Oh, Rona! I love so much about this essay. It struck deeply at my heart. When I was a child, 4 years old, my brother was born. I had a different reaction than yours, I was thrilled. He was my baby. As we grew, he separated from me, to be with his peers, and told me to stop following him around! We went through a period of 2-3 decades where we were mostly estranged. I perceived him as selfish, arrogant, and aggressive. I stayed away. Was he those things? To some degree. But I never took the time to look at him more objectively, more compassionately. He grew up in a difficult family, too. But I was unable to see anyone else's suffering but my own. Since our father died in 2011, we've become increasingly closer, more intimate. Sharing our experiences of what it was like for each of us growing up in our parent's house. Recently we were talking about my perception of how great a big sister I was. He quickly disabused me of my fantasy. Humbling, for sure. He's done tremendous healing work, brave and painful, and I'm so proud of him. Sometimes I refer to him as my big little brother, I've learned so much from him of late. And yes, he's got quirks, and there are little things about him that I find irritating, but I've got my little brother back, and now he's a man. And I adore him. He's turning 60 this year, so yes, you're right. We've softened toward one another. We share a unique bond. We're the only ones who truly know what it was like to be Diane and Sid's kids. Love to you, so happy that your trip was good. Still wish I'd been there! xo
“I was unable to see anyone’s suffering but my own.” That’s the key. You were both Diane and Sid’s kids but you played different roles in your sad, troubled family. As grownups, you slowly found a bigger lens. I’m glad you two have made a relationship that works.
This is a little painful because my brother and I are estranged. He has a serious gambling addiction and completely wiped out our aging mother's savings. After years of trying to help him (first by giving him money - not advised, then various other ways), we just reached at dead end. Funny that you mention the now defunct More magazine because I wrote an article about this under a pseudonym years ago. I think this is the first time I openly acknowledge our rift and the reason for it.
Painful? How could it not be? Addiction drives so many family members apart because it turns the addict into a manipulator. I’m sorry gambling took your brother- but glad you’ e taken the padlock off your tongue. This in itself is huge.
I have been estranged from my brother and his family for the past 13.5 years. It has brought me a deep sadness and anguish that I could not imagine. There were briefer periods of estrangement before this latest one—always at his initiative ( I never get an explanation, a chance to understand or an opportunity discuss...I'm simply frozen out and exclude)— and we found a way forward. This time, no. Now, I fear too much time has lapsed. Maybe after our parents are gone...maybe we can have a coffee, share a glass of wine or a Christmas lunch...I just don't know...For me, I have learned the hard way that I no longer trust him or his family, so how to move forward? Somewhere inside of me I hold hope, but not a lot...The story of you and Joyce keeps me thinking, keeps me open to the possibility, but as of yet, no words—written or spoken— have been exchanged. But you and Joyce give me hope and that is something.
Ellen, do you know the movie THE STRAIGHT STORY, in which an old coot without a driver’s license takes a long road trip to visit his estranged brother while time runs out? It’s a beauty, and may give you hope. Too much time? Maybe not.
From personal experience, estrangement from a family member is hard enough when you know the reason. I can't imagine how hard it must be not knowing the real or imagined reason for the estrangement.
Rona, I could not read this without weeping. I’ve been semi “estranged” from my sister for several (or more) years. We don’t call it that, but… I was eight when she was born, so I’d already lived a small lifetime before she appeared. We are very different; she was exuberant and outgoing from the get-go (I was a different sort of child, shy and introverted). It has seemed impossible to unwind the layers and layers of misunderstandings between us, especially in recent years. I haven’t written about this, but maybe there’s a tangential way... 💕
Such a wonderful recounting. Those words might have been presented as having a high cost, but what an upbringing! I appreciate the comments here on family — we used to trust that “family” was there no matter what and worth the effort. I’m so often disheartened these days to see so many people advocate just walking away. I like knowing family bonds have resilience and memory, and I’m glad you two found your way to common ground. I know not everyone finds that. I think a lot of older siblings have similar reactions to the birth of the baby. Taking back the name though is a great story. It says a lot that it sounds like your family went along with that, too!
"I’m so often disheartened these days to see so many people advocate just walking away." Funnily enough, this very point came up in a conversation I was having this morning, albeit it was on the subject of friends who disappoint us or let us down, not (necessarily) family members. I said I've never consciously cut anyone out of my life -- I don't like the idea of doing that, although I recognize that sometimes it's necessary -- but there have been times when I've been hurt by friends & cousins who have disappeared from my life for unknown reasons. I could have written them off but I've always kept the door open -- but it's up to them whether they choose to walk through it again. Happily, a few of them have. I may not feel as close to them as I once did, but I'm glad they are still part of my life in some way.
Like many of the topics you tackle, this one is very relatable. I'm the oldest of three sisters and at various times in my life have been estranged or semi-estranged from each of them. There are many reasons including our unique personalities and our shared connection of a chaotic home life. While I railed against the cruelty and violence we lived with as children (which made their lives more difficult), they tried to keep the peace and pacify our parents. Eventually, we all left home and scattered to live our separate lives.
After our parents died, we kept our distance for a few years to avoid remembering that painful past. Slowly, we're reconnecting and, as you so eloquently phrased it, “honoring the best in each other and letting go of everything else.”
I find myself more open to the possibility of connection, independent of our history.
Margaret, its fascinating and sad how kids in dysfunctional or dangerous families may not pull together—how they may in fact compete for the scraps of what passes for love. I’m not surprised you’ve had ongoing sister trouble.
My sister is 18 months younger, born during the Big one, WWII, as the Veterans tells us. We were fast friends, having an idyllic childhood, riding bicycles, playing dolls and games with our friends, taking our first smoke, coughing away, with the same friends. When, she turned 13, she would not do a thing I said.
I was morose, what happened? Teenage years, my mom told me. She still loves you, but she needs her independence. We still hung out a little bit. I went off to college, and she went the next year. I got married and had children. She visited often, my children loved their Auntie Deenie fiercely. She was a teacher, met a man she loved and got married. I got divorced and was working full time as an ED nurse, and we would see each other every couple of months. Parents died, a younger brother died, and that brought us closer. We went on trips together, had fun.
Time marched on, and her husband died. It was then that I noticed how forgetful she had become. Her memory issues increased, her daughter in law became her legal person, Audrey and her husband Bob took her to a neurologist, a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s. I knew it in my gut. They found a lovely community for her, chef’s cooking, activities and events. She is happy. I don’t know what I am. Sad but relieved she has such wonderful care. I call her every night, she has 15 min recall, but I have become patient, and I do most of the talking. She misses my calls if I get busy, and texts me to tell me she has not heard from me in ages. I miss her, the old her, and I am accepting her, the new her. The best we both can do.
I remember the loss of her husband and the onset of her illness. How terribly sad. You are able to meet her where she is, and take pleasure in her lucid moments. I wish you many more.
“Waving her arms like the twin flags of story and language” - you just keep wowing this devoted reader. I am estranged from one brother, and the story is too long to tell. I often say that it’s as long as War and Peace, minus the peace.
Oh, Rona, you do know how to get to the essentials. I, too, was an older sister, to a four years younger sister who was very obviously brighter than me, when brighter was the measure of choice in my family. There is a photo of me with a very annoyed look peering into her pram, which suggests that the sibling rivalry began with her beginning, but it was nothing but heightened as she grew and outshone me. She was writing poetry and exchanging correspondence with Gregory Corso when she was 13 (I have a feeling I may have told you that) and she ended up at Sarah Lawrence with Grace Paley as a close mentor.
I married young and so did she to another aspiring writer, Mike Kempton (the son of Murray) – and they both died in a terrible car crash when she was 25, when they were on their way to Mexico to spend a year living cheaply and writing. We did not have any on-the-record rivalry but her existence was perpetually troubling to me. I like to think we might have reconciled at some point in our lives. My one act of contrition was to help my father put together a book of her writings (a mixture of poetry and prose) after her death, published by what they then called Vanity Publishing.
I am so pleased that you had what sounds like a true reconciliation. It must make the rest of your life both much less painful and much more enriched. Mine remains a forever unfinished story.
I might add that I also have an older brother with whom I have had a happy email relationship for years, but we spoke last week when he needed help and I have a feeling we may become closer in our last years.
Ann, I recently interviewed a number of people about sibling bonds in later life (there’s a magazine piece coming up). Needing help or consolation is a not-uncommon factor in the deepening of a relationship. I didn’t know you had a brother and hope your thriving connection with him compensates to some degree for the early loss of your gifted, complicated sister.
Thanks. He’s very clever but not all that practical so he welcomes my very down to earth advice. But I think it may bring us closer.
Interestingly, my father and his brother were so competitive early on that when one moved to NYC, the other moved to LA! But they became friendly in their 60s and traveled together to search out some family history in Germany. (My uncle who was the younger said that when he wrote a good essay in school, a teacher asked if my father had written it! He later became a well known professor of anthropology)
I still think of those essays you and your sister wrote a few years ago. Now, this piece will stick with me too as my sister and I navigate a bumpy path we find ourselves on. ❤️
Onward, Dale. If you keep an open mind, your sister might surprise you. I find it helpful to remember that most people are doing the best they can. A few years from now, they might do a lot better, given the chance.
I loved this essay so much! Thank you for writing it. It gave me hope. Perhaps. Perhaps, the estrangement between my sister and myself can be healed. Perhaps we can listen to each other so we can hear our hurts, our slights, our pain of having bought into the division that was easy to slip into within our family. My brother always said our mother fed the inability to come together as siblings, and I think he was right. I am also estranged from him, but have been through most of my life. I would love to be closer to each of them. I would love to have a relationship based on the connections we share, but mostly, it is my sister I grieve over. It is a sad legacy my parent left: siblings that are estranged.
Sally, the rift between my sister and me had a lot to with our mother, who raised us to be rivals. And yet, by teaching us to write, she also built the bridge. I hope you are able to find grace without your siblings while keeping the door open to reconciliation.
Thank you. You are a gifted writer. Your mother gave you both two lifelong gifts in the end: writing and sisterhood. I love that you found your way to each other through writing. It speaks of a lack of jealousy and an abundance of respect for both gifts.
I had the pleasure of hearing yours and Joyce’s first craft talk at the Toadstool Bookstore in Keene NH. I’ve also had the wonderful experience of being welcomed to an Alumni Writer’s Reunion at Casa Paloma. I love how each of you draw me, the reader, into an honest, intimate relationship, just as if we were sisters. Thank you!
Oh, Rona! I love so much about this essay. It struck deeply at my heart. When I was a child, 4 years old, my brother was born. I had a different reaction than yours, I was thrilled. He was my baby. As we grew, he separated from me, to be with his peers, and told me to stop following him around! We went through a period of 2-3 decades where we were mostly estranged. I perceived him as selfish, arrogant, and aggressive. I stayed away. Was he those things? To some degree. But I never took the time to look at him more objectively, more compassionately. He grew up in a difficult family, too. But I was unable to see anyone else's suffering but my own. Since our father died in 2011, we've become increasingly closer, more intimate. Sharing our experiences of what it was like for each of us growing up in our parent's house. Recently we were talking about my perception of how great a big sister I was. He quickly disabused me of my fantasy. Humbling, for sure. He's done tremendous healing work, brave and painful, and I'm so proud of him. Sometimes I refer to him as my big little brother, I've learned so much from him of late. And yes, he's got quirks, and there are little things about him that I find irritating, but I've got my little brother back, and now he's a man. And I adore him. He's turning 60 this year, so yes, you're right. We've softened toward one another. We share a unique bond. We're the only ones who truly know what it was like to be Diane and Sid's kids. Love to you, so happy that your trip was good. Still wish I'd been there! xo
“I was unable to see anyone’s suffering but my own.” That’s the key. You were both Diane and Sid’s kids but you played different roles in your sad, troubled family. As grownups, you slowly found a bigger lens. I’m glad you two have made a relationship that works.
That's it, isn't it. I'm glad we have, too. He's a peach. xo
I am sharing this article with my five daughters. I hope
They read it and allow themselves to soften. While they are yet young, time is fleeting. It is never too soon to say “I’m sorry.”
Deborah, I wish them—and you—the peace of loving connection.
This is a little painful because my brother and I are estranged. He has a serious gambling addiction and completely wiped out our aging mother's savings. After years of trying to help him (first by giving him money - not advised, then various other ways), we just reached at dead end. Funny that you mention the now defunct More magazine because I wrote an article about this under a pseudonym years ago. I think this is the first time I openly acknowledge our rift and the reason for it.
Painful? How could it not be? Addiction drives so many family members apart because it turns the addict into a manipulator. I’m sorry gambling took your brother- but glad you’ e taken the padlock off your tongue. This in itself is huge.
I have been estranged from my brother and his family for the past 13.5 years. It has brought me a deep sadness and anguish that I could not imagine. There were briefer periods of estrangement before this latest one—always at his initiative ( I never get an explanation, a chance to understand or an opportunity discuss...I'm simply frozen out and exclude)— and we found a way forward. This time, no. Now, I fear too much time has lapsed. Maybe after our parents are gone...maybe we can have a coffee, share a glass of wine or a Christmas lunch...I just don't know...For me, I have learned the hard way that I no longer trust him or his family, so how to move forward? Somewhere inside of me I hold hope, but not a lot...The story of you and Joyce keeps me thinking, keeps me open to the possibility, but as of yet, no words—written or spoken— have been exchanged. But you and Joyce give me hope and that is something.
Ellen, do you know the movie THE STRAIGHT STORY, in which an old coot without a driver’s license takes a long road trip to visit his estranged brother while time runs out? It’s a beauty, and may give you hope. Too much time? Maybe not.
From personal experience, estrangement from a family member is hard enough when you know the reason. I can't imagine how hard it must be not knowing the real or imagined reason for the estrangement.
A truly lovely post. Written with apparent ease, or with the talent of one who made it seem easy.
Thank you, Beth. I don’t often see the shape of an essay from the outset. This time I did. So, while not quite easy to write, it was easier than many.
Rona, I could not read this without weeping. I’ve been semi “estranged” from my sister for several (or more) years. We don’t call it that, but… I was eight when she was born, so I’d already lived a small lifetime before she appeared. We are very different; she was exuberant and outgoing from the get-go (I was a different sort of child, shy and introverted). It has seemed impossible to unwind the layers and layers of misunderstandings between us, especially in recent years. I haven’t written about this, but maybe there’s a tangential way... 💕
Such a wonderful recounting. Those words might have been presented as having a high cost, but what an upbringing! I appreciate the comments here on family — we used to trust that “family” was there no matter what and worth the effort. I’m so often disheartened these days to see so many people advocate just walking away. I like knowing family bonds have resilience and memory, and I’m glad you two found your way to common ground. I know not everyone finds that. I think a lot of older siblings have similar reactions to the birth of the baby. Taking back the name though is a great story. It says a lot that it sounds like your family went along with that, too!
You could argue they should not have let me do it, but they clearly felt a need to humor me. Joyce’s arrival made me so anxious and sad.
"I’m so often disheartened these days to see so many people advocate just walking away." Funnily enough, this very point came up in a conversation I was having this morning, albeit it was on the subject of friends who disappoint us or let us down, not (necessarily) family members. I said I've never consciously cut anyone out of my life -- I don't like the idea of doing that, although I recognize that sometimes it's necessary -- but there have been times when I've been hurt by friends & cousins who have disappeared from my life for unknown reasons. I could have written them off but I've always kept the door open -- but it's up to them whether they choose to walk through it again. Happily, a few of them have. I may not feel as close to them as I once did, but I'm glad they are still part of my life in some way.
Sounds like a healthy perspective. It has felt (in recent years) like a new “trend” to just cast off people and relationships.
Yes, a trend fed by therapists.
What a stunning essay, Rona. Brava 👏🏼👏🏼
Like many of the topics you tackle, this one is very relatable. I'm the oldest of three sisters and at various times in my life have been estranged or semi-estranged from each of them. There are many reasons including our unique personalities and our shared connection of a chaotic home life. While I railed against the cruelty and violence we lived with as children (which made their lives more difficult), they tried to keep the peace and pacify our parents. Eventually, we all left home and scattered to live our separate lives.
After our parents died, we kept our distance for a few years to avoid remembering that painful past. Slowly, we're reconnecting and, as you so eloquently phrased it, “honoring the best in each other and letting go of everything else.”
I find myself more open to the possibility of connection, independent of our history.
Margaret, its fascinating and sad how kids in dysfunctional or dangerous families may not pull together—how they may in fact compete for the scraps of what passes for love. I’m not surprised you’ve had ongoing sister trouble.
My sister is 18 months younger, born during the Big one, WWII, as the Veterans tells us. We were fast friends, having an idyllic childhood, riding bicycles, playing dolls and games with our friends, taking our first smoke, coughing away, with the same friends. When, she turned 13, she would not do a thing I said.
I was morose, what happened? Teenage years, my mom told me. She still loves you, but she needs her independence. We still hung out a little bit. I went off to college, and she went the next year. I got married and had children. She visited often, my children loved their Auntie Deenie fiercely. She was a teacher, met a man she loved and got married. I got divorced and was working full time as an ED nurse, and we would see each other every couple of months. Parents died, a younger brother died, and that brought us closer. We went on trips together, had fun.
Time marched on, and her husband died. It was then that I noticed how forgetful she had become. Her memory issues increased, her daughter in law became her legal person, Audrey and her husband Bob took her to a neurologist, a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s. I knew it in my gut. They found a lovely community for her, chef’s cooking, activities and events. She is happy. I don’t know what I am. Sad but relieved she has such wonderful care. I call her every night, she has 15 min recall, but I have become patient, and I do most of the talking. She misses my calls if I get busy, and texts me to tell me she has not heard from me in ages. I miss her, the old her, and I am accepting her, the new her. The best we both can do.
I remember the loss of her husband and the onset of her illness. How terribly sad. You are able to meet her where she is, and take pleasure in her lucid moments. I wish you many more.
“Waving her arms like the twin flags of story and language” - you just keep wowing this devoted reader. I am estranged from one brother, and the story is too long to tell. I often say that it’s as long as War and Peace, minus the peace.
Great line about War and Peace, Elizabeth! If you ever tell the story, I know you won’t do a Tolstoy and conclude with tendentious theorizing.
Oh, Rona, you do know how to get to the essentials. I, too, was an older sister, to a four years younger sister who was very obviously brighter than me, when brighter was the measure of choice in my family. There is a photo of me with a very annoyed look peering into her pram, which suggests that the sibling rivalry began with her beginning, but it was nothing but heightened as she grew and outshone me. She was writing poetry and exchanging correspondence with Gregory Corso when she was 13 (I have a feeling I may have told you that) and she ended up at Sarah Lawrence with Grace Paley as a close mentor.
I married young and so did she to another aspiring writer, Mike Kempton (the son of Murray) – and they both died in a terrible car crash when she was 25, when they were on their way to Mexico to spend a year living cheaply and writing. We did not have any on-the-record rivalry but her existence was perpetually troubling to me. I like to think we might have reconciled at some point in our lives. My one act of contrition was to help my father put together a book of her writings (a mixture of poetry and prose) after her death, published by what they then called Vanity Publishing.
I am so pleased that you had what sounds like a true reconciliation. It must make the rest of your life both much less painful and much more enriched. Mine remains a forever unfinished story.
I might add that I also have an older brother with whom I have had a happy email relationship for years, but we spoke last week when he needed help and I have a feeling we may become closer in our last years.
Ann, I recently interviewed a number of people about sibling bonds in later life (there’s a magazine piece coming up). Needing help or consolation is a not-uncommon factor in the deepening of a relationship. I didn’t know you had a brother and hope your thriving connection with him compensates to some degree for the early loss of your gifted, complicated sister.
Thanks. He’s very clever but not all that practical so he welcomes my very down to earth advice. But I think it may bring us closer.
Interestingly, my father and his brother were so competitive early on that when one moved to NYC, the other moved to LA! But they became friendly in their 60s and traveled together to search out some family history in Germany. (My uncle who was the younger said that when he wrote a good essay in school, a teacher asked if my father had written it! He later became a well known professor of anthropology)
Teachers can be so unthinkingly cruel.
I still think of those essays you and your sister wrote a few years ago. Now, this piece will stick with me too as my sister and I navigate a bumpy path we find ourselves on. ❤️
Onward, Dale. If you keep an open mind, your sister might surprise you. I find it helpful to remember that most people are doing the best they can. A few years from now, they might do a lot better, given the chance.
Hello. Thanks for sharing. You are two impressive women.
Thank you, Cindy. I’m pretty impressed with my sister.
I loved this essay so much! Thank you for writing it. It gave me hope. Perhaps. Perhaps, the estrangement between my sister and myself can be healed. Perhaps we can listen to each other so we can hear our hurts, our slights, our pain of having bought into the division that was easy to slip into within our family. My brother always said our mother fed the inability to come together as siblings, and I think he was right. I am also estranged from him, but have been through most of my life. I would love to be closer to each of them. I would love to have a relationship based on the connections we share, but mostly, it is my sister I grieve over. It is a sad legacy my parent left: siblings that are estranged.
Sally, the rift between my sister and me had a lot to with our mother, who raised us to be rivals. And yet, by teaching us to write, she also built the bridge. I hope you are able to find grace without your siblings while keeping the door open to reconciliation.
Thank you. You are a gifted writer. Your mother gave you both two lifelong gifts in the end: writing and sisterhood. I love that you found your way to each other through writing. It speaks of a lack of jealousy and an abundance of respect for both gifts.
Sending this to my sister who got pissed off with me last year when I suggested a right turn would get us out of the cemetery
Well, THAT sounds like a story worth writing.
I had the pleasure of hearing yours and Joyce’s first craft talk at the Toadstool Bookstore in Keene NH. I’ve also had the wonderful experience of being welcomed to an Alumni Writer’s Reunion at Casa Paloma. I love how each of you draw me, the reader, into an honest, intimate relationship, just as if we were sisters. Thank you!
Wasn’t that a wonderful time at Toadstool? I’m so glad you could be with us. And as you probably know, there’s a video of the whole talk.
Oh how I wish I would have signed up for this intensive with the two of you. So glad you found your way to each other! The picture is perfect too.
I wish you could have been there, Kelly.