My feelings on the word "Family"

Hey guys!! Its been a while since I've posted a blog, but I really want to get into posting every week again. Today's blog is going to be about someting very serious and extremely personal, but I'm tired of holding it in and keeping it a secret.

Starting in junior high, just about everytime one of my brother's friends would spend the night, he would come into my room once my brother fell asleep and sexually abuse me. When he was finished, and would go to leave my room, he would always leave saying "I'm sorry". This all went on most nights he spent the night, until about the end of my sophomore year of high school. I know you're probably wondering why I never said anything to anyone, but I never told anyone because of fear and mainly because I knew what its like to lose a bestfriend, and my brother and I were close at the time, so I didn't want my brother to lose his bestfriend and be hurt.

One day, my brother and I had gotten into a really bad fight, and I decided I didn't care if it hurt him, and I told him what his bestfriend had done to me for years. His response was, and I quote, "I don't care, he's still my bestfriend though". He even to this day continues to hang out with him. My own brother, told me that he did not care what his friend did to me, and that he was going to continue to be friends with him. I felt so unbelievably betrayed, hurt, and honestly just utterly destroyed. As a result, I decided that if he didn't care about what was done to me, than I don't care about him. Its been over 2 years since I told him what has happened to me, and I have not talked to him since that day.

When my brother told me he didn't care about what had happened to me, I learned that just because someone is family, does not always mean that they will automatically have your back. The word "family" to me now is pretty much just a word, until someone puts a meaning behind it. I don't consider my brother family anymore, because what he did is not something a "family" member should do.