My sister-in-law is repeatedly nasty to me and I find it upsetting and unjustified. She is over a decade older than me and lives, with her husband, 200 miles away. My husband is the younger child and her only sibling. My sister-in-law is retired, wealthy and has what many would consider an enviable lifestyle.
I have a busy career with lots of travel. I’m pretty competent and have a nice home, am an OK cook and also fairly artistic. I am also the only other female in this family of husbands, nephews and sons. We meet a few times a year, often for a celebratory family meal at my home where I will have cooked. At some point I will be subjected to a vicious attack – possibly a character assassination or a response to some perceived error that I have committed. Each time I am shocked and somewhat incredulous – both that this happens, and also that no one says or does anything about it. I either ignore it or brush it off. Of course I have analysed it and can only conclude that the reasons must be of insecurity, possible jealousy and the need to feel superior to me – to keep me in my place.
My husband witnesses many of these instances, but not all of them. When I tell him how unjustified and hurtful I find this behaviour, he says that his sister does not mean it and that it is her attempt at humour. My sister-in-law gives me far more extravagant gifts than any other family member. I feel that she does this so that she can tell herself she is generous and to balance out the verbal attacks.
It’s at the point where I dread meeting her and want to minimise contact, but I can’t because this is my husband’s family and he loves them. It takes me days, even weeks, to recover from an incident. I can’t stop being upset by it. How do I get my husband to see how destructive this is? And how can I stop my sister-in-law from treating me this way?
Unfortunately, you’re asking the wrong questions. A better one to ask is how you can minimise the effect all this has on you, because yours is the only behaviour you have control over.
It would be easy for me to say, “You must tell your husband that his loyalty is to you,” and once upon a time I would have. But real life has shown it doesn’t really work like that. I’m sure his loyalty is to you, but in that moment, surrounded by family, he probably takes the path of least resistance. He may also be right; it may be his sister’s attempt at a joke, however gauche it sounds.
You don’t give me any examples of things your sister-in-law has actually said, and I thought that was quite telling. I’m sorry it takes you days or weeks to recover from these remarks, and I understand about stings in comments – I’ve suffered a few. But you may want to look at what nerve this hits, because taking weeks to recover from a comment hints at a deeper wound. I’d be interested to know what your own sibling relationship is or was like.
What stops you saying something at the time? Something like, “Ooh, did you mean that to sound so rude?” Said with a hollow laugh and an arched brow, it can stop certain personalities from saying things like that again. It won’t be easy but, then, neither is festering in anger and resentment for weeks afterwards.
Is it the words or the person saying them that hurt? Some time ago I came up with a way to help me to work out if it was what was being said, or who was saying it that irked. You take the comment, imagine it in a speech bubble and then imagine it being said by someone you like, trust and who you know likes you. If the comment still hurts, then it’s what’s being said; if not, then it’s who. It can help you separate out which bit to work on.
I wonder if she goes away and thinks, “Why did I say that?” – hence the extravagant presents. The comments may not be as loaded as you think.
But, really, if you want to try to fix this, then there is only one thing to do: you and she need to talk (converse, not confront). She may well find you annoying, superior, competitive, any manner of things that make her feel (albeit erroneously) that she has to take you down a peg or two. And certain patterns get set in families, laid out on misunderstandings. You could break all that. It won’t be easy, but it’s an incredibly powerful thing to do, not least it tells her you’ve noticed her behaviour, which may be enough to stop it.
• Send your problem to annalisa.barbieri@mac.com. Annalisa regrets she cannot enter into personal correspondence
