The unwritten pact among brothers and sisters, never tell who did it, no matter what. We would rather do extra chores around the house, side by side all week long, be grounded from video games, and not have bedtime treat, then to confess, who did it.

They certainly are not anything like I was as a child. I hate to confess to all of you that I was a brat. If one of my sisters had caused me to do extra chores because she didn’t want to confess her guilt, I probably would have beaten the snot out of her. I am thinking that I would have pummeled her until she confessed to our parents and me. I have two sisters, one 20 months older and one 2 years younger.

My daughters just stood there working side by side as if they were having a great time. I assigned them to washing the kitchen walls with a bucket of soapy water and sponges. There seemed to be no animosity at all for the betrayal. It almost drove me nuts. Yet this response seems so typical among older adopted children.

Our daughters who are now adults would do the same thing. We adopted them when they were nine and 15. The older sister would blame the younger sister for everything that happened, and the younger sister would never defend herself. She would silently accept her extra chores. I never even heard her reprimand her older sister.

Finally, when I thought I couldn’t stand watching the girls silently wash the wall, I turned into the evil suggestive conscious. As I was walking past them I said things like, “I sure would be angry if my sister made me do extra work,” and “I think I would be convincing my sister to confess so I wouldn’t have to do all this extra work.”


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