Photo: TikTok
She's been doing it for 3 years.
By Nia Tipton — Written on Jan 03, 2023
While grieving the loss of a family member can be an emotional time — one woman has an uncharacteristic way of helping her elderly family members that have left many people shocked.
In a now-deleted TikTok video, Annie Niu shared that her grandparents have no idea her twin sister is dead, and it's all because of preventative measures she's taken.
Niu says she pretends to be her dead twin sister so her grandparents don't find out about her passing.
While it is an unconventional way to withhold information about a family member's passing, Niu stands by her decision.
Niu first shared the routine she does with her grandparents in a video that showed her talking to them on the phone.
"POV: your twin sister passed away three years ago but you still haven't told your grandparents so now you have to call them every holiday pretending to be her," she wrote in overlay text.
Though Niu deleted the video, other users were quick to repost it and share their horror.
In another video, Niu went on to explain that her sister had passed away from viral meningitis, and defended her decision to protect her older family members.
She pointed out that such a thing is "really common in Asian cultures" and there isn't any malicious intent behind it because all she and her family want is to "shield the elderly from terrible news."
Niu said that her grandparents "basically raised" her and her sister, and all of them were extremely close.
“A lot of people are like, ‘Oh well, they deserve to know,'" Niu said. “Well, they don’t deserve to die, and you can’t guarantee that’s not going to happen if you tell them.”
Despite the circumstances, Niu declared that she and her family have no future plans of breaking the death of her twin sister to her grandparents.
“We’re probably just going to continuously make up excuses for why she is not visiting them,” she continued. “[We] don’t have the heart to tell them. It’ll crush them.”
Niu admitted that she doesn't mind pretending to be her twin sister.
Niu clarified that she doesn't mind calling her grandparents as her twin sister, and admitted that the ritual makes her feel closer to her sister and her memory.
She revealed that she even still dreams about her sister "almost every single night."
“So I treat it as I am spending half of my life with her still,” she said.
Niu's video drew a slew of mixed reactions from other users, with some sympathizing with the situation and others criticizing the decision.
"What happens when they find out?” one user questioned, while another declared the entire thing: “Actually sick.”
However, others offered more compassionate words and even admitted that they had no room to judge since they couldn't relate to Asian culture.
"Both painful and hard for both sides. I couldn’t even judge her for doing it, to be honest," a third user wrote.
Nia Tipton is a writer living in Brooklyn. She covers pop culture, social justice issues, and trending topics. Keep up with her on Instagram and Twitter.