Woman tells sister she doesn't 'fit in' because their dad didn't push her but was hard on the rest of their siblings. AITA?
I told my twin she will never fit in with the rest of us (our siblings).
Best-Truth-4056 writes:
I (29F) have four siblings: Mark (33M), Josh (31M), Eva (29F), and Tony (26M). Eva and I are fraternal twins. Our mother was a stay-at-home mom, but she was emotionally absent.
Growing up, our father was very hard on us. He wanted his first son to be a doctor, so Mark had to work all the time. He had Josh learn violin at 4 years old and made him play for hours. Tony had to become a lawyer. I had the “privilege” of being a beautiful child and participated in beauty pageants starting at 3 years old.
Eva was free from this pressure because she wasn’t considered beautiful, and my father didn’t believe that a woman could achieve much anyway. She always had freedom and could do whatever she wanted without pressure on her shoulders.
She could have friends, didn’t care about her grades, and didn’t have to work hard every day. We aren't proud of it, but we tended to exclude her since she was slacking off while we were working so hard.
She was also a problematic teen: she skipped classes, hung around with a bad crowd, and did things she shouldn't have. She even disappeared for a week without notice when we were 15, stating afterward that she wanted to go on a road trip with her boyfriend.
Meanwhile, I wasn’t even allowed to leave the house for a night because my parents wanted to ensure I did my work and only ate what I was allowed.
Eva would throw tantrums, saying she was neglected and no one would care if she disappeared. I was enraged with her because she never realized the opportunity she had, and we only grew further apart from that point.
After high school, I moved far away and started working as a makeup artist. I eloped at 26 with Eli (27M) and never looked back. Last month, our father passed away, and my siblings and I went to the family home for the funeral. We stayed for three weeks and reconnected a lot.
Mark had a breakdown at 23 from all the pressure but recovered. He is now happier, has a job as a tech in a lab, is married, and has two little kids. Josh stopped playing the violin and is now a drummer and piano teacher, and Tony is a public defender. Eva chose to become a social worker.
It was a bit weird with Eva since we hadn’t seen each other for years and lost contact too. She once again tried to dismiss what we went through, saying that she had it as hard as us, even though that is nowhere near true.
One evening she completely flipped out on us, calling us a^@$oles and saying that we were like our father and excluded her. She kept going on about how our parents never took an interest in her, neither did we, and that she went through hell thinking she was worthless.
Mark started to cry, so I took Eva outside and lashed out at her, saying she was the a^&%ole for being jealous of our misery and that she would never fit in with us because she never experienced what we went through. It was insane of her to claim she had. She left that night and didn’t apologize to any of us.
When I went home, I cried a lot and told my husband everything, expecting him to support me. However, he said I should be the one to call and apologize to my sister. So, am I the a$^%ole?
Here are the top comments from the post:
ZebraGroundbreaking1 says:
Your sister disappeared at 15 for a week and no one noticed? That's so messed up. Not that it’s a competition, but it sounds like your strict father focussed on kids he felt “worthy” and ignored her because … well what’s the message any kid would get from this behaviour?
That she’s worthless, nothing, not worth the effort, invisible. You and your siblings may have felt the pressure to success but she was ignored entirely. This isn’t an enviable position in the family, it’s horrendous. You and your siblings are continuing to be mean to her by minimizing her experience and alienating her. If you didn’t admire your father, then stop replicating his behaviour.
stolenfires says:
YTA (You're the A^*&ole). Your father was awful to all his children, including Eva. He basically told her she was ugly, dumb and worthless so he didn't care about her at all.
DelusionallyObvious says:
But you are like your father and excluded her. You did treat her like she was a nobody because she didn't bask in your shared misery. Everyone just ignored her because she wasn't seen as pretty or smart, she was a lost cause not worth bothering with.
Any wonder she was acting out? How else would she be seen? You didn't even notice when she went missing for a week. That's just wrong. So, yes, YTA.
SnooRadishes8848 says:
YTA, so self centered you don’t see she also had it tough in a different way, and you and your siblings stuck together and she was left out there too, I feel so bad for her.
What do you think? Was OP right to demand an apology from her sister?