A boy, a girl and a cup of spilt water! (Sibling Rivalry!)

Member Name: Claribella

Product:	Sibling Rivalry!
Date:	16/01/09 (107 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Healthy part of growing up.

Disadvantages: Lots of arguments and fighting

Picture the scene if you will. Boy and girl are happily playing with some toys on the dining room floor. Mum comes in with a drink for each of them and places them on the floor. Mum leaves the room and the boy and girl continue playing. The girl does something that the boy doesn't like. The boy gets angry and purposely knocks over the girls drink. On hearing the commotion the mum returns to the room. The girls heart pounds hard as she hears the door open. The mum's face looks like thunder when she sees the spilt drink. The boy and girl look at each other. The mum shouts and asks who spilt it. The girl looks over at the boy and waits for him to own up. The room is filled with silence until the mum returns to the high pitched shrieking that she was very good at. The girl stabs the boy with her gaze and once again waits for him to admit to what he had done. The mum continues in her shouting and explains that both the children will have to sit in a separate corner of the room until the dad arrives home. The girl trembles at the thought of her dad arriving home and feeling the wrath of his hand so admits to something she didn't do and gets the wrath of her mum's hand which was a lot lighter.

The tale that you have just read isn't a story or a page of a book, it was actually a real life occurrence and these occurrences happened all the time in our house. If me and bro weren't fighting over the purple tiger that Skeletor rode in 'He Man' then he'd be chucking me down the stairs by my hair. If we weren't arguing over which TV programme to watch then we'd be in an 'MMA' style fight in the middle of living the room floor. If he wasn't forcing me to eat mud then we'd be throwing the little circles from 'Connect Four' at each other. I rarely remember a time when we weren't arguing or fighting for my mum and dad's attention. The funny thing about it is that we did really love and care for each other and we would have done anything to help each other out as long as we were outside of the four walls of our home. We had a kind of love/hate relationship.

I'm not sure why we fought like we did. Maybe it was the fact that we were just 10 months apart in age or perhaps it was because most healthy children go through this. I don't know but looking back now it seems to me that my brother was so jealous of me and started most of the fights. I'm not saying I was 'Little Miss Innocent' but he definitely felt that he needed to fight for my parents attention even though my dad did 'Boy stuff' with him quite a lot.

I look at my two boys now and see a real love for each other. From the moment Elijah popped out and Noah first saw him, he has been really protective over him. You can tell that he really loves him and vice versa. Even though Elijah is only four months old he really looks up to Noah and no one can make him laugh as much as Noah does. It's such a joy to watch! On the other hand I have seen little glimpses of jealousy from Noah which I am hoping we can remedy. If Daddy is having a bit of fun time with Elijah then Noah will want to be in on it all of the time and if I'm feeding Elijah sometimes Noah will want me to take part in some random game.

I do think that is a healthy part of growing up and I'd don't hink it can be stopped fully but there are ways in which you can help the situation.
Although at times I know I fail, I do try to meet both of their needs. I have special time with both of them and make sure that that one of them doesn't feel left out. As time goes on I will continue to do this and hope as the years go by our boys will see that they are both individual and special to us in different ways so they don't need to fight for our attention.

Summary: Fighting, fighting and nore fighting!