Dear the youngest child who feels just as pressured as the oldest,

I know people care about me, it just feels like they don't. I wake up every day and everyday it's the same. I don't know how to deal with the expectations that have been given to me. I always hear how the eldest child has it the hardest, but what about the youngest child. The youngest of all the siblings your parents are disappointed in. What about me? Every day is another reminder I must be the best so I can accomplish all the things my siblings did not. My parents talk about it like a joke, about how I'm the last hope. I don't think they realize how that makes me feel. I feel like I'm drowning in expectations, in pressure, but mostly deeply I feel like I'm drowning in loneliness and fear. My whole life I've been the last hope. The pressure to make sure everything I do will make my parents feel reassured, like thank goodness we didn't mess this one up too, makes me feel so much anxiety and in the process of trying so hard to be what they want I no longer know what I want or who I am. How am I supposed to join the real world when I couldn't even tell you my favorite food, when I don't even know what I like to do because I don't have time for enjoyment when I need to first be everything others around me couldn't. My parents, they care and do their best to provide, but they don't understand that their words affect their children. They don't know that their kids resent them and most importantly they don't know that everything I do is, so they don't strike out. And that is how I plan to keep it because I think I would rather drown in pressure than have to live with the guilt of letting my parents down when i could've done better. I know they care, but I still feel lonely- and wow I just really want someone to talk to- but admitting I need help will only let my parents know I'm struggling. I've given the illusion that I'm fine, that my family is fine, like every time I share a story about my family's arguments, like sister getting kicked out and my brother getting breathalyzed, that it's just a big joke. Like it didn't kill and gut me. Like I don't hate myself because my parents are funny and I don't act like I'm struggling. I'm in too deep and it's too late to back out, I need to keep this image up. So, I'm just alone with my thoughts. Alone with the fact that I will continue putting myself last and always believing I will fail so I don't feel so bad when I do, because I just don't know any other way to be. I know nothing about myself and it's my own fault.