Reading Edoardo’s outburst I saw myself again. But with reversed roles. I am the younger brother and since my mother’s passing, my sister interacts with me as if she were my guardian. Or it would be appropriate to define her as a carer: I am 57 years old and she is 61. She is married with two children and I am single and have always lived at home with my mother. For four years, that is, since our mother passed away, my sister has been as apprehensive as she has ever been with her children. She must know everything I do, where I go, who I go to the restaurant with… Maybe she thinks she is demonstrating her “sisterhood” in that way, but paradoxically she doesn’t do it with the tenderness and sweetness typical of a sister but with the classic icy distance of a caregiver… exactly. Do you remember Miss Rottenmeier from the Heidi cartoon? Well, my sister’s empathy is exactly that style. So returning to Edoardo’s letter… a brother who takes care of his sister is welcome as long as it is done with empathy, sensitivity and sweetness. Because cuddles don’t have an expiration date like yogurt!
FBP
Dear FBP, perhaps your sister simply has a brusque affectivity. Because you yourself say that she is sometimes protective towards him in a way that she wasn’t even protective of me towards her children. Or perhaps the time has come for both of us to evolve. Which doesn’t mean losing yourself at all but changing that tacit code that has regulated your relationships up to now. There is also the possibility, in fact, that his sister is so rough and hasty towards him due to the fact that she is tired of being the older sister-mother-caregiver of a now adult man. And there is the possibility that she continues to fulfill this task because she considers it a commitment that she made a long time ago and that now, with your mother’s passing, she doesn’t feel like giving up. But she is 57 years old and her sister is 61: the “little” and the “elder” no longer exist, as you will understand well. Maybe it’s time to change direction and the passing of her mother could paradoxically help her with this. It’s always horrendous, at any age, to stop being a child. But it’s not (just) terrible, at any age, to become an adult.
Unfortunately he lost his mother, it’s true. But then don’t turn into someone else’s child (your sister’s, in this case). Try being a brother, maybe you too would want (and have the right) to lean on his shoulder every now and then.