Thank you.
Hello and welcome back to a new episode of Hot Pursuit, a podcast about creating conversations where nothing is off limits.
This podcast is produced by Asian Boss Girl.
Hi, my name is Emily.
I'm the older sister you've always wanted hi, my name's jen, i'm the cheese ball in your snack drawer and i'm madeline, your girl who thinks everything really is that deep.
I feel like sibling order is kind of like the new zodiac.
I mean, it's not like a new zodiac, but you can tell so much about a person based off of where they fall in the sibling order.
You can also tell which sibling they are, just based off how they interact with you.
Yeah.
Can people guess what sibling order you guys are when they meet you?
Have people tried to guess?
Are they right?
Are they wrong?
Are you shaman-ing them?
They're right.
They're right.
Yeah, they're always right.
I get a mix.
Oh.
What about you?
There's less of my kind, so most people don't guess.
Yeah, you actually give that you have siblings.
You don't have siblings.
Yeah, meanwhile, I get guessed that I'm an only child, and I take it as the greatest insult.
Let's share our sibling order.
I'm an only child.
I'm an older sister to a younger sister.
I am a younger sister to an older brother.
So we got only child, older sister, baby of the family.
We run the gamut.
We do.
Of sibling diversity.
Yes.
Yes, my intro is the older sister you've always wanted, because I've always been an older sister and I had to become one, like the best older sister, because that was what was expected of me.
You feel it's your responsibility in life.
And so not only are you an older sister in reality to sweet baby Janelle, when you meet other people, you feel the responsibility to kind of be an older sister to everyone, which is why, when you came on this podcast, you want to be an older sister to whoever's listening.
So my sister and I are two years apart, 22 months to be exact.
And it's kind of opposite, because you would know older siblings to be the rule followers and the ones that are very obedient to their parents.
But I feel like it was switched where I felt like I was always kind of rebelling and trailblazing and she was the one that followed all the rules.
And even I talked to her on the phone the other day.
She was like, Just give me any amount of rules and I'll follow them.
That's where I feel the safest.
But I think having an older sibling to kind of pave the way I always tell her, I have paved the way for you, like You were an only child for a whole 22 months before Sweet Baby Janelle came into the picture.
What was that like?
I don't remember.
I don't remember a life without my sister because I was only two years.
I don't even remember my mom being pregnant.
I just remember going to the hospital with my dad and then there was a baby.
And I was like, is that ours?
Is she ours?
And I remember holding her for the first time.
They brought her home and they're like, Emily, sit on the couch and put your arms out.
And she was.
She was born 10 pounds, think two ounces.
She was huge.
She was a week late, she stayed in for too long, but she was 10 pounds and i remember, like holding her like this, i put my arms out and i scooped it and they placed her in my arms and i just remember feeling how hot she was.
I was like she's so heavy, she's so hot.
I feel like i'm holding onto a log and i was like can you please just get her out of here?
But I remember just being so enamored with her.
I'm like this is a new human being and we get to keep her and I get to play with her and she's mine.
And my parents always say that they made her for me.
Oh, that's really sweet.
I know.
With that, I feel like I had to be the best for her because I was really all she had in the world.
I mean, she had friends, she had my parents, but like the closest thing that she could look up to was me.
So I took my role as an older sister very seriously.
So you've always felt that pressure from the very beginning to be everything for her.
Yeah.
Where did that pressure come from?
Oh, my parents.
I remember my parents would say like you need to be a good example for Janelle, because she doesn't know how to do things.
You need to be a good older sister.
And I'm like, I just got here three, four years ago.
I don't even know how to do this.
How am I supposed to be a good example?
But they're like, oh, but you've lived two more years.
So you have two more years of experience so you can teach her.
So she kind of got three parents and one who was just like freshly had learned this new lesson and so i taught her a lot of what she knows now, like she doesn't know any chinese, because when i went to preschool i went to preschool when she was just learning how to talk and when i came back from preschool i would speak to her in english, so she never absorbed any chinese And that was.
It was a consistent rhetoric growing up that my parents expected me to be a good example for her in terms of character and living my life.
So anytime I had any misstep, it wasn't met with much grace, because not only did I mess up, I showed her the wrong way to do something, and then she would learn from that.
So there was so much pressure in not making a mistake, because if I did make a mistake, it felt like I would ruin her life.
That's what that was the messaging I was getting.
Oh my gosh yeah, that's so heavy.
It was heavy.
It was so heavy up until maybe Two or three years ago.
She finally told me, like I apologized.
I was like, I'm sorry I haven't lived a perfect life for you.
And I've made all these mistakes.
I'm so sorry, I'm not the perfect image of a human being that our parents wanted from you.
And all she said she was I think we were just driving and she was like Emily, you don't have to be a good example for me anymore.
I can make my own decisions.
I'm in my twenties now and I can see that you have your own life and I know how to live my own life.
I know how to make my own decisions.
And you aren't the only example that I have to pull from."
And that was so freeing to hear that from her.
And I was like thank you so much for saying that, because I felt like That was my role on this earth to first figure out my life and then to help her figure out hers.
And of course I would do that for her, but it was the constant pressure to be perfect.
And I felt like I couldn't ever measure up.
If I made a mistake or something that I knew would affect maybe her character or influence it poorly, I would hide it from her because I just didn't want her to see an older sister that was not perfect and who made mistakes and who did wrong things even if she knew that it was the wrong thing to do.
Because I think there's a difference in doing a wrong thing on accident versus doing a wrong thing and you know that it's wrong.
So, of course, like I didn't want to be like a toxic figure in her life, even if I was trying to live my own life,
It sounds like you feel almost morally responsible for how she shows up, how she turns out in the world.
And I think a lot of people, a lot of older sisters, talk about being the unsung heroes of families and a lot of the thankless jobs and how they are expected to just absorb so much.
So what are some things that you had to absorb?
I like to tell her that I got the mean version of our parents, because I describe it as the first sibling is the first pancake.
So whenever you make pancakes, The first pancake is always like, maybe the heat's not on right.
Maybe the batter is a little too thick or too thin.
But then you make the second pancake and it's perfect.
But the first pancake is the experimental one.
So that's, I feel like I was the one that my parents, because my parents didn't know how to be parents.
Like I made them parents.
So I was the one that they messed up on.
Or not messed up, but maybe they were too harsh in some ways or too lenient in other ways.
So I feel like I absorbed a lot of their mistakes, which is no fault of theirs, because they were figuring it out too, but it was kind of like they got to try things out new parenting techniques on me.
And if it didn't work, then they would try something else on her.
So I felt growing up I was disciplined a lot because I was trying to figure out life and she got to watch and she got to learn from my mistakes, which is a benefit for a lot of younger siblings.
But it just felt really unfair because I was constantly being punished for trying to explore in this world and trying to forge my own path.
And I remember telling my parents I'm like you never.
You're always punishing me and you're never punishing her.
And they're like, well, that's because she's obedient and she doesn't talk back and she learns.
And so I kind of learned from that that To be a good kid in the eyes of my parents was to just say yes and to not push back.
So I felt a lot of the forging of my path And like trying things that are scary to my parents fell on me because she didn't really know how to do that, because she also felt the pressure of being good and being obedient as well.
A lot of times, those things that you absorb come at the cost of parts of you that maybe aren't able to be acknowledged or have space to come out a little bit more.
Do you have any examples of things that you feel like, as you're starting to see these things more clearly in your family dynamics, that there's little parts of you that you're like I have more freedom to let this flow a little bit more, that I maybe didn't have growing up?
I was always a fighter.
I feel I would listen to people who said no to me.
For example, if I wanted to go to homecoming, they just saw what homecoming was off TV.
So they just saw it.
Yeah, they saw grinding.
They saw underage drinking.
They saw premarital sex.
They saw all of those.
And so they were like of course we're not going to let you to homecoming, because that's what they saw on TV, even though they both grew up in America.
But they just did not participate.
But I was like well, I want to go because it seems like a fun activity that you can do with your friends.
And so I had to fight.
I remember crying and fighting them about just going to a dance.
And I had to present them with this whole thing like, we're going to go as a group.
I'm going to wear this dress.
I'm going to go with these people.
And you can trust them.
And if you need to meet their parents, then here are their contacts.
In the end, they allowed me to go.
I just had to give them hourly updates.
But because of that, it was easy for her to go the next year.
She said, I'm going to homecoming.
And they said, OK.
And so for me, I'm like, I did that for you.
That OK from them was earned through my tears.
So yeah, so i've always been a fighter and so now that i'm, i kind of get to exist outside of that sphere of protection and fear.
I feel like now i can be a little bit more experimental in my self-expression.
And i still do get feedback from my parents.
Sometimes they're like i don't like that.
That was like, i don't like how you were displaying yourself in this way.
Can you come over to this box?
And it's still a dance.
It's still a dance.
But I still I see the value in pushback, because that's the only way really you can get what you want is if you push back and you fight for yourself.
And that's something I'm trying to teach my sister too, because I think she's still kind of her hands are tied by that fear which she has expressed to me.
And I'm like, just take baby steps, just push back, push back.
So we didn't tell my parents this, but next week she is getting a tattoo apprenticeship.
We didn't tell them.
And I'm going home. so that she could give me a tattoo because I am her greatest supporter.
I want her to push back and I want her to achieve her dreams.
So I was like, I got her a tattoo gun a few years ago.
And she was like, she just never touched it.
I'm like, you have to do this.
Cause if you never do it, then you'll never do it.
So she finally took that one step.
And I know our parents are going to be so mad, but I'm so proud of her for doing that.
And for I know my mom watches this podcast.
So sorry, mother, but not really.
Like she needs to she needs to express in the way that she wants.
And I think this is so important for her to do.
And I'm going to be there every step of the way supporting her.
I was curious when you meet other older siblings, do you find that you relate to them or have camaraderie?
Or are the eldest sibling?
Stereotypes do you find to be true when you meet others that have similar experiences?
Or is there a specific, like it's eldest daughters that you relate to?
Yeah, because I think something that's different about you is personality type.
You are a fighter, and I think older siblings typically fight a little less.
They learn to kind of absorb it.
You learn throughout the years to take it and not fight back to your parents.
You learn throughout the years to choose the path of least resistance with your parents sometimes.
And that's difficult for your personality type because you are ultimately a fighter.
And so that's a little different from like the typical that you see.
I think for older siblings, their personality is inconsistent.
There's not a common thread in personality, but in the way that they are considerate of others and the way they acknowledge people is very similar.
You could have someone who's like an extrovert older sibling versus an introvert older sibling and they can behave very differently, but they would be the first one to set a napkin down at the table.
Or like if you sneeze they would bring you a tissue, which is like in action.
And i think it's notable to acknowledge age difference too, because sometimes people are maybe five years difference in age versus, for me, two years.
She kind of feels like a peer, like a baby, but still a peer, so we're able to go through life differently.
Some older siblings actually just act like parents, So that's a very common thread that I've been able to see.
You mentioned that your younger sister gets to reap a lot of the benefits of the path that you have forged.
I'm wondering if you ever feel a little bit of Do you ever have spicy feelings about it?
Yeah.
Do you ever feel a bit of resentment that she gets to just waltz through life?
Sometimes.
I did a lot of prediction in the past.
I would fight with my parents for the thing that I wanted.
And then, as the argument kind of closed out, I would be like I bet you will let Janelle do this without a fight next year.
And they'll say, no, we won't.
And lo and behold, next year she gets to do it with zero resistance.
And I just kind of stand there like, huh, interesting.
That's very interesting.
So there was, of course, there's a bit of resentment, but at the same time, I feel proud that she's able to glide through life. because of the stage that I set up for her.
I remember the first time, like once I got my license.
Literally that evening my dad was like Janelle needs to be somewhere for school.
Can you take her?
So I was like immediately immediately, I'm like thrust into this, like you have a privilege, but now you have a responsibility.
So I felt like I was always driving her around, which I don't mind.
I love hanging out with her, but it was kind of the being voluntold to do things without asking me if I was okay with that.
That was just completely absent in my childhood and i remember i i give her crap for this story a lot.
I just i never let her live it down.
Every time um, she needed school supplies, we would go to target.
She's like, can you bring me to target?
I need to get some like markers or something.
So we would go to target, we would find her markers when we would line up and then i would notice that she's not shuffling through her bag And I'm like Janelle, how are you expecting to pay for this?
And she just looks at me with these giant eyes.
She goes, your money?
And I remember yelling at her.
I'm like, you cannot expect me to pay for all of your school supplies.
How do you think I get money?
I'm only 16.
So I, of course, of course I paid for it.
Um, cause I love to spoil her and everything, but it's kind of like that learned expectation from her as well for me to take care of her.
And I'm just like, who's gonna take care of me?
And I felt I feel like that overarching emotion of like no one's going to take care of me has been something that I've kind of carried throughout my lifetime.
So whenever I get just like an ounce of care from anyone, namely an older sibling, it just it feels so nice because this is just not my normal mode of operating.
So obviously 22 months in, a hot log was thrust upon you.
Growing up.
Did you ever wish you didn't have any siblings or had a different sibling, or did you always
Yeah.
How did you feel about having your baby sister?
No, I adore her so much.
I can't imagine, I can't imagine my life without her.
She's just she.
Our parents call her or sunshine because she.
She was born with a full head of hair and she had, like this sunshine clip and she just looked like a doll.
I remember visiting her crib every single day and just checking in to see like Is the child OK?
I would like to see the baby.
And so even now, as she's married, she owns a house, she has a dog of her own.
I just I still see her as my baby.
And I like to tell her that even when we're like 82 and 80 years old, I'm still gonna see her as my baby, because I would do anything for her.
And when she was looking for a job, I was so scared for her because I was like, oh no, she can't survive in this real world.
She's been protected all this time.
If anything happens to her, I would blame myself.
I just feel so protective over her, but I've also been able to see her grow in her own strength.
I'm just so inspired by her because she has expressed to me that she actually doesn't like being called a baby.
She doesn't mind if we call her the baby, but since we say it so much, everyone else thinks she's a baby.
So she feels like she has to prove that she can do things for herself.
She's like, that's why I bought my own house.
That's why I bought a dog.
So people can see that I can do things.
I'm just so proud of how she's been able to shape her own life.
But I don't know.
I always think of the most dramatic scenarios where like, if it's between me or her who's gonna take the bullet, and it's always gonna be me.
I will never let her get hurt in this world.
If it's up to me, i will always step in front of the bullet and i will take anything bad that happens to her, because i just believe that she deserves, like the richest, most beautiful life, because because she's mine And she was made for me.
So I feel very protective over her.
Like so much so that I would just discard my own life so that she could have hers.
It almost sounds like parental love without the discipline.
You get the good parts.
There's still responsibility, but and the and the responsibility and the weight of that too.
Yeah, but she's just my best friend and my most favorite person on this earth.
She's your sea star.
Yeah, she's my sister.
She's gonna she's gonna do a really cool tattoo on me next week.
I can't wait to show you guys.
If she wanted me to steal the moon, I would.
I would find a way.
Yeah.
I'm curious to know how being an older sibling has shaped a lot of who you are today and some of the traits that you have that make you you.
I feel like when I meet a new person, I see their heart a lot quicker because I've been able to be protective of someone else's heart.
So I'm very sensitive to fear.
I'm really sensitive to.
When I meet a new person, I can sense when they feel vulnerable and I'm able to both draw that out and create a safe space for them if that's what they want.
Sometimes that's not what people want, but I feel I don't think maternal is a good word, but I feel very like older sisterly to to younger people.
I don't know even older people.
I'm able to identify the child in them and the child who hasn't been given space to come out.
As a role, as an older sister on this earth, I just feel like I'm a really considerate person.
And I always wanna make sure people are okay.
And I wanna make sure people are happy.
And that might not be good because sometimes I'm not happy when other people are not happy.
But being able to influence and drop words of wisdom at a drop of a hat, I think I'm very good at.
I love a good platitude.
Being an older sibling is a huge honor.
It's a huge burden, but it's a bigger honor.
And I'm very happy and very blessed to be given this kind of life.
We talked about me being an older sibling, but Jennifer, she is the only child.
There aren't very many of us in the world.
I often don't come across only children.
So for the longest time there was always stereotypes for the other sibling order, like the middle child, the youngest, the baby of the family.
But I was just in my own little world being like, well, I'm an only child, just me and my parents.
I would say the biggest stereotype about us is that we're bratty and spoiled and entitled.
So I take it as the biggest compliment when people say that they don't think I'm an only child.
I'm like, okay.
And I think it's really interesting because a lot of times parents of only children I found especially Asian parents are very aware that that can be a dynamic that exists around the child being spoiled.
So they'll sometimes overcompensate to raise a child to be hyper-considerate of others.
Is that what your parents did?
Yes.
That's what my parents did.
You're talking about grand.
Yes.
How true do you think those stereotypes are?
It makes sense, because all of the love that both parents have gets channeled into this one tiny human, But that also means that all of the expectations also get channeled into this one tiny human.
Did you feel that way?
I think that only child guilt that comes from a strong sense of duty and responsibility to take care of your parents' expectations is very real.
So a story that I have is that one of my friends who's also an only child her best friend from high school, also an only child We were planning a birthday dinner for a bunch of us and one of the girls that we invited is also an only child and she couldn't make it.
After we were all there and she said she couldn't make it.
There was such a long apology and so much like I'm so sorry I couldn't make it.
And we all just sat there and were like, ah, only child guilt.
We get it.
And I've never felt such camaraderie with others that I was like, oh my gosh, wait, you feel it too?
You feel it too?
And there's just a moment of like.
We all identified exactly what was happening in her, which is that she felt like she couldn't meet a bar that was set, that she probably set for herself, and was like overcompensating by it, profusely apologizing because the guilt was very strong.
So we talked the rest of the evening about only child guilt.
And I feel like it's opened my eyes a lot to how there's a lot of that in many areas of my life.
How else does that manifest?
What are other examples of when the only child guilt gets flared?
Yeah, it comes up a lot in expectations that I set for myself.
So it might come up at work, like, I think I should have done this well, but then I didn't.
Or showing up for a friend.
I wanted to be able to have three hours to be able to talk with her about something that was happening, but I could only have 20 minutes.
And then I'm like, oh, I couldn't show up for her.
It shows up in every area of my life and it comes from the fact that when your parents set those expectations for you, you end up absorbing them and then taking ownership of them and then setting them for yourself.
But because your parents have such high expectations from a young age, you are trained to believe like that's the bar that you should constantly, constantly be meeting.
So I find that the overachieving, the sense of duty and responsibility for the things that you take on is very strong, because it comes from parental sources at first, but then it kind of becomes your own.
Because you said your parents set such high expectations for you.
Was there a fear of very intense repercussions if you didn't meet those expectations?
Because if she was apologizing profusely, that means maybe she's afraid of something.
Yeah, I've thought a lot about this the past year because I'm seeing that guilt run so much of my life when I feel like I've failed or haven't met a bar that I've set or I think I should be meeting.
And I think for me where it comes from is when you don't meet a bar or you don't meet the expectations of your parents.
You bear the full weight of that responsibility and it feels like the displeasure you are now cast, almost like cast out from the family until you earn your way back into affection.
Approval again.
Because, as in an only child family, the only source of chaos or conflict is literally from you alone.
You don't see that it can come from any other source.
So the weight of it feels greater because it's such a small, tightly controlled environment.
So everything, everything feels bigger because now it's them two together and you are almost like- Them against you.
They needed to be a united front because they are the parents.
That's so hard.
But it's more like when I messed up or I didn't meet the bar and expectation, I was always alone.
There was no one else to talk to.
There was no one else to be there.
I just absorbed all of the like.
Oh well, now I need to know.
This is why I can't do this ever again.
And I know how to please and be what they want.
One of the assumptions you have concluded growing up is that you must go through this life alone kind of, when it comes to responsibilities.
Yeah, I spent a lot of time alone through, whether it's like playing by myself or dealing with things by myself.
If my parents understood, then that was great.
If they didn't understand, then it was just me, you know?
And so I'm really great at absorbing and internalizing things myself.
And my instinct is not to share them.
My instinct is not to bring other people into it.
My instinct because I've always done this is just figure it out yourself, process it yourself, deal with things yourself,
So it breeds hyper independence, which can be sometimes detrimental, because I'm not able to bring other people into the fold as easily as I find that others are able to quickly share things or they're willing to ask for help.
And that does not come naturally for me at all.
Did you notice examples growing up of people being able to connect with others easier because they had siblings?
The thing that I remember observing a lot more is that they're much more okay with conflict.
My mom jokes with me all the time.
Now she's like you need to fight with people because no one ever fought with you when you were younger.
No one ever said, you're like, that's not my problem.
She's like, no one ever says mean things to you.
You never, you need to develop tougher skin.
And I'm like Oh okay, you're like i would have liked some help growing up that you could have given me through the form of maybe, a sibling.
Yeah, it's ironic because i, i also didn't want something.
My mom, when i was younger, asked me if i wanted siblings.
Oh, and i for a few years said i wanted an older brother.
That ship had sailed, obviously.
And then I said no, I didn't want siblings.
How old were you when you said no?
I think I was pretty young.
I was like, no, I don't want siblings.
And then my mom was like, OK, we'll be there with you.
We'll be your siblings.
Do you feel that?
I do.
I feel like one of the really special parts of being an only child is the closeness that I have with my parents, especially as an adult.
Now i feel like we're like a little group of friends, like we're a little trio, we like we'll go on vacation together, we have the best time together and i there's so much condensed time spent with them talking and sharing, and they weren't distracted by other children in the house except for me, so So we had a lot of time to bond.
And so those bonds go really, really deep because we got so much time together, so much quality time together.
Growing up when I was younger, I did not feel like they were my siblings.
Now, I like tease and bicker with my father.
Like he's like my older brother, even though, yeah.
Yeah, John always says like, My parents are my siblings.
I'm like, no, they're not.
It's not the same.
You can't trash talk your parents with your parents.
They have authority over you.
There's still a bit of respect.
Yeah, you wouldn't like pull the hair of your mom, you know what I mean?
Yeah, you wouldn't punch your mom, right?
You wouldn't say disrespectful things to your mom the same way.
But it is nice that you're so close to them.
So you basically determined your future by saying you didn't want a sibling.
And now as an adult, it sounds like you wouldn't change that answer, but do you ever wonder?
I do wonder.
I always got asked growing up, do you want siblings?
Did you miss not having siblings?
And I was like, I always in my head was like, I don't know.
I don't know what it's like to have siblings.
So no, I wouldn't.
I think there's a lot of trade-offs.
I think I had to grow up a lot faster.
One dynamic of being an only child that I think is different from having siblings to play with is that I was thrust into adult world much faster.
I just spent so much time like running errands with my parents and sitting at the dinner table and like listening to their conversation.
So there was less like parent-child dynamics often.
They would just be adults and they would expect that I'm an adult together with them.
And so I think I was around adult world sooner than probably most children that maybe would play with their sibling.
When my parents were buying a new house and I was in like fourth grade, we went to so many different open houses and they would just take me along and I would had my like, like games and stuff.
But I often would just sit back and listen.
I remember so many moments as a kid, thinking back where I was just in the world of adults, listening to adult conversations and watching and observing and all of the dynamics, how the real estate agent tried to sell the house, the way that the seller like there's just and I think that's informed a lot of like hyper observant, like awareness and sensitivity to people and little quirks and things that they do that I picked up on just from like having to be quiet and watch a lot as a kid.
It's interesting that you attribute that to being an only child, because i'm hearing you say all these things and i'm like well, i feel like people with siblings do that as well.
So i'm wondering like yeah, what specifically about that was?
Like it was a specific to being an only child, you know.
Because I'm like, I hear you.
I'm like, I went to open houses and listened to the same thing.
And like, I also like went and got groceries with my parents.
So, like how is that different in your perspective from like?
Yeah, I think a lot of.
It is maybe just the amount of time spent going along to and running errands with, and also being sometimes the only kid at, adult parties and dinner parties.
If you're just one more, they kind of just add you to the mix.
As opposed to like childcare.
Yeah, exactly.
Exactly.
Like I was not growing up, like when we went to other people's houses and stuff.
Sometimes there were the kids' tables but sometimes there weren't.
And you're just at the adult table because you're like ah, I'll pull up a smaller chair, put a phone book on it and like be quiet.
But then being quiet, I'm just like listening to everybody else.
I think also play looked very different.
A lot of independent solo play.
My mom would tell me that she would often sometimes not schedule play dates for me because she wanted me to be able to be okay with and learn to play along, which I thought was such an interesting intentional choice.
Yeah, a lot of puzzles, a lot of like just solo absorbed time and like imaginative play where, like nobody else is having a world build with you.
Like you, build the world by yourself, which is different from how I hear a lot of siblings play together or they'll play together, versus a lot of times I was playing by myself.
Do you find that you, like is your default to choose to do things alone now that you are an adult and you've like, experienced other relationships and like people that have siblings and you can think kind of outside of the paradigm of being an only child?
Yeah, I think my instinct is always to just take care of handle things by myself, because that's what I've always done.
It's often not that I think that I should ask for help and then I choose not to.
It's like I don't even think to ask for the help to begin with, because I think my default assumption is okay, you can do it, figure it out, and no one we'll be there to help you anyway.
And so even learning the muscle of asking for help, being in community, being with other people and asking for help.
It's like a new muscle, because the default is let me just do it.
One time I ordered a sofa for this new apartment that I was moving into in Seattle and it was so big and i lugged it all the way up to my apartment by myself and i was so frustrated and tired and i literally sat on the floor and i cried and then i was like, why didn't i ask for help for this?
I'm just sitting there with like these giant cardboard boxes, being like i can't do it.
Oh my god.
Part of being like maybe single female living alone, but also instinct, is the package came.
I'm going to bring it up.
And I never even crossed my mind and be like, Oh, let me text a friend to see if they're free.
Not very independent, very independent.
Do you have someone in your life that is the closest thing to a sibling?
Yeah.
I find that only child, only child friendships are really special, because they know what it's like to do a lot of life alone.
And they also don't have siblings in their life.
And so you almost feel like chosen sisters in a way.
So one of my good friends from college is like that.
She's also an only child.
Our family growing up dynamics are so similar.
And so we experience a lot of the same burdens, traumas and also tendencies that we're learning and unlearning all at the same time.
Now she feels like a chosen sister.
And it's funny when our parents are visiting us in town, they'll like take both of us out to dinner.
We're one family and both of our parents to the other will be like Thank you so much for being here helping take care of her, being there with her.
And so seeing our parents almost like adopt us into each other's families is really sweet.
That's so sweet.
Yeah.
When you have the option to have your own family.
Do you want to have one child or multiple children?
Ooh, I get asked this question a lot too, because they're like did you like it enough to want it yourself?
Yeah.
When I was younger, I wanted three kids because I thought it'd be cool to have a bigger family.
Now that I get older, I think it's really beautiful to have just one kid, because the bonds that you have with them are so special.
Um, i think i got lucky with two parents that really grew together with me and are so fun now especially.
I think the sweetness of being an adult now and not being a child and getting to be friends with them is really special and the closeness is is unparalleled.
Like we're just a little trio and so To be able to have that and pour all of my love into this one person would be fabulous.
I would like to not replicate pouring all of the expectations into the child so they're not crest under the weight of that, but all of the love can go to that one child and just to have that closeness I think is so special that I'd want to create again.
Yeah.
You noted that all of their expectation is placed on you.
Is that something you still feel today?
And is that something you feel like you're going to feel for the rest of your life?
Do you feel like you cannot disappoint them even now?
Well, first of all, I'm great at being the perfect daughter.
I know how to do it very well.
And I feel like I've had a complicated relationship with it because sometimes I really lament it and I'm frustrated sometimes with not being able to have the full freedom to be maybe all that I feel free fully to be, because I know that some parts might upset or create dissonance and friction with my parents which, growing up as we mentioned earlier like I would run from.
But I also recognize more clearly now that it comes from a desire to love them.
I just wanted to make them happy.
But sometimes loving someone at the cost of yourself is also not good either.
And so understanding where the balance is to give them and love them in that way, but then also still acknowledge and honor parts of myself.
It's something honestly that I'm still kind of walking out and figuring out now.
So I don't know.
But I also think, now that I'm older too, the parents are loosening the reins a little bit too, which helps a lot.
What is one thing about you that you wish your parents knew?
Ooh.
That's a good question.
And celebrated.
Yeah.
I think I'm much more emotional than I sometimes let on, because sometimes my emotions can, because they love me, can create worry in them.
Oh.
So if you're sad, they're like oh no, we need to make sure you're happy.
Yes, we won't be happy until you're happy.
And for a while i was just frustrated with like, why can't you just understand that i'm sad right now?
And i can see more clearly now that their instinct is oh my gosh, my daughter, my sweet baby, is sad.
I want to make her happy, so i'm going to say everything to try and convince her or help her understand why it's going to be okay, you know When.
All I want sometimes is someone to just sit with me in it and be like hold my tears, wipe my tears, bring me a tissue.
So I think that's one thing that I think they would be more surprised at just how much I feel.
And I feel very deeply that I might not always have the space to fully express as much to them.
What would it look like if you actually shared your emotions with them and asked them to just let you be sad?
I'm learning to voice that more clearly to them.
Like sometimes now I'll just say, I just am feeling sad about it, and I will be OK.
Don't worry about it.
I just wanted to tell you.
And they have done an amazing job being like, oh, OK, cool.
But the instinct and I think especially when I was younger and I couldn't voice that as clearly was to explain why it's going to be OK and use a lot of logic very Asian parent to explain why we're going to be OK.
I didn't feel like I was going to be okay sometimes, and I just needed to sit in that.
So I'm better without being triggered by feeling like my emotions are validated.
I can let my emotions almost take up space and just say, this is how I'm feeling.
I'm really sad about it.
I'm going to be okay, but I'm just sad today.
And they're like, okay.
And that sometimes it creates worry in them, but sometimes and I'm learning to have to be okay with that too
And then I think it helps to recognize that their worry comes from love and not because they're trying to invalidate my emotions, even though that is a byproduct sometimes.
So I love that.
Yeah.
You have to learn to kind of like.
You have to tell them what the expectation should be and then just say that's my piece.
And be okay with sitting in the tension too, the discomfort that you have caused.
Yeah.
I find that I relate a lot to older, oldest siblings because they often carry a strong weight and responsibility and parental expectations.
They were only children for many years, until a little one came along.
But also just the sweetness of closeness with your parents that is by kind of built into the way that your family unit exists, is you spend so much time with them conversing talking, chatting and um, that relationship is really special.
It's like they made me their world when i was little and now, growing up, now they get to be my world too.
So yeah, only children.
There's a few of us we're repping out there.
The youngest child, hi guys, the brat, that is the youngest sibling, The baby.
The baby.
The forever baby who gets everything she wants.
Who has it easy in life, who will pick fights, who thinks that people need to worship the ground up.
No, I'm just kidding.
Oh my gosh.
I'm just kidding.
No, you say that, but you're not kidding.
Okay, I'm not kidding.
So what was it like being the youngest baby of the family, the littlest one?
You completed your family.
I am a younger sister to an older brother, which I feel like is a very specific type of younger siblingry younger siblinghood.
How many years apart?
We're three years apart and i think that younger, younger girl sisters to older brothers have a very specific type of grit to them.
They have, like a thicker skin.
They they can appear more chill doesn't mean that they actually are more chill um, but they've just had to like, deal with a lot of just boy energy in their life.
And so I think like just show up in the world a little differently.
So like one thing that we always talk about is like Em has only had like girls in her life and then Jae is just an only child.
And I often say that I feel like an ogre in front of them because, like because they just show up so feminine and soft and I don't feel that way at all.
So has life felt easy for you?
That feels a little pointed.
It is.
This is like classic older sibling, younger sibling.
So how nice are the roads that were paved before you got here?
Hearing you talk about being an older sibling gives me a lot of sympathy for my older brother, I think, because he did have to deal with a lot of my parents just being harder on him.
I see the scars that that has caused in him and what he has to carry in the world because of it.
And, like you said, you can't fault your parents for it, because they were just doing the best that they could.
But of course that caused some trauma, some pain.
He just has to carry that around, which is like not great.
And then watch me reap the benefits.
So I think, in some ways, like you get to watch your older, like the mistakes that your older sibling makes and know exactly what to avoid, whether that's with your parents or that's in the real world, kind of like seeing how they react to friends, or like what path they choose to take in school or even in their career.
And I think like my brother and I have have quite different interests to begin with.
So it's not like one thing was better than the other.
Kind of similar to what Jay was saying, like observing a lot growing up and then kind of like choosing how to deploy what you see is most fit.
So what are the benefits that you received?
Let's be specific.
I would expect that my brother would pay for meals.
Go on.
It's funny because he would be like, it's okay, I got you, but I'm going to collect.
Don't you worry.
Did you feel like your parents were softer on you because you were a girl?
Yeah, I think that we had to deal with such different.
We had like a different set of problems to face in addition to being older younger, sibling.
I think like the societal expectations of like what a guy should be versus like what a girl should be, and how the guy should respond to girls, how the guy should respond to authority versus how a girl should respond to authority, so like the girl should kind of like be submissive and that's not necessarily what my parents trained into me but um, watching society and seeing like that's how i should be behaving, versus like my brother um, I can't speak to like what he felt, I guess in that but I saw that he would take the path of least resistance and just kind of like okay, I'm not gonna cause conflict, like I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna take it, I'm gonna shut up and I'm gonna go to my room, you know um, and so, contrasting to you um, like i was always the fighter in the family, like i would always talk back, i would always like pick the fight with my, with my dad or my mom, and my brother would never do that, he would never talk back.
Um, so i think that shows up in your confidence and how you show up in the world, like you are willing to to cause discomfort a lot more freely, I think.
Like, how did you almost feel, like learn to feel comfortable causing discomfort chaos, friction in your family?
Because a lot of younger siblings do feel that.
They feel more emboldened to voice their needs and trust that I'm going to just shoot my shot anyway and try.
Because the repercussions won't be as harsh as harsh or severe.
And i think, like part of it is just like you just get it unfortunately, like because you are the baby.
Um, i think, like you, you just kind of get the easier path sometimes, which is like terrible to say, but it's true.
And so i think, as a result, like I don't, I don't, I don't walk through the world expecting that, like I'm going to get X, Y and Z, like I find actually that I have to fight really hard for it.
But like, maybe that feeds into like I feel I have to work so much harder because I'm used to expecting that I should.
I mean, I don't know like how much of, how much of that is the truth versus how much is you know like just how the world is built?
And I'm sure there's like, I'm sure there's like strong threads of truth in both.
I really feel for my brother, I think.
And like, when it comes to like making friends, I would always like I don't know, were you always not wanting Janelle to like be friends with your friends?
Like my brother would have my friends over and I'd be like, I wanna hang out.
And he'd be like, no.
Get your own friends.
Yeah, yeah.
And it's like I had my own friends, but I just wanted to like.
I thought my older brother was so cool.
I wanted to be cool like him.
I looked up to him and like everything he accomplished I was like I want to do that.
You know, he started swimming, he started playing piano and I didn't do that because I was too young.
But then, like when I was asked like, of course I want to do because that's what my brother does.
So you mentioned earlier that girls with brothers have a certain kind of grit that other girls don't, which I agree.
I do not envy girls with brothers because do you feel like he influences how you see men outside of your family?
Yeah, definitely.
Um, i think one part of that is like men can just be so much meaner with words and so, like i'm used to saying like really mean things and like it doesn't actually i don't actually mean that necessarily, but like girls who have grown up with only girls will take it really personally and i have to like walk it back, like no no, i didn't mean to hurt you.
Like you know um, that's just kind of how i have been raised being a bro yeah yeah, but like that's like really hurtful, and so i've had to like walk that back and relearn a lot of those things.
Um, but then, at the same time, like i have like boy vernacular, You do.
I have boy interests that are slightly developed because I just watched what my brother did growing up and saw those things as cool.
So of course, I wanted to be like him.
And so I think the way that the world perceives you can be different from what you actually feel sometimes.
Because I feel like a girl, but I don't necessarily I don't feel as feminine as I look.
That sounds kind of dumb.
Yeah, but going back to your question about like, does it affect how I view men?
I think absolutely, because my brother is like an older figure in my life and like he's an older male figure.
And so whatever he thought was cool, or whatever he thought, whatever he gave his approval to Especially when it came to me, I thought, was how I needed to show up in the world to get the approval of men.
And which is another topic that is really complicated, I think.
But like growing up and finding that sometimes like what my brother said versus like what most guys think sometimes is not true and was just like what my brother's opinion was, was a little groundbreaking for me, which sounds so elementary.
If my brother thought a pair of jeans was really cool, I would see that he would wear that pair of jeans.
And I'm like, oh, I want one of those.
He's like, yeah, you should get one.
But then later, I look back, and I'm like, that looked terrible.
But he would say that it looks good.
And I'm like, that was awful.
Why would I ever do that?
And I think another thing is growing up you just play what your older sibling wants to play most of the time, or that's what I did.
So like my brother would want to like play karate, or like he would play on gaming consoles, you know, and I would just watch him play like Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat.
And so I have like Yesterday, I was out with Jen, and she borrowed one of my t-shirts.
It was literally a graphic of Ryu from Street Fighter.
And it's like, why would I own that?
But I thought that was cool.
And to this day, I bought the t-shirt because I was like, oh, it's my childhood.
But what girls fewer girls would would probably think that that was cool.
So it informed almost your interests, maybe hobbies a little bit, but also the intangible things of how you show up in the world.
I'm curious if you ever wanted sisters or desired for like younger siblings at all.
Um, having like maybe met other people with different sibling dynamics especially, i think at school, kids always talk about their sibling dynamics together.
Did you desire for anything different when you were little?
Well, my mom has eight siblings.
Yeah.
And my dad has four siblings.
And I've always loved growing up in a huge family just like having so many people to talk to and play with.
And so I always thought it would be cool to have more siblings, but not like a ton, just a couple more.
And then I always wonder how different my brother and I would be if we had other siblings, because me and my brother are really close.
And I think if there were two more in the mix or one more in the mix like maybe we wouldn't have a chance at being as close.
And to kind of like validate you Em, though i i've always wondered how it would be if i had more siblings, but i've never felt that my brother wasn't enough like i.
He's, he's like everything, and that's all I've known to want, and that's all I do want.
I wish he was a little more protective sometimes and I wish he was a little nicer and not a bully.
But I love him and he's a part of me.
We look the same.
You do.
You guys are copy-paste.
We have the same mannerisms.
We think the same.
I have always actually been really thankful that I don't have a sister, because I feel like the comparison would be really really rough.
I don't know why I feel that way.
That was a question I had for both of you, which was like comparison between siblings, which I never had to deal with.
I know a lot of siblings had to deal with, oh, you're so similar.
You're so different from your sister in this way.
It's like people trying to understand who you are by understanding you in context of people that came from the same genetics as you.
What did it look like having to deal with other people comparing you with your sibling?
When I was younger?
I just wanted to be like as good at he was at everything, because he's really smart and he was really like.
He was good at swimming and he was good.
He was good at everything that he did.
So I just wanted to be like him, which was good.
But then I think, like as we got older, we just kind of diverged in paths and there is not so much comparison anymore.
I think there was an aspect of when you're in school and he has gone before you and everyone kind of expects you to be a certain way, that you feel like I'm different, you know, like I am unique, when in reality, like they've forged the path for you and it's actually a good thing.
I don't know.
You kind of have to fight for your uniqueness, I suppose, is what it feels like.
Do you feel like there's parts of his personality that you adopted?
Yeah, for sure.
Because I looked up to him so much.
And to this day, there's so many parts of him that are just the core of my being.
I think I would watch how he shows up with his friends, like in his friend group, and the responses that he would get.
And so I've just kind of like modeled myself off of what I would see as successful.
And since he's cool, he's very much cooler than I will ever be.
I've gotten to reap the benefits of like the cool hack, even though I am not naturally cool.
You know how to perform it.
I know how to act.
Yeah, I know how to perform cool, but I mean you might disagree, but I can act cool even though I'm not cool on the inside.
I think you're cool.
Oh, thanks.
You're very cool.
So you've heard a spread of three very different family dynamics.
I feel like we've covered almost all variables, like siblings, no siblings older younger, and sisters and brothers.
I think the common thread has been like they've really informed who we are today.
Some of the character traits that we have, how we show up in the world, some of our tendencies, some of our greatest strengths have all come from our little family worlds and so if we want to understand more deeply, like who we are and who we each are, seeing how we exist in our worlds of our families is essential.
So i think the conclusion is basically sibling order is the new horoscope, or it's always true.
It's always been a horoscope And it's always been a very accurate identifier of who you are as a person, how you exist in this world.
If you had to guess what we were before us telling you, what would you have guessed each of us were?
Let us know in the comments.
We are on youtube spotify, apple podcast, wherever you get your podcast.
We love to hear from you.
So leave a comment below let us know your sibling order, how that has played into how you exist in this world.
We love to hear from you.
Hot pursuit out.
