Original:
Thank you to everyone who commented on the last post, I didn't expect to get as big of a response as what I got. There were a lot of really helpful things that were said, and a lot of things that opened my eyes. I spent all night thinking about what I would tell my sister, what I would say… The thing is, I knew what I had to do, and I just hated it so much that I was hoping there was some kind of way around it. But the more I thought about it, and the more I talked with my husband the more I realized there wasn't anything else that I could do.
I gave my sister the time to show up to my house when my husband would be long gone. I promised myself that I would at least start out calm. I would give her the chance to explain. I knew that I at least needed to hear what she had to say about what she did. I was going to have my husband’s back in this if she tried to lie.
So when she showed up, I was calm, but it was already tense. At the advice of my husband and many of the replies to my previous post, I started recording our conversation as soon as she walked in the door. I let her in, let her sit down in the living room, gave her a glass of water... At this point I was honestly just trying to read her/ gauge where this conversation was going to go.
I sat down and said, "tell me what happened when H got home yesterday." Me saying this made her face break then she started sobbing. "I'm so sorry" was the only thing she said, or at least that I could make out. I told her that I really didn't care if she was sorry and that the tears don't mean anything and asked her again what happened.
Her words were, "I tried to f*** him, I have feelings for your husband." She admitted to everything, how her feelings started once H broke up a fight between her and her (abusive) ex, how it escalated in her head because he was kind to her. She flirted with him even though he never showed interest, and she knew it bothered me... but no guy had ever given her that much positive attention or been that respectful to her, so she felt like there could've been something between them. (She hasn't ever been in a super healthy relationship at least that I've known of, so she's not lying here).
This is where I lost my cool.
I told her that I'm so, so, sorry for what she's gone through, and how she sees herself... But she has absolutely no right to corner H, grab his penis, tell him how much she "wants him" and then try to have sex with my husband in my house while my son is sleeping in the next room. I told her I hate her for this, and what makes it worse is that I still want to love her.
I reminded her about something I went through in college, how bad I got in terms of my depression, and how I was in a really dark place for a really long time. But I didn't hurt anyone else just because someone hurt me. As an added bonus, now I'm watching H go through pain so similar to what I went through, the feelings of shame and embarrassment of what happened. I made sure to tell her how talking about what she did reduced H to tears and I've NEVER seen him like this.
My point was that being wounded doesn't give you any reason to hurt someone the way she did.
It took me a lot of reflecting, and I had to see the connection between what she did to my husband and what my attacker did to me to realize that my own sister made H hurt the same way that I wouldn't wish upon anyone... Hurt in the same way that I felt at my worst. I wouldn't have been sympathetic towards someone who made me feel so worthless, and I wouldn't make anyone else go through such pain just because I was hurting.
She tried to say that she's not as strong as I am, that sometimes it feels like she's going to live the rest of her life like this... My sister still has a support system, and she can get through what pains her. I told my sister that she is strong enough to overcome this and I know she will, but I can't be there for her anymore, and she can't be around my husband or my son ever again.
Cue the tears, again.
I asked her who she told about what happened to, and what she said, if she lied... She said that the only person besides me that she had talked with about it was our mom, who tore my sister up after my conversation with her, she swore that she wouldn't lie about what happened. I hate not being able to support her in recovering from her trauma, but she did it to herself. She made that choice and I'm not just thinking about my own well-being anymore. I can't.
I did what I needed to, and I made sure that she was able to say what she needed to. I let her say goodbye to my son, because it's going to be a long time before any of us see each other again. While she said goodbye to him, I made it abundantly clear that if she even loves anyone in my family, if she’s really as sorry as she says she is, or if she wants to even see me again, she's not going to lie about what she did to his father to anyone, because a lie like that would ruin both of them. I know how much she loves my son, so I phrased it this so that so that the gravity of the situation was put into perspective (she does love my son and want the best for him, in spite of all of everything that is wrong with her, even if she doesn’t there are other things are at stake for her).
As she was leaving, she offered to hug me, and I didn't do it. All I could tell her was that I hope that she gets the help that she needs. She left, tears in her eyes again. I cried my eyes out too after she left, though. I only really got emotional for her to see when talking about what she did to my husband, and then my traumatic experience, but everything about this sucks. Even though this is probably the best outcome of the conversation, and I’m glad that things went the way they did, AND it was all recorded, (makes for an easier reddit post when you can refer back to direct quotes, lol). I still feel awful. I feel awful that it happened, that she made me do this, and that my sweet husband who was trying to help my sister ended up being victimized by her.
I called my husband and we talked for about an hour, I told him everything that happened, and I sent him the recording. He made a police report today just for documentation and filed for a restraining order at work, my sister doesn't know this (yet). He’s doing a lot better today than he was yesterday, but I know from experience that this won’t be easy. So now I’m going to wait for him to get home, I promised I would make tonight about him, so we’re probably going to end up getting take-out, watching Netflix and playing with the little one until we pass out.
TL; DR - Today, after great consideration and reflection, I cut my sister off from my family indefinitely. While I have a lot of contradicting feelings, I’m hoping that I made the choice that is best for my family.
Submitted November 24, 2020 at 05:18PM by _ephyra https://ift.tt/3601aF4
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