Drama

This has been a weekend of revelations...

On Saturday on the way back from Lancaster (yes i did go to the tournament- and it was shit...), Mum text me to tell me that the police had rung her because they had picked up my middle-ing sister Abbie, drunk, in Leeds. I wasn't overly concerned, since i already knew she had been drinking a little in Leeds with her friends for the past few weekends and it seemed harmless enough. I assumed the police had raided the Corn Exchange, where they hang out, to give all the kids a bit of a scare, since its notorious for under-age drinkers.

In actuality, the police had called an ambulance, because she was so very drunk. Her so called "friends" all ran off and left her. When i finally managed to get in touch with Mum again, a good few hours later she told me that Abbie had been admitted to the hospital after the doctors found apparently self inflicted razor blade cuts on her arms. She told Mum she had done it because she was so unhappy.

I was beside myself. I just couldn't believe it. I know she is going through some "Emo" phase, and its cool to be depressed and dark. I even know that she's carved things into her arms with compass points before now in a fit of generic adolescent drama. But razor blades? I can't even begin to imagine how, or why. According to Mum, the injuries look horrific.

I felt so incredibly guilty. I know favourite sisters shouldn't exist, but she is mine. I love her so much, and for her to have been so unhappy and me to not even have known is just unthinkable. I thought we were close. I know i don't spend as much time with her as i should. Even when i'm not at Uni, i'm always with The Boy or somewhere else. And that's so selfish of me, i know it is. I know she doesn't have a good time at home, and i should have been there for her more. The thought of her in hospital on her own all night, and feeling so poorly just made me cry. I know it was her own fault, but still.

She wasn't allowed to be discharged on Sunday until she had seen a children's mental health team.

Speaking to her about it yesterday, when she had got home from the hospital, it appears the whole drama was over a boy. This boy she had been "going out with" and thought she was in love with had dumped her (she bearly eats anymore, on account of her massively distorted body image, and apparently tried to make herself sick the other day, which is why he ended it) and now has another girlfriend. Hence why she was drinking so heavily on Saturday. Apparently she drank three bottles of wine... three. She's fifteen! I can't even drink one. She drank so much, her body went into shock- she had a irregular heart rhythm- the paramedics thought she had taken drugs... I can't even begin to imagine how ill she must have felt. I suppose at least it has taught her a lesson about alcohol, that noone else could ever have taught her. Hopefully she will stay away from it for a good few years now.

I asked her about the cutting, if she was doing it for attention. She said she had been doing at first, but now it just felt like something she "had to do" when she had a problem she didn't want to talk about. I'm finding it hard to know what i believe. Part of me thinks she might well have a serious problem. She obviously didn't intend on getting found out, and only the fact that she got so drunk she had to go to hospital led to anyone noticing. But then, another part of me think she is doing what she thinks "Emo's" should do. Its like a trend. She's learnt it. Its not an innate urge.

I don't know.

Knowing what i know about myself, her, and our family, i know she is unhappy beyond her adolescent love-life. I strongly suspect a part of her, however small, has done this for the attention. Typically, my parents are brushing the whole thing under the carpet already. Neither of them has bothered to try and talk to her about it, which is infuriating me. And she refuses to talk to them. Which is fair enough. They're my parents too, i know how bloody unapproachable they are.

I just worry this will escalate out of control, without some kind of intervention. I have tried talking to her but she's so fucking nonchalant about the whole thing somehow, i just want to slap her. I desperately want to help her. I don't want her to be as miserable as i know i have been. But she just seems to see it as no big deal. Even when i try to explain to her exactly how much damage she is doing her body by not eating, she just shrugs it off. Infuriating.

Maybe it is no big deal. Maybe it was a moment of adolescent madness and i'm just projecting my own neuroses onto her as some kind of explanation for her behaviour. But i just can't see it. I'm sure its more serious than she's letting on.

I just want to go home and hug her.