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Sunday, October 18, 2009 - 20:00
Q: How are sister relationships unique from other relationships?
A: A lot of what's true of sisters are true of other relationships. But sisters have a particularly intense combination of connection and competition. The connection comes from being in the same family and sharing history. If sisters have grown up in the same house, they often spend more time with each other than they do with their parents - by a lot in many cases. It might be more or less obvious, but some level of competition is always there because these people are looking to the same source for everything, including continuing approval and financial support. There's one set of parents. The final thing I would add is that in families where there's not so much obvious competition, there's always comparison. When I asked women about their sisters, they all almost immediately told me that they were different and then would go on with that.
Q: That seems to resemble, a little bit, the common push-pull relationship between mothers and daughters.
A: In many ways it does, but in many ways it doesn't. When I talked to mothers and daughters, I heard them say that they're the same and different in just about equal measures. They might acknowledge that they really butt heads because they're the same, or say they don't get along because they're different. But with sisters, I only heard them claim to be different - never the same. When there's more than one child, there's a tendency to label them - she's outgoing and she's shy or this one's an artist and the other is a bookworm.
Q: What role does birth order play in sister relationships?
A: It affects just about everything, and it continues throughout their lives. I had a lot to say about oldest and a lot to say about youngest, but middles are combinations of oldest and youngest. The oldest is often considered bossy and judgmental. Often, older sisters are put in the role of telling younger ones what to do because they're bigger and they know more. Sometimes they're protective, and that can be perceived as judgmental - you can see ways that the younger ones can improve and you feel like you should tell them. It comes across as criticism.
Younger ones are often accused of not doing their share, that she sits down and expects to be waited on. I think that's related to a sense that if you do something, you're going to be doing it wrong or to do it another way. They may be waiting to be told what to do.
Q: Did anything really surprise you while researching this book?
A: What really surprised me was that so many women started by telling me that they're different. And they would also tell whether they're close or not. That's what led me to think that sisters often view each other as reflections of themselves. It's almost like they can't ask who they are without who they are in relation to her.
Q: When sisters defined their relationship as close, were those relationships still fraught with quite a bit of conflict?
A: It was all over the map. I did talk to sisters who had nothing but positive things to say - they adore each other and talk five times a day and say they couldn't live without each other. And on the other extreme, I talked to a sister who cut another off and wouldn't talk to her. There were very few who didn't mention any kind of frustration, but it could be good-natured, loving frustration.
Q: So you must now get a lot of questions about how you get along with your sisters.
A: We fit into the category of sisters who get along well. We really adore each other.
Q: Do you have any tips for getting along better with a sister?
A: Well, it depends on the source of frustration, but there are a few things:
1. Take time to spend together as sisters, no spouses and no kids. If you can go away for a couple of days, that's great, but even just an hour alone when everyone's together.
2. Remember to say the positive things that you often assume go without saying: I think you're great and nice and you're done a fabulous job raising your kids. That last one is particularly important, because feeling like a sister disapproves of the way you've raised your kids can be especially hurtful. Anything positive can be good - and people too often think it and don't say it.
3. Humour is always good. Some of the best stories I heard involved just laughing together.
4. Try to remember that her idea of how to be a good sister might not be the same as yours, so you have to be a bit indulgent there. One might think we should talk every day and the other might think we should talk every week. One might think intimacy is talking about what's going on in your life and how you feel and all of your problems, and the other might want to keep that to herself. It can leave both sisters feeling frustrated.
Here's a personal example. When I wrote my last book, I sent drafts to both my middle sister and my oldest sister. My oldest sister, as usual, wrote detailed comments - she's a great reader. My middle sister called me after a time and said, "I started reading your book but I didn't get very far, and I realized that I would rather make beads than read your book. How about if I made you a necklace of beads I made myself?" And she doesn't just string them, she makes the beads herself out of glass. She goes to a studio and fires up a torch and melts these glass rods into beads; I could no more do that than walk to the moon. I treasure that necklace, and it's fine that she didn't want to read my book.
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