Dear Anita, I am going to shift gears with this post today.

I am away in California this week, I am here for all sorts of work interviews and meetings, my husband joined me this weekend because we had a few meetings to go to, and also we were going to take a better look around the area to look at some potential homes and see if this is a place that we would really like to relocate to. As I have told you over the past few months this has been a big part of my recent life, going to different locations in interviewing and seeing if they are a good fit. Given that it is 2 physician jobs it is a huge decision careerwise and of course personally. I had not seen my sister since the wedding, in September, so I thought it would be nice if she joined us this weekend too. So she came in on Friday just like my husband for the weekend.

I was very excited to see her, and the hour that she was there before my husband arrived was really fun like old times, fun sister silliness. But what happened next I will try my best to explain without trying to seem one-sided it will be more of a stream of consciousness on my end.

I have mentioned to you an example in the past with my parents, for their anniversary how I had to visit them to make it fun for them, and while I was there I had a meltdown at the restaurant. And how although it was negative-not the right place to have a melt down, it was a pivotal moment for me because it made me realize that I was so burnt down and run down by my mother that actually making it to this anniversary dinner wasn’t the point. it was her expectations of me and how much she had drained me. The anniversary dinner will always be that for me, an alarm that went off, that I had reached a breaking point and at this restaurant I couldn’t take it anymore it was all unloaded.

So my sister arrived on Friday, my husband did too, and my friend who lives locally in California joined us for the evening. We are all at the hotel lobby hanging out and then proceed to walk around to get dinner.
Looking back I instantly noticed something. I was extremely drained.It had been a tiring trip for me already given that I am here for not just play but also for work, and so travel plus work things, plus having to be on my toes for interviews isn’t necessarily a leisurely thing. So I am baseline exhausted – let’s put that out there.

Now what happens next is kind of a blur. We end up settling down on a pizza place, and all of a sudden I start feeling like it is not good enough. I feel that my sister has come all the way to visit us for the weekend and so I want to show her a good time, so I start feeling we must eat elsewhere. The pizza place is blah. I say out loud “well is this really good place for us to eat, I’m not sure don’t you think that she may have fun elsewhere.” My sisterbreacts and says that ” I shouldn’t worry because I’m just here to spend quality time, I don’t have to worry about where we are going.” Which is true, of course. but I still felt uneasy. A few minutes later, out of nowhere like I can not control it I say out loud “wow isn’t this place depressing.” Given that my husband has been through so much with all this recently, he then said to me why is it such a big deal it’s just a pizza place!! My sister says too. I then proceed to say “well I’m not sure but I don’t know I don’t think this is going to be fun for her,” meaning my sister who is right there. It ends up being a huge huge debacle.

I end up having another meltdown that is similar to the anniversary party restaurant example above. I’m not sure exactly what I said but this is how I felt. I felt overwhelmed and I felt burdened. I felt like my sister was there so I had to show her a good time and so the place that we were at, was it good enough? When my sister saw this she, she didn’t get why I was doing this. My husband also felt I needed to take a step back and be. In reality , she never said anything to make me feel uneasy or this way and it was just my insecurity. I’ve had this pattern with my sister before because I have felt I want to show her a great time, and then I put this under pressure on myself. My sister stated there was no reason she gave me to act this way. All of a sudden. To this I said, yes it is my insecurity, but for some reason when I’m around you I feel like I constantly like I have to try my best to make you happy. She got upset of course and says ” that she is happy, she has made so much progress on her own, and it is not right for me to bring the stuff up out of nowhere and really single her out and project onto her.”

She is absolutely correct. And then it gets worse, I start getting really upset and crying and feeling just overwhelmed, I start saying things that are really inappropriate, I start saying things such as I can’t take it anymore between my mom and you I just feel so drained I just don’t have anything left. My sister of course gets upset and said well you invited me this weekend and where is this coming from, we were just sitting down about to have some pizza and now you’re doing this?

Yes Anita it does sound crazy. Like I am unraveling at a pizza parlor out of nowhere. I was.

Then all these things start coming to me, I think about how she was so up-and-down about whether she wants to quit work or not before that week of my vacation, which was the same exact time that my dad had chest pain and had to get the procedure. It was that week in which I spoke to you every day and we realized so much. During those conversations I saw that my sister is a lot like my mother, and constantly giving into her was accommodating it wasn’t going to even help her get better. This was also during a time where you had mentioned that you were no longer going to communicate her in that same fashion , because you would also not accommodate that sort of behavior. That was a very important time in my life for me. you showing me that was very pivotal.

And it was interesting on Friday all of the sudden that came up, I realized how draining that was on me, between my mother making a huge thing about me not showing up for my dad‘s procedure, my sister had really put me through the ringer with going up and down about whether she wanted to be a part of her program or not. Which was so draining I had told her that week away that I couldn’t speak to her. I needed space.
That is just one example and not to say that this is the only way my sister functions. In fact I have done the same to her many times I am sure too. The root of it all is our mother, who has created a negative an abusive environment our whole life, so as you see it trickles down. She has created anxiety and issues in both of us. However I made a huge step a month ago to cut off contact with my parents, so my threshold for dealing with negativity has become very low.

It was wrong of me to put this all out there, it was wrong of me to say things like this about her and in front of my friend who is a third-party. It was rude and volatile.

My husband and sister stepped out fora moment then because he wanted to calm her down. During this time I sat there and contemplated and I said to my friend, I think I just can’t take it anymore, I can’t be a caregiver to her. He said well this is just her coming here and trying to have fun she hasn’t done anything wrong. I said yes but I think I have a lot of anger and built-up resentment and just frankly an overwhelming feeling around her. The moment that she came here I felt like I regressed and went backwards, kind of the way I do when I pick up the phone with my mom I automatically start feeling anxious and depressed.

Needless to say our night ended early, and my sister was so upset that my husband got her a separate hotel room for the night. Which was a good idea. For the next few hours I spoke to my husband and I really figured out a lot of things that caused me to be triggered in this way. I realize like I said above that soon as my sister arrived I felt that same anxious depressed feeling. The kind that I would feel when I would be around my mom. I did feel bad about this because my sister did not do anything to invoke this, it was merely her presence. She had mentioned this at the pizza parlor before we left, she said to me “do you know how horrible it is to say to someone that just your presence makes me upset and uneasy.” She is right it is horrible. But I think it’s true…

I realized the following: yes her mere presence makes me anxious and uneasy. I think this is the link to the role that I’ve had to have in her life which has been uplifting her and being her support system. And I think it also has to do with the fact that she does have qualities of my mother that can be draining without having the awareness of what she is doing to those around her. Lastly I think that it is also some PTSD of going up and down with her over the last few months, and so unfortunately even if she doesn’t do anything wrong per se I still feel that around her. It was my first time seeing her over the last seven months but we speak all the time, but seeing her in person made me realize very quickly that the energy I had was changed instantly when I was around her. How interesting though, it’s not like when she arrived she was negative, it was not like she arrived and had anything bad to say, she arrived and everything was going as normal and fine as could be, but yet I felt like that. This sounds similar to a lot of times I have felt like this around my mother as I mentioned. Is it mean to think and say out loud to myself or to someone, that just your presence makes me uneasy and uncomfortable. Yes it is, but I think it’s the truth.

The next morning we were able to get back on a better path all three of us went for a walk on the beach and proceeded our day in a normal fashion, we had many different activities, and then my husband and I had a work related dinner.

My sister was going to meet a friend while we were going to our work dinner. I noticed something again, that it was causing her a lot of anxiety about what she would do while we were busy, she was trying to act like she was fine and that she could just go hang out on the beach and she didn’t need plans, but on the flipside she would make comments like oh well if I have a few hours I should probably just make a definitive plan. I realize once again it wasn’t like she was asking me to be stressed about it for her -but naturally given that I have that nurturing motherly role I went and got involved and said OK well let me try to help you figure out what you want to do. To that she would say “well don’t worry about it because you have an important meeting to go to I’ll take care of myself.”

It’s hard to explain but it’s kind of like if you have someone visiting from out of town, and they are at home while you’re at work during the day. And if the person is a mentally healthy individual that is independent, has their own life: you don’t really worry about them while you’re at work because you know that they have enough things to occupy themselves with and they’ll figure it out.
But on the flipside if the person that is staying at home while you’re at work is lonely and not very stable, you worry the whole time when you’re at work that, are they bored? are they lonely? I wonder what they’re doing…

Now the latter person will say well I didn’t really ask you to worry about me so you shouldn’t be. But the truth of the matter is is that this person doesn’t have to ask for me to worry (or even show any signs). just their presence is going to cause anxiety while you’re at work because the baseline kind of person who they are. Just because of the baseline kind of person they are.

This is quite interesting. One may say well that’s on me, my sister is fine and perhaps I am hypersensitive and feeling uneasy because I am thinking that I have to always help her when in reality she’s fine. Yes, one may also say, just leave her alone you don’t have to baby her. One may also say, you don’t have to read into everything, why is it a big deal you go do your thing and let her do her’s. Sure. And of course I did. My example with the dinner isn’t that it was a huge deal it’s that I still felt a strange feeling of “OK what will she do?”

And of course she mentions how she has made a lot of progress, she has become less lonely and is doing a better job with friends. However, my body and mind dont just instantly progress to that way. I don’t all of a sudden say OK great my hands are in the air my sister is 100% fine and she is no longer someone to have to worry about woo hoo!

Also, I am not just absorbing this energy out of nowhere. The energy has to be coming from her too. I am not only focusing on past things she has said and then projecting them onto her in the present. It’s more about the above example it’s the baseline person she is, that will cause me to feel like that in almost any situation. Does this make sense?

Going back—I also noticed something after the Friday fight, my entire demeanor changes. I become someone I don’t really like around my sister, someone who is uneasy and anxious. Someone who is on edge, someone who is talking too much and overcompensating. Someone who is not chill and relaxed (not to say that I am a super relaxed person in general as you know from everything I wrote, but this threw a torch in to my baseline feeling of being pretty centered). Just two days ago I wrote you a post that you felt was book worthy . And I agree. But yet when my sister arrived I felt like that old uneasy ball of stress.
And she honestly did nothing to provoke this. Almost like snapping back into old me.

1) What are your thoughts on that? I want to ask before I continue to the next part of what I have to say. As I have been thinking about this and thinking about telling you it throughout the weekend.

2) Next,

My husband noticed that I changed as soon as she arrives. And in fact he felt similar. He felt that he was more drained and run down the whole time because my sister was there. And mind you he is a great brother-in-law to her and when we got into this fight on Friday he took her aside and really did apologize on my behalf and played the role of mediator. He couldn’t have been better. He also mentioned that I should be the bigger person and not embarrass her like that. He made it known how terrible it was for me to make her feel that way, but also didn’t understand where my triggering was coming from. He was right.
But as the weekend went on he did see where it was coming from even more and more. I told him that the way I acted on Friday was not correct, but there was a stem, just like the anniversary dinner with my parents it was a pivotal stem. He saw it.

By the time that the weekend ended and I dropped both of them off at the airport, (I am staying here a few extra days) I saw that my husband was truly drained-the same face I’ve seen after a weekend with my mom. We discuss this a little bit before he got onto his flight. He mentioned how he feels that just my sister being around feels like the energy is down. It’s kind of like being around a person where you have to walk on egg shells even if you’re not doing anything or saying anything. But it’s not because she was judge mental or doing anything wrong even! I said to him well isn’t this interesting even if she was to say nothing just her presence makes us feel that way. And we both agreed yes. For example if in the future she lived locally and we saw her more regularly I can see myself feeling extremely drained just like I did with my mother. And it’s not because she is a narcissistic evil person like my mother, it’s just that with her comes a lot of the old parts of my life.
And – she herself has some qualities of my mother. I don’t think she honestly sees how draining she can be to other people like prior to that vacation of mine when she was up-and-down with her residency program. Even you, an outside individual, felt like you had to put a “kabosh on it.”

He mentioned something that is very true, but over the next six months we are going to make a lot of progress, I have stopped talking to my parents and we are going in the right direction. But it felt like a weekend with my sister was a step backwards. Because of that feeling of anxiety and depression that came back again and also the energy.

Now I don’t want mean to write this to say that I no longer want to talk to my sister, or that I am above her and she is a terrible drain on me. No it is more of a very interesting observation. I felt that this weekend was an energy suck and the only reason is because she was here, I had a very stressful day just a day prior to her arriving, that I wrote to you about in a post. The interview post. But yet when she was here : nothing bad/important happened such as that —-but it was so much MORE draining. Interesting.

At the end of the day I do feel really bad for my sister, given that you know a good amount about her as well, she has been truly abused by my mother throughout her whole life in even a different way than me. I also feel bad that she has to be in the middle with so much of the issues between my mother and I, and she gets pushed to the side often. I also feel bad that she is struggling, she does suffer from loneliness. She has her whole life. She does suffer with the inability to make very many good friends. I am proud of her for making progress, but I do know there is a long road ahead. And there is for me too, in other ways. However, I do find myself feeling similarly as I did with my mom. Such as I say out loud to myself (to her) “I know that you are suffering, but I can’t go down with you and for some reason your energy is draining to me.Unlike my mom you’re not trying to bring me down with you, it’s not your fault. It is just by nature of perhaps who you are. What a shame and it sounds very mean, but I think it’s reality.”

What do you think?

So as a result I think that I will just have to have some better boundaries with her. Looking back this was a very important weekend for my husband and I, with the dinner and the meetings and just soaking in the energy of this new place. It probably would have been better if she wasn’t there because the energy of the weekend was based on her not really about our surroundings. We both felt really bad admitting that to ourselves because here she was visiting just to have some quality time with us, she didn’t mean to create this aura. She has no idea she creates this aura. But she does. Also we are sensitive to it because we care about her and are kind of like parents to her so we observe this energy more than just some same aged stranger friend.

I also see that I am someone who is still healing, something monumental just happened to me a month ago. So I cannot honestly take anyone who may be an energy suck. Whether that person is doing it on purpose or not, perhaps it doesn’t matter.

Its like I am 25 years old and I just went through something really Traumatic and I am trying to heal, I am on the road to healing. now someone says to me, there is an orphan that needs a mother are you OK with being the mother? I said sure I would love to help this girl out.
Then I see this child is from a background which is similar to mine with a narcissistic mother and so she is traumatized and so young that she can’t really handle it. So here I am trying to heal from my narcissistic mother and rebuild my life, and simultaneously being a mother to the child who also suffered the same but at a very different level given that she is not my age. Imagine! I am not saying that my burden is so severe as this one, but to a small degree I feel some sort of similarity.

When I changed my phone number and cut many people out of my life, and decided to become less social, I think I needed to give myself more credit for self-preservation. I needed to give more focused to self preservation. At present.
What I realized this weekend is that it is not about now slowly assimilating back into normal life. I still feel that so much healing has to be done; and so if I have to preserve a healing cocoon for myself I should. It is not the appropriate time for me to expose myself to other individuals or situations that will drain energy. I don’t have energy left to even sustain myself these days and so I do have to be very careful. What do you think?

I also don’t have to feel guilty about that because it is just like the Snickers commercial, “when you are hungry you are not you.” Like on Friday I was drained and exhausted – I was not baseline me and so much more likely to snap. To avoid this it is better for me to preserve my energy in a healthy way. And also probably to create boundaries with individuals that may be draining my energy so I don’t get to such Lows.

I am very interested in hearing your thoughts about how I reacted to my sister. And how I felt throughout the weekend.