When did the “I crave attention” kid go too far?

The Obsession with One-Upmanship

My sister faked cancer to sabotage my Ivy League dreams, so I exposed her lies and watched her life collapse. Two years later, she is at my door crying, asking if we can ever be sisters again. My sister was ready to destroy anything and everything to one-up me, including herself.

Growing up, I always tried to be best friends with my older sister, Sasha. I bought all my clothes based on what her wardrobe looked like. And whenever she started a hobby, I would start it, too.

But instead of wanting to be my best friend, she started seeing me as her number one opponent. Whenever she’d come home after winning an award in running, dance, or any other hobby of hers, I copied. I was the first one she told.

Bet you couldn’t do this, could you?

She’d then wave the award in my face, but instead of crying or getting jealous, I’d hug her super tight and tell her how happy I was for her.

But this just made her even angrier and she’d shove me away. Sometimes so hard that my entire body would fall onto the floor. It wasn’t until my 12th birthday that I finally gave up trying because our parents got me a pink glittery bike, one that Sasha always wanted.

As soon as I unboxed it, I ran up to her room and banged on her door. When I brought her into the back garden and showed her what I got, I asked if she wanted to be the first one to ride it.

Sure,” she said with a smirk plastered on her face.

She told me she wanted to ride it on the road, and since she was 16, I figured she was old enough to ride responsibly. But instead of sitting in the seat, she locked eyes with me and threw it into the open road right as a truck passed by and destroyed it.

My heart broke, and that was the moment my childhood ended. I vowed to never tell her about my achievements or any updates on my life for that matter. Unfortunately, when I was 14, I won first place at the regional cross country championships because Sasha hadn’t moved out for college yet, so she heard my parents talking about it.

But to my surprise, instead of flipping out, she asked to come to my awards ceremony. I enthusiastically said yes because I thought she was trying to rebuild our friendship. On the big day, the coach announced the winners in order of lowest to highest.

Except he never called out my name because right before he could, Sasha dramatically collapsed onto the floor. Everyone turned around to face my family and ask if she was okay. She didn’t wake back up until you could hear the ambulance sirens outside.

“Oh, sorry, everyone,” she announced, jolting straight up.

“I just didn’t eat enough food today.”

Everyone marveled about how glad they were to see she was okay. I just rolled my eyes. From there, I kept pretty much everything in my life a secret from not just my sister and parents, but my entire family.

It definitely made life lonelier, and it took a lot to kill the desire of running to my parents when I got good news. Fast forward to when I was 17 and got accepted into an Ivy League university.

My parents found the acceptance letter before me. When I got home, my mom yelled, “Honey, we are so proud of you.” Without missing a beat, they started taking a bunch of pictures of me with my acceptance letter to plaster all over their social media.

And for the first time in years, I let them be happy for me. Because I figured that Sasha couldn’t do anything to ruin it. But again, I was wrong because the next day, I woke up to my parents barging into my room and throwing all my stuff into black bin bags.

Your sister has just been diagnosed with stage three ovarian cancer.

She’ll need one room for her stuff and one to sleep in.

My mom’s voice was shaking and my dad had tears in his eyes. I instantly knew she was faking it. I just needed some sort of evidence. Sasha came home later that day with a smirk on her face.

Her hair was completely bald, which is funny because I had seen a photo on her story with her hair blowing in the wind just a month back. Still, she lied down and slept. Said the cancer was tiring her out.