than damaging.

OP I still don't understand the source of the nervous breakdown. Is it the disappointment that Mum is a nasty old bat after all or the rejection that is proving so distressing?

Narcissists make for being deplorably bad grandparents and can do an awful lot of emotional damage to the grandchildren whom they see as narcissistic supply. Its quite painful watching a narcissist interact with their grandchild because there is really no interaction at all.

Your sister has likely been trained by your mother to solely be an extension of her so rejection like this now as well is very hard to take. She is likely to have grown up without proper boundaries and a proper self identity.

Thank you all. What I meant was that my sister placed my mum on a pedestal and now mum has fallen off. My sister is having a hard time accepting that my mum's not perfect. My sister has a very bossy tone about her and this has put my mum's back up. My sister has meant well and has tried to help mum, but my mum "resists".

I am a great follower (and sometimes poster) on this board. I have read "Toxic Parents" and have absorbed. I've also read a lot of self-help books. In a way I'm lucky because I didn't have my mum on a pedestal. I'm more detached than that. Looking at it from my more detached stance, however, I wonder if my sister is cut from the same cloth and is railing at my mum because my sister can't control my mum. But that's just an idle thought.

I think it's that my sister is having a very hard time accepting that my mum won't do what is good for her. She talks the talk but doesn't walk the walk. I'm used to it and I watch out for it all the time. My brother is the same as me, but my sister, being the youngest by nearly 5 years, is having a tough time accepting it.

Both my brother and I have the attitude that my mum is not going to make us ill with her dramas.

Sorry to dripfeed, but my mum was at death's door a few years back and if it hadn't have been for my sister and I and the doctor doing things to get her into hospital, she would be dead. No two ways about it. She had another health crisis a few months later, and hasn't drunk alcohol since then. (If that helps with anything).

"Your sister has likely been trained by your mother to solely be an extension of her so rejection like this now as well is very hard to take. She is likely to have grown up without proper boundaries and a proper self identity"

As I did. It has had a bad effect on my life. I'm happy though :)

Bumping. Are there any other books that I can recommend that my sister read to help her with this please?

Thanks

toxic mothers by susan forward. but it also sounds like your sister is pretty bossy which is a trait that is really unhelpful and a very difficult one to get people to see :s

"being the youngest by nearly 5 years"

How old is your sister?

Meerka Yes, I know, which is why I'm finding it so difficult to help her. It may well be a case of 6 of one and half-a-dozen of the other, in which case, they'll just need to sort it out themselves. I just don't like to see anyone in such a state. Mind you, I've been left to get on with it myself by her.

Cog She's nearly 45. (Her reaction makes her sound like she's much younger....).