Siblings

While growing up, I did not value, cherish or relish my siblings; I only learned how to live among them and stay out of their way.

The oldest, a brother, was ten when I was born and by the time I became aware of his presence, he was a teenager with hairy legs. 

The second born, a sister, stayed in my peripheral vision most of the time while the third born, also a sister, had a personality that lent itself to being one of the more friendly ones of the older ones.

Fourth born was also a sister. I shared a bedroom with her for the longest time. She was a sloppy roommate. 

I paled around the most with the fifth born of the family, a brother only 18 months older than me. I liked doing whatever he did; climbing trees, riding bikes, playing flag football and traipsing through the woods and along river banks. 

The last born was also a brother, born on my third birthday. Sharing a birthday with him was special for a while. But as he got older, he became more of a nuisance; cutting off the hair of one of my favorite dolls and hiding under my bed or in the closet to get a laugh out of scaring me. 

This was the noisy bunch of siblings I grew up with, to whom I belonged to until the unthinkable happened; Dad’s suicide. After that, our grief isolated us from each other. 

Family trauma affects the whole family, but in wholly different ways for each member of the family. 

Though my siblings and I shared the same trauma, none of us knew how to be honest about our grief. Instead, like silos on a prairie, we stored our sorrow away.

 Sadly, getting that invitation from my sister to join the weekly conference calls only stirred up the mucky muck I still felt toward everyone; why hadn’t we helped each other through that awful, terrible time? Why did we have to go it alone?

Deleting that email did not delete my mucky muck feelings. Instead, it only piqued my curiosity. I wanted to be part of that family again, to belong once again to that bunch of noisy unique individuals. But, I wasn’t sure how, so I reached out to my third born sibling, the one who always seemed to be the kindest of the older ones. With her encouragement and counsel I was prompted to participate.

Since then, these family calls have given me the opportunity to hear my siblings’ side of the trauma story, the one we all experienced, but never shared.  

Why Bother?

Why bother valuing siblings? We all have failed. Recognizing how we’ve failed each other we are less inclined to remain isolated and instead, dial in.

P.S.  I wrote the story of my journey to forgiveness for those who, like me, recognize the need to change, but are not sure how to do it.  You can find A Heart’s Journey To Forgiveness at Redemption Press and Amazon.