48 27 February 2021 | The Guardian Weekend
Family Ask Annalisa Barbieri
I am the target of my sister’s rages.
What can I do?
My childhood was overall a very happy one, and I adore my parents and
get along very well with my younger siblings. However, my older (half)
sister has been diagnosed with a number of mental health conditions.
In my early childhood, it felt as if most of my sister’s rages were
directed at our mother, and sometimes our father (her adoptive dad).
But as I got older, I became the target. My sister has always felt a sense of
persecution, often bordering on paranoia, and she would often overreact.
These reactions have persisted into adulthood ; they’re still shocking, but I expect and
dread them. I am sure that I gave as good as I got when I was a teenager, but we are adults
now. I wouldn’t tolerate this kind of hostility in any other part of my life, and for the most
part I don’t with her, either. Perhaps this is what causes the friction?
Though there are moments of calm when the family is together, they require me (and
often our mum) to walk on eggshells ; if anything is said, she says it is a personal attack
against her. It is exhausting. In some ways, it is my family’s behaviour that I resent
more than my sister’s. There is almost always silence after one of her outbursts, m aybe
murmurs of how she is “not well”, or suggestions that I am the one at fault.
I hate it, and got as far away as possible as soon as I was old enough. We are now moving
back to be close to my family and sister, and I cannot live like that again. What should I do?I’ve edited out the specifi cs of your letter, but your sister did, and still does, use highly
emotionally manipulative language, and I can see why you feel held hostage to her moods.
However, whether this is because of her mental health issues or her personality isn’t clear.
You don’t mention how offi cial her diagnoses were, and I’m sorry that none of you were
given better tools to deal with this.You appear to have all behaved and interacted
in a similar way for years, but it seems only you
want it to change. Given that you can’t control
the way the others react, maybe you could
look at your place in this anew? I consulted
family psychotherapist Joanne Hipplewith
( psychotherapy.org.uk ) for help.
In your longer letter, you gave examples of
interactions between you and your sister that
ended badly. You mentioned a time when she
wanted to give you a lift and you,
instead, wanted to walk. Hipplewith
wondered if you could look at that
as maybe your sister wanting to
spend time with you, but expressing
it badly? If that were the case, you
see how your rejection of her off er
(albeit for valid reasons ) would seem
like a snub to her. We wondered how
diff erently you’d feel if you imagined
the subtexts of her outbursts to be
about her wanting to be accepted by
you. Could you fi nd a way to respond
less to the words spoken, more to the
meaning behind them?
There does seem to be animosity
from you towards her, and I wonder
how much she notices this. Maybe you are
justifi ed, but at the heart of this may be a feeling
of rejection (hers ) and disdain (yours). I wonder
what it was like for your sister being the only
“half ” sister in the family ; maybe she feels less
accepted, and perhaps your mother’s behaviour,
which you see as indulgent, tried to redress that.
“You seem to be taking a very binary view,”
Hipplewith says. “ Your overall position seems to
be that your sister is wrong, and the way the rest
of the family is responding is wrong, but the way
you are, is right.” Maybe, Hipplewith suggests,
the family responds to your sister that way for a
reason and it works for them, if not you? “How
helpful is it,” she asks, “to always be right and not
question your own position?”
I got the feeling that you might perceive being
more indulgent towards your sister as giving in
to her, or giving her power. Hipplewith says that
often the need for power goes with vulnerability,
as “ a way of protecting ourselves”.
Given you have come to expect your sister’s
responses, is there some way you could think
about them retrospectively, and consider how
you might have responded, and in future, respond
diff erently? What would happen if you didn’t
respond to every outburst and simply observed?
Your family situation doesn’t sound easy, and you
should not have to put up with abuse from your
sister, but changing your response may open up a
chance to allow her to respond diff erently to you LO COLE /THE GUARDIANCould you
fi nd a way to
respond less
to the words
spoken,
more to the
meaning
behind them?If you would like advice on a family matter,
please email [email protected]. See
gu.com/letters-terms for terms and conditionsWhatWW c