As much as parents deny it, every child is treated a little bit differently. It’s only natural. But boy does it drive kids absolutely crazy!

But sometimes that treatment goes beyond small petty differences, especially when dealing with parents who play obvious favorites.

This story is about a twin who shunned her sister all of her life because she thought her parents went “easy” on her!

Was she wrong to blow up at her? Decide for yourself!

AITA for telling my twin sister she will never fit in with us?

I (29F) have four siblings, Mark (33M), Josh (31M), Eva (29F), and Tony (26M). Me and Eva are fraternal twins. Our mother was a SAHM but she was emotionally absent.

Growing up, our father was very hard on us. He wanted his first son to be a doctor, so Mark had to work all the time.

He had Josh learn violin at 4 yo and made him play for hours. Tony had to be a lawyer. I had the “chance” to be a beautiful kid, and I participated in beauty pageants starting 3 yo.

However, OP said Eva received a completely different treatment from their Father…

Eva was free of this, because she wasn’t beautiful, and my father didn’t think a woman could do much anyway.

She always had liberty and could do whatever she wanted, without pressure on her shoulders.

She could have friends, had no care about her grades, and didn’t have to work her butt off every day.

We are not proud of it but we tended to exclude her since she was slacking off while we were working so hard.

And when she started to act out, the divide between her and her siblings grew even more…

She also was a problematic teen: she skipped class, hung around with a bad crowd, and drank.

She even disappeared for a week without notice when we were 15, stating after that she wanted to get away with her bf for a road trip.

Meanwhile I wasn’t even allowed to leave the house for a night because my parents wanted to make sure I did my work and would only eat what I was allowed to.

Eva would throw tantrums, saying she was neglected and no one would care if she disappeared.

I was enraged with her because she never realized the chance she had, and we only grew apart from that point.

But after their Father passed, the siblings all reunited at home for his funeral…

After high school, I went far away and started working as a make-up artist. I eloped at 26 with Eli (27M) and never looked back.

Last month, our father passed away, and my siblings and I went to the family home for the funeral. We stayed for three weeks and reconnected a lot.

Mark had a breakdown at 23 from all the pressure and barely recovered. He is now happier, got a job as a tech in a lab, is married, and has two little kids.

Josh stopped violin and is a drummer and piano teacher, and Tony is a public defender. Eva chose to be a social worker.

And old wounds were soon reopened as the siblings reminisced on their respective childhoods.

It was a bit weird with Eva since we hadn’t seen each other for years and gave up contact too.

She once again tried to dismiss what we went through, saying that she was as abused as us even though that is nowhere near true.

One evening she completely flipped out on us, calling us AH and saying that we were like our father and excluded her.

She kept going about how our parents never took an interest in her, neither did we, and that she went through so much thinking she was worthless.

And while their brother was obviously guilty about their treatment of Eva, OP didn’t exactly see things the same way…

Mark started to cry so I took Eva out and lashed out at her, saying she was the AH for being jealous of our misery.

I said that she will never fit in with us because she never got abused and it was insane of her to claim she had. She left that night and didn’t apologize to any of us.

When I went home, I cried a lot and told everything to my husband, expecting him to support me, but he said I should be the one to call and apologize to my sister.

AITA?

Sounds like everyone went through their own traumatic childhood, but turning your trauma into a competition to see who had it worse benefits nobody.

OP needs to realize that just because her sister wasn’t subject to the same pressure as her, that doesn’t mean she had an easy childhood.

Reddit said that OP needed a serious wake up call, and that if Eva disappeared for a week at 15 and no one even cared, that was evidence enough of what Eva was trying to tell her.

Others noticed the parallels between this story and the movie “Encanto.”

Many thought that both of the sisters were victims of abusive behavior, just behaviors at the opposite end of the spectrum of each other.

Finally, this user framed the story in the terms of family psychology, saying OP exactly fit the “Golden Child” label, while Eva was clearly the “Black Sheep.”

Sounds like the lot of them are in serious need of some family counseling!

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.