Hello all, I’m new here 🙂 I’ve subscribed to TB for a long time, but didn’t realize there were forums until today! I could use some community advice about how to end a relationship with an adopted sister without causing her even more pain than she’s already in. Our story is quite unique and it would take too long to spell it all out here, but I will try to put it in a nutshell: My parents adopted a baby, age 9 months, when I was 9 years old. We were a very happy family, not even realizing the challenges ahead of us, considering our racial mixture – three white folks and my sister is black. My mom was a huge advocate for my sister, taking her to black churches, making sure she stayed connected to her birth family in California, but my sister hit the skids in late adolescence despite all mom’s efforts, and got involved in drugs and criminal activity, which followed her through her 20’s and her first pregnancy. My mom passed away right after my sister had her first baby girl. The family was devastated and torn apart. My father, who had always been hyper-critical of my sister, now turned all his attention on her, and what a poor mother she was, etc., etc., and meanwhile I was happily married and doing everything “right” in my dad’s eyes…the favored child, the white girl, his biological daughter. Ten years and another baby down the road, my sister just hasn’t figured out how to maintain relationships. My dad continues to antagonize her – I am sure he is full of shame and feeling like he didn’t “raise her right” somehow, so he shines a spotlight on every failure. He is foster parenting her 12 year old daughter now, partially because the daughter has several psychological disorders and is almost impossible for any normal person to manage, much less my sister with all her challenges, but also because my dad was so critical of her parenting that he continued to report her to child welfare services until they finally removed her daughter from her care. My sister (as you might imagine) is so full of anger and resentment. She reaches out to me when she needs to, and I don’t enable her or give her money, but I do listen and take the approach of “do no further harm”, but lately, I am just so sickened by the way she is unable to see how she creates this pain and suffering for herself, her victim attitude, her constant tears and grief about losing mom and how evil and horrible dad is…honestly, I think I’m done. I’ve created a good life for myself outside of what we had before mom died. My husband and kids are amazing, we aren’t rich but certainly not living paycheck to paycheck, and I feel like I am just going around in a toxic circle with my sister. I feel terrible for saying this…and the only other person I’ve said this to is my husband…but I don’t feel love for her in any way except on a human level. It would not disrupt my life for one second if I never heard from her again. I wish her the best life; she deserves to be happy, but she is still so far away from figuring out how to help herself, that I can no longer stand to witness her struggle. Tomorrow is her birthday. I want to acknowledge her birth and her arrival in our family as a gift; we did have many good years, and I maintain that my life from age 9 to 18 was much better for having her with us. I’ve told her this before. But I am ready to move on from grief and struggle. Is this terrible? I’ve heard it said that the people who irritate us the most are actually our teachers, and we need them here, to show us where we need to grow. I’ve tried to look at her as my teacher, but either this doesn’t apply in her case, or I am just too dense to recognize the lesson. If anyone has experience with this, I’d love to hear about it. Thank you in advance for your support 🙂