Sibling Rivalry

If you or someone you know are a parent to multiple kids you more than likely have experience sibling rivalry, I know I have and here are some tips that can be used to lessen or eliminate it altogether.

1-Love Your Children and Don’t Show Favoritism.

Ask any son or daughter who the favorite child is in the family and you may get an answer—pointing to the rival. Sibling favoritism offends and infects the heart of a child and leads to feelings of inferiority, anger, resentment, and even bitterness.

The Bible story of Esau and Jacob is a prime example of how favoritism damages a family. We learn in the book of Genesis that the father of the boys, Isaac, preferred Esau while the mother favored Jacob (25:28). This led to deceit between the parents and to Jacob’s stealing Esau’s birthright and blessing.

In many families there is no favoritism, and you must challenge your children’s false belief that there is. You know that you love each of your children completely, but that you also have a different relationship and behave differently with each one. It is essential to know each child’s particular love language and to communicate your love in that style. You must constantly discuss this essential difference in how people receive love until your children get it—which may not be until adulthood or when they themselves have children.

2-Don’t Compare

Most siblings are already very sensitive to the competitive aspects of their relationships with brothers and sisters. Instead of asking themselves, How good am I at this? they ask themselves, Am I better than my brother [sister] at this?

It is best for parents to avoid directly comparing their kids to one another. You can comment on your children’s gifts and uniqueness apart from their siblings. For example, while it is good to say, “Jane is great at soccer, and David is a whiz at piano!” it is not good to say “Jane is better than David at soccer, and David kicks Jane’s butt at music.”

3-Counter Jealous Feelings

Often jealousy is at the heart of sibling rivalry. If an older sibling is experiencing jealousy of a younger sibling, try the following techniques:

Help the child verbalize his or her feelings.
When children are able to verbalize their feelings, they are much better equipped to understand them and cope with them. However, verbalizing feelings is not a simple process for children. For example, can you imagine a young child saying, “Mom, Dad, I’ve been feeling a bit neglected and insecure since my little brother came along and I could really use some more attention. Specifically, I would like us to spend more one-on-one time playing games together like we used to.” Yeah right! Children are much more likely to act out their frustrations. Only through practice and coaching can a child learn to describe their emotions and needs verbally.

Kids want attention, and even though it seems backwards, for some children bad attention is better than no attention at all.
Therefore, a good way for parents to improve a child’s behavior is to attend to good and okay behaviors and ignore the bad ones. For example, if your child behaved well while getting her shoes on, tell the child, “Thank you, honey. I am very proud of how good you are. You put on your shoes quietly when asked.” If your child misbehaves by putting up a fuss, ignore the behavior—don’t give her more attention.

Show the child the privileges of age.
All adults recognize that age has its privileges, but kids don’t always see it that way—especially when there’s an infant getting gobs and gobs of attention. Point out all the privileges of age to the older siblings. What are they getting because they are older? If they’re not getting many, give them some!

Hope these help.

Source: AACC