Ask Lemmy

My brother and I have been best friends for most of our lives. He's so much fun to hang out with, has a great degree of emotional intelligence, and I'm just so proud of him.

Very distant

We're both in our 40s now with my sister being 4 yrs younger.

I recently went to a therapy thing that dug up allot of the past. This made me reach out to her to see if it was as bad as I remembered.

Turns out it was way worse with her having a similar journey just before me. We sat in the pub drinking coffee and chatting for 5 hours.

During that conversation we realises thar even to this day our parents were manipulating us to keep is distant.

The worst manipulation was when our kids were young we had a silly argument over you forgot to get my kid a present for a birthday (we hadn't just not gotten it to a mutual drop off point with it. Usually my dads) pater that yr my youngest landed in hospital forest of the year. Thought she was going tondie levels of terrified.

They manipulate her with that stupid argument to make her terrified to visit. She did phone the hospital for updates but avoided talking to us while my parents made comments to me about her not being interested.

I don't think we will ever be close but we are in a way better place and now know the shit our parents are pulling to better avoid the traps.

My sister went full blown right wing “Christian “ Trumper. We barely talk. Haven’t seen each other in years

I'm the oldest of a big (real big. Crazy big) family.

I don't get along with all of my siblings, but more in a "we don't hang out" kinda way, not a "please die in a fire" way.

Our family reunions are the stuff of legend. Days of hanging out; taking turns cooking meals for an army; hours spent swapping stories and just enjoying hanging out together.

My best friend in the world is one of my brothers. I could spend years just hanging out with him. (I mean, we did, growing up, but I'm still not sick of it.)

My siblings and I don't see eye to eye on everything. We all have gone down different life paths as the years have gone by. Some of us are very liberal and some are very conservative. Some of us live in major cities, others in the heart of the country. Some are atheists and some are devout.

We aren't perfect. There have been cruel words spoken, tears shed. I've broken up fistfights (...and been in a couple myself).

Growing up, my mother taught us how to talk things through. How to start from a fight and finish as friends. She set us an amazing example that I am trying to teach to my own children.

My family is one of the best things in my life. I love my siblings and my parents. I know not everyone gets a happy family. My wife really didn't. I'm not sharing this to brag. I just want to say that... It's out there. A family that loves each other and largely gets along is possible. I don't know if we're a fluke of nature or a miracle of nurture.

But next year is our family reunion. And I can't wait.

we get along fine but we're not close

If that fucker wants a glass of water I might throw some ice cubes at his face, if I like him that day.
But the second he needs a new heart I'll rip out mine with my own hands if I have to. (Don't you dare tell him that though, I'll deny even thinking about it)

Distant in all the ways that matter, but we check in every once and a while.

When I say every once and a while, I saw one of my brothers about 5 years ago... after not having seen him for nearly 20.

My sister doesn't talk to me because I told our mother that her child (she put her up for adoption when she was born because my sister was YOUNG) is alive and wants to connect. I haven't seen my sister in more than a decade

My eldest brother is the closest, and I'll be seeing him soon. I know almost nothing about his personal life, and probably won't see him again for at least a year

We're all extremely different people

Great. My older bro is one of my best friends. He lives halfway across the country but I'm excited for him to move much closer next year when their lease is up. My younger brother and I play Xbox nearly every day together even though he lives 12 hours away. My two younger sisters live two houses down and we are very close. My older sister lives about 40 min away and is probably the sibling I am most distant from emotionally but we still get along and see each other several times a year.

NullPointerException

We're pretty distant. I'm older but only by 17 months. I love my sister and wish her well but I don't trust her enough to be close with her. Our mother really did a number on us and I have to be very careful what I tell her, because I don't have any faith she won't share it with our mom. And it's a shame because if we could talk honestly I think we'd have a lot to commiserate on. As it stands we trade texts very occasionally, mostly focused on nostalgia for some TV show or game we played as kids. Never anything more personal than that. It's usually months between texts.

Her dog died and I wanted to send a sympathy text, but my mother asked me not to because she wasn't supposed to tell anyone the dog died... well then why on earth did you tell me?!?!

We are two women in our forties still goosestepping around a difficult mom who I strongly suspect is borderline, and because of the way she treated us growing up, our sibling relationship basically became collateral damage.

I get along with my sister and her family just fine. I don't really talk with her or my parents much, maybe a few times a year, despite only being a couple hours drive down the highway. I know she talks to my parents weekly, but I mostly just keep to myself.

We call each other and catch up occasionally, text here and there, send Christmas and birthday gifts, meet up when I'm in town. My brother used to be my best friend when we were kiddos.

I haven’t seen or spoken with my siblings in several years. I was always the black sheep among my sibling group and when my parents divorced, it basically just made it that much more concrete.

Personally I don’t regret it, though every now and then I wonder how they’re getting on with life.

Odd.

I love my sibling - but they're kind of an asshole. There isn't any real malice behind it, or at least I'd like to think so, but they just do not consider the opinions, feelings or needs of others at all. A little bit of that is healthy. I'm talking to an unhealthy degree. It has repeatedly bit them in the ass, and was a major factor in torpedoing what could have been a good career before it could get going, so thoroughly that they'll likely never work in the field they trained for.

In the last couple years, they've at least started to learn when it's best to just keep their mouth shut, but it was a long time coming.

At their core, they are not a bad person, but I always find myself frustrated with something after spending time with them, which is upsetting. I really wish this wasn't the case.

We're practically Blood ~~family~~

My sister and I are incredibly close. She's my fave person ever. She was adopted the day before my 13th birthday. We say she's the best birthday gift I've ever gotten lol. She and I may bicker at times, but we will fiercely defend one another from bullies and whatnot. Someone I know spoke badly about her having autism and intellectual disabilities in my presence and I went off on them. You don't disrespect my sister. My sister once defended me in a similar situation when she mentioned my chronic pain condition.

She has been taking excellent care of me lately because I am laid up with a broken ankle/leg that needed surgery to fix. I did the same for her when she had spine surgery.

She and I share so much with each other. Probably more than anyone else but our mom. My sister constantly comes into the room I'm staying in to talk and show me her drawings. She talks about her friends and how they're doing and if she has plans with them. She'll read me the letters she's going to send to her friend who is in the military.

She's the best. I get frustrated with her when she throws fits or doesn't listen to me when I try to help her handle the dogs, but that feeling is temporary.

From the moment I met her, she was my favorite person. We put her in the car, she was 3 at the time, and she said "Mommy, Sissy, where we goin?" My mom and I broke into happy tears when we heard that.

Gosh I love her so much.

My sister is amazing and I love her. When we were kids we were close but fought like siblings so but now at 40 she’s practically my best friend.

I'm 42f and have two sisters, six and eight years older than me. I live (by choice, not necessity) with my mom and eldest sister, and our middle sister lives about 10 miles away with her husband and kids. We get together regularly and are very close. During my childhood I was the odd one out because I was so much younger, but the older we get, the closer we get.

Sister is 3 years younger. I was the test child punished for everything and sister was the baby who could do no wrong. We dont talk and she's only become a worse person as we've aged and yet my parents still treat us the same. They protected her when she got into drugs and left me to fend for myself when my life fell apart.

Not terribly close, but not terribly distant either. We talk and enjoy each other's company at holidays and say happy birthday, but otherwise we just live our individual lives for the most part.

We're still closely related

I've two half-brothers in their early 20s.

One ghosted me about 7yrs ago after our dad fell out with me.

The other refuses to speak to me cos he thinks I should have been more "present" in his life.

Both a pair of cunts in different ways. I've decided not to bother contacting them.

Our parents gave us authority over each other and that almost ruined my relationship with them, but as I started to operate separately from them, I've begun to miss them.

I went full no contact about a decade ago. After dealing with crippling lonelyness and finally figuring out how to manage my mental health I decided to open up again a couple years back. Some days are better than others. Most of my family is still a hot mess and not progressing toward any meanginful change. But they're there and I'm better at keeping their issues at arms length so it's not all bad. Nice to have people talk to, even if it's mostly about drama they got themselves into

They're indiscreet gossips and I can't tell them anything in confidence, but I love the crap out of them anyway.

I have 6 siblings, we're all just about evenly spaced at about a year and a half. I get along with some better than others but none are excluded.

Not close and we don't talk to each other much. We have abusive parents. Both physical and mental.

Depends on which one. One is dead, some are distant, some close, two really close.

Brother 1 - good relationship but not very close, only see each other every couple of months

Brother 2 - ok relationship; we have a tendency to get into fights when he is being an asshole (common, he has asshole tendencies and anger issues), but thankfully that hasn't happened in a good while; we maybe see each other once a month

Brother 3 - ok relationship; he did something incredibly pervy and inappropriate to me once which I will never forget and which ruined the relationship we used to have, but beyond that we get along nowadays; used to see each other roughly every other weekend, but now it's less common

My brothers do not answer texts, so I only speak to them when I see them in person.

Older brother: we get along well enough but haven't talked in ages.

Younger brother: I haven't spoken to him in about 12 years, since I had the epiphany that I don't have to put up with constantly being treated as a lesser person because I'm a woman and have interests that don't line up with his. The fact that he can't beat the hell out of me now that I live 1200 miles from him is also a giant plus.

Not what I'd like. We are 4 years apart (I'm older) and through school it always seemed that we were too different of ages to really get along well. I tried to connect when we were both in college but (from my perspective) he consistently chose his frat brothers over me, and we grew further apart. Then I moved out of state for grad school and work and now I've basically just accepted it.

My next older (middle) sister made repeated efforts to show me that I can’t rely on her, despite her best mediocre efforts to assure me of the contrary. So after giving her sufficient chances I‘m done with her.

Sadly it complicates my relationship with her children which, while being messed up in their own way, shouldn’t suffer because of their mothers actions.

I'm an only child. My dad remarried and got divorced, but she had 2 kids. Does that still make them my step-sis and step-bro?