Everyone in your family, young and old, is experiencing feelings like fear, anger, sadness, guilt, and confusion. Family may look and feel differently now—and that’s okay.
While it is your brother or sister who is missing, everyone in your family is experiencing this difficult time in different and yet connected ways; each family member’s feelings and responses affect the others’. When a child is missing, the entire dynamic of the family changes. Your parents, other siblings, and extended family—and even trusted friends—are all navigating frightening and unfamiliar territory. It’s hard enough handling your own feelings. How do you cope with their feelings too?
There’s no doubt about it: your parents are acting differently. They may have been there for you and your siblings in good and bad times before. But now they may seem so sad, distracted, and angry that you don’t recognize them. You can feel forgotten at times. One minute you’re angry at your parents for not giving you their full attention, and the next minute feeling guilty for being angry with them.
You may think you need to be “perfect” and not make a mistake because your family couldn’t handle anything more. And ironically, as you’re trying to be “good,” you may feel like your parents aren’t even noticing. It’s like there doesn’t seem to be much time or attention left for you; you’ve been pushed to the “back burner.”
Other times, you may feel like you are acting as the parent to your parents, which can be confusing and make you resentful. You want your parents to act like your parents again. It’s not always the big things that bother you. It’s the little things, like getting a good grade on your math test and wanting them to get excited about it. It’s things like your mom forgetting that you have practice, you need a ride somewhere, or your dad not being there for your game. You’re still there, living as a family in your house, and yet somehow, they’re not there for you in the same way.
“My family is a mess,” you may say to yourself at times. What is happening to you is very, very hard. Your parents are still your parents, they still love you, and they care about your feelings—even if they can’t show it right now. Don’t be too hard on yourself, and don’t be too hard on them. You’re all on this journey as a family, and things will get better.
“It would have helped if people explained to me why my parents were acting so differently. I wish I knew that under the circumstances, their behavior was normal. Your parents are going to act differently. They’re dealing with the situation in their own ways, which may be different from the way you think they should act.” —Martha
“People kept asking, ‘How are your parents doing?’ What about me? Don’t they want to know how I’m doing?” —Trevor
“I remember harassing mom until she actually cooked breakfast. To me, what was normal was mom cooking.” —Erika
“In this situation, it’s normal not to feel ‘normal!’” —Martha
