Favoritism

[Anonymous]

Yes. By the time my kids were in preschool they knew the phrase “everybody in this family is in the same team.” We support each other. Just keep repeating it and demonstrating it.

[Anonymous]

This is one of my favorite things about having an only child.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. By the time my kids were in preschool they knew the phrase “everybody in this family is in the same team.” We support each other. Just keep repeating it and demonstrating it.

This is amazing. Thank you.

[Anonymous]

I’m an only child, but there is an imaginary favorite sibling of my parents that keeps popping up with different names they get from people they meet that are close in age to me. They prefer other people’s daughters to me. I was born to be never enough.

This was the biggest thing I ever dealt with in therapy. I’m not competing with these people any longer, and when they start comparing me to these women, I say goodbye and go where I’m wanted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m an only child, but there is an imaginary favorite sibling of my parents that keeps popping up with different names they get from people they meet that are close in age to me. They prefer other people’s daughters to me. I was born to be never enough.

This was the biggest thing I ever dealt with in therapy. I’m not competing with these people any longer, and when they start comparing me to these women, I say goodbye and go where I’m wanted.

You know what that is about? Outward appearances. Whomever is gushing about (this or that here), is trying to pretend that they have a heart. They don't - they never did and they never will. People see right through that pantomime BS, OP - the recipients, the bystanders, everyone. Don't worry, you need not say a thing. Not a damn thing. Get the popcorn, and enjoy! I give you permission

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m an only child, but there is an imaginary favorite sibling of my parents that keeps popping up with different names they get from people they meet that are close in age to me. They prefer other people’s daughters to me. I was born to be never enough.

This was the biggest thing I ever dealt with in therapy. I’m not competing with these people any longer, and when they start comparing me to these women, I say goodbye and go where I’m wanted.

Are you me? My mom had the same playbook except she had a favorite child too. Did you find the people they chose to be favorites outside the family didn't have even half the qualities mom requires to be acceptable, but she would put the person on a pedestal. Then, maybe months later or years or even decades, that person says the wrong thing to her and is garbage and she finds a new random person close to your age who is perfect to her. I used to be so hurt, now I just see her as deeply disturbed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Boy howdy, wait til the Olds begin to lose their cognitive faculties and their filter and you will find out who the favorite is. If you have ever witnessed your brother and his wife receiving a check for 100k for Christmas while you receive a literal cardboard box full of expired canned goods from the pantry then maybe you understand. But yeah it’s probably my fault for being too sensitive.

Another post I relate to and yes, when they lose their faculties they sometimes play favorites in the most obscene way possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Boy howdy, wait til the Olds begin to lose their cognitive faculties and their filter and you will find out who the favorite is. If you have ever witnessed your brother and his wife receiving a check for 100k for Christmas while you receive a literal cardboard box full of expired canned goods from the pantry then maybe you understand. But yeah it’s probably my fault for being too sensitive.

Another post I relate to and yes, when they lose their faculties they sometimes play favorites in the most obscene way possible.

+1

Some don't even try to hide it, they were always hurtful people, now they are more hurtful - and selfish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m an only child, but there is an imaginary favorite sibling of my parents that keeps popping up with different names they get from people they meet that are close in age to me. They prefer other people’s daughters to me. I was born to be never enough.

This was the biggest thing I ever dealt with in therapy. I’m not competing with these people any longer, and when they start comparing me to these women, I say goodbye and go where I’m wanted.

You know what that is about? Outward appearances. Whomever is gushing about (this or that here), is trying to pretend that they have a heart. They don't - they never did and they never will. People see right through that pantomime BS, OP - the recipients, the bystanders, everyone. Don't worry, you need not say a thing. Not a damn thing. Get the popcorn, and enjoy! I give you permission

I wrote the post you quoted but I am not OP. I agree with you. As I have moved away from caring about social climbing, I’ve lost my family of origin. Those who haven’t died care about that before all else. I’m not interested in playing that social competition game, so I folded my hand and I’m out whenever they start a round of that, even if the ones that they don’t make all about me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My sister is the favorite of both of my parents, but I recognize that I was a very difficult child/teen. I excelled in school, was involved in clubs and sports, had lots of friends, but also suffered from anxiety (no one used that phrase in the 1970’s/80’s - my family just called me “uptight,” ha!), so in the safety of my home/around my parents and sister I had a short fuse and would get upset very quickly. In hindsight, I am sure I made home life difficult for my parents and sister, and my sister on the other hand was very easy going.

Favorites are not always the result of one child being difficult. Nor should it be held against that now grown adult.

Sometimes there are bullies in the families who want to create and perpetuate a false narrative - you know, the histrionic sibling who tells the stories where they are unfailingly the hero. Or the fabricated stories about who did what, when, decades ago (while carefully omitting important and accurate facts).

The sibling who was accepted to a better school, or got a better job (or any random reason) and the other sibling/s having a chip on their shoulder about that - which sometimes never goes away. The sibling that helps others, yet no good deed goes unpunished situations can be difficult, because nothing is ever (ever) good enough for certain people.

There are siblings that literally exclude other siblings, out of greed. Heck, I have seen some petty siblings take photos at holidays, etc. and leave a sibling who was present out of the photo (and feign ignorance). Bullying can be subtle or not, and carry over from early years, as the bully refuses to grow up, and remains socially stunted.

It can sometimes be better to let the favorited sibling get their just desserts, and sit back and watch what happens.

I was not the easiest teen, and now as an adult, I've been diagnosed with ADHD and much of the poor treatment from my mother and younger sister I understand much better now, though I still think they are not kind. I was successful in school, made friends easily, but they just never liked me. They spun a lot of stories about why I was so awful, and it hurt then and still hurts now. Most people who meet them are surprised that I come from such hateful people. Today, we still have a strained relationship and they are both pretty unhappy. Sister is single and can't find a husband, so she hates that I am happily married with a child and my mom is on husband number 3 and hates that I have the life now that was taken from her. She was a SAHM who had to go back to work when she divorced my dad. I don't wish unhappiness on them, but, they are also living the lives they've built for themselves with their actions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, there is extreme favoritism. Sometimes it overt and other times more subtle.

As an overt example, I'm the oldest and when I turned 18 my parents stopped buying me Christmas presents. They said they needed to save their resources for "the kids." I'd come home from college and spend Christmas morning watching my teenage siblings open laptops, dSLRs and iPhones while I got nothing (despite having used my minimum wage job to purchase presents for everyone else). I learned a few years later that this "rule" only applied to me and my siblings continued to get extravagant Christmases for years after turning 18, while I'd still get nothing or a token pair of socks. It was hurtful and humiliating. If you ask my mom, who purchases the presents, it's because I'm so self sufficient that I don't need presents, I can just work and buy things for myself.

There are a million more examples, but that's one that's easy to tell.

I have a similar Christmas story. Siblings all got nice thoughtful gifts. I got something from the basement and here's the kicker it was something I had purchased years before that for some insane reason I'd thought she'd like. Another Christmas I asked for a specific doll and got told no it was too expensive. But somehow there was money for when my sister wanted a more expensive toy or the same doll a year later . many .ore examples.
I really wish terrible people just wouldn't be able to reproduce

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, there is extreme favoritism. Sometimes it overt and other times more subtle.

As an overt example, I'm the oldest and when I turned 18 my parents stopped buying me Christmas presents. They said they needed to save their resources for "the kids." I'd come home from college and spend Christmas morning watching my teenage siblings open laptops, dSLRs and iPhones while I got nothing (despite having used my minimum wage job to purchase presents for everyone else). I learned a few years later that this "rule" only applied to me and my siblings continued to get extravagant Christmases for years after turning 18, while I'd still get nothing or a token pair of socks. It was hurtful and humiliating. If you ask my mom, who purchases the presents, it's because I'm so self sufficient that I don't need presents, I can just work and buy things for myself.

There are a million more examples, but that's one that's easy to tell.

I have a similar Christmas story. Siblings all got nice thoughtful gifts. I got something from the basement and here's the kicker it was something I had purchased years before that for some insane reason I'd thought she'd like. Another Christmas I asked for a specific doll and got told no it was too expensive. But somehow there was money for when my sister wanted a more expensive toy or the same doll a year later . many .ore examples.
I really wish terrible people just wouldn't be able to reproduce

DP here. This is such crappy behavior. The parents I know that practice favoritism, have generational favoritism - it has been happening in their family since the beginning of time - not that different than alcoholism. Of course, not that they would admit it. They lack the very basic of parenting skills, and stems from NPD.

Think about it, would you want to be the favored child? How could that possibly end well, with your life so skewed and off kilter?

In the realm of "gifts", would you want anything form these dirty people who tend to favor those most like them - to be reminded of their ever looming NPD? The gifts would only serve to remind you how dirty and gross the people who favor are, who wants to be reminded of them and their dirty behavior?

Dirty people = dirty gifts. No thanks, I would rather live in peace, knowing that I broke the cycle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, there is extreme favoritism. Sometimes it overt and other times more subtle.

As an overt example, I'm the oldest and when I turned 18 my parents stopped buying me Christmas presents. They said they needed to save their resources for "the kids." I'd come home from college and spend Christmas morning watching my teenage siblings open laptops, dSLRs and iPhones while I got nothing (despite having used my minimum wage job to purchase presents for everyone else). I learned a few years later that this "rule" only applied to me and my siblings continued to get extravagant Christmases for years after turning 18, while I'd still get nothing or a token pair of socks. It was hurtful and humiliating. If you ask my mom, who purchases the presents, it's because I'm so self sufficient that I don't need presents, I can just work and buy things for myself.

There are a million more examples, but that's one that's easy to tell.

I have a similar Christmas story. Siblings all got nice thoughtful gifts. I got something from the basement and here's the kicker it was something I had purchased years before that for some insane reason I'd thought she'd like. Another Christmas I asked for a specific doll and got told no it was too expensive. But somehow there was money for when my sister wanted a more expensive toy or the same doll a year later . many .ore examples.
I really wish terrible people just wouldn't be able to reproduce

DP here. This is such crappy behavior. The parents I know that practice favoritism, have generational favoritism - it has been happening in their family since the beginning of time - not that different than alcoholism. Of course, not that they would admit it. They lack the very basic of parenting skills, and stems from NPD.

Think about it, would you want to be the favored child? How could that possibly end well, with your life so skewed and off kilter?

In the realm of "gifts", would you want anything form these dirty people who tend to favor those most like them - to be reminded of their ever looming NPD? The gifts would only serve to remind you how dirty and gross the people who favor are, who wants to be reminded of them and their dirty behavior?

Dirty people = dirty gifts. No thanks, I would rather live in peace, knowing that I broke the cycle.

*favoritism stems from NPD

[Anonymous]

To add, worst are the utterly selfish family members, who are so obvious at trying to keep the others (usually siblings and grandkids) at bay, and create a divide, in the interest of favoritism.

To them I say: GROW OP.

[Anonymous]

And I have a sister who badmouths me to my aunt so that she can inherit a valuable house. Not much better - I’ve endured decades of bullying from her. Her reason is that I was the favorite child of one of our parents - then again she was the favorite child of the other parent. While it’s wrong, it does even out. She’s deeply disturbed IMO and would benefit from therapy.