Nothing makes me realise how much money can divide friends like wedding season.
Social media post after post comes up in my feed; life-long pals despair as the bride-to-be organises weeks-long hen ’dos in the Bahamas or mandates £500 bridesmaid dresses.
The same goes for holidays, too. But while I reckon I see friendship wealth gaps discussed a lot, I don’t often hear about siblings divided by different incomes.
That’s the sort of split that led Redditor u/Charming-Maybe-9626 to chuck her sister out of her house following a remark about money (the comments suggest she’s not alone).
So, we thought we’d speak to clinical social worker, counsellor, and clinical director and COO at Heartwood Recovery, Nick Borges, about how to handle one sibling being better off than another.
The original poster (OP) says her sister has lost empathy for their well-off family
Writing to Reddit’s r/AITAH (Am I The Asshole Here), u/Charming-Maybe-9626 said that her sister’s comment at dinner led her to chuck her out of her home.
“My husband lost both of his parents when he was 17,” the poster wrote, which her sister knows about.
“Their deaths were preventable.... a lawsuit followed and at a young age, my husband found himself orphaned but wealthy.”
The poster started dating her now-spouse a few years after both the tragedy and the influx of money happened. “We’re very comfortable and few know exactly how much my husband actually has,” she says.
“He’s very smart with his money and not only invests but looks to our future and the future of each of our children.”
At a recent family dinner, the poster’s sister turned up with her boyfriend and mentioned that they were saving up to go on holiday to a destination it turned out the poster’s husband had also visited.
Seemingly out of nowhere, the sister “said to my husband the least he could do was offer them the money for the weekend away since he could afford it.”
“My husband told her that was a big ask and she snapped at him and said he had no idea how lucky he was to be rich because she’d give anything to have that kind of money.”
OP then chucked her out of her house because she felt the comment was “insensitive”, especially given how her family came into their money.
“Money changes relationships”
Borges told us that no matter what, “Money changes relationships.”
“Socioeconomic differences between siblings typically trigger what I call ‘comparative identity confusion’ ― when your identity becomes destabilised because someone from the same roots as you now belongs to a different social class,” he added.
“We do so because we use our siblings as benchmarks for our success” (after all, most siblings grow up in the same level of wealth).
In this case, Borges says, that divide was handled very poorly.
If a sibling “starts to avoid family gatherings, or to make passive-aggressive comments about money, these are red flags,” he wrote.
But in general, he adds, “Wealth inadvertently establishes a power shift that isn’t seen by the person with money.”
“The majority of siblings make the mistake of never talking about money, and a shadow relationship is formed in which resentments build up under the surface-level interactions,” the expert continued.
“I recommend ongoing check-ins where both siblings are given an opportunity to express feelings without judgment,” and if you notice a rift, trying bonding activities that don’t show or centre wealth divides can help.
And whatever side of the divide you’re on, he warns, “I often tell clients to notice when jealousy arises and treat it as it as information, not truth.”