Hi @catsarethebest !
Thankyou for being so vulnernable and for opening up on here, i'm so sorry to hear that you've been feeling this way. It sounds like you've been dealing with this for a long time too. You mention feeling really lonely and emotionally isolated within your family, but also jealous of the attention your sister recieves. It also sounds like you're feeling guilty for feeling all of the above as well. This all sounds super overwhelming.
I'd like to reaffirm that your desire for love and attention from your parents does absolutely not make you a horrible person. You are not a burden, you are not ungrateful. I think it's so easy to forget that our needs as people extend beyond physical needs for food and shelter and clothing, love and attention is also an incredibly important need. You can absolutely acknowledge the difficulties your parents face in caring for your sister, whilst also wishing that you were given more support too.
I think it's a great idea to think about having a conversation about the way you've been feeling with your parents. I think it would be great for you to write things out beforehand, just so that you can make sure that you get to say everything you want to say. I find that writing things out first always really helps me to navigate tricky conversations much more calmly, especially if i'm not sure how the other person will respond - you might find this helpful too! You might also like in the conversation to foreground all of the things you've mentioned here - ie that you're aware that your sister has complex needs that take up quite a bit of their time, and that you and grateful for the stability you have in your family life. You might also like to give your parents some tangible examples of ways that you've felt unsupported in the past/how you would like to be supported in the future - eg you mention that they haven't attended award ceremonies for you in the past. I think that giving people real examples like this is a great way to illustrate your points better, so that they can really grasp what you're saying. This said, these are just suggestions and only you know what works best for you 🥰.
I'm thinking of you and would love to know how you're feeling/how things go as you navigate this 💜.
