
Please don't judge, I just wanna get this out. I've always had self esteem issues, bouts of self loathing over my shortcomings, but watching my sister have and achieve everything I wished I could when I was her age is amplifying it all. It's like the life I could have possibly had, or the life I wished I had, without any of my problems, without the mental afflictions holding me back. She is living my dream childhood.

Firstly one of my biggest insecurities has been my hair. My sister has grown her hair down to her back. Being black, this hits extra hard because retaining length in our hair is extra hard, so when a black girl has big hair its a big deal. I damaged my hair in middle school straightening it and have been trying to grow it back ever since. 

My sister is adorable in general and can dress very well. I cringe when I look at old photos of myself.

Both of those are superficial but there is more. 

When I was younger I never had any friends, and still don't. I have bad social anxiety and can barely speak unless I'm spoken to. She has always been the social butterfly. She has many friends and always messages and hangs out with them. When I see them I see everything I've been missing out on for years.

She is doing so well in school, has straight A's, awards no other kid in school has, test scores off the charts. When I was her age I would constantly here all my work was very good but I couldn't focus, couldn't turn things in on time, couldn't test in an appropriate time span, couldn't be on time for class, and no matter how good you are at a subject or how smart you are, these things will affect your grades and performance in school. I went through this for all 12 years of school. Barely passing classes, day long detentions from accumulated tardiness, and by the time senior year rolled around I finally got mentally evaluated and got an IEP. I was put in the special ed program. Not for ADHD though, even though I took a test and it said that I was highly likely to have it, just for the depression and anxiety that resulted. This was great and helped a lot but not enough, it was too late. It was literally senior year and I still struggled. I never got a diagnosis either, and I still don't have one. I can't afford to get evaluated again. (I live in the US). I'm still struggling. 


Of course naturally some teachers would belittle and disrespect me for these shortcomings instead of trying to help. I never stood up for myself. One day when my sister told me a teacher belittled her intelligence, I immediately told my parents and we all banded together to help her stand up for herself. Then she proved the teacher wrong. I wished I could have done that.

Two days ago I found out my sister was taking AP  biology and AP english. Two classes I tried to take at her age. I got a recommendation for AP biology, not an official one, but after a while had passed and I tried to bring it up again, they asked me if I "thought I deserved it." So they completely renigged. I was dumbfounded and didnt say anything. 

But failing to get into AP English took a little dig at my self esteem. I love English, especially writing. And I thought I was good at it. My teachers have always told me I was good at it, they encouraged me to write for the paper and for the poetry book, and said I could go far despite how messed up I was in every other way. But apparently I wasn't quite good enough that day I tried.

In hindsight I probably wouldn't have been able to handle the demand of an AP class. I know it's just a class and one little failure shouldn't derail my only redeeming quality but hearing that my sister got in reignited that disappointment 10x. 

I'm glad my sister didn't have to deal with any of the crap I dealt with, I'm glad she's thriving because she is the brightest child I've ever seen, I'm not just saying that because we are related. But I'm not going to pretend that seeing her live pretty much my dream childhood isn't tearing me apart. I thought I'd gotten over it, and I know it's stupid to be jealous of a child, but it's like all those old wounds are being ripped open again, and once again I am asking myself, what the hell is the point of being good at something if you're so messed up that nothing ever good comes from it. Why couldn't I just have the skills and the learning capacity? Why the mental conditions to make sure I stay down and never excel? 

And the worst part is it's so hard to be there for her. When she asks for advice about her friends I try my best to help but how would I know? I was never able to keep a friendship for more than a couple months. We would just drift apart eventually. When she talked about being nervous going to high school I tried to help her, telling her it would be just like middle school but bigger, meanwhile all I could think about is how much I miss being told what to do and having opportunities thrown at me at an affluent high school. Adulthood has me lost. Then she talks to me about the pressure to keep up with her good performance to make her parents and teachers proud, and I try, again, to help and ease some of that pressure but nagging in the back of my mind is how much I wished I had that problem, instead of the problem of continual disappointment and never meeting anyone's expectations. I wish I could push it all away and just be a helpful sister but it's like everything is tainted by my self pity. It's so stupid that I can't stop thinking about myself. It's not like my sister's life is completely perfect, she struggles with her feelings as well and worries about her future. I wish we could bond more without my mind constantly comparing my younger self to her.

But now I'm thinking about what's next...watching her have fun at school dances I turned down because I didn't have friends much less a date. Shoot watching her GET a date. Watching her achieve a scholarship or get accepted to a bunch of schools by the time senior year comes around. Watching her go to prom and have a cool graduation ceremony and party, not robbed from her by a worldwide pandemic. It's only going to get more painful from here. A mixture of being proud of her and silently suffering. Unless I somehow get myself together finally. Thats the only silver lining, is that she inspires me to keep pushing and achieve something my younger self would be proud of. I may have some mental health issues but that just means I have to work a little harder, and the outcome will be all the more satisfying. Unfortunately I don't even know where to begin.