Dear Roe,<\/p>\n
I am close to my sister. I\u2019m in my 50s now, and she\u2019s 10 years younger, and growing up I was kind of like her second mother. She\u2019s incredibly warm-hearted and caring. My dilemma is this: I am seriously concerned that her lack of selfishness is damaging her health and potentially shortening her life expectancy, and I feel like I\u2019m a bystander letting it happen. She has a child with a chronic condition and her husband is going through treatment for a serious illness. She has numerous significant health problems herself. In the last few years she is constantly exhausted, always in pain with headaches and back pain, and her mood is low (which is understandable). Despite all of this, as well as managing all the kids\u2019 activities, she volunteers to help anyone in need, elderly neighbours, relations, school events, play dates etc, even when she doesn\u2019t like the person that much or they haven\u2019t been particularly kind to her. She is a wonderful person, but it\u2019s heartbreaking to see her in constant pain. This lack of ability to protect herself is damaging her health and her quality of life, and it seems there\u2019s nothing I can say or do to make it better. I help practically wherever I can, though she never asks. Any advice?<\/p>\n
The care you have for your sister is heart-warming, and it\u2019s obvious that you love her deeply and want the best for her.<\/p>\n
I presume you know the situation deeply, but I would warn you against automatically conflating things, and to not assume that you know what is best for your sister more than she does. It is very possible that you have a clear-eyed view of your sister\u2019s habit of over-extending herself and the stress it causes. But I do want to leave room for the possibility that your sister\u2019s habit of volunteering and helping others in her community is deeply important to her and actually provides some relief from her feelings of stress, pain and low mood.<\/p>\n
Volunteering, feeling needed and appreciated within your community, helping others \u2013 all of these activities may give your sister a real sense of purpose, a feeling of connection, and may actually be emotionally important opportunities for her to get out of the house, have some time away from caring responsibilities at home, and give her some distractions. I understand your instinct may be to try to make her sit still, to take it easy, to wrap her in cotton wool \u2013 but it\u2019s important to not only respect your sister\u2019s agency, but to understand how the ways she chooses to spend her time enrich her life, before simply telling her to give them up.<\/p>\n