‘I really can’t stand my sister’s opinions but I don’t want us to fall out for good’
Our relationships expert Anna Richardson will help solve your problems
Q My sister and I are in our 50s and, while we share many interests, we have very different world views. She voted for Brexit and thinks it’s a good idea to send refugees to Rwanda, both of which I disagree with completely. These differences are making it harder and harder to maintain a good relationship. For the sake of our parents and wider family I don’t want us to fall out, but how can I get on with someone I disagree with so vehemently?
A Over the past few years, this country has endured seismic events that will affect generations to come, without question. Brexit, turbulent party politics and the pandemic have left families across the UK at total loggerheads. It has caused rifts between generations, arguments with colleagues and even led to a spike in couples splitting up. No one seems to be able to agree with each other, and tensions are rife.
Think about it – what does a referendum ask us to do? Make a binary choice. Yes or No. Remain or Leave. In or Out. This is what you’re starting to ask yourself about your own sister – should I stay or should I go?
The thing is, when we’re dating someone or making new friends, we can pick and choose who we want to become intimate with. We judge them on their values, decide if they align with our own, and then forge ahead (or not) with a close relationship based on those shared principles. If ‘values’ are a person’s standard of behaviour and what’s important to them in life, then it goes without saying that they’re not just random thoughts. They’re an expression of who they are, how they view the world and how they believe people should act within it.
The problem is, we sometimes find ourselves in an intimate relationship with someone we didn’t choose – aka family – whose values and opinions are so abhorrent to us that we’re faced with the agonising choice of how to navigate that relationship, and whether we can be bothered to make the effort with them at all. Much as you love your sister, her opinions are making you see her in an unpleasant light. And when someone we love has radically different core values from our own, it can be deeply painful. It can also feel like a personal rejection, and I can only imagine
