Dear Athena, don’t you just hate when you do something together with your siblings and then one of them gets to take all the glory? I’m stuck in the middle of a messy royal family with only one son, so it’s something I’m pretty accustomed to, but the sting of pride and hurt at being ignored never quite goes away.
‘Glory’ might not be the correct word to describe what my little brother is being credited with at the moment. ‘Blame’ or ‘guilt’ would probably be better. You see… he murdered our mother. The situation is actually even worse than it sounds if you can believe it. The slaughter of my mother is the third in the most recent series of violent deaths that have plagued my relatives. (There are even more if you go back a few branches in the family tree). First, my father sacrificed my sister, then my mother killed him in vengeance for that so, naturally, my brother and I had no choice but to arrange for her death as a consequence.
You’ll note that I say ‘my brother and I’ here. Nobody else has been acknowledging my role in this story. Let the record show that there is absolutely no way that he could have pulled this off without me. It was my drive, my plan, my voice urging him to bring the sword down.
I realise that I sound rather callous. I would also like the record to show that I am not exactly proud to have been one of the architects of my mother’s doom. I know it was the right thing to do to honour my father’s spirit, but that doesn’t keep this sickening sense of sorrow and shame away.
What I’m upset about, apart from the loss of the majority of my family members, is that these very feelings, my pain, my guilt, my regret, are not being validated. It’s as though being the one to wield the sword has made my brother the only one who can shoulder the burden of responsibility for this awful crime.
I’ve tried to help him, to share in his culpability, but he just tells me that I don’t understand. Who could understand better than me?! I literally told him to do it. Has he seriously forgotten that?
I will admit that my attempts to ‘be there’ for my brother are not entirely selfless. I desperately need to get this guilt off my chest and, as nobody is inclined to believe me about my role in this, who else can I turn to but the one person who knows the truth? We were in this together, yet now I feel so alone.
I know I must seem bizarre craving credit for a terrible crime, but I just need someone to recognise the part I played. I feel as though I am being written out of my family’s story and that there is nothing I can do to stop it. Will I have to carry the crushing weight of this dreadful responsibility in silence for the rest of my life? –lost_my_spark
Athena says: Under normal circumstances, I’d start my response to you with a joke about sibling politics on Mount Olympus – and believe me, I can think of a lot – but on this occasion it seems more important to say I know what you did without (too much) dilly-dallying.
I hope that my saying so does indeed provide you with the comfort you crave. I, of course, understand why this is something you need to hear, but it does feel slightly counter-intuitive to be offering support to someone by telling them that you really are convinced that they were involved in a murder…
As I say, I can understand and imagine how you must be feeling right now and I have a whole heap of thoughts and advice to share on your relationship with your brother and your life going forward. However, starting with that would make me feel very guilty for just brushing past the aforementioned terrible crime of, let’s give it its proper name, matricide.
You and your brother conspired to kill your mother. Again, I understand why you felt you had to do this. You had to avenge and honour the spirit of your murdered father and so on and so on and so on. But did you really think that this was a good thing to do? You yourself mention the brutally violent family history that plagues you. Had that taught you nothing? I’ve said it before and no doubt I’ll say it again: revenge doesn’t solve anything. Yes, your mother committed a crime, but it does not help for you to do the same and write off another family member, especially when yours are dying out so fast.
Your guilt will be a harsher punishment than any words of mine
I suspect that this is something that you are beginning to realise. Better late than never I suppose, and your guilt will be a harsher punishment than any words of mine. What’s done is done. Neither you nor I can change the past and so, like you, I shall bring my attention back to your present issue.
As I have allowed myself to understand your feelings and your perspective, so now do I want you to put yourself in your brother’s sandals. You have already done this to a certain extent – you can sense that he is plagued by guilt, the very same feeling that is gnawing at you. I know that all you want to do is help him, but it might just be too soon for that. You yourself say that your brother would not have been able to go through this hubristic act if it weren’t for you. He may be pretending otherwise, but I imagine that he remembers this all too well. You may be too much of a reminder of the awful thing that he has done. He may even be blaming you for it.
I don’t say this to alarm you, I very much doubt that things will stay this way forever. The two of you need each other now more than ever, and he will come to realise this as time puts greater distance between him and his misdeed. Try to be as patient as you can. Wait until he is ready, until he feels able to approach you about the burden you share.
Another possible motive for his withdrawing from you could be that he is trying to protect you. Maybe he truly does believe that as he is the only one who actually brandished the weapon, he is the only one who bears the blame. Perhaps he is doing his best to spare you from any guilt that you might suffer if he shared his pain with you. When the moment arises, do make it clear that this isn’t the case. It is a sweet thought, but an arrogant and misguided one also.
The two of you need each other now more than ever
Whether any of this reflects the truth of how your brother is feeling we cannot know for sure, but what I hope that you are beginning to realise is that you can’t expect him to react in the same way as you. Yes, you share the blame, yes, you are connected, but you are different people and had different roles to play. You each need to give the other time to process, to discover for yourselves individually how to deal with what you have done.
Whether it’s an hour, a week or even a year from now, however long it takes for your brother to feel able to talk things over with you is going to feel like an eternity. A daunting prospect when you are already feeling lonely and cut off from your family. I hope that it will help for you to remember while you wait that although you each have to come to terms with the past on your own, this does not rule out a shared future.
Now feels like an opportune moment to point out that, as siblings, you and your brother do share a great deal more than responsibility for your mother’s murder. It will be hard to look beyond the acts of violence which have shaped the most recent years of your life, but going back to childhood memories, games and escapades might prove the best place to start as you reconnect and rebuild your relationship.
Another chapter in your family’s tale has come to a close, but the story itself is not over. You and your brother still have roles to play as you regret, repent and repay your crime, and shape the way that the world remembers your mother, father and sister.
Dear Athena 