I am so ashamed of how jealous I feel of my sister

[Solonthelawgiver]

My parents had two children, myself and my sister. We grew up in the south east, but not in London. Growing up, I was the family scapegoat while my sister was the golden child. This began patterns of behaviour that are still in play.

I left home as soon as I could. DM was abusive in every sense of that word, and living with her was like a prison sentence. I literally used to cross off the days until I could get out to university. My sister, by contrast, hasn't left home. My parents do everything for her. She is now in her mid 30s. They make her breakfast, do her washing, do her shopping, tidy up after her, etc etc etc. She has a decently paid job (nearly £40k), and her boyfriend of ten years earns even more - so while they are not rich by Mumsnet standards (!), they are, statistically speaking, high earners.

The family story is that DS can't move out because of MH issues - and she definitely does suffer from depression/anxiety. I don't want to sound like i'm diminishing the significance of this as something that holds her back, but her issues are not so big that they prevent her from being functional at work or socially. I do recognise that she is at home partly because of the pressures of being a golden child. But she is also exploiting the situation for all it is worth from a pragmatic point of view. She and her partner are saving almost all their income, and they are amassing a fortune (and I am talking hundreds and hundreds of thousands of pounds) so that they can move out to a dream house in a dream area.

I live a long way away from my folks. I made the decision that I couldn't get onto the housing ladder where my sister wants to buy, and moved somewhere much cheaper. My parents will not travel to visit, though they are able to do so - my mum is a bit anxious about travelling, but not excruciatingly so. It feels like they just don't want to make the effort, while they bend over backwards for my sister. In the last five years, they have been up to see me twice.

I've not be working recently due to health issues, and a confined and isolated life, and a serious of medical cockups over five years resulting in fertility issues that mean I can't have children. So I've developed serious depression on top to the point that functioning normally is a challenge. Fortunately, I am amazingly lucky compared to many in my situation: DH has a well-paid job and has been so supportive, allowing me to focus on getting better rather than dealing with the nightmare that is the benefits system. Before this happened, I had a decent job (the only decent job I've ever had, actually), and was doing OK, but now everything is in turmoil and I really have to build my life from scratch and find a new direction and purpose, without the prospect of creating my own family. I am 37 and I am terrified of this challenge. The rounds of treatment I've undergone have left me emotionally, physically, and mentally exhausted, and I just don't feel I have anything left to give. I could use some support right now, but absolutely nothing practical is forthcoming. My Mum acts like she's making a huge sacrifice in talking to me on the phone occasionally, and seems to think that she has already gone beyond the call of all duty. (Actually, I spent more time on these calls supporting her as she deals with my grandmother!)

I think my DS is on the brink of moving out for the first time ever. I should feel glad for her. I should be happy to see her spread her wings and fly like a fledged adult. But I feel jealous and sad. I honestly don't think it's the money, and I have sat down and really considered whether this is just envy, but I don't think it is. It's more that I feel like my parents have handed her the ability to live in the absolutely ideal location of my dreams, and that I am just exiled hundreds of miles away, struggling along to be independent, without any support or love from the family. They don't even seem to recognise or acknowledge that they do treat the two of us so differently.

I know I need to get past this, hitch on a smile and try to feel glad, but I can't. I just feel... bereft. It's like the situation is just screaming everything that is wrong with the family dynamic, and I am finding it hard to stay positive. The fact that it's come at a time when I'm dealing with my own inability to have a very different family of my own just makes it a hundred times worse. I'm hoping people will give me a good talking to about this so that I can buck up my ideas.

My goodness, why on EARTH do you think you deserve "a good talking to' from us after that choldhood?! You are very much the scapegoat still but you DO rwalise to which is a great start. I agree counselling - good, in depth psychoanalysid over cbt which could be damagingly shallow. It was for me at least in aimilar circs- i was told by a highly recommended counsellor that i had "difficult relationships ()also dsis and dm) because i was difficult"!!! I was so subdued that at the time i thought "pf course, ok then". After 2 years of decent psychotherapy (with a man) i get the family dynamic. So be v careful who you choose.

Am struck by several things- first the depth of shame you feel and express... Understandable but they should have the shame not you. Hopefully you can come to accept who you are, how you feel - dont deny the envy- notice it, allow it but try not to indulge it, let it go. Have you looked at mindfulness at all?

Also, i get the feeling your family is all about your dsis. Well, change that. Dont go and visit until you're ready, focus on you and yr dh, move the locus of your lofe away from hers. And why did/fo you want to live in this eonderful placd/town in ehich she lives? why really? Because shes been gloating about it all these years so its become the holy grail?
As for her being capable, sure she is. Everyone has there good & their bad sode but who the hell respects someone, really, when mum amd dad handed it to them on a plate in their 30s? I'd call that licky on some ways, pathetic in others.

Aware this is all so easy to say and that you are in difficult circs and they dont help you. which is wrong. But it is their choice for whstever messed up reason and you have to accept it and them as they are. Or break contact, at least until you can handle them on equal terms. Good luck, OP. Found your post so touching and raw. You deserve to get through this and to move on.

Sorry for the many iohone typos!

I think counselling will really help. I experienced fertility issues and it was incredibly helpful to talk to someone who was just there to listen. It is like a bereavement and people don't always get that. I felt very miserable for a while before I found the right counsellor (seconding the advice above to choose someone non-motherly -- I saw one awful one before finding a really nice, young man - I hadn't thought about that aspect until reading what the poster advised above). I think the best revenge will be to get better and not need your toxic family. Stick with your DH. If you have managed to get away from them and recover from the abuse and the anorexia you are one tough cookie, even if it doesn't feel like it.

The abuse you have experienced is severe. I'm not sure you get that.

Ime of being the scapegoat it has been, and will continue to be, a lifetime's work to recover. Not endless navel gazing but, yes, treatment. Not permanent treatment but huge, solid treatment for a number of years, then top-ups as and when. Our entire structure has been fucked and we have a big job rebuilding from scratch. Some of it will never be second nature - we have to keep on it - but we can do a lot to build a sound, functioning base to live successfully.

You say you dont know why you have ground to a halt. But it's obvious why you have ground to a halt. You are chock full of trauma and there's only so much papering over we can do before the whole thing collapses. Good job, really, though it doesn't seem like it at the time.

This house represents the terrible, terrible hand you were dealt in this hideous family. They normalise it - but don't you! It was, and is, unspeakable, dark, twisted, terrifying. You have to face that, as hard as it is - but it is not as hard as a lifetime living on a ledge. Do you know what I mean about a life reduced?

Fwiw I have TWO sisters who live in my dream homes; one sister has the life I would dearly love (apart from the alcoholic abuser husband!). Yippy do. They are also hideously abusive towards me, both adding their own touches and flair to the family dynamic that puts me in the sewer, which they consider my rightful place. So it's a good job I don't see them!

You have a lot of work to do to shift this awesome weight away from you , where it never belonged, back onto them, where it really does belong. Yy your mother had a terrible childhood etc but you have to get linear about this, you have to protect yourself. They are poisonous, your life manifests the extent of that poison, the depth of it. You have to get it off you so you can stretch out and LIVE.

You have to get it off you so you can stretch out and LIVE.

I feel so like this springy, that's so well put. Since I told my mother no more and I didn't want to be in touch, I feel like I'm allowed to occupy the space I'm in, that I can "stretch out" and just take my true shape and not be fearful or crushed. I didn't know until I did it, that that was how it would feel.

Thanks everyone. I got some sleep, which has been very restoring.

I don't feel that what my family has done is right. I don't at all. But I know that it isn't going to get better. They are never going to care about me in the way they care for my sister. And they're not going to 'fix' me either. So while I do feel all kinds of resentment and blame and anger against them, I know that those feelings don't really do anything for me- and right now what I need to do (urgently) is to put my life back together.

I desperately want to do what you say, springy and stretch out and live! But the answer to that is never going to be my parents. I am a mess in so many ways, and the only person who can sort that out is - me. I wish it wasn't. I don't feel like I have the skills or the energy to do it by myself.

I know I need counselling and you people have really helped me to understand a bit more how it could help me. I have spoken to my GP already and have been booked onto a clinical trial, which should mean I get more help than is normally available on the NHS. But I have so much more than that to do. I want - desperately - to rebuild my life, but I am too afraid. I know that not trying means that I will automatically fail, but I just can't will myself on.

It's like being in limbo. I don't understand what is happening to me and I am scared. I make excuses for myself. Some of them are quite good. I have had operation after operation since Christmas, the last just three weeks ago, long-acting medication is draining from my system, my dog died two weeks ago today, I've had an appalling cold the last week (a result of all the crying about my dog, I swear - I have cried my eyes bloody over him). I feel guilty about these things, that I should have been striding on in spite of them rather than huddled in a heap on the floor afraid even to move at times. I am really struggling with my inability not to have children, and the feelings of bereavement feel quite similar to my feelings about my family so it is all very confusing and screwed up (and you're right, it is like bereavement Phin - it's yet more grief for a life I never had. But here's the sick thing: a part of me feels relief. When I told my mother, she just said 'Oh well, you'd have been a crap parent anyway'. At some level I believe that, and so I can't even grieve properly for the children I might have had. )

I am so sorry. I can add nothing from experience or expertise but I wish it were different for you.

I am hoping this rock bottomness that you are feeling is the catalyst to get the help you need to support you to move on to better things and to begin to recover and come to terms with what happened.

FWIW I think you sound very brave and very strong to have ridden out on your own in spite of all this. I think also that the real you must be a very special you to have forged a good and loving relationship with your partner after such a dreadful childhood. This inner core will be your saviour and I hope will both help restore you and allow you to move on.

It sounds as though your sister's house is just the final straw after a long line of hardship and disappointment.

I wonder if you should be jealous though because reading between the lines, can your sister love having watched all this and going along with it? Is she perhaps as much as a victim as you but her story hasn't unfolded yet because she's only just got away.

I know you are in a bad place and bad things have happened but you sound like the "lucky" one to me. You had the grit to leave, to move away, to meet a good partner and you have love to give. I'm sorry it feels that all that love has nowhere to go just now but there will be a way to channel it later - right now I think you have to channel it inwards and let it help you heal.

You've had a truly awful childhood.

What city are you in OP or area?

Solon you got through that awful upbringing.
You have a wonderful dh who loves you. Many would give their right hand for that.
Get great counselling and perhaps, in time, you might adopt or foster children.

Well done, lovely name.

In years to come your story will go :

'I was severely abused as a child and when I was n years old, following yet another devastating loss, I broke down completely, body and soul. Although it was a dark and very painful time of confusion and loss, I was at last able to come to terms with my past and, with excellent professional support and loving relationships, build a new and healthy future free of the toxic ties that had reduced me to a shell. I have a rich, fulfilling and healthy life now which I enjoy immensely, surrounded by people who care for me and want the very best for me. I am loved and my love is valued and precious to those I love. Although I paid a high price to get here it has been worth it because the quality of my life is unrecognisable to what it was before. I will never be completely healed of my past but the life I have now more than eclipses it. At last I am free to enjoy my many gifts and to live the life I was born to live.'

When I told my mother, she just said 'Oh well, you'd have been a crap parent anyway'.

That is an appalling, absolutely terrible thing to say. For me, i used to just take remarks like this from my mum and just absorb them, somehow I felt I just had to put up with it. I was too scared of upsetting her if I stood up to her and said "hang on, how dare you speak to me like that?" (And if I ever did try anything like that, she would get all self-pitying and cry about why was I being "hostile" to her...)

But when you look at things like this with a clear eye, putting aside the sense of guilt, duty and longing for her to be a good mum, that was simply an appallingly rude, hurtful remark and – you don't owe anything to someone who hurts you like that.

FWIW I don't think you would be a crap parent at all going by the insight and thoughtfulness you've shown here. Very obviously, your mum is the crap parent and she is projecting big style.

Solon I'm so sorry for what you're going through. Your childhood abuse, your incessant health challenges, the loss of your dog and the bewildering, crazed grief of infertility - any one of these might floor you, and you're dealing with them all.

I do think Springydaffs is right; this is the turning point of your story. Everything you've written points to a wise, insightful and self-aware person who has gone through a horrific time and is reeling from it, but is more than able to regroup, learn and build something of great worth.

For what it's worth, you've helped me. My story is nothing like as bad as yours, but a difficult home life left me unable to identify what I wanted, admit to hopes, or trust in and accept love, a bullet that my sister largely dodged. She married a loving and successful DH, and is a SAHM in a dream house with 3 beautiful DDs who I adore. I was single for decades before finally finding my way into a highly compromised relationship, only to face my battle with infertility. By a miracle I did have DS, who is my world, but 10 rounds of IVF wiped out my finances and I'm deeply scarred by the loss of my other children and the fact that DS would love a sibling. DH is mostly out of work and I support all of us with a draining job that takes me away from DS far too much and squeezes out hobbies and friendships. For years, I felt my sister's success, not as envy or a wish that she didn't have it, but as an agonising contrast, shining a light into the hole at the centre of my life. I lock myself in the bathroom and cry at some point during most visits. Our stories aren't the same, but reading the parallels and the very perceptive responses on here have made me reflect on mine, realising that I need to seek help to unpick and move on from some of my stuff. My childhood value lay in soldiering on regardless, but maybe I should learn to admit defeat and get help.

I salute you. If you choose a different path to motherhood, I'm sure you will be a spectacular mother, but whatever you choose, I wish you the very best. Who was it who said Living well is the best revenge ? They were right!

Sometimes the right thing to do is to fold. We're conditioned to keep on, to win, masters of our destiny blah blah blah but sometimes the weight is too great, we are too compromised, and we have to give in and BE broken.

Give up darling, you are in a lot of pain for very good reason. I hereby give you permission to collapse and stop being the brave soldier.

Springydaffs is right. Just wanted to add more , you are going through so much right now. Go easy on yourself.

You poor poppet. I am so angry that your mother treated you this way. Be kind to yourself.

Be kind to yourself - you are obviously exhausted. Running on empty. That's another reason why it's so overwhelming. You hardly have any resources left.

Its awful how parents treat their offspring so differently. You are so much stronger than your sister, once she has to really live in the real world she will fall apart. I agree with Plasma above, maybe to go no contact would help. What is your relationship with your dad? Your mum abused you im afraid. Im so sorry i cant help you, but you are stronger than you think and i hope that counselling will help you realise this. I wish you luck. Keep your chin up. You deserve lots of happiness.

OP I watched something called happy on Netflix last night and it was all about studies that have been done about happiness. I wrote some notes while it was on about what makes people happy and have copied them for you below. I've been asking lots of questions recently and am trying to work on things myself by taking little steps like getting to bed early and exercising. OP I know there are lots of things that you need to work on through counselling, however I hope you are looking after yourself. Not being able to have children involves deep grief I know.

Getting in the flow of something absorbing. Could be anything - work, play, excersise

Some special relatives/friends. You don't need to get on with everyone in your life though.

intrinsic goals and not extrinsic goals (So personal growth and
Community involvement rather then material wealth and looks)

Spiritual - any form

Cooperation , Compassion , Love

Counting blessings once a week/daily

Thank you all so much. It has helped me so much to hear what you all have to say.

Springy - thank you for the permission to collapse. I really mean it. It helps A LOT simply to have people acknowledge that it has been difficult. Tormentil is right - I needed to stop 'hanging on', because I have nothing left to hang on with any more.

Magenta - thank you for being so kind to me and for saying that. I don't know if I would be a good parent. When I was in my 20s and with exP, I really feared that I might replicate the pattern of behaviour (especially as exP wouldn't have lifted a finger to help. It took me until my 30s to find the right person, and by that time I was having physical difficulties that are only recently sorted after 5 years!! (5 years! Childness! In my 30s, and saying repeatedly to my GP that I was concerned about my fertility - they didn't listen. I had to fight so hard to see a specialist).

MoJangled - 10 rounds of IVF! Oh my God, that's the emotional equivalent of the marathon des sables. You must have been so strong to get through it, but that statement doesn't even begin to describe the day-to-day struggle that you have fought through. You are right that it is the contrast that hurts. That is partly what has been so puzzling. I love my sister and my upbringing isn't her fault (as Beaufort said), but my parents' - yet I know she's behind a lot of the scapegoating in the last 20 years and it's done quite deliberately - yet I think she does it because she is herself weak and suffering from having the golden child position - it is all really emotionally confusing because not clear cut at all!

Box - I'm going to see if I can find that show, thank you! You are right that getting into something is important. I tried really hard not to avoid writing this morning, and I actually got a little bit done. It's not good stuff, but I did something and that feels like a major victory right now. In terms of exercise, diet I am my own worst enemy, but I have started to make small changes and I hope I will be able to sustain this.

I am going to be assessed for counselling this afternoon. I'm hoping to get onto a clinical trial that will potentially give me substantially more help than is available right now in my area on the NHS. Keep your fingers crossed for me - I could really, really use this break!

yet I know she's behind a lot of the scapegoating in the last 20 years and it's done quite deliberately - yet I think she does it because she is herself weak and suffering from having the golden child position

I think it's also likely that she's protecting herself - if she contributes to your scapegoating you get all the kicks and she deflects them from herself. She may fear your mother, sees what she is capable of, and doesn't want to be on the receiving end.

It would have been better for you if you and your sister had been able to unite against your mum's dominion, but your mother may have meted out the different treatment to you two on the principle of divide and rule.

As regards therapy. I would like to put a different perspective to the poster who said avoid an older woman therapist. My mother was nothing like as bad as yours, but she caused damage nonetheless & I had no relationship with her from the age of around 12 onwards.

I have always cultivated positive mother figures - friend's mothers or older female friends to make up for it. I also specifically chose an older woman therapist. The process of therapy helped wipe past and re-programme the 'mother' meme. It showed me what having a real mother actually feels like. It also showed me that not all mothers are like mine, and that there was nothing specific in me that was triggering unpleasant behaviours in mothers generally, it was simply that my mother was a bitch.

It depends on the therapist but I think women understand tangled mother-daughter relationships better than men, because they've experienced it.

I just wanted to add my support to you!

Also, I think it's interesting that your DM struggles so much with her mother and yet she was the golden child. I think this paints a much clearer view of your sisters future than you are aware - your Dsis will be the one that you DM continues to control and I am sure the whole 'we supported you forever, you must now support me..' will be trotted out as your DM's needs become greater. I wouldn't want to swap any of what you have for that...

I think you are immensely strong to have got away and even though my childhood wasn't as extreme, I was also the scapegoat and have purposely distanced myself from my family which helps!

Best of luck today - I really hope you get on the trial

So the good news: I got onto the clinical trial.

The bad news: I still have to deal with the NHS waiting list.

I feel quite low today. When I went to my GP, I had to fill in a questionnaire. Anyone who has been in for depression will recognise the kind of thing - question: 'Can you function like a normal human being?' Multiple choice answer: 'Most of the time/ Some of the time/ Occasionally/ Not at all'. So I dutifully filled it in.

Then I get sent to the mental health team, who do the same questionnaire again, with a bit more detail. Question: 'Do you feel completely fucked off with life?' Multiple choice answer: 'Most of the time/ Some of the time/ Occasionally/ Not at all'. I dutifully fill it in again, feeling a bit more miserable about how things are going this time.

Then I get sent to the Research Assistant on the trial, who dumps a questionnaire the size of a telephone directory on me. Question: 'Do you have suicidal thoughts?' Answer: 'Most of the time/ Some of the time/ Occasionally/ Not at all'. She leaves me on my own in a room to do it. She forgets I am there. She appears, apologetic, 40 minutes later and says she got 'lost in her data and forgot I was there'. Question: 'Do you feel like other people value your contribution?' Answer: 'Most of the time/ Some of the time/ Occasionally/ Not at all'.

She presses a button on the computer, which tells her I am severely depressed. She tells me this is an excellent thing, as because I don't have anxiety I can join the trial. She flicks through the pages on self-harm and turns to me in alarm and says 'You're not feeling suicidal right now are you? Because if you are, I have to go and get someone else to help, as I'm not a clinician and it is a pain in the neck'. I reassure her that I am not about to do a DIY job with the computer leads right there in the office. Her reassurance that she won't have to mop bits of me up off the floor is palpable.

She then tells me I'll be sent a letter about the therapy 'some time soon, and if you feel like you are waiting a little bit too long, then you should ring up and chase it up'. No help, and no timescale until help arrives. The whole thing left me feeling like complete crap.

That's appalling treatment by the RA, Solon - unprofessional and unsympathetic, and making you feel like a statistic at a particularly vulnerable time. And it sounds if you felt compelled to put on your 'fine, responsible, coping grown-up' face to reassure her, which is the last thing you need.

I have nothing useful to add to other people's comments, other than to express my deepest sympathy and outrage at how you were treated by your family, and my admiration for what you have done despite it. The thing that has really struck me is what a good writer you are. I suppose the 'obvious' therapeutic thing to suggest is writing about your childhood as therapy, but you strike me as a natural novelist. Might writing be something that would interest you? It's absorbing, can be done in poor health in the safety of your own home, and can give you a sort of satisfying control when you don't feel it in other areas of your life.

For what it's worth, I think you're extraordinary.