“I love you to the moon and back a million times.”
That was the text I received on my 21st birthday from my middle sister Grace, right at midnight on Dec. 11, 2024. I stared at my phone, tears welling in my eyes.
“I love you more.”
I have been the eldest sibling for nearly 18 years now, and I truly believe it has shaped my character and life in unimaginable ways. If I could go back in time to make myself an only child, I wouldn’t even consider it – never in a million years. Growing up with my two younger sisters was essentially like living with my own built-in best friends. We have always been close, and that did not change when I moved to Hofstra University nearly four years ago.
What did change, however, was my mother’s health and well-being. She passed away on July 4, 2023, when I was only 19, and my sisters were 16 and 14, respectively. Her death was a major blow to our family and a highly unexpected tragedy.
My mother was sick; she struggled severely with her mental health, but there was never a time that she let her issues get in the way of her love for her three children.
My mother, Joanne, was one of the most kindhearted and genuine people you would ever meet in your lifetime. She gave her entire life to helping others and raising my sisters and me to be good people. Her passing changed something in me. For a time, I felt lost and afraid for my future without her here. Both Grace and Jamie, my younger sisters, looked to me for guidance more than ever before, and that terrified me. To this day, it still does.
With my mother gone and my father needed at work, there was one person left to take care of the girls: me. I have always held responsibility within my family, given how close we are and the fact that my sisters have always looked up to me, but this time was far different. I did not have my mom anymore to complain to when my sisters were acting bratty or to get advice about a situation with friends. I was doing everything all on my own with no direction.
People always say there is no guidebook on parenting, and while that much is true, most new parents have their instincts and their own parents and families to coach them through the process. There is absolutely nothing on how the oldest sibling can assume the role of her mother following her death.
“What time do you have practice? What do you want for dinner? Who are you hanging out with after school?” were all questions I found myself asking my sisters every day, wondering, “How did my mother do this so effortlessly?”
The summer before my junior year of college, I spent picking up the pieces of my family and taking care of my sisters nearly the same as my mom did. I felt solely responsible for my sisters and for holding up the “motherly standards,” and it nearly tore me apart. My life was consumed with filling the hole she left, and it cost me my own mental health.
How could I heal from losing my mom and deal with the grief it caused if I didn’t spend any time processing it?
The new semester starting helped me realize I did not need to hold onto this enormous responsibility. It was not my job to parent my sisters, and it was not my place to replace my mom. My sisters saw what I was dealing with, and they both assured me they did not want me to be a mom; they needed me to be their older sister. One they could laugh and cry with, go on hours-long shopping sprees with and gossip to in the back of a Dunkin’.
This upcoming summer, it will be two years since my mother passed away. The bond I have with my sisters and my father is stronger than ever before, and I am healing. Being the oldest sister carries so much weight, but I wouldn’t change it for the world.
