My Sister Is A Trigger I Can't Escape

[Deleted member 37085]

The co-survival siblings dynamic is fragile. I have yet to meet siblings who as adults have anything close...

@Muse your post is so relatable to me regarding me and my sisters (bio) and (half) and I thank you so much for posting. I will take notes in my personal journal here on what you have written regarding foxhole friendship and traumatic bonding for this makes sense to me. For Patricia and I, nor Barb and I never had an opportunity to healthily bond on a familial level. No close-knit ties, no true loving, sharing, and mutual caring feelings were ever allowed through the trauma then later as we got older closeness and bonding was not chosen to be cultivated between Patricia, Barb, and me. I tend to lean towards Patricia, who remembers all of trauma we went through, very well may have survivor guilt; age may play a role, also my being dissociated through our California nightmare and all the rest of that crap we shared together, etc.

And I am truly trying to only focus on my recovery now and not what either sister thinks, feels, etc. about me. I am finally for the first time in my life in full-on recovery (emdr) and dealing with trauma now. I love both my sisters as I stated above for it is an innate deep-rooted feeling of love I will always have for both of my sisters @Muse . I have no unrealistic expectations of what the future may hold for me and either of my sisters regarding re-connecting on any level. I do leave the door open, and I do pray for them both. I only hope they pray for me as well. Again, no expectations either way in any way, whatsoever.

I am human, and at times especially during holidays I cry and grieve as I shared above for what could have been for us as sisters and also for what is now, nothing. For what could have been between me and my sisters @Muse were Christmas' together, loving, sharing, all of our life experiences together with one another. Not to be. I appreciate your naked honesty, truth, and experience on the subject of siblings and when the bow breaks so to speak which occurred in each of our lives (my sisters and me). So much psychological damage, so much violence and torture and trauma. Again I love them, I will always love them, forever and ever. Take care @Muse. JJ

 

[ms spock]

I was the eldest and I got in the way of the abuse from both my parents, most of the time, but I couldn't do it all of the time. I was shredded again and again. I learnt how to never be in my body to manage the pain. I now accept that there will never be relationships between us all because of how much damage was done to us all. There is a visceral rage at me for running away and getting the school involved in order to stop my Father from killing us all - even though they say they know I saved their lives - they still rage at me for leaving them behind. They hate me for the times that I wasn't able to stop my parents, especially after I no longer lived in the house. This has caused me to have corrosive self doubt within myself because if only I could have made a better decision - come up with a better strategy - then I wouldn't have lost my siblings. But that is fantasy thinking - that sustained me when I was 15 - and most of my adult life.

I can't help my sister when she is flashbacking to something from our past and screams at me to deal with that past situation. I can't do it. I live a long way from my sister. She has a job. I am minising contact with her. I sincerely can't see anything but a complete break from your sisters and niece ever letting you have a life on your own - this will mean you actually dealing with your own stuff then. And that is not easy either.

I cut my sister off for a decade I couldn't cope with her screaming at me all the time about how much emotional pain that she was in. The long term result is that she did get a lot of therapy and worked on her self when I was no longer the whipping boy.

No matter which way you go there will be some type of regret - that is the nature of living with such intergenerational traumatic abuse - but I would push for no contact with any of them for at least 5 years so you can stablise yourself.

And you sister is a trigger that you can minimise, avoid and cut out of your life. You don't have to have her in your life. You have choices now - you are no longer a child. And she is no longer a child either. Hard and unfair as that might be - you have choices about having your sister in your life.

And I think that when you are in a way - hoping for suicide to end her pain and your pain - then that thought/thinking gives you a clear message that you can't cope with this situation. ( I totally get those types of distorted cognitions). You can't stop her pain. Radical Acceptance. It is what it is. So time to set boundaries and cut off contact to all of them as one will just hook you in to contact via the others.