What do I do?

LegacyUser

What do you do when you just cannot get along with a family member? No matter how much I try I just cannot get along with my sister. I know it takes two to tango and I have really tried to look at my part in this. However I just can never win. No matter what I do its wrong.

Everyone sees my sister as a little angel who wouldn't harm a fly but I get very different treatment and at times she can be quite toxic, manipulative. I start to dread family events and as we have a few mutual friends in common meet-ups can be stressful. I try to ignore it but there is just this undercurrent of tension that I am sure is unpleasant for everyone. I am often the one who decides not to go to something so then I end up losing out.

Please don't say try and talk to her I have tried this several times and it always goes back to the same thing again and again.

What can I do please? Thanks so much

Victor

What stage of life are you both at? Are you still living at home?

Is there a particular reason why she is seen as an angel and you aren't?

LegacyUser

hi OP here,

Thanks Victor. Neither of us live at home I am thirty and she is late twenties. Sorry, I did not make myself clear in the post, it's not that I am seen badly, it's just she has a kind of fake personna that people buy into whereas I get to see a nastier more manipulative side of her.
She likes people to march to the beat of her drum and if you don't you will be punished. it's always very indirect and subtle though (snide comments, veiled asides). if you challenge her and bring it out in the open she will deny it fully and go into victim mode.

She does this to others too and the mask slips occasionally but I get the brunt of her treatment and I am just sick of it. I try to ignore it, have tried speaking to her many times but there is this unpleasant tension underneath the surface whenever I am around her.

Getting there

the best you can do is be civil. Try not to get too upset about ti and if shes being manipulative dont allow yourself to be dragged in. I know its easier said than doe but try to rise above it.

Shes probably jealous of you tbh, little sisters often are

Ickle Magoo

The best piece of advice I was offered with regards to not getting on with people is: you can never change them, you can only change how you react to them. It's true. Whatever response they usually get from you, change it. Stop trying to talk to her and just ignore her at family event or just keep it civil and no more. Just block her out your head and accept some people are idiots and nasty and no amount of rationalising or discussing is going to be able to change them unless they choose to change, you just have to stop caring and letting it get to you.

Best of luck.

WWC1

Hi,

Know a little how you feel. Have a similar issue with my brother and his wife. They tend to be "their way or no way" on things. Whenever they speak to me or about me its to critisise. Always digging that I never call to see them even though I lived away from home for 9 years and he came to visit once. Just feel whatever I do will never be enough for them and have aknot in my stomach when a family occassion looms. Anyhow, came accross a quote from Bill Cosby recently and have decided it will be my mantra when it comes to them - "I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody".

Going to get on with my own life, let them to theirs and be civil and courteous when we meet. It already feels like a weight has been lifted

Hope things work out for you
x

xx

Grawns

My little sister loves to tell me how to how to do things, she is always handing out unasked for and unneeded advice. I just ignore it. She's happy to be listened too and I'm happy to play along. As another poster said, no point in trying to change her. She's trying to impress me or feel superior or something but she'll always be the little sister.

Is there such a thing as a little sister complex?

astra2000

Hi you should go to these events its not fair to miss out, try not to be left alone with your sister thus making it less possible for you to be on the receiving end of her bile. When you are in a group play her at her own game be as nice as pie if her conversation is getting on your nerves get out of there or get distracted so you dont have to listen. Shes your sister so shes not going to go away how ever with time you may have to see less of her. its a pity really i would be lost without my sister but my hubbywishes he could lose half of his

Zen65

questiontoday wrote: »

What do you do when you just cannot get along with a family member? No matter how much I try I just cannot get along with my sister. I know it takes two to tango and I have really tried to look at my part in this. However I just can never win. No matter what I do its wrong.

I don't have any advice for you, or at any rate I have no advice on "winning" this game. May I share a true story with you instead?

I traveled with an older colleague of mine some years ago, and as we sat in the car he told me a story from his youth (I think he said he was in his twenties at the time). He had not got on well with his brother, and at some stage when they were both in their twenties (and drunk) a row broke out and they decided never to speak to each other again.

Roll the clock forward thirty years, and the next time he saw his brother it was when the brother was lying in a coffin. He said that at that moment he could not remember why they had fallen out, but he suddenly realised that the game was over and he had lost.

He had lost thirty years of close friendship with his only brother. To see a man in his fifties with tears in his eyes when he tells you a story is something you remember. I remember it anyway, and it reminds me to tolerate the occasional idiosyncrasy in my own siblings, and be glad of their company at all times, even when frankly I wish I could have been adopted

As we get older, it is the friendship of people who knew you when you were younger that means the most. I'm not that old yet, but time only goes one way.

Be at peace,

Z