I think about guilt and loneliness; my sister and I
I never really gave it much thought until relatively recently, when talking about... well, my current circumstances. She feels guilty. Guilty of not being enough, of not "saving" me.
It's curious because she couldn't have. She was a teen with no tools in hand and with a head messed up from trauma. She did her best and more than anyone could ask for. -I- asked for nothing.
And yet... the guilt is there. I don't think it's self-inflicted, or rather, that assuming said guilt comes out of nowhere. I think she assumed a responsibility that wasn't hers, and was conditioned in general to feel guilty over failure. I couldn't possibly know that as it is, but it wouldn't surprise me.
Then, there's me. Loneliness. I had no emotional connection to anyone until a friendship that developed into a relationship, in 2015. I was already 21. I was told I'm unfeeling, cold, uncaring. Almost inhuman, and certainly treated as such. That person made me realize none of that was true. I couldn't have possibly known before, I had no opportunities to experience it, and thus part of me believed it: I was a thing.
Two years later I was met with a dreadful realization: I didn't own myself. I had no dreams, no sense of self, no aspirations, no desires, nothing. I looked inside, and there was nothing. My person was constructed to keep outside forces at ease, simply to stay alive, and I moved because I was put on a treadmill. I knew all this, but never thought about what happens when the treadmill is gone.
How do I move? to where? and why? I had no answer. My person was so thoroughly suppressed, that the question "what do you want" had "nothing" as an answer.
And I... broke.
From birth to that point, I was completely alone. I was a thing existing around people, but not allowed to be. Anything involving me didn't consider me, I was a prop in the moment and not an actor with agency.
Fortunately, the breaking point didn't kill me. I could pull myself out of it, and realize that while the life and "person" built for me up to that point is bullshit, I can throw it away and start anew. Make myself with my own two hands.
And I did.
I decided to make myself a good person (to my criteria) and work on it. Somehow, through all of that, I realized my gender too, but that wasn't a trigger nor a catalyst nor anything. A very... curious coincidence, all in all.
It was working on myself that I developed meaningful friendships, most of them still around today. People with whom I can trust being called out if I fuck up, whom I can establish boundaries with and have them respected, with whom I can talk about virtually anything so we can grow together.
At this time, my sister became a part of my life too. She listened to me for the first time.
It is ironic to me that she feels guilty for not helping, that she did all these things, and most of them did not consider me in the plan. I was never asked, I was never talked to, I was never listened.
She was very hurt when I said i've always been alone, but it's not a lie. Company isn't existing in the same space (i dont think a year constitutes sharing a space as something significant anyways), company isn't random aimless acts.
She did put effort, and I understand the frustration of that being fruitless, but it's misguided. It's not an effort born of a desire to help, but rather, a desire to compensate. Looking for redemption, to finally "be good" rather than doing good. She treated me like an object for her own good like everyone else and fails to see it.
The first time she did something that DID help me was because we sat down and talked. It was me who reached out, and lord didn't I have to insist (2018 was... frustrating, to say the least). I didn't ask for said help, but it landed properly because she listened for once.
I don't resent her. I expected nothing and got mostly nothing. I didn't ask nor demand anything. I never complained about lacking anything. My only complaint was "help" that instead harmed me, because I was not being taken into account as a person, but as thing to extract results from, but that didn't go through anyways. That guilt has nothing to do with me.
And my loneliness has nothing to do with her. She was not someone who looked the other way from the abuse, nor the abuser. She didn't contribute to it. She's as much of a victim as I am. Not helping isn't a good metric, because nobody did, and that expectation lands on authorities and guardians, who ALL failed.
She's troubled and I get that. So am I. I don't pretend to be anything in her life that I didn't actively do myself. I know I'm lacking, I know I do nothing, and I don't expect anything except the corresponding treatment.
I couldn't have been saved, so I wasn't. I saved myself. Whatever growth and improvements i've achieved as a person in the last 7 years were on me working to be this way, building these bonds, caring for others and myself. I now have people that care about me and hear what I have to say, but I didn't back then. I didn't for 3/4ths of my life.
It's not a condemnation of anyone to say that I was alone, it is simply a reality. It bothers me, however, how there's this common trend with family of wanting to reap something they didn't sow. It is a bit unfair, though, because she does have her heart in the right place. Her perception of me specifically is twisted because of our upbringings.
I've solved this loneliness for the most part, but she hasn't worked out the guilt. Hope we can sit down and chat some day.