The mystery of the Youngest Daughter
In a world of pieces written about eldest daughters, here is a youngest daughter writing her point of view.
Raw and Real Conversation
In the year 2025, Taylor Swift released her 12th studio album, whose track #5 (the track number in every album of hers that has a sprinkle of a heartbreak/vulnerability) was of “Eldest Daughter”.
In the year 2016, Lisette Schuitemaker wrote a book called The Eldest Daughter Effect. The book talks about, “…(eldest daughters) seriously doubt that they are good enough. Being an eldest daughter can have certain advantages, but the overbearing sense of responsibility often gets in the way.”
I also came across a clip from Mel Robbins podcast talking with an Ivy League psychologist about the eldest daughter syndrome and how it shapes us.
On the contrary, I am the youngest daughter to my parents and I have something to share.
Across the globe we talk about the eldest daughter. I agree on that plight. I have seen my elder sisters sacrifice massively throughout their lives.
So as you read this, I suggest you keep an open mind. Towards the end, I will share why I wrote this piece.
We are four sisters. I am the youngest one. They are 13, 12 and 8 years older than me respectively.
By the time I was 20, my third sister had gotten married.
Now I was the only child that used to live with our parents :)
The sisters would visit often, as they all lived in the same city. But then go back home. At the start of their marriages it felt like a dopamine burst to me when they would come home. And that dopamine taken away when they went back. However, all they spoke was of how their life had become a treadmill of never ending responsibilities. I was now only a side character in a movie that had initially signed me up as a lead.
As years passed by and they started having their babies, I even saw a side of life I had never seen before.
My sisters kept leaving their kids with my Mom to babysit them. Or came to stay at our home for their deliveries and postpartum care. I think that is fine too, as long as all parties agree. Almost everyone leaves their kids with their Moms and rarely with their Moms-in-law.
In this process, I saw my Mom getting massively tired. Yet she never spoke up for herself. That she could not take care of the kids because she was often tired enough to properly to take care of us too.
After her marriage, along with the task of taking care of us four sisters, my Mom also took care of my chacha (and my father got him married), my Mom took care of another chacha’s kids, a neighbour’s kids, and all the family responsibilities because my father was the eldest son (ah, the irony in this very post).
So looking at my sisters thinking my Mom was free and my niblings could be left with her led to a lot of resentment from my side. I used to think my Mom was being used. And in my heart I kept getting distant from my sisters.
In this game of raising their kids, they even forgot they had a younger sister to just be with, and nothing else. Someone with whom they could have kept up with.
This inner and unspoken resentment within me kept getting so big that I forgot to see the rational side, that Mom could even speak up for herself while loving them. Yet this broken puzzle with no apparent fix created a crater in my heart that eventually only kept getting bigger.
——
I recently watched the 6-part docu-series of Taylor Swift’s Eras tour, and concluded that the reason this woman is ultra confident is because she has the backing of her family. Her brother legit travelled with her from the stadium (where her show was) to the hotel back with her.
My sisters don’t even know exactly what I do for a living. Or what I do in general. Or why I did not really enjoy the trip whose pictures were extensively shared in our group and on the internet. Or why I got the delivery of my car on my own, with no one from my family around. Or why I disliked that they gossiped about my pyjamas and crocs, and loved me when I was polished and crafted; when they were supposed to love me regardless. Or that no matter how much money you make, you always need your family.
Each time I share this with my Mom, she says “they have a lot of problems in their lives.”
I get it.
I do get it that I might not even understand most of their problems.
But I still wonder how many of these problems allow you to perpetually be unavailable in person and on phone every with your youngest sibling.
——
I remember last year I went to Mumbai to stay with my cousin bro and bhabhi for three days. And I was so delighted by what I experienced there. Not because of his luxuries (he has the best of those luxuries, he lives in SoBo to begin with), but because standing in his office overlooking the Mumbai city while he was sipping tea and he did not offer me like a true brother (because he knows I don’t drink tea), we spoke about absolutely random things in Mumbai. Or that he went for a walk with me to the beach near his house because he knows I love walking after dinner. For those three days I got to experience an elder sibling that I had forgotten how to experience for so many years.
Or when I used to live in Ahmedabad at my Bua’s home during my college days. My elder cousin bro would come back from his work (and he already had a family at that time), but there was no day I did not talk to him. I am sure he would have his own share of life problems at that stage, but I must confess it was a good dopamine boost to see my bro come home. My sisters come home so many times when I go home. I do not remember a single instance of a meaningful conversation yet. Maybe not even a meaningful conversation, but I don’t remember a time when they were not on the go.
They always have some place to go, and never have I ever been that place.
——
Which is why, this mystery of the youngest daughter.
You have your siblings taken away from you.
You see your parents go through so much pain that you become an Oscar winning actor at hiding your own.
You learn the art of not asking your family for your time. (Even if they do, you don’t want to be sitting in a round table conference with fingers firing at you instead of hugs hurdling at you.)
You are so grateful for the sacrifices of your elder siblings that you got an excellent education only because of their sacrifices, that you do not ask your siblings for anything ever again. Not even their sisterhood.
You are the youngest daughter. Who isn’t free from slaughter either.
——
Coming to senses and sensibilities, why am I sharing this with you?
The youngest daughter perhaps faces nothing as compared to the eldest daughter, as the data and experiences suggest.
I would never be able to experience what an eldest daughter experiences, obviously.
But that does not take away from me having to share what I have experienced as a youngest daughter. I am allowed to express the loneliness I felt despite being surrounded. I have the highest gratitude for the life I live. Let me be clear, my sisters and I would stand for each other any day. No one could ever speak a word against one of us in front of the other. Anyone raise a finger against them and I am standing for them before they even ask.
At the same time, when I share this, maybe one of the thousands of people who read it would be present to their younger sibling(s) even when the younger sibling is apparently thriving.
Success is one part of life. Having family to do random things with — be it chatting around life, be it cook a meal together, be it choosing to be present with your sibling over a phone call maybe 5 minutes a month, is another success that we need to be speaking more about in 2026.
If any one of us is able to be present like a human being to anyone else around us regardless of their position, power or paisa, we might create a little more happier world.
If this piece helps us get there, I’d be glad the mystery and the loneliness of the youngest daughter helped feel someone else a little less lonely :)
——
To summarise:
I know you are busy.
I know you can see someone around you who is apparently happy.
But for every single one around you who looks cool and thriving, they sometimes need family too. May we choose to not forget that.
Everyone needs someone to play with their balloon, even when they got what they always wanted: the balloon. People, not to please. People, not to be please with. People, because we need a peep in.
2 Raw One Liners:
When you start losing internal battles, you start creating external ones.
Girl to girl: A rich girl is a witch girl as per society’s norms. Worry not, sweetie. Keep making that money while they keep thinking they are funny.
3 (for Real) “Blast from the past” pictures:
My parents had their 49th wedding anniversary yesterday. Talk about compounding :) My eldest sister wanted us to look into our camera rolls and send her our family pictures so that she could produce a collage to gift them.
In that searching, I also found some other pictures from my past too. Enjoy :)
April 2012 — final year exams in college. Chinar and I would eat breakfast somewhere out before reaching college by 9.45 for our exam to begin at 10.30. This was one of the days we went to a restaurant for our expensive breakfast, instead of the usual ₹10 poha. (Back when I would still do outside food :))
Around the same time — studying for college exams. In the final year of college I studied the least of all three years (no more than 2-3 hours per day, because after the exam Chinar and I had to go visit somewhere together in Ahmedabad and return home that night). And secured the highest marks in that year of all three years :)
At this time I’m realising it has become too much of “me me me”, so here is a pic of my late Nanaji (he passed away in 2014). He was admitted in hospital for the last 2 months of his life due to heart attack. But other than that, lived a very fit life. Had his breakfast every day around 8 am, lunch at 12.30 and dinner around 6.30. Even when his sons in law (and their parents) were invited for lunch, my Nana would accompany them for their lunch at 3 pm, but always always had his meals at his own timings. He also never ever had a vehicle. Cycle was his only means of transport, even though he was pretty middle class and able to afford it.
True influencers have been all our grandparents tbh.
On that note of sharing a blurry (and only) photo of my Nanaji, let us bring this to an end.
I hope you shine and bloom like flowers, wish you a belated Happy Basant Panchmi, and may your life always bring flowers to everyone else’s lives.
I’ll see you next weekend.
Till then, stay raw, stay real my friend.
Nishtha Gehija
LinkedIn | X | Daily blog | Weekly newsletter
Instantly access my ebooks:
20s versus 30s: The strange and unique differences between the two most important decades of your life
The Corporate Life Handbook: If you are in corporate job and struggle with daily humdrums of it, one-pagers with harsh truths are something no one is going to tell you :)
The Career Changing Guide: If you are looking for a sign, this is it :)
How to Deal with Heartbreak: A book almost everyone needs but no one gives you right in your hand. If you don’t need this, get this for a friend you know certainly needs it.
Every Writer Needs to Read this: A book I wish I had 11 years ago when I was starting out as a writer
This is such a nice piece. I must commend you for being so brave to share something this personal with such grace and level-headed perspective. Enjoyed reading this.