This is long, sorry in advance. My big sister (Amber) had her first baby two days ago. My family is thrilled (my mom especially) and my folks are buying my older brother and myself plane tickets so that we can go out and see her at the end of the month. I'm a little stressed . . .

When I was 18, I left home and flew across the country to go to college and live with Amber and her husband. Amber was always cruel to me growing up, but since she'd gotten married I hadn't seen her in a couple years and I thought maybe she'd gotten past her unusually bitchy ways - especially since she'd OFFERED to have me come stay with her and her hubby while I went to school.

She didn't change at all. And in fact, since I didn't have the folks around anymore and was in "her territory", she got worse. I was unable to go to school due to random life crap, but my sister made my life a living hell. Her and her hubby.

They'd demand $600 for rent, when I was only making a little more than that a month. Which meant after I paid my phone bill (a shitty cheap flip phone, only for bare minimum usage), and after I put gas in my moped, most of the time I wouldn't have enough money to buy food. If I wanted THEIR food, I'd have to ask. Sometimes they said no. And if I asked too often, they'd have a talk with me about money management. I'd tell them I'm paying too much in rent and that's why I couldn't afford my own food half the time, but they refused to lower it because "landlords in the real world don't do that".

I was with them for 3 and a half years. During the last year and a half, money got so tight that I was only able to spend 50 cents a DAY on food. I was living off of one apple a day because I couldn't afford anything else. I was starving. I lost a ton of weight simply because I wasn't eating.

But that wasn't even half of it. She and her husband would constantly make me feel like I was worthless and like I should praise them for their abundant generosity. MULTIPLE times a year, they'd take trips to Disney and vegas and live the high life, and if I asked to go, they'd remind me that I had to stay there and work so that I wouldn't ask them for food anymore.

And on the rare occasions I had extra money, they'd guilt trip me for wanting to spend it on food and tell me about how much money I still owed them (they bought my first weeks worth of groceries and my moped when I first arrived).

I'd always - ALWAYS - try and pick up extra shifts at work, but I just couldn't get the hours sometimes. And when I'd try and look for a better paying job, Amber would remind me that she's the one who got me the job and if I left it'd reflect poorly on her. And heaven forbid I got sick and had to call in. I'd go to work sick as a dog just so I wouldn't have to have another guilt trip lecture from them about money. The entire 3 and a half years I was there was a nightmare.

I was finally able to scrounge up enough money to move back home. My parents know a little of how they treated me, and I've tried telling my friends, but no one seems to want to really listen. It's been 6 years since then. I've seen Amber and her hubby twice in that time (they came here for a visit) and both times they made me feel the way I did when I was living with them. Like garbage.

But now, I'm flying back out there - out to that hell hole of a place and will be staying with them for a couple days. My only saving grace is that the rest of my family will be with me, but I'm still nervous. I don't want anything to do with her or her hubby or their baby, but she's FAMILY, and it'd break my parents hearts if I told them that. They're extremely family oriented. Family is everything.

Has anyone else been through this? How did you handle it? I'm sorry this is so long, I just had to get it all off my chest.

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