I haven’t seen my sister in 5 years

Growing up I had a sister ( half sister ) but that didn't change a thing. Or maybe it did? I don’t know.

She was four years younger than me, which meant that for a big part of our childhood, we didn’t exactly like each other.

She would want to play, and I would be annoyed.

I would go to my dad’s every other weekend. And to her it probably felt weird having her big sis leave to another home.

We were kids. We didn’t understand the complicated parts of family yet.

But as we got older, something changed.

We started becoming friends. I enjoyed her.

We would go on long car drives and talk about everything. Boys, Sex, Gossip, life.

We would laugh until our stomachs hurt. She became someone I genuinely wanted to talk to.

I miss her.

I wish I could tell you there was one moment where everything fell apart.

There wasn’t.

It was a bunch of little things that eventually became something too big to fix.

My sister got a boyfriend.

Which is funny because, at first, she didn’t even want to date him. She just wanted to be friends. My parents really liked him and encouraged the relationship, and eventually, they started dating.

She was 17. And well I didn’t like him.

He was cool ya, but like my sister is a freaking model, long brown hair, perfect skin, and perfect lips that every girl wants.

And this guy?

Well…

I didn’t think he was cute.

But it wasn’t really about his looks.

There was something about his energy that I didn’t trust. I felt like I could see through him in a way that she couldn’t.

At the time, though, I was already moved out of the house and starting my own life..

She would call… a lot

She would tell how mean our mom was. And how jealous she was.

This created a very unhealthy dynamic between my mom and my sister.

My sister wanted to spend more time with her boyfriend and his family, and my mom took that personally.

And somehow, I ended up in the middle.

The triangle.

One person would tell me their side.

Then the other person would tell me theirs.

And both sides, in their own way, wanted me to understand why they were right.

But I didn’t want to choose.

I loved them both.

I remember one phone call in particular.

I was in the shower, and my sister called me crying and upset about my mom.

I tried to stay neutral. I listened. I tried to be there for her without taking sides.

And somewhere in that conversation, she told me something her boyfriend had said.

He told her that the best thing he ever did was block his entire family for a year after he turned eighteen.

At the time, I didn’t know what to say.

Because I remember thinking,

That isn’t going to happen here.

She’s my sister.

This is my family.

And there was another fight with our mom.

I don’t remember exactly what it was about anymore.

I just remember my mom saying,

“If it’s so bad here, then why don’t you just move out?”

So she did.

She moved out with her boyfriend. And she blocked my mom. And once again, I was in the middle.

My sister asked me not to tell my mom where she was living.

My mom would ask me. I never told her.

Not once.

A year went by. My sister and I still talked. But I didn’t see her.

And then came Christmas.

I remember that Christmas because it broke something in me. I was driving to my dad’s house, and my sister and I were talking on the phone. At first, it was a normal, surface-level conversation, and then she started talking about Mom. More negativity. More hurt. More of everything that had been happening between them.

And I was exhausted.

I didn’t want to be in the middle anymore. I wanted to have a relationship with both of them, and for me to do that, they needed to stop talking to me about each other.

So I said, “Can we please stop talking about Mom?”

Maybe she heard something I didn’t mean. Maybe she thought I was choosing a side. Maybe she was hurt. I don’t know.

But she said, “Fuck you. I’ve never even considered you a sister.”

And then she blocked me.

Everywhere.

Social media. Phone. Everything.

And just like that, I lost my sister.

The years since have been quiet. Over time, she has blocked almost our entire extended family…aunts, uncles, grandparents, everyone.

And then something happened that made the distance hurt in a completely different way.

I found out I was pregnant with the twins.

And I found out that my sister was pregnant too.

We were due in the same month.

I don’t think I’ve ever experienced such a strange combination of happiness and heartbreak.

Because I should have been calling my sister. We should have been pregnant together, texting each other late at night about our weird cravings, talking about how badly our backs hurt, comparing baby names, talking about our bodies changing, and laughing about all the things nobody tells you about pregnancy.

I should have been able to call her and say, “You’re not going to believe what just happened,” and she should have been able to call me and say the same.

Instead, I watched from a distance and wondered if she was okay. I wondered if she was happy. I wondered what she was experiencing. I wondered if she ever thought about me.

Because I think about her.

More than she probably knows.

And she will always be my sister.

Even if she doesn’t consider me hers.

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