If it's any comfort (and it might not be, but I'll operate on the off-chance that it might help), we favorites don't always have it easy. I was the family "golden child," but it didn't exempt me from abuse. Instead, I was held to a higher standard and given less margin for error. This made me far more afraid to speak my mind than my "black sheep" brother was. He said what he felt like saying, whereas I could have been sitting on a rattlesnake, but I would have said I was fine.

I don't mean to belittle your suffering, and maybe I shouldn't have mentioned it. But is there a chance that this fact might help mend things between you and your sister? I know that my brother got far worse physical abuse than I did, but their emotional abuse of me was much more subtle, and in the end it did more damage.