siblingsurvivalry

posts about #siblingsurvivalry more →
"Mom Always Liked You Best"
Erica Jong's Sister: "Fear of Flying Has Been A Thorn In My Flesh For Thirty-Five Years"
The Younger Kardashian Sisters Are In-House Underminers
'Glamour' Explains How To Beat Cancer, AND Your Dead Big Sister
Older Sisters Are All A Bunch Of Hilarious Sadists
An Open Apology To Our Younger Sisters

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FourInchHeels
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
My sister and I joke about how my parents love her more (watching old home videos really does support this hypothesis) my mom gets REALLY visibly upset if we mention it, even jokingly. It doesn't bother either of us, and I think it's pretty funny - they DO love me, they just sometimes really appear to love her more.
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RingTailedLemur
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
I think it depends on the degree of the un-favoritism. It's pretty obvious to me (and to anyone else around) that my mom favors my future stepbrother over me and I definitely wouldn't consider myself well-adjusted. Then again, ask me in a few years when I'll be long gone and a "true" grown-up.
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DangerMouse
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
My sister and I each thought the other was the favorite when we were growing up.

Since my early/mid 20s though, my mom and I have become closer (although my sister and I call the same amount, and my sister sees her more). I don't think she loves the 2 of us unequally, but I think that Mom and I have similar personalities and interests that would allow us to be friends if we weren't related, whereas I think that she and my sister don't have that extra bond in their relationship because they have less in common.

However, my dad and my sister could talk politics all day while my mom and I just rolled our eyes and started talking about weird interactions with kids, so maybe it's even.
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LadyNo Fondles Sweaters
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
My parents never played favorites, but they also didn't try too hard to be "fair." My sister and I are two very different people, so they treated us as such. I think if you always try to make everything equal, you're bound to disappoint somebody.

For example mom has a tradition with my sister of always sending her flowers on her birthday. No such tradition with me, but I don't mind, I know there are other things that are just for me.
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morninggloria
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
My mother prefers her Pomeranian over all of her children. Fucking bitch.

(The dog.)

(My mom's awesome, btw.)
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LaComtesse
01/21/09

@morninggloria: My mother's four cats are her new favorites... each one replaced a child...each one is crazier than the last.
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hellosunshine
01/22/09

@morninggloria: My parents' chihuahua-terrier thing has officially replaced me. My adorable lab and I (the only child) are NOT IMPRESSED.
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TheFormerJuneBronson
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
Am I the only one who realized the freedom inherent in being the bad kid? My sister is the favorite, my brother is the only boy, and my other sister is the baby. I got perma-bad kid status in high school, and by college, figured out that I could do anything the hell I wanted with my life, and it would neither improve nor worsen my situation with the family. Twenty years later, though, my sister the good kid is still paralyzed with the need to please my parents, from whom she derives all of her self-worth, and as far as I can tell, she is about 55-65% miserable all the time. Whereas I am happily married, with a great kid, and have done exactly what I wanted with regards to school. It's not perfect, but what I do is mine mine mine, and I love myself no matter what my parents think of it.
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Kater Tot
01/21/09

@TheFormerJuneBronson: Oh, MAN. Your sister and I should start a club. I'll never forget the day my father told me that all of the careers I aspired to were "unrealistic." This coming from a man who has experienced nothing but misery from becoming a doctor after his father practically railroaded him into that career. I also feel the need to chronically reassure my parents that they aren't bad parents by overcompensating for my little brother's astonishing academic fuck-ups. I think that's why I'm going to marry a guy whose parents never finished college, who tried nearly every drug known to man by the time he finished middle school, and who has truly taken to heart the message that academic degrees are not the most worthy accomplishment in life.
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TheFormerJuneBronson
01/21/09

@Kater Tot: In all fairness, I still have the good kid beat for academic degrees (she's got one master's degree! Amateur!), but I went wholly impractical (English and museum studies) and she did the exact same academic path as my dad. I do wish she'd realize--as I did after a long time--that our parents will be proud of us no matter what we do, but when you've spent thirty years deriving your self-worth from your parents' opinion of you, it's hard to shift gears and please only yourself.
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Grim Reaper of the Forest
01/21/09

@TheFormerJuneBronson: I am having an early-30s crisis. I always was the good kid and I feel like I can no longer trust what I really "want" to do. I have tempting visions of quitting my reasonably well-paid job in my dream career to be a...I don't know...secretary...poet?
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TheFormerJuneBronson
01/21/09

@Grim Reaper of the Forest: Well, according to Marie Claire, all you need is to get pregnant...or a master's degree. :D

I hear you, though. I worry about settling down into a normal job. I've had this vagabond student existence for most of the last ten years. What if I get to the career part and I want to kill myself after a few months of 9-5? I never liked it before, but I just assumed that that was because I was processing insurance claims.
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clevernamehere
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
When we were little, my mom told my brother and I seperately that we were her favorite but it had to be a secret. Dumb move mom, guess what we both shouted to each other in a fight a few weeks later!
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nellicat
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
Ha! I just bought each of my children a t-shirt that says "Mom Loves Me Best." When one of them whines about his/her sibling getting something that he/she didn't, I always say "Well, that's because I love him/her more than I love you." Inevitably, they will laugh and see how ridiculous they're being.

I think it's kind of like being in highschool, though - EVERYONE felt that they were misunderstood and persecuted, because we were all in our own little self-centered worlds and felt like no one got us. I hope my children will grow up knowing that I love each of them more than I thought my heart capable.
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LaComtesse
01/21/09

@nellicat: Something like this backfired once. My grandfather, who is a melodramatic, Hallmark moment loudmouth lawyer, once turned to a friend and said "Watch this" he then went up to a group of his grandchildren (there's just under 20 of us) and said "Everyone tell me which one of you is my favorite." Immediately, all the kids said someone else. My grandfather frowned and said "You were all supposed to say yourselves..."
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Trashtastic
01/21/09

@nellicat: This is totally something I would do - Except my 6 yr old is very literal-minded and would cry heart-brokenly.
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nellicat
01/21/09

@Trashtastic says can't nobody break our stride, can't nobod...: Yeah, I've only been saying it since my little girl turned 7 and quite suddenly "gets" sarcasm.
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MissyMcCLung
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
This reminds me of the night I caught my mom quietly telling each of us that we were her favorite. Probably not the bets idea when your kids share a room...
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Liz11685
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
I was told separately by both parents that I was their favorite- but I think it may have just been a ploy because I moved so far away from them. I really think that the whole reason my brother still lives at home is that he was treated so favorably growing up he didn't become a normal well adjusted adult.

Moral of the story: Treat your children normally and they will be normal adults... seems like common sense.
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Jello Mix
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
My brother is totally my mother's favorite, but that's okay because I'm her best friend.
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LaComtesse
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
I have to say that I believe Mama LaComtesse when she says that all of us are her favorite for a different reason...

Me: Because we "grew up together" and are probably the closest.

Brother 1: Because he needs her the most

Brother 2: He was the quietest in a family of loudmouths.

Sister: Mom sees so much of her own childhood/teenage defiance in my sister.

Grandparents? Forget it. I'm the favorite hands down. I don't think they REALLY put too much of a fight when I inform them of that fact anymore...
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mepo - Robert Cornhole invented it
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
They comment on Jezebel?
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Hana Maru
01/21/09

@mepo: so true!
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PrettyNotPretty
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
So...Everybody Loves Raymond isn't the accurate depiction of adult siblings it claimed to be? I feel lied to.

DAMN YOU, RAY ROMANO.
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la.donna.pietra
01/21/09

In reply to "Mom Always Liked You Best"
Being an only child is very convenient.
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Klobasa, Esq
01/21/09

@la.donna.pietra: Yeah, but sometimes I wish I had had siblings so something, anything could have had escaped my mother's laser tracker eyes all those years.
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la.donna.pietra
01/21/09

@Klobasa, Esq: Definitely! Also, an older brother would have come in handy in high school, when I was mostly a target for all and sundry.
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hellosunshine
01/22/09

@la.donna.pietra: SRSLY.
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