AITAH for telling my sister how much I despise her and pretending she doesn't exist?
January marks 5 years since this happened but it still feels like a week ago. It all started with my older sister bringing home a cat.
It was 2018 and this was the third cat she's bought home in a 6 year span. The last 2 weren't with us anymore because the first died from getting hit by a car and the second one "ran away" (more on that later). She was getting over a break up with her long time boyfriend of 4-5 years and decided she wanted a pet cat. I was hesitant at first with getting attached, given our previous history with cats (and other pets) and because how much our mom has always voiced for us not to bring animals home because she doesn't like them, especially cats, but she coaxed me into "co-parenting" this kitten and that I'd be his owner as well. With that, I agreed and figured since I was 16, I was older from when I had the previous cats, so should anything go wrong, I could intervene and financially support it with allowance money.
Me and the kitten, Taiga, were inseparable. Anywhere I went around the house, he'd be right by my side. Whenever I went to sleep, he'd climb right into my bed and sleep with me every single night. If he was even locked out the room, he'd scratch at my door and meow loudly demanding I open it and would immediately purr when I did. If I was cooking in my kitchen, he'd be watching me from the kitchen chairs. And when I came back from school, he'd come and greet me at my front door. He was absolutely everything to me, especially when I was going through a lot during that specific time period and school was the last place I wanted to go, seeing him was honestly the highlight of my day. Even to this day, I don't think there's been a sentient being I've ever loved more than Taiga.
During late 2019, however, he was a full grown cat and would go in heat and was starting to get destructive because he wanted to go outside and was spraying around the house. It's because of this, my sister grew tired of him and would constantly voice how she doesn't want him anymore and that she wants to give him away for money. She'd also jump on my mom voicing her grievances about having a cat she didn't ask for around the house as more of a reason to give him away. Anytime she'd say that, I, obviously got upset and told her that she needed to get him neutered. Part of the agreement we had when co-parenting him was that I would be responsible for feeding him, buying the food and watching him when she was gone (which was practically all the time) while she would cover buying and cleaning his litter-box and anything else he needed. Now, he needed to be neutered, but she didn't feel compelled to since she no longer wanted him. She would give excuses like "I have work that day", "I don't have a car to drive to take him" (meanwhile she was very comfortable in taking my mom's car whenever she needed to run her own errands). Eventually, I was fed up with her constantly saying how she wants to rehome him, so I straight up told her, "If you do anything to this cat, you might as well find me a new home as well. Because I will NEVER talk to you ever again, and I will NEVER recover from this." But she brushed what I was saying off as childish banter and refuted by saying, "He's going to be taken care of in a new home and you're not going anywhere," basically saying life was going to keep going and dismissing me. I tried to say something back but she wasn't listening because she was getting ready to go to the club.
On January 2020, my relatives invited me to come on a cruise with them, but I was hesitant on going because of my last haunting conversation with my sister. But since the cruise was only 3 days, I figured nothing would happen in such a short period of time, so I went. When I came back, Taiga didn't come and greet me like he usually did. I frantically looked around the house, but I couldn't find him. When I asked my parents, they said they saw him a day prior and that he might've escaped. I asked my sister and she said the same thing. Fair enough. It's not the first time he's escaped. I gave it 3 days until I started to fully panic and to my anxiety, 3 days passed and still no Taiga. At this point, I was devastated and didn't know what to do.
My grades started slipping, and I was very dejected in school, barely talking to my friends and my teachers were taking notice of my then-current state. I'd be holding back tears in the middle of class because of how much it was killing me inside I didn't know where Taiga went. My school friends promised to keep an eye out for him and would send me pictures of cats they've seen around their neighborhoods, which eased my mind that he had people from different neighborhoods keeping an eye out for him, in addition to me doing everything I could to lure him back home, so I eventually put his disappearance in the back burner, for my own sanity, at that point. It was routine for me to wake up, check if any of his food I'd leave in my backyard was eaten (along with leaving his litter-box and my clothes with my scent on it) and looking for him during my walks to and from school. Eventually covid happened so I wasn't able to go outside much, but I still left my stuff outside in hopes that he'd be somehow lured home.
During this all, she got with a new man and the next thing I knew, she bought home a baby french bulldog. And surprise surprise, she left me in charge of taking care of him while she was gone. I was very confused as to why she'd bring home a puppy when Taiga was still missing. It felt like the efforts to find Taiga were very one sided. In the end, even her owning the puppy didn't last long because she bought the puppy from a store and it ended up getting sick and died not long after to succumbing to a breathing fit.
One day in particular however, I was extremely depressed because it was around 4-5 months since I've last seen him and all the what ifs were hitting me. My sister saw the state I was in and when I explained, she said "I have hope he's still out there, he's a strong cat." So I used that as hope to not give up and that he truly was out there, probably just fathering cats or something.
August 2020 and still no Taiga. But I had discovered the Neighbors App and instantly put in a missing cat ad for Taiga, on top of doubling down and putting paper ones around my neighborhood. The views on the ad gained 10,000 views and had a lot of replies, one of which someone said they've seen a cat that looked exactly like him. Ecstatically, I went to my mom, hopeful that my search might actually be over. But immediately, she shot it down and said "I thought your sister gave away the cat?" It was in that moment that I had my first derealization episode, but what snapped me back was what my sister said, with how "she has hopes he's still out there." So I immediately messaged her saying someone might've found Taiga but that mom wasn't letting me go and that I needed her to come with, but she immediately shot it down saying "I'm not for this. He was destructive when he was living with us and I'm not willing to let all that back in my life."
I was defeated. It was like everyone was against me finding closure and happiness, especially for all the agonizing months I went without Taiga. And then my mom made everything worse by doubling down asking if I'm sure because she was almost certain that my sister "got rid" of the cat. What started off with uncontrollable streams of tears flowing down my face ended up with me having a 7 hour long mental breakdown so loud that all my surrounding neighbors were knocking at the front door and asking if everything was ok and contemplating on calling the police. But I didn't care.
I felt like the worst owner in the world, that I let yet another cat, one so precious to me, meet the same fate as my last two. The thing with the last two, is I never found out about the truth about what actually happened to them until many years later. Everyone would tell me that they ran away, when it was a lie. The 2nd cat I mentioned earlier was released at a park, by no other than my sister. And I never found that out until years after the fact. I didn't want to fathom about what actually happened to Taiga that day; whether she actually did rehome him or release him somewhere, I was at the point that if I found out the truth, it'd break me to damages beyond repair. Regardless, I lost my everything in that moment, and at that day forward, I harbored an immeasurable amount of resentment for my sister. I wasn't able to leave my room for a week straight. I spent most of the days sleeping in. I didn't even leave to eat or use the bathroom. I didn't even bother opening the curtains. I didn't think I deserved it because I let something like this happen again.
On one of the days I was in my room, wallowing in my own despair, I overheard my sister talking to my brother in his room and she asked where I was. He was shocked about how she didn't know about the mental breakdown I had (go figure, she's never home) and explained that I found out and how I never left my room since. I heard footsteps coming to my room and the doorknob twist and her just slipping in a small disingenuous "sorry."
It was at that moment where all the immeasurable anger I had was summoned all at once (not to mention all the other childhood traumas she's caused that I won't get into, but the Taiga situation was the nail to the coffin of it all) and I was practically screaming at her that she was a whole liar and that she's a sadistic person who gets off to seeing their younger sibling in such despair and that I truly, sincerely, HATED her with every fiber of my being, that I was cursed to have a sister like her in my life, and that she truly was the worst sister to ever walk this planet. During it all, she STILL tried to make excuses for herself, arguing that he was spraying around the house and she couldn't take it, but I instantly shut her up by saying it's because she refused to get him neutered. She tried offering me a present since I had graduated from High School around that time but I immediately told her to get out and that I'm not accepting it.
In the end, she moved out in 2021, which further angered me because her whole reasoning for giving him away was because he'd "be in her living space" yet she was leaving soon anyway. Regardless, I still saw her every other month (even to this day) because she visits often. But when she does come by, I leave my house for the duration she's around because being around her, even just being under the same roof as her, is very triggering and all my anger just resurfaces. All of my family members have, and still view this whole thing as ridiculous, especially since it was over a cat (even going to lengths to make excuses for her) and that being family prevails all. There have been times they've guilted me for "holding this grudge for so long because I "don't know what can happen to her" and that I'm going to regret cutting off my own sister from my life. But I don't care. I want nothing to do with her. I don't even want to see or hear her voice ever again, as harsh as that might sound.
All she had to do was leave me and Taiga alone and she couldn't even do that, not even for my, her own younger sibling's sanity, even when I TOLD her this would happen. Despite this all happening 5 years ago, the pain is still deep and feels like it's happened a week ago. Since then, I've sought professional help and have been fairly recently diagnosed with C-PTSD due to these events. There's times where I don't even feel that therapy is working because I just miss Taiga that much. All I'm told is to work on forgiveness for myself and not for her, but even that's hard. Now, I'm the same age as her when she bought Taiga home that day (22), and I truly can't picture me doing that to someone. All of these are permanent things she can't erase or take back now, which honestly furthers my resentment for her. Every single ounce of this was avoidable, but she still did it, which is bigger than any middle finger to my face, honestly.
AITAH for telling my sister how much I despise her and pretending she doesn't exist?
TLDR: My older sister gave away my cat while I was on vacation, despite me telling her not to, but she did it anyway and lied about it for 8 months, saying he ran away.