That’s what she tells people sometimes. Right in front of me, with a smirk that can be seen from the space station, she says it as if it were carved in stone. And it never fails to break my heart.
It’s been interesting spending my entire life trying to prove I am NOT my mother’s favorite. And it doesn’t help that absolutely no one else in the family agrees with me.
What goes on in the mind of a parent who discovers, for whatever reason, s/he has a preferred child? I have no experience with that from the parental side because I really do have an only-child.
As I watch other people with their children, it is sometimes obvious that one of them elicits a special look in the eye of their parent, a softer countenance, a calmer voice. Sometimes it is a father who dotes on the only daughter in his brood. Sometimes a mother strokes the head of a son tenderly while she berates his brother in her outside voice for one infraction or another.
I don’t get much sympathy for bearing the burden of “favorite child.” I suppose I understand that, but it can be lonely to carry around a kind of pain few people can or will relate to.
Back in the 1970s, out of the blue, at least as far as I was concerned, she stopped speaking to me. At all. I was crushed when she didn’t invite me to her wedding to her second husband, whom I had never met (and never did.) She moved from our home state of Illinois with him to Florida without so much as a goodbye.
Years went by with me making overtures and being totally ignored. This was the sister I loved so much I tried to mother her, despite being only 30 months older than she. When we were children I protected her, made sure she was clean and groomed, while our mother worked outside the home. I had no idea, being only a child myself, how she seethed within her low-key persona.
The unilateral rivalry, ever-present, had escalated as we moved through childhood and adolescence. She deeply resented what she viewed as the ease with which I conquered studies she found not only difficult, but useless. I loved school; she hated it. I enjoyed Brownies and Girl Scouts; she despised it. She announced to our parents on the evening before her first day in high school, where I was a senior:
“Do not expect me to get the grades Lezlie does. It won’t happen. Do not look for me to be joining all those clubs she joined. I won't.”
There was one thing, however, she decided to follow me into. We both learned to twirl a baton in a public park summer program when we were about 9 and 5 or 6. We were equally adept at acquiring that skill. We continued to learn each year and we became quite good at it. So when I became a drum majorette in our high school band organization, she must have vowed to herself to make her mark in that arena. In her own senior year, with me finally out of her hair and away at college, she was not just a majorette – she was the Captain!
I can only imagine what she was feeling when she called me to tell me of her achievement. Finally, I have outdone her. But since I did not share her sense of competition in this sibling pairing, all I felt was proud of her.
The other thing she did was get her driver’s license on the first try when she was 16. I had failed my driver’s test at 16 and was so demoralized, I didn’t even attempt to get it again until I was 18, although I had been driving since I was 12.
About five years ago I was driving her to the auto repair shop to retrieve her car. Back-seat driving on her part has always been a problem between us, but I usually just “suck it up for the cause of harmony.” On this particular day, I wasn’t in the mood. When she told me to watch out for some hazard or other she saw but just knew I didn’t, I snapped: I have been driving just as long as you have. I KNOW!
Pause. Pause. Pause.
Well, technically, that’s not true. I got my license first, remember?
As an adult, she recognized this rivalry and her sense of being less-valued was eating her alive. She had gone to therapy about it and the therapist convinced her that her refusal to speak to me was unfair, that her animosity toward me was misplaced. Slowly, she returned to me. And quickly, she ceased any contact with our parents. That lasted 10 years.
We are good now. The little barbs still come flying my way, but they don’t hurt as much anymore because I understand they come from a broken place in her heart. She has told me how ashamed she has been about some of the things she’s done to hurt me – purposely. I believe her and I love her still.
She, too, only had one child. That was deliberate on her part. She says she never wanted a child of hers to feel the same hurt she felt. If there was only one, he was automatically the favorite.
But what’s fascinating to watch is how she has singled out one of her grandchildren to dote on, to try to provide compensation for the fact that his mother abandoned him to his father. She relates so much to how he feels, she has lost all objectivity about her relationship with the rest of her grandchildren in comparison.
It is very hard to watch in silence, but I do.
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Comments
You look exactly the same in that picture. That cracks me up. Always beautiful!
Wifey has her issues with her parents in that same area.
Rated!
It's wonderful of you to honor her pain even though it hurt that she pushed you away. It's sad that you offered her such a precious gift and she wasn't able to feel it. I hope your sister is now able to accept and feel how much you love and approve of her.
Rated.
I appreciate your depth here, sibling and parental relationship color our entire lives and it's sad to me when the negative sides claim a majority, it happens too often, the consequences last too long.
My sister was favorite, was always assumed smartest (likely still is), is also a Harvard Graduate School alumni, and definitely most accomplished -- and she doesn't have any issues with any of that at all -- why would she? : )
She also took all the jewelry when my mother died and the best china too, as oldest daughter, and didn't even feel she needed to talk about it.
Somehow I feel sorry for her need to have the best, be the best.
Early on, I took the 'pretty' sphere and the artist, and Mom, sphere, until my same (lesbian) sister became a Mom and we struggled in our peace together -- she entered my sphere! -- then when I learned my (kept secret from me for years) IQ is only two points short of Mensa membership, I began to think of myself as smart too -- I entered her sphere! Our every dynamic changed forever -- I just stepped into my own strengths and quit worrying about my sister.
I'll buy myself my own jewelry some day : )
That is why it was such a terrible dissapointment when I turned out to be completely and utterly NOT the fantastic, successful businessman like my father.
Tink: I’m starting to see these problems are pretty pervasive in our culture.
Scanner: I can’t believe how cruel your siblings were to you. I would find it hard to forgive them too.
Deborah: {smiling knowingly} Oh, tell me about the wondering. My sister is absolutely convinced that she has a different father than I do. My mother has sworn on a stack of bibles it’s BS.
Matt: Children are little sponges with the memories of elephants. It is a terrible mistake to believe they don’t know what’s going on, even at a very young age.
jmac1949: So true.
l’Heure Bleue: Hmmm. My mother and sister are so much alike it’s not even funny. I think what happens is they see in each other the things they dislike above themselves. They both tease me for being so sensitive, trying not to hurt people’s feelings, for example. Sharp tongues are a family trait, but the two of them take it to a new level.
J.T. : I know what you mean about “taking” an area of expertise. My sister has always prided herself with having far more common sense than I do. The books, she left to me.
jlsathre: It is very hard. I want to scream at her “can’t you see that you are doing the same thing????”
Doug: Oooh. That hurts. Expectations can be brutal when they are not based on the interests and talents of the person in question.
ps -erk.
above comment: "alumnus"
: )
It is your last paragraph in particular that made me think of the lifetime, and often multi-generational imprint of these relationships. Many parents "make up" for the way their parents treated them, but I think too, we try to compensate for any sibling injustices we felt as a child.
R for taking a different perspective on the issue than I was expecting!
My mother never hid the fact that she loved the middle kid the best. The oldest one and I never could figure it out. ~r
This was hard to read, but I'm so glad I did. My sister doesn't speak to me either unless she has to about our folks, and I don't know why, and have asked, to no response. Maybe someday she will explain. Your story gives me some possible insight into what might be her perspective–competing with someone who doesn't know there's a competition. Sad.
Cranky: Yeh.
Marilyn: Not talking, huh?
J.T. I love it when that happens…and it does.
Maurene: The same thing happened to me with a girl cousin. We all grew up together, but I am the oldest of the five, she is in the exact middle. When we were both well past 40, I learned she had resented me all her life because of my close relationship with her father, my uncle. I was shocked and felt even worse about carrying this first-born load.
Emily: Yes, the problem seems to infect a family and get passed on to generations to come.
Joanie: Thank you! You know, I’ll bet your mother couldn’t figure it out, either. We have our theories, but she swears she doesn’t understand why my sister feels that way.
trilogy: Your family’s model is the one my uncle’s family took on. Their only daughter was a holy terror from the start and got the lion’s share of their parents’ attention. Late in life, the middle brother got hooked on drugs. He has always felt he was lost in the shuffle and his younger brother got all the attention after their sister left the nest. (Sigh) Seems like a stacked deck for all families.
greenheron: Thank you! I remember those costumes as if it was yesterday. I do hope you can get your sister to open up about what’s bothering her. I’ll bet it has similar origins. And, greenheron: Thank you! I remember those costumes as if it was yesterday. I do hope you can get your sister to open up about what’s bothering her. I’ll bet it has similar origins. And, yes , it is sad.
I certainly wasn't my mother's favourite ... not by a long shot ... but I never ever begrudged the sibling that was. I just wished she could love us all the way she did him.
I watched my mother in law negotiate these dangerous waters with the grandson she raised. She worked hard to not make the others feel she loved him more than them, and still give him the love and attention he needed. It was almost impossible.
I always longed for a sister, but fantasy is almost always better than reality.
My brother, who was next in line a year and a half after me sounds a lot like your sister, forever engaged in a competition he could not win because I wasn't competing -- by mere accident of birth, I was already in first place -- and that was never going to change. I'm sure there's more than a bit of frustration that goes with that.
Thankfully, time has softened his need to compete, but on occasion it still rears its ugly head. All that said, I love him dearly -- as I love all my siblings. When I look around at other families in which sibling rivalry is still very much alive -- even when the siblings barely are -- I feel so blessed to have the brothers and sister I have.
LL2: Yes, your mom did use you unfairly. I’d imagine the dynamics in a larger family of kids is much different than when there are just two.
Myriad: LOL! Yes, it looks like you have.
Christine: I’m sorry if this upset you.
Abrawang: I have to admit I was oblivious too until my sister actually verbalized it. I blame my grandfather mostly for this because he was quite overt about his fondness for me. It made me uncomfortable.
Little Kate: Thank you. I wish all parents could do that.
koshersalaami: I often wonder how your daughter is doing now.
Sally: Exactly! That’s the way it feels every time my sister and I reminisce about our childhoods.
nerd cred: Wow, that’s unusual. At least you figured it out somewhat early in your lives.
bikepsychobabble: I’m sorry you experienced that.
Mimetalker: I wouldn’t trade my sister for anything or anyone. She is a wonderful person who has issues; just like everybody else.
Tom: Birth order has a lot of impact, good and not so good. My mother was especially strict with me when it came to just about everything. By the time my sister came of age, mom had lightened up considerably and it really irked me. :D
Irrational malice is so poisonous to an innocent self-esteem. There's one thing when you wrong someone and there is guilt to be processed that has some logic to it. but being shamed by irrational malice and jealousy is out of one's control and grasp of understanding.
it inspired in me grave self-doubt and, yes, self-contempt. After all, the hate coming at me seemed so deeply passionate. there must be something I didn't see that was inspiring it. something worthy I suspected I couldn't see. I read in a book once how growing up some of us have "our willingness to be wrong" gravely exploited.
I remember once my brother started shrieking about how my handwriting was really harder to read than his but people considered me having better handwriting and I had hoodwinked them and didn't deserve such respect. He seemed so crazily and murderously angry about this and insistent as if I could change my handwriting. I had been through so many jealous rants and ambushes by him but this one seemed particularly insane.
My jaw dropped open and once again I tried to fathom what he might want me to do about something that was pretty much out of my control -- it was my handwriting -- which again I managed as best I could, not looking for accolades, just doing my best with it to communicate. Not part of a vicious plot to outshine him.
We were close in age and if I received positive messaging from teachers and kids at our school immediately afterwards my Greek chorus for self-hate brother told me how humiliating I had been for him with my very existence once again. Poor him -- he had to endure this humiliation day after day.
A dysfunctionally alcoholic and now I know borderline family has assigned roles for the children. Hero, lost child, mascot and scapegoat. The roles get incorporated into our self imaging. The roles can be straitjackets. Sometimes siblings assign us contradictory roles from what our parents assign which is extra crazymaking. I was mascot to my parents. I was his scapegoat.
I also think sometimes the children pick a safer target for their anger for the sake of security with a parent figure which you make the case for very well above. I think sisters (coming from my own history and family configuration) pick up some of the rage brothers might feel for the sake of fathers toward their mothers but can not bring themselves to betray their mothers by aiming this anger at them. The approval/love is too precious to mess with. So the hose of rage for dad's issues gets aimed at a less formidable family female. My take. I think I picked up on ricocheted disdain because I was the family female, junior and safer mirror/target of mother/wife.
When my only sister died at 2, I was 5, my mother declared that God took her because she was perfect and he wanted her with him in heaven. My mother declared to our grieving family network how perfect and angelic my little sister had been. She was 2. She was a darling baby, but my mother's insistence on her perfection messaged that the rest of us weren't since we had been rejected by God, thank God we guiltily decided no doubt.
We were enjoined to be perfect by my mother always, her hey, if we were would be zapped from life, too?
More importantly was this insistence by my mother of my sister's PERFECTION -- it set up a dangerous belief system that my mother's approval and love was won only with PERFECTION. On some level I wanted her to drop the perfect-speak and just mourn a child she loved. A child who was lovable in her essence not in whatever a two year old can do to earn perfection.
I know the death of my sister was a grave tragedy for all of us. I can't begin to imagine how a mother would feel losing a child and at that tender age. My mother was so hysterical about it that as kids we were told by my dad and grandmother it would be cruel to my mother for us kids to EVER refer to my sister or her death again. We rarely did. Our mourning process was cut off to enable our mother's recovery. That was not healthy for any of us including or especially our mother.
Families are not always base camps for the mountain of life, as Scott Peck declares the healthy ones are. sometimes we need base camps for these wounded base camps.
Thanks, Lezlie, for your honesty and vulnerability in this. Your unconditional good will toward your sister is touching. You gave her some parenting she obviously was in need of but it illuminated to her what she wasn't getting from where she could be getting it and your good deed therefore was so often punished for as I say illuminating that reality for her! FWIW
best, libby