Big Sister Always Acts Superior

[MissCongeniality]

She is always telling me I need to take responsibility and even when I do she will never let me forget what I did. She's always been perfect and I'm just the screw up. She's always been like parent our actual parents never were. She just sets the bar so high! She never broke the law she never screwed up she was popular got the best grades and the rest of us especially me were always reminded. Everyone always said "Why can't you be more like your big sister?"

 

I am so sick of her judgments and lectures. She has never stopped to have a nice time she just acts like the mother we never had when none of us even asked her take up that role.

[basil67]

To be fair, it's completely normal that the elder sibling in a dysfunctional household will step up and run things. I mean, someone's got to do it.

 

If you want her and others to stop lecturing you, you need to do two things:

 

1. Live wisely and make good decisions. Stay out of trouble.

2. If you do mess up, sort it out yourself without letting others know what went wrong.

[turnera]

That's just what older siblings do. Has nothing to do with you OR her: she needs to 'raise you right' since nobody else is doing it. Unfortunately, she doesn't know much better than you do. My brother did the same thing.

[MissCongeniality]

To be fair, it's completely normal that the elder sibling in a dysfunctional household will step up and run things. I mean, someone's got to do it.

 

If you want her and others to stop lecturing you, you need to do two things:

 

1. Live wisely and make good decisions. Stay out of trouble.

2. If you do mess up, sort it out yourself without letting others know what went wrong.

Yeah but I never asked her to. She acts so superior like she's responsible for me and the rest of our siblings but she never protected me from our dad. Most of the time she'd try but just freeze up and watch and wouldn't speak to me for days. So I don't see why she feels the need to act like she's looking out for me. She has no right to judge me.

[anika99]

Yeah but I never asked her to. She acts so superior like she's responsible for me and the rest of our siblings but she never protected me from our dad. Most of the time she'd try but just freeze up and watch and wouldn't speak to me for days. So I don't see why she feels the need to act like she's looking out for me. She has no right to judge me.

 

That sounds like a pretty painful situation for your sister. To want to protect your sibling but be too young and too afraid to know what to do. She probably carries guilt/shame (it's not her fault or her guilt to carry but she likely does anyways) for not protecting you. She didn't have parents either and she didn't have any older siblings to look to for guidance. Her position was very sad too. Your family was dysfunctional and you probably all need counselling.

[MissCongeniality]

That sounds like a pretty painful situation for your sister. To want to protect your sibling but be too young and too afraid to know what to do. She probably carries guilt/shame (it's not her fault or her guilt to carry but she likely does anyways) for not protecting you. She didn't have parents either and she didn't have any older siblings to look to for guidance. Her position was very sad too. Your family was dysfunctional and you probably all need counselling.

I doubt she carries any guilt she's never acknowledged it if I bring it up she'll adamantly deny it. Which is why I get so mad when she tries to tell me how to live my life! I will never forgive her. I mean all of our siblings acknowledge what happened she's the only one she doesn't care about anyone but herself.

 

She completely ignores reality and blames me it's always "Grow up!" or "Get a real job!" I can't stand her she never has looked out for me. I have a job it's not inside social norms but I like it and I am not a perfect person but I am doing the best I can. I hate her.

[amaysngrace]

I think you are more mad at your Dad but you're taking that anger out on your sister.

 

She probably doesn't want to acknowledge what happened because she feels guilty to not be able to stop him.

 

You should try to forgive your sister and she should forgive you too because whatever your Dad did to you isn't her fault (or yours either).

 

I'm sorry for your pain.

[basil67]

You say she acts like a mother - and you say she doesn't care about you. This is a contraction in terms. She can't be both like a mother and uncaring.

 

It sounds to me like she's done best she could with what she had. I'm sure she was equally damaged by having to give up her childhood to become a mother to you all. But you probably don't think she had it tough, do you? Put yourself in her shoes for one minute and imagine being too frightened of your father to protect your younger siblings.

Edited June 6, 2016 by basil67

[ChickiePops]

Wait..do YOU break the law??

[Buddhist]

I doubt she carries any guilt she's never acknowledged it if I bring it up she'll adamantly deny it. Which is why I get so mad when she tries to tell me how to live my life! I will never forgive her. I mean all of our siblings acknowledge what happened she's the only one she doesn't care about anyone but herself.

 

She completely ignores reality and blames me it's always "Grow up!" or "Get a real job!" I can't stand her she never has looked out for me. I have a job it's not inside social norms but I like it and I am not a perfect person but I am doing the best I can. I hate her.

 

She is doing the best she can too, actually.

 

I get it, I really do. I was raised in an incredibly abusive household, and I thought I would never forgive a certain individual either. Such was my hate. I wanted to punch anyone in the face who told me she did the best she could. But actually they were right.

 

Surely you recognise you are affected by your upbringing. The fact you don't like your sibling's personal expression, does not mean she got through the same experience without being affected by it too. Why do you think she adopted Little Miss Perfect as her persona? It was fear. This is her survival mechanism, just as being recalcitrant was yours. Your response was aggression, hers was playing dead (being perfect is a version of that. Don't rock the boat, don't garner attention by doing anything 'bad'). She took up parenting you because she was scared and thought if you all learnt to play dead then whatever terror it was in your home would go away. At the end of the day all of you are playing whatever roles you decided as children made you safe in an environment that was clearly dangerous.

 

None of you are better than the other, and none of you are to blame. Little children cannot defend themselves in these situations. They grow up into adults who have frightened little children on the inside. These little children adopt roles in life to prove to themselves they are safe. But at some point, you will drop this role, all of you will but it's unlikely that will happen all at the same time.

 

You are interacting with her coping mechanism, not her.

Edited June 7, 2016 by Buddhist

[MissCongeniality]

She is doing the best she can too, actually.

 

I get it, I really do. I was raised in an incredibly abusive household, and I thought I would never forgive a certain individual either. Such was my hate. I wanted to punch anyone in the face who told me she did the best she could. But actually they were right.

 

Surely you recognise you are affected by your upbringing. The fact you don't like your sibling's personal expression, does not mean she got through the same experience without being affected by it too. Why do you think she adopted Little Miss Perfect as her persona? It was fear. This is her survival mechanism, just as being recalcitrant was yours. Your response was aggression, hers was playing dead (being perfect is a version of that. Don't rock the boat, don't garner attention by doing anything 'bad'). She took up parenting you because she was scared and thought if you all learnt to play dead then whatever terror it was in your home would go away. At the end of the day all of you are playing whatever roles you decided as children made you safe in an environment that was clearly dangerous.

 

None of you are better than the other, and none of you are to blame. Little children cannot defend themselves in these situations. They grow up into adults who have frightened little children on the inside. These little children adopt roles in life to prove to themselves they are safe. But at some point, you will drop this role, all of you will but it's unlikely that will happen all at the same time.

 

You are interacting with her coping mechanism, not her.

Yeah well it's not like we can ever be any more than what ever we our dynamic works well I'm the trashy little sister she's the perfect successful older sister who has the perfect everything. Besides we've caused each other enough grief to the point I don't think we could ever be close. We use to be then my dad did what he did and we never were close again.