An Orphan

So, as most of you know, we live next door to my dad, step-mom and younger brother and sister. In their living room is a table that is covered with family pictures, the whole thing, there are probably 15 or 20 pics there. Over the weekend they had some friends in town staying with them, and one of the friends is a photographer. She took some pictures of my step-sister in her wedding dress and some pictures of her two kids, Hannah and Hunter, and she was going to take some pics of my dad, Sussan and my brother in their fire department regalia. So today I was over there and the pictures on the table have been updated with the new pictures. There are pictures of my dad and Sussan, pictures of Hannah and Hunter, Pictures of Stacy and Steven and pictures of D'Liesa and James. There is not one picture of me. There is not one picture of me and Justin. I know that they have some. I gave my dad a framed picture of him walking me down the aisle at my wedding. They also have a non wedding picture of me and Justin together that looks like the other 700 pictures of me and Justin, several of which have been posted here. And, if for some reason they have lost those, like I said, there are lots available all they have to do is ask. So, I asked about it. I said "Hey the new pictures look great, but there's not a picture of me in there." I didn't make a big deal about it, just mentioned it in passing while looking at the other pictures. Immediately Sussan went defensive saying that she wasn't "finished yet" putting the pics on the table. Trust me, there's not room for another picture there, besides, what was there to finish? They already had the pictures, in frames. So my feelings were really hurt.

But it gets worse. I was flipping through the albums of their new pictures from over the weekend, and there is a picture of D'Liesa, Sussan and Stacy. Sort of an "all the girls" pic, but um, I'm not in it. They said " oh you're not in the pictures because you weren't here," but I was there yesterday. If they had planned on taking family pictures I feel like they should have told me. I feel like I'm not a member of the family anymore and it really really hurts my feelings.

It's not just the pictures either, their friends don't know about me. I know that seems like a weird thing to say, or to feel bad about, but the thing is, they all do know Stacy, Steven and D'Liesa and her kids. When I went to the party at the fire station on the 4th of July people didn't know who I was. I'm now "Stacy and Steven's sister" instead of "Susan" or "Bobby's daughter." At a community function with my dad a few weeks ago, a woman actually said something like "oh I didn't know you had another daughter."

My feelings are so hurt. I don't feel like I can talk to my dad about it because I know that he'll just take Sussan's side. I actually did ask him about the picture thing a few weeks ago (there hasn't been a pic displayed of me in about a year), I said "hey, where's that picture of you and me that I gave you? It's not on the family table" and he said that it was on his night stand, but it wasn't, and when I told him that he couldn't think of where it might be.

The worst part is that they made me put a picture of Sussan up on my family picture magnet board. I was resistant to doing that because I don't have a picture of my step-dad up there, so I thought that was fair. Apparently not. She had a fit and so now there's a pic of her in my house, but not one of me in hers. I feel very very rejected. *sigh*

My dad and Sussan have been married for half my life now, and they always pretend that everything is equal and that we're one big happy family with no "steps" involved, but It's becoming very very clear that she's functioning under an "us versus them" mentality. I guess it was clear all along, but she's becoming bolder in the way that she's making her statements and I don't know what to do about it...

Actually, now that I think about it, it's really more of an "us versus Susan" kind of thing. I don't think I'm going to go over any more. My dad can come see me here.