Whew! I survived another Christmas. I know, I know - it's supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year - and at some future date it will be for me. But as I've chronicled before, I have a very difficult family and being around them - especially the younger sister - is like driving a garbage truck through a nitorglycerine factory. I survived this holiday but not without the usual sideshow my sister consistently engages in. It's her version of the high school popularity contest. She is 50 and as best I can figure, is so jealous of me and the good things I have in my life that all she can figure out to do is try to diminish me at every turn - especially at the holidays. She is one of those unfortunate people who can only build herself up by tearing someone else down. She is a person of means and lavishes multiple expensive gifts on everyone in the family - except my husband and me. She does not acknowledge us when she shows up late as usual and leaves after packing herself up all the leftovers instead of leaving them for our sick parents. My father gives her money every year and asks her to buy gifts for the rest of the family on his behalf. She will buy everyone something thoughtful except, again, me and my husband. This year, instead of getting me a sweater in a size which is obviously too small, she bought me a vest in a size larger than what I wear and in that ever-slimming color of white. In short, another effort at humiliation. She will put on her usual "Giver of Gifts" show after dinner in which she will sort all the presents and assign the seats of everyone there. The gifts for my husband and me were left at the two chairs farthest away from the inner circle of the other ten people in attendence. She tries as hard as she can to diminish and belittle me and I used to let this bother me but I had a revelation yesterday.
I have noticed that lately her physical appearance has taken a sharp turn for the worse. Although she is younger than me by 14 months, her looks have become very haggard, making her look as if she's 5 to 10 years older. She has gained an enormous amount of weight but continues to dress as if she were her old skinny self. I'm not saying any of this to be catty but it appears to me that all this negativity with which she has been living her life seems to be backfiring and turning itself inward. The poison of hate is rotting her from the inside out.
I don't know exactly where this relationship went off the tracks. She has always been a difficult person - very quick to anger and assign blame away from herself. She sets very high standards for everyone but herself. In the past 15 years or so I have become the main target for her rage. My parents and brother have always made excuses for her or refused to become involved and so she has taken this as tacit approval of her behavior. As the people pleaser, I never wanted to upset the norm and so was fast on my way towards becoming the family door mat. And as I allowed this behavior to continue, my family took that as tacit approval of their behavior. The breaking point finally came 4 years ago at Thanksgiving when my sister took issue with me for throwing away what she considered perfectly good dinner rolls. Since she is never part of the preparation or clean-up at the holidays I took issue with her finding fault and suggested if she felt so strongly about the rolls then perhaps she should be helping out in the clean-up. She turned on me with such a vile stream of vulgar language and insults - which she has been doing to me in private for years - except this time she did it in front of my 9 year old son, my husband and my mother who has Alzheimer's. Enough!
My mother was shaken and crying and my brother took both of us for a walk. But in typical fashion, he refused to become involved. Hey, he wasn't her target so why should he jump in, right? Even if it was the right thing to do it wasn't impacting him in a negative way so he took the easy way out. I was shocked that he could be so indifferent to her cruelty towards me. If the situation were reversed I would back him to the hilt. But everyone in the family, to my great disappointment, excused her behavior yet again. But not me. After taking some time to think about it I wrote her a letter and let her know that her treatment of me was unacceptable and that she was no longer allowed to call or visit my home as long as she continued this verbal and emotional abuse. As I expected, she never apologized or has shown any remorse and my father, to this day, finds fault with ME for cutting her off. I used to try to justify myself but not anymore. The pain had gotten too much to take. I now throw it back to my father and ask him if his brother ever treated him like my sister treats me. And mind you, this is his sainted brother who tragically died at the age of 47 and was loved by all - so I was very hesitant to bring him into the fray. But it had the intended effect. "How would you like to be treated this way by a member of your family,Dad, and have no one object? How would that make you feel?" He hemmed and hawwed but I think he finally got the message - I wasn't taking it for one minute more and if he wanted something done about it then he needed to be talking to my sister - not me.
I suspect that my father has never confronted my sister about this. Perhaps he realizes that she took many of her lessons from him and that is a painful realization for any parent. My parents are now both very sick and this has taken center stage, as it should. I have grieved for the fact that I cannot force my family to treat me as respectfully as I treat them and that in this very trying time of our parents' illnesses, we will not be looking to each other for comfort and support. It has been a one-way street for far too long and has taken a substantial emotional toll on me but it has finally taught me a hard-won lesson: I am no longer looking outward and to others for approval and acceptance - I am looking to myself. It is a tough transition to make given my years as a people pleaser but know that it's the path to peace of mind and self-acceptance. And maybe with the self-acceptance comes the self-love that will finally convince me that I am worthy of treating myself with dignity and respect and will win this battle of the bulge once and for all.
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