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18 Things That Happen When You And Your Sibling Have A Huge Age Gap

When "big" sister actually means "legitimate grown-up."

1. One of you gets to know your parents as young people.

2. You may be members of different generations. (Or at least really feel like it.)

3. When other people talk about getting into physical fights with their siblings, you have no idea what that's like.

4. In the early years, your relationship feels more like a parent-child one.

5. If you're the younger one, you have someone whose advice you can actually trust.

6. You both have a period of experiencing only-child syndrome.

7. If you're younger, you'll end up discovering music that made you feel way cooler than your friends.

8. If you're older, people will often assume your little sibling is in fact your child.

9. But later, you may also go through a period of time when people ask, "Who's older?"

10. If you're older, you depend on your younger sister/brother as a resource for understanding newer things.

11. A magical thing starts happening when the younger sibling grows up: You guys start becoming amazing friends.

12. Although it might become slightly weird when you're both in an age bracket where you could potentially be dating someone the same age as your sibling.

13. If you're the little sib, you rarely got hand-me-downs, but when you did, they were either awesome or totally weird because they qualified as vintage.

14. If you're older, you get annoyed when they blatantly copy you. But you ultimately find it flattering.

15. If you're younger, you grow up just wishing you were older, and finding you'd rather hang with more mature people.

16. If you're younger, you sometimes unfairly compare yourself to your older sib, and feel like you've accomplished nothing. (But then you remember they've had many more years to do stuff in.)

17. If you're older, you get to see your younger bro/sis go through life milestones. And because you have perspective, you really get to appreciate their accomplishments.

18. Above all, you both know an age gap doesn't mean you're not close.