Over-protective older sister

#TriggerWarning

I consider myself an over-protective older sister to my younger sister. I don't know if I'm doing a good job though. I was away when she was growing up, and only reunited with her when she turned 12.

For this post, I want to write about a specific incident that happened recently.

I noticed I feel very uncomfortable around this cousin-in-law, and at some point, both my brother and I think that the way he speaks to my sister is a bit inappropriate and sexualized.

Then a few days ago, his daughter who is my sister's age invited my sister to go for a sleepover at their house. I came home a bit late that night, so I came after my sister already agreed to go and couldn't talk her out of this sleepover plan.

I shared with my sister that I don't feel comfortable that she'd be near this cousin-in-law, but she said she'll be fine.

I couldn't sleep well that night. Bad thoughts kept coming up in my head. For example, I thought: what if he sneaked into their room at night and touched her, or worse than that? I don't want that to happen to my sister. I was mad at my sister that she put herself into a situation that could allow that to happen. But it's all in my head.

What made me write this post is I want to see what made this idea get into my head. Why did I just jump to the conclusion and imagine this scenario? Did something happen to me? Maybe I should just let my sister enjoy her sleepover and not text her every 10 minutes to make sure to lock the room's door.

It could be that I worked with a few organizations that work with women and for women in the community who have faced abuse and rape, and their stories are in my mind and a similar scenario like this triggers me to imagine it. Or it is because of the book that I read that tells the real-life stories of trafficked women and girls, and it triggered something else in my brain to react this way?

I think I don't feel comfortable in general when teenage girls are in the same space as older guys. They don't always have to do anything wrong. I just usually feel very weird about it.

Thank you for reading. In case you have had a similar reflection or came across a similar situation and you know what could trigger this, please help share in the comment section. Or a new perspective works too. I'm curious to know this for myself.