It shows how different my sister and I are from each other

Ok, this is unbelievable!!

I called my mom to ask her how her back treatment was going at her memory care. Earlier this week her geriatric nurse agreed with me to let me buy a Walgreens gel pack for the back that can be microwaved to use as a heating pad, or cooled to use as an ice pack for the back.

My mom's geriatric nurse calls my sister and I to consult with us about our mom's healthcare treatment. Recently my sister told the geriatric nurse just to call me as my sister is pro-medication and I am anti-medication. Fine. Anyway, the geriatric nurse was going to prescribe 3 treatments of lidocaine patches to be placed on my mom's back every day for two weeks. I said no. Too many side effects. I suggested the Walgreens gel pack that is large enough to be strapped around someone and covers their entire lower back. The geriatric nurse agreed and she said SHE SAID she'd submit written orders from HER to the memory care head nurse who then tells the CNA staff there in memory care, what to do with each memory care patient's treatment orders.

Well, that did not happen. During our phone call today, the head of NURSE TRAINING was in my mom's room demanding to know where the memory care library books were. My poor mom. She has dementia for god sake. How would she remember she'd taken them?!

My mom answered my question that the CNAs used a heating pad on her. That went directly against medical advice and directly against family advice. I was livid. I asked my mom to put the head of nurse training on the phone, regaled her with the whole scenario and told her I wanted to speak to the head of nursing.

Then, I composed and sent an email to the memory care executive director, cc'd the director of nursing, the head nurse, the geriatric nurse, the nurse trainer lady, my sister and kept it simple.

I texted my sister to ask if she knew about the heating pad. She responded no. But, she couldn't help herself. She texted that I overreacted per my email.

No, I didn't. The memory care staff directly violated medical orders written by my mom's geriatric nurse who gets the orders signed by my mom's geriatric doctor PLUS I am family and left a note taped to the freezer outside of my mom's memory care room where the gel pack is, and how many times to use it. Clearly the CNAs could see it as its directly below the locked cabinet where my mom's medications are stored.

My sister is wrong. I did not overreact. I believe that I responded correctly.

I just don't get it. I really don't.

I called my sister today to find out what she told the memory care nursing station since she's the first point of contact. I resent the fact that I have to call to ask my sister. She doesn't respect me enough to initiate any conversation with me. She could have just texted me what the plan was if there's an emergency with our mom while she's out of the country, to inform me what she told the memory care nursing staff.

Our conversation today was very brief. I didn't wish her a good trip because...why should I? She clearly doesn't respect me, let alone like me as a person. Or she'd treat me differently.

I'm really frustrated and sad that my sister treats me like this.

Awww @Motts I’m so sorry! Your sister sounds like… a challenge. I’m so sorry things are so rough!
I just wanted to say I hope you are looking after yourself and I really hope you’re doing ok!
Sending lots of hugs

Thanks Pinny. I hope that your dog park romp with your cute dog and your mum's two dogs was fun today.

My sister is a challenge. Our sister-relationship has always been one sided. I do all the work as far as reaching out, initiating conversation. She is 100% closed off and has been that way with me throughout our entire lives.

I asked my sister if she was on my side and understood my frustration with the way the CNAs blatantly ignored our mom's geriatric nurse orders re: the cool gel pack not heating pad issue. My sister's response was robotic that she understood.

If she'd only made an effort with me over the years to have a healthy relationship. Yet, she chose not to. Maybe our adult relationship would be different. Like that popular American phrase states: "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink." I have tried to explain and show my sister that reciprocating on her part, even going to therapy with me would benefit our relationship. But I can't force my sister to accept my request. She is doing what she wants - rejecting me as her sister.

Maybe we are just not compatible siblings per our two personalities and communication styles. It doesn't help that she always exhibits narcissistic behaviors with me.

I've been googling 'sibling estrangement and I know that it's long overdue for me with my sister and her family. Long overdue. It's toxic for her and I to stay connected the way that we are. I think once our mom passes away, we'll 100% become estranged.

There's literally no other reason for us to stay in each other's lives anymore, although she has great kids (except for my niece who is really emotionally immature - wonder whom she inherited that from).

Hi Motts

It's understandable that you feel hurt but we do expect better behaviour from siblings and relatives because of who they are.

My niece (17 next month) always appreciates the gifts I've given her. However, she now gets money because her mother has habit of giving away things after a couple of years. My niece also has more decency and integrity than many of her relatives (parents, grandparents, half-sister, wider family). My brother is her father.

Later in life (I'm 60+), we often realise that we don't have a relationship with siblings for any number of reasons. Things we've excused in the past because of the blood relationship can be called into question through either a gradual realisation or a defining event.

I'm estranged from my brother because of his wife's behaviour. Relationship with my mother also not good because I will not apologise to my sister in law for her bad behaviour towards me. Many years ago, an ex-work colleague asked why I put up with my family's behaviour. When I replied it's because they're family, he replied, "that does mean they can treat you that way". He'd ceased contact with his family because of his mother's attitude.

Hope this makes sense. It's sad when you realise that you have nothing in common with close relatives but there is a life outside of these toxic relationships.

I was going to share with you, gently, that it seems by all you've shared that your sister and her daughter are quite possibly narcissists. Your sister seems to have taught your niece that it's okay to treat you like this, so she's at the very least a completely self-absorbed young woman; and, at worst, a narcissist like her Mom.

It took me years to piece together the truth of a very similar situation with my own sister and niece. I am still healing from years of game-playing and devaluation of me that my sister engaged in. It does help to become as educated as you can about the disorder---because it affects you profoundly as a sibling, whether you ever realize what it actually is propelled by, or not.

I could write a whole book about what it created, and destroyed, in my life. But I'd rather hug you and tell you, You are NOT alone!

Getting our heads around the disorder helps by removing the continual and soul-scouring self-examination and ruminations, wondering what we could have done differently. Narcs are geniuses at turning it all into OUR problem, OUR shortcomings. Don't take the bait!

I've also learned that any reputation damage my sister tried to inflict over the years fortunately only had short staying power. People pretty much knew me to be a much finer person than the "me" she tried so desperately to portray. So it largely backfired on her. And I'm at an age now where I basically do not give a rat's about what anyone thinks of me, anymore, anyway---even if they were once highly-respected family members.

I hope you know you're not the only person to have suffered these humiliations. You can move on, and you can heal.

It takes time and perspective, but it can happen.

Hi poshgirl,

It does make sense, what you wrote and from what you discovered with your own experience with your family.

Sounds like is not like my niece so that is good! It is very smart that you only give your niece money since your sister selfishly gives your gifts to her daughter away. Your brother's wife's bad behavior sounds like it would be exhausting to deal with on a regular basis. And, it's sad that your brother refuses to see the damage that's caused with his relationship to you - his sister.

It's true. At some point in our lives, we come to that realization that we don't have a relationship with siblings for any number of reasons. The unfortunate reality is that they will never apologize for their behaviors, b/c that would mean they have to acknowledge their own bad behavior, which self-centered types of people are incapable of doing.

The hardest for me is to accept that my family rejects me. That, I don't need to reject myself just because they choose to reject me.

Yes, I believe you are correct. I do believe that my sister has taught my niece that it's ok to devalue and minimize my feelings based on my sister's own negative feelings towards me. That, and my niece may just generally be very emotionally immature at 21 years old and impressionable with her mother who is very stubborn and overbearing and controlling.

I need to stop taking my sister's bait. I still do. I need to just walk away 100% and stop all communication because it's not changing anything. And, I need to create closure within myself because my sister and my niece are both incapable and/or unwilling to acknowledge their bad behavior. I have to figure out how to do that with a support system b/c I would have walked away a long time ago if I'd had more a social support network.

How did you successfully heal? I continuously educate myself reading journal articles about narcissism, blogs from adult estranged siblings about their own experiences, and studies about adult sibling estrangement and narcissism. Yet, here I am, choosing to remain stuck, suffering the humiliations, the devaluation and game playing at the hands of my sister.

How do I move on, though? That remains to be seen.

I appreciate you and poshgirl etc sharing your experiences with narcissistic family members because it gives me a broader perspective and helps me reflect on my own situation. I just don't know how to move on 100%. Or, why I won't yet. They clearly don't value me or respect me.

Narcissists can do an awful lot of damage. It can take a long time to recover from all they do to us.

Also, it took me years to figure out what was up with my sister, to get the fill 360 degree picture of her pathology. Once I did, I started reading everything I could get my hands on about narcissism; as much as I could handle at a go, because reading did become a challenge for me once I realized I was depressed. (I sometimes still find books to be daunting.)

However, I have discovered a wealth of information on Quora. There are Narcissist's Survivors groups on there---it's easy to sign up as a member. Then you just type what you're looking for in the search field, and you will find no end of accounts and assistance from other survivors.

Once I had begun the difficult job of trying to understand how a person who grew up in the same room, home, eating at the same dinner table, and attending the same church as me could behave as she does, it seemed all I wanted were more validations and explanations. Learning what drives her has been like lights coming on, one by one, in a darkened mansion. It's been a long journey of almost 20 years. But doing it has helped me recover from my own depression, which I now realize contained many more elements of being traumatized than I ever cared to admit.

My sister is younger and smaller than me, but she still was always very abusive to me; mostly emotionally. She was rather young when she figured out how to keep her rotten treatment of me from my parents. To them, she was their fresh-faced little baby doll, who could do no wrong. If I ever had anything to say about it, it would be viewed as jealousy of her, and subsequential lies, on my part. Because, as we all know, she was a "wonderful little girl", she was "far too young" to come up with the evil she routinely engaged in.

I still tend to haunt the book sections of thrift stores, and stumbled across a wonderful volume about the subject of Sibling Abuse, written by Vernon R. Wiehe. (It is actually an advanced psychology college textbook, written for people who are considering specializing in that area of study. It is hard to find, and when you do, it's very expensive. But if you can luck out on Amazon or e-bay, it might be helpful to you, if you think it might apply to your situation.) I could only approach the contents a page or two at a time, so it took awhile for me to find the answers I needed so badly. But I felt wonderfully vindicated and validated, when I finally did.

It did also put me on the scent of the possibility my sister was, and is, a covert narcissist, and that she was very likely born that way, judging from what an early age she started to exhibit these tendencies.

Now the difficulty I face is how to think about her. I have given it a lot of thought, and I know myself very well. I will never be able to forgive her for many of the things she's done over time, which range from quietly whispering de-valuing and humiliating things at me, all the way to full-blown, outright reputation-destroying campaigns within my own family. On the one hand, she is only partly responsible for her actions; she is mentally ill. On the other hand, she has expressed that she knows that what she does is wrong, and that it's like trying to fight an overwhelming urge, and give in to those tendencies. So how much can I forgive her for, when she has never sincerely shown any genuine contrition for it all?

I have not had anything to do with her since I became fully enlightened as to her pathology (15 years). In my case, I cannot be around her, because of the heinous and cruel things she's knowingly done to me. One sneer from her and I would probably become enraged. I am not the docile, depressed, passive person that I used to be, when I still believed in the philosophy of turning the other cheek. I am very aware of how much she contributed to my losing practically 25 years of my life to depression, and perhaps more to a decimated sense of self. She has convinced my niece that I am a horrible person, and has irreparably destroyed how many members of my family will always see me. There is now almost nothing she could ever do that would convince me she is worth one more minute of my time.

The general opinion seems to be that mental health professionals consider narcissists to be beyond the reach of therapy and counselling and help. They cannot/ will not reform themselves, at least not in the way their victims wish they could.

I would absolutely like to find some kind of Christian, super-high-moral-ground kind of way to forgive her. But it will never be possible. I just don't have that kind of time left in my life. I am still healing from so much drama, damage, loss, horror, and wreckage. I no longer have the energy, nor the patience that being in the same room with her would require.

I have to concentrate on me, on re-building what she so gleefully and continually tore out of me.

I also wanted to add that narcissists do tend to target loving, caring, patient, giving-types of people. They know that this sort of person will forgive them (for a certain amount of time, anyway---especially if they are family), and that they will provide them with regular narcissistic supply (the satisfaction they get from hurting you, and de-valuing or perhaps even humiliating you). This is one big reason you and your sister are so very different. You probably tolerated her nonsense longer than anyone else has. She sees you completely differently to the way you have, until now, seen her.

I genuinely wish I could sit with you and look into your eyes and tell you it will somehow be alright. If you are the caring, forgiving individual you seem to be, there's every chance you will be able to heal from the things she's done over time. It means you possess that inner strength to be able to move on, once you can get your head around her historical patterns. And I do wish you a faster recovery time than I experienced.

But do not get caught up in hoping she will change, or that you can open her eyes to her problem. Narcissists can respond to being revealed with swift and terrible punishment. Prepare yourself to simply walk away from her.

Thank you for sharing your story here, @MuseumGhost about your narcissistic younger sister, in such detail.

I face the same difficulty as you - how to think about my sister. I won't forgive her for all that she's done to me either. I'm not one of those people who views "forgiveness" as much of a useful too. It's actually healthy to maintain boundaries with someone who has wronged you. I don't need to give my sister a "pass" to feel better about myself. I view "forgiveness" as letting someone off the hook, then rationalizing it as the right thing to do -- which it's actually not.

I will learn to let go of the decades of emotional abuse that I experienced from my sister by giving myself closure; by healing myself internally which does not in any way, include "forgiving" my sister.

So, I need to find a new association for my sister when I think about her, that allows me to stay detached and not stuck in the past. Your courage, @MuseumGhost gives me hope that I can also become enlightened to my sister's pathology and completely separate from her, despite the fact that I love her children as their aunt.

Of course, I will need to mourn those relationships because they were not allowed to fully develop and remain stunted by my sister's gaslighting behavior. For example, when my nephew told me he made the varsity hockey team over the phone, I told him how excited I was for him and that I would love to go watch one of his games. He had no response except to say, "here's my mom."

I found out that my brother goes to my nephew's hockey games with my sister and her husband and that's where they socialize. (I've been estranged from my brother for ten years I think it is now.) My nephew is also on antidepressants and he's only 17. Then there's my niece of course, who is following in her mother's footsteps with her arms-length behavior with me.

I wish I could rewind time and go back to when I was 18. I would have left my family and never looked back. My life would probably have been 100% healthier and who knows what it would look like now. But that's not the path I took then. So, now, I have to take that path and estrange myself 100% from my sister and her entire family, for my own well-being.

If my sister and niece actually liked/respected/cared about me, then my sister would have initiated contact with me from the country she visited her daughter at; possibly text me photos of the two of them standing in front of famous landmarks or eating meals, smiling, or FaceTiming me. But that's not the reality of how my sister's vacation abroad went.

My niece has broken every promise she's ever made to me about socializing with me, and I already wrote about how she treated me when I arranged for flowers to be delivered to her abroad for her birthday. She claimed to me this week she'd find a time to FaceTime with me to catch me up on her life abroad. More false promises on her part plus she's 21 and a 21 year old's promise is about as reliable as a lifeguard with ADD.

Then today, of all days, (my sister returned from her trip today), the memory care nursing home director sent out an email to memory care caregivers of the residents, to ask everyone to sign a legal document stating who is the legal contact for the memory care resident. I texted my sister to ask her to call me to discuss this, since legally only one family member can be the legal designated contact. No response, of course. I don't know if she was still on the plane when I sent the text or asleep from jet lag at home, or what.

I need to get a support system in place and a plan for when I permanently estrange myself from my sister.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Motts Thank you for sharing your story here, @MuseumGhost about your narcissistic younger sister, in such detail. I face the same difficulty as you - how to think about my sister. I won't forgive her for all that she's done to me either. I'm not one of those people who views "forgiveness" as much of a useful too. It's actually healthy to maintain boundaries with someone who has wronged you. I don't need to give my sister a "pass" to feel better about myself. I view "forgiveness" as letting someone off the hook, then rationalizing it as the right thing to do -- which it's actually not. I will learn to let go of the decades of emotional abuse that I experienced from my sister by giving myself closure; by healing myself internally which does not in any way, include "forgiving" my sister. So, I need to find a new association for my sister when I think about her, that allows me to stay detached and not stuck in the past. Your courage, @MuseumGhost gives me hope that I can also become enlightened to my sister's pathology and completely separate from her, despite the fact that I love her children as their aunt. Of course, I will need to mourn those relationships because they were not allowed to fully develop and remain stunted by my sister's gaslighting behavior. For example, when my nephew told me he made the varsity hockey team over the phone, I told him how excited I was for him and that I would love to go watch one of his games. He had no response except to say, "here's my mom." I found out that my brother goes to my nephew's hockey games with my sister and her husband and that's where they socialize. (I've been estranged from my brother for ten years I think it is now.) My nephew is also on antidepressants and he's only 17. Then there's my niece of course, who is following in her mother's footsteps with her arms-length behavior with me. I wish I could rewind time and go back to when I was 18. I would have left my family and never looked back. My life would probably have been 100% healthier and who knows what it would look like now. But that's not the path I took then. So, now, I have to take that path and estrange myself 100% from my sister and her entire family, for my own well-being. If my sister and niece actually liked/respected/cared about me, then my sister would have initiated contact with me from the country she visited her daughter at; possibly text me photos of the two of them standing in front of famous landmarks or eating meals, smiling, or FaceTiming me. But that's not the reality of how my sister's vacation abroad went. My niece has broken every promise she's ever made to me about socializing with me, and I already wrote about how she treated me when I arranged for flowers to be delivered to her abroad for her birthday. She claimed to me this week she'd find a time to FaceTime with me to catch me up on her life abroad. More false promises on her part plus she's 21 and a 21 year old's promise is about as reliable as a lifeguard with ADD. Then today, of all days, (my sister returned from her trip today), the memory care nursing home director sent out an email to memory care caregivers of the residents, to ask everyone to sign a legal document stating who is the legal contact for the memory care resident. I texted my sister to ask her to call me to discuss this, since legally only one family member can be the legal designated contact. No response, of course. I don't know if she was still on the plane when I sent the text or asleep from jet lag at home, or what. I need to get a support system in place and a plan for when I permanently estrange myself from my sister.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

That's exactly how I feel now, Sarahsweets.

My moment of realisation has been the pandemic, although if I look again, the realisation was dawning before then. It just brought it to a head.

My brother can see no wrong with our mother's behaviour. In his eyes, I'm supposed to put up with it because "she's your mother". Her exact words too. Blood being thicker than water and all that.

Someone has told my mother to take care of herself. This means not arguing
and trying to manipulate me into an unacceptable and immoral situation. I know who has said this, my brother!

He cannot see that she's a narcissist so just panders to her bad behaviour. So I've finally accepted that the relationships cannot be fixed. Whilst it's sad, I'm not going to change into something I'm not. I want to be able to look in the mirror and see a person who upholds good morals. It's hard work but the other option isn't for me!

Dear Motts,

The most painful aspect of my broken relationship with my sister is that she began teaching her daughter to disrespect me when the girl was only a pre-teen. I saw her warm, beautiful, pure love-filled heart turned into a cool & distant & disinterested one over time. There was nothing I could do about it. She had no siblings or close cousins to tell her otherwise; they lived in another city, 3 hours away, so it was really very easy for my sister to turn her head and fill her with all kinds of nonsense (which I had watched her do in other circumstances for most of my life). I knew what was happening, and I was powerless to do a THING about it. My Dad was gone; there was no one else to pull her aside and ask her why the huge change in attitude?

By the last time I saw my niece in person, the revulsion the now-teenaged girl felt for me was clear. I had become the "bad joke" of an aunt, one whose opinions and feelings were alternately ignored, sniffed-at, or reviled in the open. The girl was mirroring her mother in every way. To say it broke my heart is a very mild way of saying what it did to me. But I knew, even then, that I had to maintain a kind of detached and non-reactive disposition to this. Having endured years of my sister's sinister torture had trained me up well. I saved my meltdown for the long drive home, and the next week following. That beautiful girl was twisted into someone I will probably never again recognize. (But then, that child's existence had been used a weapon to control several other people's emotional lives over the last 30 years. Too long to go into, here....)

Now, I know from Fb posts and silence over the last 11 years or so, that my sister also managed to turn my niece into a hater and a bigot. I was stunned to find abhorrent and vulgar racist memes posted by my niece, around the time of the second Obama re-lection. I was aghast. I always knew my sister was unread, uninformed, uninterested, shallow, and small-minded, but I never could have believe she was capable of molding my niece into an extreme hater. When I gently questioned the girl about it, she blocked me and has been ghosting me ever since, following a tactic of her mother's. Don't explain yourself, and for God's sake, don't EVER apologize---it makes you look "weak". Since then, I have been unable, in spite of occasional hugs and short messages I send to her, to revive anything like the incredible bond I had with her as a young child. I do believe it is one of my sister's greatest and vilest examples of narcisssistic "pulling the rug out from under someone", that's ever been attempted.

I feel the pain of it everyday. I COMPLETELY understand your unwillingness to forgive your sister.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

So today was awkward.

My sister finally responded to me about meeting today at our mother's memory care to ask our mother which daughter she wants to be the legal contact for the nursing home for the county where it's located.

She agreed to meet me today and here's where it became awkward. First, she was wearing a purple coat and I was wearing a purple sweater. Neither one of us knew what the other was wearing. I thought that was odd. I looked up the meaning of the color purple Color Psychology: What Does the Color Purple Mean? and there's a section that mentions it has a strong eletromagnetic wavelength. As you know, humans give off electromagnetic wavelengths. Lots of research on it. Study on Vibration Characteristics and Human Riding Comfort of a Special Equipment Cab

I thought it was ironic that my sister and I were both wearing the same color despite the fact that we don't like each other at all. It's as though we were both wearing purple to protect ourselves from each other? If that makes sense? Maybe that's me reaching for an explanation for an otherwise arbitrary fact that has no hidden meaning.

Anyway, I printed off the director's legal document that our mother had to sign to validate her legal guardian while she lives at this memory care. My sister has the power of attorney and is responsible for our mother's finances and elderly waiver (so...she still has all of the control).

Our mother decided to switch my sister to me after being at this place for three years now, as her healthcare legal guardian (basically, the memory care nursing staff has to contact me about our mother's healthcare needs first, instead of my sister).

Do I feel vindicated by this? Not really but it does feel good to think that now I'll be the first person contacted instead of my sister. Not that I trust the nursing staff there to follow through since my sister is a nurse and has been their first point of contact for the past three years. And we all know how well nursing homes obey federal and state nursing home regulations and laws (insert my sarcastic tone of voice here). I will have to wait and see if my signing that legal statute document means that the nursing staff actually contacts me. I will send an email cc'ing my sister, the nursing home director, nursing home dir. of nursing etc. and our mother's geriatric nurse today with a PDF copy of the signed legal statute document. Who knows if the nursing staff will contact me after today or will still contact my sister, who will just not bother to follow up with me when the nursing staff do contact her. I actually told my sister over the phone that I don't trust her to contact me when our mother passes away. Because it's true, I don't trust my sister.

So, after our mother signed her legal document, my sister made somewhat of a superficial effort (?) to follow up with me about her trip (I had walked in on her regaling our mother with details of her trip abroad to visit her daughter, none of which she's shared with me since she returned stateside...no surprise). She said, "I bought you a towel and small lemon soap from [country]. It's the thought that counts, right?" Really? Lemon soap and a towel after not voluntarily sharing her trip photos with me of her visiting her daughter abroad. Like, what was that about? She lies to me all the time, intentionally keeps information her children's activities and lives and well-being hidden from me, so I have no idea what they are doing anymore. She never and has never volunteered any information with me, or asked me for advice, or confided in me, or shown any interest in having a close, emotional bond as a sister with me.

So, why would I accept that dumb (and lame) gift. She could have bought it at Walgreens and claimed it was from the country she had just visited. Why even offer that to me, when she has made it clear to me that she wants nothing to do with me. Her comment, "it's the thought that counts," seems to me that she was trying to make herself look good in front of our mother, and it felt like a manipulative comment directed at me.

Like, my sister was saying, "I bought you this so you should be grateful," even though she didn't share any details with me during or after her trip, except that brief 10 minute FaceTime with her and her daughter.

I told her the truth that I didn't want the gift because I am allergic to lemon soap (even if I wasn't allergic to lemon I would have just said, "no" to it). So, then I responded, "I'm sure one of your coworkers would like it." Why would I accept that gift anyway? From someone who clearly doesn't want a relationship with me. It felt like it was for show, for our mother's sake. Does that make sense? Am I overreacting?

It seems like she would know you're allergic to lemon, so it does seem insensitive.

Well, she does know because 4 years ago I made myself a sauté salmon with a lemon sauce and had an allergic reaction afterward which I remember calling her about, b/c my lips got itchy and swelled up and I called to ask her if it was the lemon or the salmon since she is a nurse. I took the Benedryl and the allergic reaction went away. I tried salmon again after that with no reaction, so it means I'm definitely allergic to lemon.

So, it felt insensitive on multiple levels, to have her offer me that gift. Like, a normal healthy sibling relationship means two sisters would communicate reciprocally with each other without any hidden agendas.

Like, if we had a health relationship, she would have included me in sharing her trip photos etc. and would maybe have asked me what small gift I'd like her to bring back for me from the country she visited.

She wouldn't have made up a story about how her iphone was dying b/c she switched it last minute with her other son (like, why would she need to do that before a trip), and that was why she couldn't take photos (she posted them on her active FB account but didn't share with me, I saw them through a mutual connection's FB wall) or talk long on FaceTime. What mother switches phone with a child before a long trip, instead of using their own phone and getting their own phone prepared (new battery, etc.)?

Like, I just don't understand. I really don't. Am I missing something?

I forgot to add, that when I asked my sister today if she wanted me to cc' her on the email that I will send to all parties involved with the PDF of the legal document now signed, my sister's response felt dismissive or devaluing because she said, "If it makes you feel better." Like, thanks for shaming me?

So, two days ago my mother fell in the middle of the night in her memory care room and instead of notifying me, the medical staff there contacted my sister instead. I emailed the memory care director today cc'ing my sister on the email to ask her whether or not she updated the medical staff with the new designed representative (me). No response yet.

I also learned in having a conversation with my sister (unfortunately, until our mother passes away my sister and I have to stay in touch), that she and our brother have been going on spring break vacations together with their families for the past few years together. That news hurt because the two of them clearly want nothing to do with me. I maintain our mother's FB account (to keep in touch with her friends and update them) and this is how I learned that news.

Wow, I would be really hurt if I found out my brothers were vacationing without me.

And I don't know how they think you wouldn't find out about it.

I'm very hurt. Very hurt. PLUS, I'm glad now that I told my sister that I could not dog sit for her in April because guess what? She and our brother are going on vacation together with their families THAT WEEK.

To think if I hadn't logged into our mother's FB page to update it, and if I had agreed to dogsit (as I had done in the past for my sister), I wouldn't have found out that my sister and brother had been vacationing for years together with their families the week that I would dogsit for my sister.

I feel completely taken advantage of now. I can't believe how naive I've been all these years about my family.

Oh, and my sister of course got mad at me when I told her what I saw on our mother's FB page (reference from our brother about their upcoming April vacation with my sister and her family).

She got mad at me and proceeded to try to gaslight me, accusing me of snooping which is really her just being angry that I found out the truth. It's the same with her vacation abroad to visit her daughter. She wanted to go alone with her favorite cousin to visit her daughter and not have me around, so she gaslighted me to accuse me of being emotionally divisive and manipulative instead of just telling me the truth.

Can you see now why I have such bad anxiety? Instead of respecting my feelings and just telling me the truth, I'm lied to and gaslighted. And why? What's the reason?

I really don't get it. I just don't. Someone please explain this to me.

I can't really explain her motives.

But if you post photos of vacations on Facebook, it's kind of ridiculous to assume people won't find out about it.

The memory care direct emailed me. She said that my sister will remain the first person they contact since she registered our mother. The document I signed literally means that I am the second person to contact. So, bogus. Oh well. My nervous system is deregulated from all of this stress. I’m exhausted, clumsy, and crave carbs.

It’s a hard lesson to learn that a sibling doesn’t value and respect us the way we had hoped they would.

Some people do not have the ability to be close and genuinely caring, respectful, and honest.

I learned that my sister is very narcissistic and can be down right cruel and manipulative, controlling and bossy. And my sister is a dishonest liar and drama queen.

My sister turned out to be a very different person than I thought she was.

What I went through the last five years of my parent’s lives was very traumatic and I learned that the motivation for my sister was to extort as much of their money and possessions as possible. She is an evil person and I have had to mourn not only my parents passing and all the toxic I experienced but also a death of the sister I thought I had that turned out to be an illusion.

People can have a very dark side to them that can be very shockingly cold and calculated.

I do not want anything to do with her the rest of my life. Anyone who can do all the toxic things my sister chose to do is not anyone I want anything to do with. Some of the hardest life lessons we learn in life come from our own family.

Where there was love in me for my older sister is now complete disappointment and disgust.

My sister had POA and control of my parents money. Big mistake because she extorted everything she could.

People think you can take legal action? Well that is very expensive and I did get a lawyer but I did not get justice. Justice is very expensive and why people get away with a lot of cheating, lying and stealing.