My sister is six years younger than myself. We’ve always had a difficult relationship mainly due to our parents not being supportive of us getting along as their own marriage fell apart and they basically commandeered us into taking sides.
I was engaged to a man several years ago who my sister got very close to. She was always staying at our house, we used to cook for her, she’d always be dancing with him at family events and texting him at all hours. He said he felt sorry for her because she was lonely and didn’t have much of a life of her own, but later on (after we split) my family admitted he had told her ‘I’ve picked the wrong sister.’ I think she enjoyed the attention.
We split up, it was acrimonious, and my sister lied to me on his behalf and pretended she didn’t know where he was when he left our home to have a break from the relationship.
Me and my sister managed to sort of patch things up after the break up, which mainly meant never speaking about him or addressing anything about it but just brushing it all under the carpet. Being the older sister I actually apologised to her for putting her in an awkward situation and she was happy to play the victim and said he’d manipulated her. Years later I found out perhaps she did have feelings for him at the time but I didn’t want to cause a fuss after we split, especially because I didn’t want my parents to get upset. So I’ve gritted my teeth and never said anything.
Shes now engaged to a lovely man and I’ve been single for many years, looking after my teenage son who has debilitating OCD.
Several times I’ve asked for her help with things like borrowing her car when I’ve really needed support, or helping me look after my elderly dog, to which her fiancé is happy to do, but my sister will say no, but for some seemingly ‘reasonable’ reason.
She never asks how I am or how my son is doing. She tells family she thinks I am exaggerating the extent of my son’s difficulties. This is despite a psychiatrists evaluation and diagnosis. I recently asked if I could pop the dog round, as my son was having a mental health crisis and I needed her to look after my dog, but she refused and then never asked about my son.
I have had enough of being humiliating by asking her about herself and her life and never getting anything back and have stopped asking for her support as she clearly can’t/won’t . I felt as though I supported her a lot when she needed it (although she probably used to stay at my house a lot to be near my ex) but she’s never there for me when I need it. She’s such an ice queen and absolutely looks down her nose at me for being a single parent. She was jealous of me when we were younger, but now she seems like I’m not good enough to associate with her. She certainly wouldn’t ask me to be a part of her wedding day as a bridesmaid or anything like that.
It hurts me that she gives one word replies to messages and doesn’t seem to care about her nephew. She asked about him in the past but when I admitted things are really difficult for him she just stopped replying, and when I asked her why after a few weeks of silence, she admitted she couldn’t cope with the ‘drama’ of what my son goes through.