Growing up I got asked the same question alot. "Do you have any brothers or sisters?"
I had two stock responses.
"I have four brothers here on earth and one in Heaven." The response elicited was usually an awkward mumbling and a change of topic.
The second response was: "I have four brothers."
The reply to this was ALWAYS the same: "FOUR brothers! Oh you poor thing!"
Now frankly I was very proud of having so many brothers. It made (and still makes) me feel special.
That's not to say I wouldn't have loved a sister.
Then a few years ago one of my brother's met a girl.
An American girl, who was in the US Navy. A beautiful girl, who according to the inordinately long phone conversations I had to endure from my brother raving about her various attributes, was the perfect woman for him.
Yeah, I hated her before I met her. No one could be that perfect.
And I met her and I had to agree with him. I think we both liked each other, but we were both at very different points in our lives.
So they married, and one would have thought I'd end here with a happily ever after.
Not so much.
They endured long separations over the first three years of their marriage. My brother couldn't practice medicine in the country or the naval base they were stationed at. She was away on her ships for months at a time.
I didn't see her throughout that time and our communications were limited at best.
Polite, yes. Friendly, yes. But nothing more.
I was a working mother with two small kids.
She was an NSC for the Navy though in my family we still like to call her a spy, kind of a female James Bond thing So not much in common, except that she was married to my brother.
Then we both fell pregnant within weeks of each other. We began to burn up the phone lines comparing notes and chatting. The same thing continued after Miss Em and my Mr Small were both born safely.
We talked almost every day, or emailed, or texted.
Then came THE phone call out of the blue about a year later.
My dad.
I feel so bad for him. Every time there is crappy news to break, it's HIS designated role. In his defence, no one could do it better.
So he phoned, and after a few minutes of me rambling on, he cut me off.
My sister in law was critically ill in hospital. Unbeknownst to her or my brother she had an ectopic pregnancy that had ruptured. The next few hours were touch and go.
I remember literally sinking to the floor in shock after I hung up the phone.
How could such a terrible thing happen to my sister?
I thought of her parents, so far away and feeling helpless. I thought of her other siblings. I thought of my brother, heartbroken and waiting. I thought of her sweet little daughter who I love as my own.
As is usually the way, I gathered up my brood and we waited outside in my parents garden for news.
It was a beautiful day.
My children chased butterflies and laughed and played.
And we waited.
And waited.
And finally we recieved the call from my brother. She had lost the baby, her tube, but she would live.
I have never, and hope never to, heard him sound so shattered and shellshocked.
Thank you God.
I spoke to her several hours later, and while she doesn't remember the conversation I always will. Because after I got off the phone to her, I cried. Not an elegant, ladylike cry. A real howling, pass me the BOX of Kleenex cry.
Because she was my sister. And I nearly lost her. We all did.
And this is why having a high pain threshold is being over-rated. Being a hypochondriac is much better.
It's her birthday tomorrow. So I want to wish my sweet sister a very "Happy Birthday!" and only a few weeks to go before her baby is born. Hopefully in time for her big sister's birthday! xxxx