SIBLING RIVALRY’S TEARING ME APART
MY HUSBAND and I have been happily married for 50 years. We have a daughter, 52, and a son three years younger. Both have two children who we love very much.
Our daughter and family live 60 kilometres away; our son is only 15 minutes away. Our daughter was always more attention-seeking from the day she was born, but we seemed to successfully manage her over the years.
Her jealousy was revealed when her baby daughter wasn’t asked to be involved in her brother’s marriage ceremony.
I carried his baby son into the ceremony. Our daughter was angry that he and I hadn’t thought about involving her baby. She said she wouldn’t come and her brother said he wouldn’t send an invitation if she was going to spoil the day.
She didn’t speak to any of us for almost a year. This feud has gone on for 12 years. Sister and brother have not spoken, although our son has tried to have a reconciliation, if only so that the cousins could meet.
Her insane jealousy came to a head again last Christmas and New Year when our son and family asked us to join them on several occasions. Because our daughter had been so distant last year, we accepted his invitations.
At New Year she phoned angrily, insanely jealous that we had seen him. She said she’d been monitoring my Facebook page and noted all the times we’d seen our son and that we didn’t care about her.
She swore at me, hung up the phone and I haven’t heard from her since. We love our children and grandchildren and long for our remaining years to be harmonious. This situation is making us distraught, anxious and ill.
SIBLING jealousy is a family complication many parents will recognise. In small children tension can arise over something as relatively simple as sharing toys or as agonising as the preference parents have for one child.
Let me be honest here: looking back I know I was my parents’ favourite child, and that it had dire consequences for my late brother.
No parent likes to admit to favouritism, yet it is real. Looking at the relative ages of your adult children it seems likely that the unhappy present has its roots in the arrival of that baby boy when the girl was three.
It’s interesting that memory makes you write, ‘Our daughter was always more attention-seeking from the day she was born’ - when, of course, no new born child can be accused of ‘attention-seeking’. Yet I don’t think you meant it that way and this is not about attaching blame to the longago past. Your unhappiness at this rift within the family is painful and worthy of compassion. But don’t we all owe it to ourselves to be honest about the past we cannot change?
Looking back to your son’s wedding, it seems to me your daughter had some grounds to be upset - and that he handled her disappointment less than well.
It’s too late, but I believe it might now be useful for you to identify times when your daughter might have been comforted with understanding and more kindness.
Yes, it’s inexcusable for her to instruct you not to see your son and to swear at you on the telephone but, in your place, I would just continue to keep in touch.
I’d post pictures of dogs, kittens and flowers on Facebook, swallow your hurt and indignation at her abuse and try to build a bridge.
You have become a passive victim in this family rift. Some conscious action on your part might restore harmony. All you can do is try.