This 23-year-old woman has a twin sister named Angela, who sadly had leukemia when she was a kid. Luckily, Angela has been cancer-free since they were 10-years-old.
“But since she was sick a lot as a child, I was basically invisible to our parents. Angela and I were still best friends at the time, but my parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles basically forgot I existed within that time,” she said.
Her parents sent her to boarding school starting when she was 8 years old until she was 14. All throughout these years, she knew that the reason her parents sent her to boarding school was that her sister was going through cancer treatment, and they didn’t have the time or energy to care for her.
However, her parents continued making her go to boarding school for four more years after her sister was cancer-free, and their reasoning was weak.
Finally, her parents allowed her to come home, but she was quite introverted and shy at the time, so she spent almost all day, every day, in her bedroom.
She talked with Angela occasionally, but they didn’t have a close bond like they used to since they hadn’t been living together much over the last few years.
A few nights ago, she and her boyfriend were at her parents’ house. While visiting, her mother pulled out a photo album and showed her boyfriend photos of her and Angela as children.
There were some photos of her when she was a baby, but not as many after she was about 2-years-old.
Because of this, her boyfriend asked her mother if there were any other photo albums so that he could see what she looked like throughout her childhood.
“My mom said there aren’t any more pictures of me, but he can just look at the pictures of Angela since we’re identical, and that’s the same thing,” she explained.
“I got quite angry at this and said we’re two separate people, and she should just say they weren’t interested in taking photos of me when I was growing up because they had other things to worry about, but looking at Angela isn’t a replacement.”
In her view, the photos of Angela were obviously not going to change the fact that there weren’t as many photos of her since she was way at boarding school for so many years and her parents didn’t pay much attention to her even when she was around.
Her mother told her that she could have sent her photos taken of her while she was in boarding school so that they had more photos of her to show to her boyfriend.
In response, she said that normally, it’s assumed that the parents are the ones obligated to have photos throughout their children’s lives.
After her boyfriend was gone, she and her mother continued discussing the topic. Her mother told her that she got the feeling while she was talking about the family photos earlier that she seemed to express some resentment toward her and her father in regard to the years when they were caring for Angela through cancer treatment.
She acknowledged to her mother that she does indeed feel resentment, and she feels particularly bitter about the fact that they waited four years after Angela was cancer-free before allowing her to come home.
“My mom said their reasoning was that they felt like I was well-settled there and having a good childhood, and they didn’t want to disrupt my life by bringing me back. I was shocked to hear that and said, ‘Having a good childhood at a boarding school far from home?!? Are you delusional?'” she shared.
After that, her mother started sobbing uncontrollably and continued to do so long after the argument. Her father was furious that she had hurt her mother’s feelings while having a conversation about events that had occurred years ago.
According to her father, she could never see the situation from her mother’s and his point of view, and she could never comprehend how difficult it was for them.
He told her that she could only comprehend the difficulty of their situation if she became a mother one day.
In her father’s opinion, she should tell her mother she was sorry. Upon reflection, she admits that she was a bit blunt, but she doesn’t think what she said was uncalled for or false.
What advice would you give her?
You can read the original post on Reddit here.
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