How to stop feeling green eyed over my younger sister..?

[indigoo]

We’re both mid-thirties, she’s a year younger than me. When we were kids we didn’t really get on that well, sometimes amazingly well, but mostly it was bickering. At school I was always more of a model pupil and she was more average. I got with my DH a while before she got with hers, she got in with the wrong crowd, dropped out of uni at one point and I guess if I’m honest I always thought I’d be more successful of the 2 of us. I guess I probably thought about this more subconsciously than it being in my thoughts much.

Anyway fast forward to now and she’s had 2 beautiful children, I only have 1 who I love and adore but it was a struggle to get pregnant and I can’t have anymore. Her DH is lovely and they have a good amount of money and a happy life.
I also earn well, married to my childhood sweetheart and live in a nice house but I can’t help but shake the jealousy off towards my sister. She’s very healthy now and recently told me she’s not drinking anymore and started running, she looks great. I just feel like I can’t keep up with her. They’ve got plans to do their loft conversion soon and we’re in too much debt to even consider doing anything.
I’m not sure why I’m writing this all down, maybe just to get it out of my head.
I think if I’m honest i feel our dad used to compare us a lot, and I guess I’m still feeling compared now. I dunno, I feel it stings more when you’re the older sis.
Help me get over this!

Bump

Sounds like its a competition

Why do you want to "keep up" with her?

It's so interesting (by which I mean awful) that when parents play favourites or compare their children, the children so often turn against each other than the terrible parent. Even Cain and Abel, or Joseph and his brothers. Not making a religious thing of this, just noting how it was obviously recognisable as a phenomenon even thousands of years ago.

If you can see this as a failing of your father rather than of you, because that's what it is, that may help. It's also very very common for academically able people to struggle when this doesn't automatically translate into the same level of success in a career, although it sounds like you're doing absolutely fine. Being intelligent enough but with people skills is probably a better combination. You're not alone in finding that hard too.

You want the extra child, the loft conversion and the looks? The last two are fixable.

Kindly - get a grip and grow up, OP. Instagram has a lot to answer for!

You need to let this go. It's absolute bollocks and is making you miserable.
Get on with your own life, work towards the things that are important to you and count your blessings.

Ah! You have self awareness on this and I think you shouldn’t be too hard on yourself, just keep it as your dirty secret and keep taking positive steps to engage with and enjoy your sister as a 3 dimensional person with whom you share a unique history.

Honestly, in the future you may be very glad to have a functioning happy sibling, as opposed to the alternative, particularly as your parents age and perhaps need help.

Also the world turns, let’s hope not for her sake but in 10 or 15 years your relative situations may have shifted again.

I think envy and jealousy are fairly hardwired into us and we are socialised into repressing the expression of it but children feel and exhibit it intensely.

My brother sadly had massive substance abuse and mental health problems and died in squalor in his flat aged 50 despite my mum’s best efforts. I don’t say that to make you feel bad about the way you feel, it doesn’t work that way; there is no top trumps but just don’t tie yourself in knots about it.

Aw OP, getting some harsh responses here. I feel your pain to some degree. Older sister here too. Younger sibling (only a year younger) has married into a lovely, academic, cultured and wealthy family. My DH is my childhood sweetheart but not the best family unfortunately and definitely not academic or wealthy. Non wealthy family is not so much an issue as I didn’t marry for money, (although money is nice) but the non-academic family bit is hard to come to terms with sometimes and also they are generally just less interested and less family oriented than my siblings family in law are. Truthfully, it doesn’t bother me for more than 5 mins when it pops into my head on occasion but our parents always championed us as separate people not compared us. It’s hard. Have your moment of jealously, and then move on and remember all of the lovely things you do have. If it’s a huge problem, start planning what changes you’d like to see and how you can realistically get closer to them. Give yourself a sense of control over life.

Great post and yes it’s sad it causes them to turn on each other rather than the parent. But that’s nature.

Also it’s lovely to have a sibling who is doing well. I don’t need to worry about them and can enjoy their successes as separate to mine. Jealousy isn’t productive. Admiration can be though!

I sympathise because if that was your upbringing, this will be ingrained and difficult to get rid of. Well done for noticing it and owning it.

You can recognise your feelings, acknowledge them, but not necessarily act on them. You dont have to allow them to direct your behaviour and decisions.

You might find that talking about it as you are here,maybe with your close friends or partner, helps you to keep rationalising it.

'I'm so jealous of sis, she looks amazing. Really annoying especially because it's her and we were brought up in competition with each other so it always gets to me when she's winning at something' say it out loud.

Remember it's on your parents not you,that you feel like this. It doesnt make you a bad person

It’s great that you can recognise your feelings and that they are benefiting none of you. Try and shift your feelings from competition with your sister to her success/ happiness reflecting back on you and enhancing your life. You have two lovely nieces or nephews , embrace that and encourage a cousin relationship with your child. Be proud of who she is, I’m sure she thinks you have great qualities that don’t have to be running or a loft conversion, she probably thinks your clever , reliable , admires your relationship with your childhood sweetheart etc . Love yourself and your life then you’ll have room to love her and her family too.

OP come on, you have a wonderful life. Are you going to be angry until something goes wrong for your sister so she is incontrovertibly worse off than you?

Sibling rivalry is huge between sisters and brothers. Talk it out if possible.

Well, follow her lead in the areas that you can then. Quit drinking and start running! It's that easy if it bothers you.

Or stop seeing it as a competition. She's just another person who also happens to live on this planet.

If your parents compare you, fuck em. I say this as someone who had a diabolical relationship with my sister as a result of us being played constantly against one another and compared by my mum. We now keep her at a total arms length from our relationship and are in a much better place for it. We can't undo the several decades of damage though unfortunately.

Jealousy and envy are not hardwired into us. You can do the work on yourself to accept that you feel that way and want to find a different way to feel. You don’t know what the final path of her life will be, or your own for that matter. Find inspiration in her running, even if it’s a walk around the block!

Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind
The race is long and in the end, it's only with yourself

It appears that your dad probably put her down to you when you were a child which meant you grew up believing if you were good you’d be happy. Are you happy in your marriage?

Your dad handed you his own unmet resentments in his way of relating and comparing. He never wanted you to be close with her.

Comparing yourself is such a waste of energy. You should use that energy to focus on improving yourself and your life. You may not be where you want to be yet, but you can achieve goals you set yourself if you work hard enough at them. Focus on what makes you happy, your sisters life shouldn’t be a competition.

You need to get out in the world and meet a wider variety of people. It sounds like you have a comfortable life with your child and much loved partner. Surely you know people with less?

There are so many possible outcomes that your sister (and you) could have had in life. You both got decent outcomes, its just that hers appears a little better to you, but thats nothing when you look at the vast scope of how humans live. Can you try to reframe your thinking and feel pleased for her that things didn't fall apart? It's also nice to be around people who are happy and doing well if you think about it in the right way.The only reason it ever feels better when people do badly is if you need to feel superior to someone else in order to be ok with yourself. Don't let yourself fall into that way of thinking as its destructive, and permeates down to the next generation too.

Don’t think the issue is with your sister but how you feel about yourself and your life.
Comparison truly is the thief of joy.
Look closely at the things in your life that you are unhappy with (debt perhaps) and make plans to change them.

It sounds like your identity is quite heavily tied up with feeling more successful than your sister. Now that you no longer feel that you are, that has shaken you foundations somewhat. We all have things we ‘hang our hat on’ and this is clearly something g that has been important to your self esteem. You shouldn’t feel bad for the way you feel but you would do well to address it. It sounds like this might be linked to some dysfunction in your relationship with your parents?

Comparison is the thief of joy!