There are some relationships in life that simply cannot be replaced.
A sibling is one of them.
You grow up with someone who has known you from the very beginning. Before responsibilities, before adulthood, before life got complicated. They know you from the off.
They see every version of you. The messy childhood one. The awkward teenage one. All different seasons of adulthood.
That bond is something unique.
Jane was my sister, but she was also my friend, my partner in crime, and part of the little trio that shaped my childhood.
The three musketeers.
Even though there were a few years between us, that never really mattered. Jane came everywhere with me. She was my baby. Sleepovers, hanging around with friends, house parties as we got older my friends became her friends.
Growing up in our cul-de-sac, all the neighbour’s kids were friends. The kind of childhood where everyone knew each other and the streets felt like our playground.
We used to make up plays and perform them for the neighbours, putting on full productions as if we were on a real stage.
In the summer we were out from early morning until the street lights came on. That was the rule back then.
Those long carefree days felt endless. Running for the icecream van with odd shoes, or spending weekends with our cousins.
We shared a bedroom growing up and she would always get into my bed first to warm it up for me. She would sleep in just her knickers and I would be wearing everything I owned. Nothing changed as we grew up.
We even had a TV in our room. If we wanted to stay up a little longer, we were allowed to watch a programme but only if we could get the signal.
You needed an aerial back then, and to get the right spot someone had to hold it.
That someone was usually Jane.
I would sit there watching the TV while she held the aerial in exactly the right position, because no other angle worked. Our favourite was Darling Buds of May.
Looking back now, it’s funny the little things that stay with you.
One night I showed her a box of catapilars I had collected and hid in a box under my bed. For some reason I was very proud of them.
She cracked up laughing.
I was also the sleepwalker growing up, while Jane would be snoring away beside me.
We would have all of our My LIttle Keepers lined up on our window ledge.
Another part of our little world was our hamster, Peanut.
He had one of those plastic balls that hamsters run around in, so we would line up all our VHS videos across the floor like a maze and let him roll through it.
To us it was the best entertainment in the world.
In the summer we used to collect roses and make perfume. We would crush the petals, mix them with water, and genuinely believe we had created something magical.
Looking back, it probably just smelled like soggy flowers.
But to us it was perfect.
Jane was a massive tomboy growing up. My mum used to cut our hair and Jane insisted on having a bob/mullet.
Our holidays were caravan holidays, the kind where the entertainment team ran talent competitions. Jane and I choreographed a routine and entered.
And we won.
Which meant we went back for the regionals and ended up winning a free holiday.
At home we spent hours outside in the garden with our younger brother Mike. One of our favourite things to do was set up a water slide using the hose across the grass.
If you went too far you ended up sliding straight onto the crazy paving.
Which hurt.
But we did it anyway.
That was the craze back then. My mum would get out the biggest blue sheet and the fairy liquid and we would go nuts. My mum and stepdad built a sandpit for Mike in the garden too. Of course the sand ended up everywhere, and if the lid wasn’t put back on properly the neighbour’s cat would inevitably decide it was the perfect place to go to the toilet.
We have a peach tree in our garden so in the summer we used to go to my mum and stepdads bedroom window to get the ripest ones. We used to get Mike to reach out while we held onto him. We would often find squished ones on the lawn where Mike had stood on them to make explode or run over them on his bike.
For years it had just been Jane and me, so when Mike arrived it felt like a bit of a shock to the system.
He was boisterous from the start. A proper little boy.
He spent a lot of his early childhood running around the house completely naked like a tiny whirlwind causing chaos everywhere he went.
I remember thinking, wow… this is what it’s like having a brother.
He was tall for his age and strong from the off. Always climbing, running, crashing into things, and watching the same Thomas the Tank Engine film over and over again.
When he was about three he had a habit of waking us up by hitting us with whatever object he could find. One day he stuck a screwdriver in Jane's ear!!
Even though he will always be my little brother in my mind, he grew quickly.
Before we knew it he was towering over both of us.
By the time he was 13 he looked like a fully grown man.
But as he got older, Mike also became the biggest teddy bear. Jane away from the world in that moment.
The kind where you feel like everything will be alright for a moment.
Jane used to call him her “Bruvver.”
And we always felt safe when we were with him.
Jane would always say that no one made her laugh like he did.
Mike has a great sense of humour.
We were proud to call each other brother and sister.
The three of us were very different.
I’ve always been the cautious one, loud, opinionated, the one who will say exactly what I think whether people agree or not. Always arguing with mum lol
Jane was different.
She was adventurous, more free, more laid back. She would often just say “OK Mum” even if she didn’t agree rather than argue the point like I would.
Despite our differences, the bond between us was unbreakable.
That’s the thing about siblings.
They hold pieces of your history that nobody else can. They remember the same childhood. The same houses. The same stories.
The inside jokes.
The chaos.
The small moments that shape who you become.
When Jane died, I realised I had lost more than just my sister.
I had lost my connection to so many childhood memories the things that only we'd had experienced together.
Those moments now live only in my heart.
When I used to think about getting old, I always imagined us three.
Grey hair.
Laughing about life.
Her being a Nan.
Even though she had been so unwell at times, I never imagined a world without her in it.
When the time came to say goodbye, Mike and I stood together.
We held each other’s hands and walked behind my mum and dad as Jane was collected.
I remember wishing in that moment that time could just stop that she could stay there forever, frozen in time.
We reassured her that we were there.
That we would look after everything.
That she didn’t need to worry.
We blew her a kiss and watched as the private vehicle slowly drove away.
Sibling grief is a quiet kind of grief.
It doesn’t always get spoken about as much as other losses.
But it runs deep.
Because siblings are part of your beginning.
Part of your identity.
Part of your story.
Jane will always be that for me.
My sister.
My friend.
One of the three musketeers.
And no distances can ever break that.