Reality leaves a lot to the imagination

When I was young, I had an imaginary little sister. Her name was Katy and I think she was modelled on Katy Carr from the ‘What Katy Did’ book. My Katy was my absolute defender and ever-present playmate. We shared everything. She was pretty, blue eyed and blonde and she loved me unconditionally. If anyone ever asked if I had any brothers and sisters, I told them about Katy in a very matter of fact way (I also had an older brother called Michael at one point but he didn’t last long – he was modelled on a rather handsome boy who lived over the road from us. Our make-believe siblingship ended rather abruptly when my mum and his mother, Doreen, fell out and I wasn’t allowed to even walk past their house, never mind fantasise about their son)

I used to chat to Katy secretively (often just in my head) as I knew my mum and dad wouldn’t like it or understand it. Unfortunately, my mum heard me one day in my room telling Katy something and she burst in saying “Who the bloody hell are you talking to?”, whilst scanning the room for uninvited guests. Knowing how pious she was and sure that she’d think I was nuts talking to an imaginary sister, I decided to just say “God “. I do believe that was the proudest she ever was of me.

Katy and I parted company when I was about 10, I think. We didn’t argue or anything like sisters do; we just fizzled out but I’ve never forgotten her or what she meant to me. I flirted with other fantasy sisters from time to time, like Jo (March from Little Women) Maria (Sound of Music – but only when she was a nun) and bizarrely Violette Szabo the wartime special operations executive (I was nothing if not diverse and a bit adventurous in my sibling choices)

Having imaginary friends used to be a cause for concern (Cath would have been more than concerned, I can tell you; I’d have been marched straight down the doctors and had ‘talking to herself’ added to ‘School escapee’) and was seen as a symptom of having social and development problems. It was thought that kids like me were probably lacking attention and needed company. It was seen as a way to deal with loneliness, stress or conflict but modern thinking is that children who have imaginary friends have advanced social development and use more complex sentence structure, have richer vocabularies and get along better with people. There’s some veracity in that, I reckon.

So, one Friday in April 2010, I found myself sitting in the North London kitchen of my actual little sister; my birth mother’s daughter.

She was dark and very tiny and seemingly quite nice; she also looked a bit like one of my daughters but nothing like me. She was totally spooked by how much I looked like our mother and I realise now that I know more about her life that it bothered her. We appeared to get along, despite our very different life experiences and the age gap (I’m 11 years older) She made me welcome and was strangely affectionate. I really thought I’d finally got my longed-for little sister – Katy Carr come to life, if you will.

She had asked me to stay for the weekend and as it unfolded, her own issues became more and more apparent. Her dysfunctional relationship with her only child; her apparent inability to form relationships and saddest of all, her drinking. She is an alcoholic. Or maybe a binge drinker, as she never drinks when she’s not at work just on her days off, when she is drunk for most of it. She was not sober for much of my visit. I am not judging her, after all we all make our own life choices.

On the Sunday morning, she walked me to the train station and I felt unexplainably and unbearably sad. I knew I’d never see her again and I was right. She never contacted me again. I tried to reach out once or twice but she never responded. No explanation just blankness.

What she doesn’t realise is she did to me exactly what our mother did all those years previously; saw me, hugged me, then let me go. I wasn’t good enough for either of them.

I am not sad anymore, it is what it is and proves yet again that just because we come back into our birth family’s lives, there is no guarantee we’ll fit in or even be wanted there. That is the reality for many of us and heartbreakingly, we refuse to give up the hope that one day, at least one of them will want us. We keep picking at the edges of our wound because we’re desperate to find bio family who are happy that we’ve come home.

I have discovered that I have a paternal sister now too. Is she my Katy or Jo or Violette? I am undecided yet whether to try to contact her but if I do, all I can hope that maybe, just maybe, this time, my scabbed adoptee wound is given the chance to heal. I think It’s time ❤️