Welcome to Gaia! ::

Hello, users of the guild. Obviously, I come here seeking advice, so hear me out. I have a brother (well, three, actually, and a sister, but right now we're only discussing one) who is about a year and a half older than me and has been a humongous influence on my life. Which presents two problems.

Problem number one is that recently he's gotten into the habit of berating, leacturing, and even yelling at me when I do something he sees as wrong. A lot of the time it is something that I could/should amend: my nervousness on the feild in the team we're both on, my shyness with people, my habit of feeling sorry for myself. But when he's driving me home from school and talking about me to my face about how I should do this, and how any argument I offer is either an excuse or complaint, it hurts my feelings a lot. I can't stand up to him: he scares me, and I know he's right most of the time. But I hate sitting back and just letting him bully me, especially since he keeps coming back to the same topics and repeating himself when I don't seem to follow his advice in his eyes. I can't think of what to do.

The second problem is that he's a senior in high school...or rather, he was, since his graduation is on Teusday. I can't imagine life without him. My dad's kind of a bully, and my brother can't stand him, so once he goes to college I might not really hear from him very often. And, the above problem nonwithstanding, he's very intelligent and witty, and he's totally hilarious, and life will be so boring without him. I've been "so-and-so's little sister" all my life...how can I adjust to him not being there?

I think it's because he cares about you and is anxious about probably leaving you that he keeps lecturing you. Growing up can be scary for you and the people around you. I know as I've almost finished university (college for you American types), and i'm feeling my way through the issues of first boyfriend (and now first break-up T.T), first real job and stuff like this. I find myself reacting in ways that I wouldn't have expected a few years ago. Your brother is probably going through the same thing, and to a certain extent, so are you.

Part of growing up is defining your own identity, away from the identities of your siblings or parents, and deciding what you believe and what you want, even if it's different from what they may expect of you.

Back to your brother lecturing you though, have you told him calmly what he's been doing and how it makes you feel? If you can't do this calmly, perhaps writing him a short letter and talking to him about it afterwards may do the trick. He may not even realise what he's been doing.