It’s been ten weeks since my sister died. For the first four or five, I moved through my days in a fog—doing what I had to do, waiting for the numbness to lift. Eventually it did. And when it did, the anger came, sharp and overwhelming. I wasn’t prepared for how it would hit me in waves—sometimes out of nowhere, sometimes triggered by the smallest, most ordinary moments. I kept trying to be strong, to keep moving, but grief has a way of knocking you sideways just when you think you’ve found your footing. I’m learning that this part—this anger, this ache—is also part of loving someone you never imagined living without.

I’m sure my relationship with my sister isn’t too different from many of you. I am the younger sister; she was 5 years older. Once upon a time, my sister and I were very close, through our teens and our twenties, well into both our marriages and having our own children. She was the one I always called with good news and bad. I always enjoyed hearing about how her children were growing up and becoming young adults. We didn’t live too far apart, and would make a point of getting together, especially around the holidays. This did lessen after my mother passed away. We would often go months without seeing each other. Our conversations became less and less, and eventually I felt like I was the only one that wanted to have a close relationship. She rarely called me. If I wanted to talk to her, I had to make the phone call. Admittedly, this angered me.

I noticed that my sister did not like dealing with the hard stuff. She didn’t step up when our mother was put into hospice battling end-stage breast cancer. Even though she didn’t work and lived less than 30 minutes away from my parents’ house, she rarely visited. I, on the other hand, was the dependable one, seeing my parents often and helping when I could, even though I also had two small children and was a first-year teacher (which is challenging in itself).

When my husband was hospitalized after a stroke and subsequent brain surgery, she showed up briefly, but then once again was distant. More recently, when my 85-year-old father was diagnosed and treated for colorectal cancer, she never once offered to help out, even though she didn’t work and I had to take days off to take my father to treatments. And lastly, when my father’s wife died after a horrible disease, she never came, not even to the memorial service.

That was when I felt the intentional distance she put between herself and our family. We didn’t hear from her for months on end, and she rejected all invitations to get together. On her last birthday, I poured my heart into an email, with no reply. That’s when I understood that no reply is a reply. I also realized that my sister could hold a grudge like no one else. She resented my brother for past acts as children (they were about a year apart and had some serious sibling rivalry issues). She resented my dad for marrying a woman so different from my mother, and all that transpired when they moved out of our family home.

Fast forward to 4 months ago,my father received a call from my brother-in-law in the end of July letting us know that my sister was being treated for colon cancer caught way too late. It had spread to her stomach and was considered terminal. My BIL did say that my sister had wanted to keep her illness private and was embarrassed that it had gone that far. By the end of August, they stopped all treatment, and she was given a month to live. She lasted less than two weeks.

I’m not sure if this post is more to just share my story as I’m sure many can relate, or to deal with the immense grief I have felt, and continue to feel in various ways. I’ve lost family, most notably my mother to cancer, but somehow this just feels different. It could be that I was more involved in my mother’s care, but did not have the opportunity to do that with my sister. Gratefully, I did see my sister a few times before she died, but it wasn’t nearly enough. I don’t feel like I really got the closure I needed, or got to tell her that I loved her. I will always feel a certain guilt that I didn’t push more to get her to communicate with me, instead of just letting more time pass as I wallowed in my feeling of rejection.

After the initial pain and grieving, I’ve tried to take a different approach. I hope my sister wouldn’t want me to mope around, so I’ve decided to be strong and take care of myself. Both my mother and sister passed away from cancer in their mid-sixties. I turn 60 next month, and I’m determined not to let that be my path. I will practice more self-care, exercise more, eat healthier, make the dreaded doctor’s appointments, and do everything possible to someday become an octogenarian.

Lastly, I wanted to share this tribute I wrote about my sister just a few days after she died:

This past week has been a difficult one as I said goodbye to my only sister. She was my first best friend. She taught me how to do my hair and to use make up. She took me to my first concert, bought me my first 6 pack of beer, and taught me to drive a stick shift. I was her maid of honor, she was mine. I watched her babies, she watched mine.  She was smart, super pretty, and the runner I could never be. She was also more artistic and crafty, and a much better shopper. More than anything, she loved being a wife, mother, and grandmother. Like my mother she was passionate about her beliefs and taught me to be the same. This one really hurts. Rest easy Leslie, I’ll love and miss you forever.