Important Conversation With Sister

[TheyCallMeOx]

I'm going to try and not give you a terribly long story but I really want to get the best advice, so I want to make sure that I cover everything.

 

My "first love" broke up with me late last year. It's been 9 months since she broke up with me and, unfortunately, I'm still affected by it. Over the course of the 9 months, I've hooked up with a woman or two, looked for relationships (but got impatient), had thoughts of suicide, etc etc. I attempted to go on dates, but couldn't do it. After I thought I was ready to date again, I ended up dating a woman for a couple months until we ended our relationship recently because we both kind of realized that I'm still hurt from the breakup, and as such, I can't give her what she wanted.

 

Now that I'm newly single, my sister recommended that I really take the time to get my sh*t together, 5-7 months, in order to get back into the dating scene. My sister broke up with her "first love," so I, unfortunately, believe that she'll never understand my pain. However, even if I believe that, I still want to take her advice because she is more successful than me in pretty much every area of life.

 

During my 9 months of recovery, my sister has became good friends with my "first love." During the time that we were dating, I introduced her to my sister, and I didn't really see a friendship develop till after I was heartbroken. My sister has done a half-decent job by covering her tracks. I don't know how much they hang out, where they hang out, or when they hang out. She also hangs out with my old friends that were associated with my "first love."

 

As her brother, I felt like she stabbed me in the back. There have been times (for instance a month or so ago when I helped my sister move...found some pictures on her refigerator...), where my "first love" was still a part of my life whether I wanted her to be or not. If my sister didn't become good friends with her, I have no doubts that I would be significantly better. However, I often have dreams (nightmares really) of everyone talking about me, and I can very rarely look at my sister without knowing that there's a lot of things she's keeping from me. My sister's life that she portrays around me, even for my benefit, is like a lie to me. I don't know who my sister is, and I feel like she's secretly judging me. I'm very secretive too around people and I'm sure my sister has been fed information, through my "first love" about who I am.

 

I want to forgive my sister and let go of all that. It's been bugging me for such a long time and I know that, realistically, she's not going to give up her friends for me (I wouldn't expect her to). I want to get better, but I feel very hurt by what my sister has done even if it was unintentional. In order to get better, I feel that discussing, not yelling, with my sister about it is going to at least help me get over it. I feel that if she understands what kind of predicament I'm in, how I feel, I won't feel like she's really against me because that's honestly how I feel. Right now, I'm basically expecting her to turn around and say "I'm an adult. I can be friends with who I want. Just because you can't get over your ex isn't my problem. That's your problem."

 

There have things that I have done and didn't do out of respect for family members. I could've made my sister's breakup worse, but I didn't because I didn't want to stab my sister like she stabbed me. There have been sometimes where I've felt like I should've had I known that my sister was going to treat me the way I didn't want to happen.

 

I've set up a meeting, her and I, and we're going to be talking at a park this weekend. I honestly don't know what to say, but I know that I need to say something or else it's going to continue bugging me, and it's going to drive me insane. Since I still feel like dying, it really doesn't help with my sense of worth when I feel like my feelings don't matter. I don't want to seem selfish, and I don't want her to do anything she doesn't want to do, but I do want her to understand my perspective and maybe see her side of the story and feel more comfortable with it. But right now, every time I interact with my sister, I realize that I'm better off avoiding her completely. And I don't want that because she's my sister. It shouldn't have to be that way.

 

What do you think?

[mammasita]

I think your feelings are perfectly valid.

 

Its fair to have a talk with her and express how you feel without demanding that she give up her friends, because you're right - you shouldn't and she shouldn't.

 

I think I can *kind of* relate to your situation in that I'm really good friends with my ex's sister.....she introduced me to him.

 

When he dumped me, I couldn't bear to be around her becuase any association with her reminded me of him. As time has progressed, the association has diminished.

 

I think you'll be OK in time.

[CC12]

First, I just want to say that I think you're kind of barking up the wrong tree by blaming your sister for your current state, like you did here:

 

If my sister didn't become good friends with her, I have no doubts that I would be significantly better.

 

You're the only person responsible for letting your ex influence your emotions right now. You're the only person who let a new relationship fail because you weren't over your ex. It seems like an easy thing to blame your sister's friendship with her, but if you're honest with yourself, I think you'd maybe see that you still wouldn't be over her whether your sister was friends with her or not. It's not as if your sis parades that friendship around. You said yourself that you don't even know how much they hang out together.

 

Anyway, since it seems you want some kind of closure from your sister, I think you should decide exactly what outcome you want from your talk with her. You said you don't expect her to stop being friends with your ex. What do you want, then? What exactly would satisfy you?

 

Do you just want her to know that it has been bothering you? Then say that, and expect nothing in response. Do you want her to apologize? You admit that she hasn't really done anything wrong, though.

 

If you can't pinpoint what it is you want from the conversation, it will end up going to go in a dozen different directions and you won't get your resolution.

 

I can almost guarantee you that these kinds of conversations where you don't really have a goal, where you just want to tell someone how badly they made you feel, you just want to get it out and unload on them...these conversations almost never go well. There's no real point, there's no real one issue that can be discussed, there's just a lot of emotion and nothing gets resolved. Don't have that kind of discussion with your sister.

[Grumpybutfun]

Ox, I think this conversation is a long time coming. She is family and an effort made is all you can do. Be honest but not accusatory as that will only make her defensive. Do not preface sentences with...you did this and this. Instead, be specific. Say when you continued to hang out with my ex gf, it made me feel x and x. Make sure she knows that your heart and mind has been clouded by this and you need closure on the subject so you can move on and continue to have a positive relationship with her. I don't talk to my brother much because he is a train wreck who hates me for not being a train wreck. If you can salvage your relationship with your sister, now is the time. When we wait too long, we lose sight of the real underlying issues.

Keep us posted,

Grumps