When you lose a sibling, you lose a big part of your life. If your sibling was older than you, then you have never known a time without them. You may have feelings toward this brother or sister as you would toward a parent. If your sibling was younger, you may have protective feelings for this sibling, almost as if he or she were your own child.
If your brother or sister was close to you in age, you may have shared a great deal of your lives, been playmates, confidants, best friends. This "shared life space," when lost, leaves a hole that cannot easily be filled. Brothers and sisters are our first equals. We have good times and bad times with them; we fight with them, support them, are annoyed by them and love them. A sibling relationship can't be broken just because you don't like each other. You can't divorce your brothers and sisters. Even if you haven't seen a brother or sister for years, there is still a connection between the two of you. When your sibling dies, that connection becomes especially poignant.
For a long time, mental health professionals told us that in order to resolve grief, the relationship with the deceased must be given up. Where siblings are concerned, that does not appear to be true. The bond is not broken by death.
Some siblings died from diseases like cancer or cystic fibrosis and were sick for a long time before they died. The grief you experience prior to your sibling's death is called "anticipatory grief". This term does not fully describe the intense pain of watching a loved one die, praying for them to be released from their agony. In such cases, the death may come, at first, as an overwhelming sense of relief. Time passes and then the sense of loss is felt. When you know someone is going to die, you have a chance to say good-bye, and to seek forgiveness for any actions you regret having taken against that person.
However, it also creates a period of time during which you may say (or even think) things that you later regret. Actions not taken during this time may haunt you in the years to come.
Other siblings died suddenly from accidents, murder, or suicide. In this case you have not had time to prepare yourself for the loss. All three of these causes of death come with a lot of baggage. The car accident (or murder) was someone's fault; the suicide came by choice, and how could your brother or sister choose to leave you? Knowing that these deaths could have been avoided is extremely painful.
Thoughts of what happened to their bodies after death are tormenting. You search your memories, seeking out what you might have done to have prevented the death. When someone dies suddenly, you don't usually believe it. Your sense of reality is completely shattered.
Added to your overwhelming grief is the fact that people tend to focus on parents when a child dies. Often siblings are expected to take care of their parents, make up for the loss, and rally around to do extra housework, babysitting, or other chores. This neglect, in itself, creates intense pain and guilt. On the one hand, you know that you are suffering too, and want some attention and comforting. On the other hand, you feel guilty for being upset over something so comparatively trivial. Such issues can trouble survivor siblings for years after the loss, creating bitterness and a pessimistic attitude towards life.
For all of the reasons described here, bereaved siblings wrap up the experience and hide it under a protective shield. Along with the experience of loss are all the additional sources of pain: guilt for what was done or left undone, anger about being neglected themselves, anger about the rest of the world going on as if nothing had happened, and worst of all, the invisible guilt and sense of betrayal for having survived, for living when your sister or brother is dead.
While doing my research, I discovered that many survivor siblings never talked about the death within their families, often trying not to cause pain by bringing up the subject. However, since this prevented all family members from working through the many feelings aroused by the loss, their anger, especially had nowhere to go. In such cases, family members acted out, using drugs and alcohol to kill their pain, or turned their anger against each other.
According to one expert on attachment, John Bowlby, we are genetically programmed to bond with others when we grieve. So the families who DO share their grief become stronger, and those that DON'T become isolated.
I feel that the best hope for recovery from the loss of a sibling is to find others who had a similar experience and talk about your loss. It is very difficult to discuss such a loss with someone who has not been through it themselves. It is as if the whole experience has been covered by an invisible shield. Only other bereaved siblings can get inside that shielded space. Once they do, you feel that you are not alone; a part of you shut away for years begins to live again.
Most of us recognize that the death caused us to grow up almost overnight, leaving the child or adolescent we once were on "hold". As we share together the experience of loss and realize that someone else understands, we begin to grow in that neglected part of our souls and healing begins.
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