In the time that has passed since I lost my sister, I have repeatedly been confronted with the painful truth that many people do not understand what it means to lose a sibling, especially in young adulthood.
You can find some limited articles online about how siblings are considered “disenfranchised grievers,” and how their grief if often overshadowed by parents, partners, or children. There are some pieces that try to give an explanation of what losing a sibling is like, but I found many of them were about children losing child siblings or about older adults losing their older sibling. As I sat in my early 30s having lost my sibling in her 20s, none of it quite rang true. So let me tell you what was true for me and my sibling loss.
I lost a fundamental part of my past, present, and future.
You siblings — for better or worse — are often the only people who grew up the way you did. With the same people, in the same places, sharing the same shorthand understanding of the daily growth of the you that exists now. Your siblings are a unique promise of someone who knows your past, walks with you in your present, and is a structural piece of what should be your future. I had always assumed she would be with me through it all.
To lose that is to lose a part of yourself. The only other person who had some of the same memories as you. The only other person who could understand what you were getting at in just a couple words, because you shared the same lived experiences over a lifetime. I lost a critical presence I counted on for important life milestones — my hypothetical wedding someday, a major career achievement, the eventual loss of our parents, just to name a few. I lost the sense of security I had in my own life and future.
I had to realize that my incorrect judgments of where to devote my time had cost me the only time I would ever have with her.
We did not speak as much as I now wish we did. Weeks would often elapse between contact. I hadn’t been able to see or hug her since four and a half months before she died. At that time, knowing only what I knew then, this was natural. We were building our careers, our lives, our homes. She was happy, loved, and finding success. I was thousands of miles away, busy but achieving career goals and looking forward to being much closer to home in just a few months.
We were supposed to have so much more time.
Instead, in the aftermath of her loss, I beat myself up over all the meaningless ways I spent my time instead of reaching out. (Frankly, I’m still working on letting go of the regret and the guilt and the anger.) I wish I could retroactively unwaste the hours I worked too long or the times I went out to a mediocre meal with people I didn’t really enjoy because “you never know if it might turn out to be a good time” or the times I opted to go vacation somewhere else that wasn’t home. I would take all of those hours and offer them to her, instead.
It has fundamentally changed the way I want to spend the time I now have. My social circle has grown smaller, but the relationships I maintain are far more profound. I am very judicious
I was forced to become somebody else, and I don’t know her yet.
I’m still discovering all the insidious ways this is true. I have been thrust into “only child”hood unwillingly, but must also carry the flame of my sister, because she is dead, not erased.
How do you explain that to someone who innocently asks, “Do you have any siblings?” In my case, it turns out to tell the poor taxi driver you “had” a sister and then promptly start crying when he catches the past tense and gently asks what you mean. But I know there will be many more times in my years ahead that I will have to either say, “No, it’s just me” or, if that hurts too much, obliquely say, “I have a younger sister,” and hope we can leave it at that. Either way, I will end up lying in order to spare someone else the discomfort.
Who do I have to be now that all of our parents’ hopes and dreams are pinned squarely to me? And how do I have to reframe my entire career trajectory now that my sister, the one who stayed closer to home and was there for our parents while I was far, far away, is gone? As I write this today, I don’t know if her death also means I will have to change my career. The entire plan of my life hangs in a hazy state of confusion, now.
I lost all desire to pursue many of my hobbies, and in most cases, that desire hasn’t come back. My drive at work is greatly diminished. Many of the ways people would describe who I was in the Before are no longer true in the After. It is like I don’t even know myself anymore. And that’s terrifying.
I lost my ability to trust the future.
I think this is the impact that will plague me the longest. If one day a healthy 20-something can go to bed and never wake up again, how can I trust anything in this life? How can I make plans for the future? Why do I spend as much time as I do at work? How do I motivate myself to do mundane things that feel pointless if I my time left is numbered in hours instead of decades?
I can also feel the way this is seeping into my thought processes. I would love to find a life partner to share the time I have with. But what if I only have a few years left and I pick wrong? I want to pursue writing as a side profession, but I have no intentions of leaving my main job. What if I squander the only time I might have? My job takes me to many places far from home. While I still love that, I now also feel a gnawing fear of all the things I’m giving up with friends and family by being so far away. Is my career worth the cost?
I lost my oldest friendship, my closest confidant, and the only person with whom there were no misunderstandings about where I came from and how I became who I was. And that chasm that has now opened up in the core of who I am is with me for the rest of my life.
Unmoored Sister 