|
Title: How to Deal with Sibling Rivalry
Author: Anthony Kane, MD
Website: http://addadhdadvances.com
Ezine format: 65 characters per line
Autoresponder:sibrivalry@addadhdadvances.com
Webpage format: HTML coded
Autoresponder:sibrivalryhtml@addadhdadvances.com
Word count: 1580 words
Please reprint this article. You have permission
to reprint this article in your newsletter or on
your website provided the resource box remains
intact. If you use this article please notify me at
akane@addadhdadvances.com
================================================================
How to Deal with Sibling Rivalry
by Anthony Kane, MD
Introduction
There are many new issues facing parents today. Sibling rivalry
is not one of them. It is as old as Cain and Abel.
Sibling rivalry is universal, but more importantly sibling
rivalry is normal. More than that current research shows that
sibling rivalry is a sign of a healthy family. One of the sign
of a dysfunctional home or a home where there is a lot of stress
is that there is no sibling rivalry. In these homes the
children tend to cling together for security.
So if sibling rivalry is universal and it is found in normal
homes, it must serve a purpose.
The Benefits of Sibling Rivalry
One of the main benefits that sibling rivalry teaches children
is conflict resolution. Life is full of conflict. As adults
we have developed skills to resolve these conflicts in an
effective and civil manner. How did we develop these skills?
We learned this by pounding our little brother. We learned
this by fighting with our big sister.
You can learn certain skills by arguing with your parents, but
it is not the same. Through your parents you learn how to deal
with authority. But siblings are peers. Learning how to relate
to them properly prepares us to relate to our friends and our
spouses.
You can only learn conflict resolution when there is conflict.
Sibling rivalry provides a safe and supervised haven for
children to learn how to resolve their disagreements with
others.
The second important lesson that we learn through sibling
rivalry is that the world is not fair. This is a very
important and bitter lesson to learn. There is always some who
will do better than you. There is always someone who is richer,
who is smarter, who has better behaved children, who has a
happier marriage. Life is full of inequities. We may not like
it but most of us have come to terms with these inequities.
Where did we learn to accept that everything is not always
distributed evenly? We learned it from our siblings.
How to Manage Sibling Rivalry
Now that we have a framework for what children accomplish
through sibling rivalry, we can understand better how we as
parents can use our children’s relationships with each other to
help them grow into healthy normal adults.
How to Oversee the Conflict Resolution
Since the purpose of sibling rivalry is to learn how to resolve
conflicts with others, you should as much as possible let your
children work out disputes themselves. You should direct them
when necessary, but the idea is to give them as little direction
as possible.
What You Should Do
Create a situation where the motivation is to resolve their
differences. There are times they can’t work it out- so you
coach them give them ideas how to compromise but the best thing
is to have them resolve it themselves.
For example, say they are fighting over a toy. One child says
he had it first. The other says he didn’t get to play with it
at all yesterday and now it’s his turn.
Who is right? That is impossible to say. So what could you do?
Tell them you don’t know who is right about the toy, but if they
are fighting about it they are both wrong. Then take it away
from them and tell them that when they work out a way of sharing
it they can have it back. You will be surprised how fast most
children will be able to work out something.
What You Should Not Do
Do not try to figure out who started it. In most cases you will
never resolve this. More than that, any attempt to figure out
who is the aggressor almost always makes things worse.
Usually both children are at fault. Fighting with someone else
is wrong. Once there is a fight they are automatically both
wrong. What caused the fight becomes secondary.
What to Watch Out For
Your job as a parent is not to solve your children’s problems,
but to teach them how to solve them themselves. They must
learn to make compromises. As much as possible they should be
the ones who work out the compromise. However, there are some
things you should watch for to be sure they are doing a good
job.
Make Sure Compromise is Reasonable
You don’t want to let one child bully the other into submission.
You have to make sure there is no coercion.
Be on Alert for the Child Who is too Good
Some children avoid conflict by nature. They would rather give
in and be the “good one” than get what they were originally
after. If one of your children is like this you have to be on
guard.
Constantly giving in is not acceptable. It is not good for the
child who gives in because it trains him to be a target to be
easily exploited. It is not good for the other child because
it teaches him to take advantage of the good nature of others.
You must make sure that each child gets something out of the
compromise.
Special Situations:
An Impulsive or Inflexible Child
Some children have specific problems, like being impulsive or
inflexible. This may require you to intervene more often.
Still whenever possible it is better to let the children resolve
their conflicts themselves. In most cases, when you make your
children responsible for solving their own problems, they will
be very quick to work out a solution.
Teenagers
The teen years are a special topic by itself and clearly not
enough has been written on it. However, I am going to address
only a few points here.
When Your Teen Fights with Your Seven Year Old
There are two very common reasons an older child will fight with
a much younger child. The first is he feels the younger child
is an imposition. We as parents use our older children to help
us with the younger ones. This is good for both children. Yet
at times the older child can feel that he is being forced into
a parental role that he is not quite ready to fill. When this
happens the child will begin to resent the burden of the younger
sibling and this will result in fighting.
A second common cause is that teens are very possessive of what
is theirs. Your average six year old may not understand this.
He might take be used to playing with his nine year old brothers
things, but when he takes the same liberties with what he finds
on his teenage sister’s shelf get quite a different response.
Teens have a need for privacy and boundaries around what is their
own. This need is normal and is part of the developmental stage
that they are in. When a younger child transgresses those
boundaries fights will ensue.
Treating Your Children Equitably
As I mentioned earlier, one of the things that sibling rivalry
teaches is that things in life are not always fair. We have to
keep this in mind when relating to our children.
Do Not Get Hung Up on Making Things Fair
Life is not fair. You probably know this by now. Your children
need to learn this, too.
This does not mean you want to intentionally discriminate
between your children. However, you should not knock yourself
out trying to treat each child equally, for two reasons:
1- Your children will not learn the important lesson that life
is not always fair.
2- You are doomed to fail. All you will accomplish is to
frustrate yourself.
You can’t make things fair. Nor can you give to each child
equally. Your relationship with each child is unique. This
does not mean that you don’t love your children, but each one
has a special type of relationship with you that is uniquely
his.
You should make an effort to be sure that the discrepancies are
not extreme. You should be sure to give to each child what he
or she needs. However, you are not being a bad parent by not
treating to each of your children equally. That is life.
When You Can’t Minimize the Differences
Not all children are equally easy to raise. Some children need
a disproportionate amount of your time and attention and
resources. This is a reality. You will not be able to spread
yourself out evenly. There is nothing you can do about this.
If you have a child that needs an exorbitant amount of
attention, for example if the child is chronically ill, then
you should discuss this with the other children. Explain to
them that their brother or sister is ill and needs a lot of
attention right now. You might even try to get them involved
in helping the sick child.
Conclusion
Sibling rivalry is one of the least discussed topics in child
raising. Yet sibling rivalry is part of every family when
there is more than one child. Not only that, but also sibling
rivalry plays an important part in molding each child. How a
person acts as an adult is in a large part a result of his
relationships with his siblings.
Your job as a parent is to educate your child to be able to
function as an adult. You should use how your children relate
to each other as a tool so that they can learn to relate to
others in the future.
Anthony Kane, MD
ADD ADHD Advances
http://addadhdadvances.com
================================================================
Anthony Kane, MD is a physician and international lecturer. He
is the author of a book, numerous articles, and a number of
online programs dealing with ADHD treatment
(http://addadhdadvances.com/childyoulove.html),child behavior
issues (http://addadhdadvances.com/child-behavior.html), ODD,
and education. Visit his website at http://addadhdadvances.com.
To sign up for the free ADD ADHD Advances online journal send
an email to: subscribe@addadhdadvances.com?subject=subscribeart
|
|
