Alright guys. This is a hard one for me. If you’ve read some of my previous posts, you might know a bit about my sister.
For those of you that don’t know, my “sister” is essentially the bane of my existence. She is 9 years older than me, and has literally tortured and abused me for my entire life. I don’t want to get into it, but, essentially…I hate her. And I’m pretty okay in my feelings of hatred towards her. I don’t owe her anything, she isn’t a person who I desire to associate my self with in any fashion, and there is no chance or desire of ever “amending our relationship”.
That being said, apparently the seething hatred I have towards her whenever she has the nerve to be in my presence, isn’t doing anything for me. Apparently, it isn’t hurting or punishing her…it’s only hurting me.
Look. I have gone my entire life being very comfortable and justified with the fact that I will never forgive her. There’s never been a reason to. Like I said…I have zero desire for her to have any role in my life, and frankly, she does NOT deserve my “forgiveness”. It’s never even been something I considered to be a possibility. Like…why the fuck should have to put so much work and effort and mental energy into forgiving HER, the actual devil, when I could just…………….not?
But here we are, in yet another conversation I never thought I’d find myself in. Forgiving her…or maybe that’s not even the word we’re using for it…I don’t know. Either way…that’s the question at hand.
When it first got brought up in therapy last week…I guess I sort of didn’t even take the thought too seriously. Like I said, it’s never been something I had ever wanted to entertain, let alone actively work towards.
But, once again, my therapist makes a somewhat convincing argument, and for the first time, I’m willing to consider it.
But, in all honesty…I don’t know what any of this even really means, and I have some questions.
Firstly….but, like, in all seriousness….what would it mean to “forgive her”? What does that mean??? Does it mean I’m not angry any more? Does it mean I’m admitting that she “wins”, because I’m “letting go” or whatever the fuck it is…and she didn’t do shit to deserve it??? I honestly don’t know.
Secondly, my therapist does have a point. And I can see her point, even through the veil of anger and hatred. Which I guess means that it holds some truth to it. But…how important could this really be? Like I said…I want nothing to do with her. Forgiveness wouldn’t imply or assume any hope of a relationship, because she is the very definition of toxic. So I just question why I have to put in so much work and pain and discomfort when…maybe it just doesn’t matter?
And thirdly….completely honestly here…is this even possible? She truly is……I hate her. I feel bad for it, I don’t enjoy being capable of feeling such negative things for a person, but she’s earned the feeling. So, I have to wonder if, even if I REALLY, really wanted to…if it would even be possible for “forgiveness” to take place, when the emotion attached to it is so….strong.
My therapist has a way of getting to me, of making things makes sense. Not always, but occasionally.
We ended therapy the other day with her reading something I wrote, and me randomly stream of conscious writing in a coloring book to alleviate the building anxiety.
She then read that, and asked if she could write something in there, too. So she did, handed it back to me, and then it was time to go.
I read it when I got home later that night, and it helped things make a bit more sense. And it also made me feel….I don’t know…less alone in the struggle, maybe?
She’s not wrong. Logically, I think I know that.
But I still hate her (my sister)…and I have some serious reservations about putting myself through the struggle of “forgiving” her.
I’m willing to try…but i really wish I understood it all a little better. It might sound ridiculous that I don’t fully “understand what it means for me to ‘forgive’ her”, but it’s also not the most typical situation.
Forgiveness is actually something that comes to me quite easily.
Just….this is a different beast. One I never thought I’d be facing.
I want to feel better. I really just question if it’s even possible…or worth it.
I found that Kesha’s song Praying really helped me with wrapping my head around what forgiveness might look like in the sense of releasing some of the weight that I was carrying around.
Ah, music is definitely the way into my heart. I just listened to it, I like it a lot! I can definitely see how that song can get you through some things.
It sounds like you are really struggling with this topic. I get it. There are people I used to really hate, and it consumed me. Then a couple of things were said to me. One, the other person does not care about my feelings. By investing my energy in hating that person, I am only harming myself. Two, that forgiveness is not the same as condoning a persons actions. Letting go of the hurt, grieving the loss of a hopes for relationship, and refusing to let those people take up space in my brain is something I do for me, not them. Their actions are still wrong, but that’s their stuff to deal with. Forgiveness also does not mean you have to be around them. Not being around people who hurt you is a healthy boundary. And, the other person doesn’t win, because they remain the same person. They lose out on being in relationship with me. I don’t know if any of this makes sense to you, but it helped me a lot. For me, forgiveness is just an act of letting go of the hatred and anger, and investing my energy in other things. 💚
That definitely makes sense, thank you for sharing that. The thought of investing my energy into things other than hating her seems like a really good thing.