I have always been the most responsible among all my siblings and I try my best not to disappoint my parents. This paid off as I am quite successful now. Problem with me is I get affected everytime my brothers screw up. Feels like a heavy cross that I have to carry everytime... I just want to turn a blind eye sometimes and live my life without being emotionally affected. Is this selfish? I always think that I have to share my parents' burdens...
2006-12-18 00:13:32 · 9 answers · asked by arc* 2 in Family & Relationships ➔ Family
I mean I really really want to stop feeling affected and burdened by other people's problems.. and they're not even strangers, they're my family...
2006-12-18 00:20:15 · update #1
No, this is not selfish. If you love your siblings, you are never going to be able to not care about what is happening to them. But at the same time, you can distance yourself so that you are not drawn in to every problem they have.
2006-12-18 00:35:44 · answer #1 · answered by eharrah1 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
What you're feeling is normal and you should feel guilty, from what I've read. It sounds like you've been there as a support for you folks who, if you were to ask, have felt the same way you do right now. It's hard to keep helping someone who doesn't seem to care about himself or anyone else. Talk to your parents about this, it may be time to sit your brother down and let him this is the last time you'll help him. It's time for him to grow up and stop screwing up. That even though you love him, enough is enough. If all your siblings are grown, it's time for your parents to start enjoying life for themselves without worrying about their grown children. Soon it will time to start caring for them. It sounds like your brother is the one being selfish. Go and talk to your parents, it's time for all of you to have some peace.
2006-12-18 08:24:43 · answer #2 · answered by Mama's gone crazy 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Why do you find it necessary to take on someone else's problems?
Family or not, your brother "screwing up" as you put it, has nothing to do with you. If he's making a mess out of his life, its HIS problem, HIS burden, not yours.
Emotional support is fine, but taking on the problem as if it were your own has no logical sense to it.
You say your successful - I take that to mean financially. Were any of these family members concerned with you before you hit it big, or is this a recent development? (Having money sometimes brings out the worse in reletives.)
Don't allow yourself to be guilted into a situation "Oh, son, I've raised and fed you all your life and now all I need is $10,000 dollars..."
2006-12-18 09:37:53 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
You are a good person. You are doing what is right but things have limits to. We share with our loved ones burden but we also at times let them carry their own burden. It is not right to carry lods for them all the time, in doing so you are destryings their growth to be responsible and productive as human being.
You are not selfish if you put things on the right perspectives.
Let them be responsible for the results of live arround them and let them know that it is also a way of letting them grown.
Tell you, I beged for help onece to a relative and she reponded promptly but it was not enought so I asked for some more halp and she ignored me till this day, I was hurt but that was a lesson for me that I have to strive for my own survival and now I stand again on my own., If she helped me through out I think I am a parasite now and who knows untill when?
Things have limits my dear.
2006-12-18 08:22:21 · answer #4 · answered by theats7 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
You are a really nice lady!
But you have your own life to deal with right?
when ur married ur husband and kids are your main family...everyone else are just other people. No its not being selfish, its begining to realise there are people in your main family that need you to be emotionally and physcially available for them and if you are not available for your main family you will end up regretting bout it...
2006-12-18 09:43:43 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
no your not being selfish you made a good life for your self now its time for your brothers to stand on there own feet your not always going to be there so they need to get there life going yo can still be there for them but the rest is now up to them
2006-12-18 08:26:12 · answer #6 · answered by hallowsevenight 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You are trying to force everyone to adhere to YOUR chosen way of life. You can't, your brothers have to live their own lives whether you approve or not. It is not up to you to give your approval anyway. It is one thing to want to ease the "pain" of the family but another to think you HAVE to be in the middle of it. What you are is self centered not selfish. You think that YOU will look more favorably upon if you take over when it is not our place to take over.
2006-12-18 08:24:19 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋
no, your siblings are not your kids, you don't have to feel wat your parents feel, that is wat parents do not u, it sound like you are very close to your siblings but you have to have your own life and can't be there for them everytime.
2006-12-18 08:18:49 · answer #8 · answered by zoey z 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
er...not really
thats quite nice actually
2006-12-18 08:15:42 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋