Dear Nicola, when children get a sibling, it’s often not so easy. What are the reactions? What do parents need to know?
Each child reacts differently, which depends particularly on his age, in which it gets a sibling. For us parents, it is most important to know that it is normal for many children to go into regression. That means you may want to get back on your arms, are no longer dry, want to be treated like a baby. Development steps that you have actually already taken, such as attracting alone, can be forgotten for a while. As parents, we often have to say the impulse:
But you’re the big child now! You can!
However, the opposite is helpful: if the supposedly large child experiences that they can do these backwards, he is very helpful. So we play baby – and know that it goes over again.
What factors does it depend on how strongly a child reacts?
It depends heavily on the age gap between the siblings, that tells us the research situation that I have shown in my book “Siblings as a team”. If I am still extremely dependent on my binding person at the age of two, an even more dependent infant hits me particularly hard. It also depends on the child’s temperament. Some children can put their needs back very well at the age of two, others find it much more difficult and they need more time.
The circumstances also play a role if my main person’s person after the baby arrives disappears from the scene for three weeks because she suddenly has to go to the hospital, this can be stressful for the children.
What can parents do to prepare children?
Especially for the first time, we should definitely provide a lot of help so that the children’s main relapse does not get into the excessive demand to have to provide a regressive toddler and a needy infant. This gives stress and bad mood – that’s not nice for everyone. In his view, we should also explain the situation to the child: you become a big sister or big brother. Instead: Mom and dad get a baby. It also helps not gloss over anything:
Babies do a lot of work and need a lot of attention, but we can do it.
We are honest, but confident, we include the child, but we keep responsibility with us. If possible, we let the child decide or choose and speak of “the baby”, but of a little person who may already have a name or “your brother/sister”.
What can you do if the crisis is great despite all the preparation?
The most important thing is understanding for the big child. Wherever possible, we should make it clear to him that we understand his situation and are with him.
Then there are very practical things: While we breastfeed the baby, we can communicate quietly with the big child via hand signals so that the baby falls asleep. A classic is particularly important: if the baby is supposed to sleep and the big child has to be quiet, we have to raise the greatest understanding if it simply cannot suppress the impulse loudly. No matter how sensible it works, we just can’t expect it from a toddler.
We should always communicate to the big child that it is also important:
Listen, your little brother cries and needs me, come we go together, I don’t just want to leave you alone.
Or: “Your little sister is calling for us, but I think it’s not so urgent yet. We both are coming to an end here now, I think she can still wait so long.” So the child experiences that it still has an important place in the family
You have already said that you should get help. How can the environment specifically support?
At the species -appropriate, we call it the village, and this village as species -appropriate can support us a lot! All of these people should be completely there for the big child, play with him, can endure that it wants to be small and maybe in need and vulnerable, whine and angry in this phase. Understanding tall people who don’t say: “Now you’re a big brother, pull yourself together!” But: “I understand how you feel, come into my arms we make something particularly beautiful”, is worth gold.
Does this phase play a role in the later sibling relationship?
Of course! If you ask adults with siblings, they can all remember the feeling that suddenly someone else was there, even if they were still very small.
If I was able to protect and well accompanied by this phase, in the sure feeling that I was allowed to develop at my pace despite the little sibling, then children can result in it. But if I had to put back too much and was not ready for it, traces remain. Many adults are still angry with their little siblings today because they suddenly had to share their main affiliate or they love each other hot and intimate because they got through well through this first phase (or later worked up). In my species-appropriate books, the parent-energy conservation set is located and it says: It is always worth investing energy early in children because it pays off in the long term. That also applies here.
Siblings still have each other when we have been parents for a long time and research shows that they get healthier and happier old if they have been able to develop a close, sustainable relationship. The idea that my children give each other warmth and support and keep to each other, when I have long since crumbled to dust, had this book written – it is the most beautiful that I can imagine.
That’s correct. This is a nice thought! Thank you, Nicola!
Photo: Jess Zoerb
