One day after I moved into a new neighborhood a few years ago,
a young child who lived down the block came over to say hello. Like
so many exuberant preschoolers, he couldn't wait to tell me all
about his world, spewing forth details about himself, his parents,
and his new baby sister, Katy. When he paused to take a breath,
I asked him how old he was.
"I'm five," he said with a smile that was quickly followed
by a melodramatic sigh of apparent frustration. "But when Katy
turns one, I'm going to be thirty-seven!"
In those few words he told me how overwhelming the experience of
being an older sibling can feel to young children. To toddlers and
preschoolers, the birth of a new baby is almost always an event
filled with mixed emotions. They may take great pride in their new
titles as older brothers and sisters. Yet those positive feelings
are often overshadowed by worries about the changes in their roles
within their families. Will they be replaced or abandoned? How much
of their parents' attention and love will they now have to share?
Despite the importance of these concerns, young children seldom
express them directly. But if you know how to listen to the messages
behind their words and actions, you can see what's on their minds,
even before the birth.
The daughter of two friends of mine expressed those strong but
ambivalent feelings quite beautifully. The girl had begged her parents
for a baby brother and, at first, was overjoyed when her mother
became pregnant. But as her mother changed shape, and both her parents
became more focused on the upcoming birth, the girl's attitude changed.
One morning, when her father asked her what she wanted to do as
a new big sister when they brought her brother home from the hospital,
the girl replied, "I'm looking forward to holding him and hugging
him until he turns blue!"
There was no true malice in her statement. It was simply an honest
reflection of her conflicting feelings: simultaneously wanting to
love him and to get rid of him. That's why it shouldn't surprise
you if, a few days or weeks after you bring a new baby home, your
other child asks when you're going to send him back. Many toddlers
and preschoolers don't realize that the change is permanent.
Two of the most common signs of sibling rivalry among toddlers
and preschoolers are emotional and physical regression. Young children
may become more clingy than usual. A boy who's recently been toilet-trained
may start wetting his pants. A girl who just stopped sucking her
thumb may take up the habit again. This regression seldom lasts
more than a few weeks or months until the children understand that
their worst fears ("My parents will abandon me!") haven't
been realized. They'll then surge ahead in their development and
get back on track.
The age difference between the two children can also have an effect
on how much regression and other behavior changes you see in the
older child. On average, siblings in our culture are separated by
two to four years. Yet those are the ages at which children are
struggling to feel comfortable when separated from their parents.
That's one of the reasons why toddlers and preschoolers tend to
show more regression than older children do when a new baby is born
into their family.
Toddlers and preschoolers also often have unrealistic expectations
for their new brothers and sisters. They have little conception
of how newborns behave, and may imagine that they'll quickly be
playing house or riding tricycles together. They think of their
new sibling as a playmate, not a baby.
Interestingly, children who have been attending preschool or a
child-care center regularly may have an easier time adjusting to
a new sibling than children who've been cared for at home. It's
not simply a matter of children who are at home being used to depending
on their parents for all their emotional support and adult attention.
It's partly that children who are in preschool have a space and
people that they don't have to share with the new baby.
Handling Early Sibling Rivalry
Always remember that the fundamental concern of toddlers and preschoolers
in this situation is that they'll be abandoned by their parents—in
essence, traded in for a newer and better model. This is a fear
that parents need to address repeatedly, even if their children
never broach the topic. Sometimes the best ways to reassure a child
are symbolic rather than direct. For example:
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If at all possible, don't have the new baby use the same crib
as the older child, especially if the older one has recently
transferred to a regular bed. You might try swapping cribs with
someone in your birthing class who's in the same situation.)
If that's too expensive a change to make and swapping isn't
practical, buy different bedclothes for it so that it looks
somewhat different.
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Toddlers often attach a great deal of emotional importance
to the blankets that comfort them at night. That's why "security
blankets" are such a common transitional object. One way
of letting your child know that she won't be replaced is to
put her old blankets in her room and tell her that she can keep
them for the rest of her life.
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Put together a scrapbook about your older child and her family.
This can have pictures of family members, the child's friends,
and souvenirs of special family activities such as vacations
and holiday celebrations. This reassures her about the links
between her and her family, and gives her something to hold
on to—both literally and figuratively—while her mother's
in the hospital.
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Get out your older child's baby book. Go over the pictures
and talk about what she was like when she was born. Retell happy
stories about her birth and her first trip home. Talk about
how much she cried and when she slept and ate. This will allow
her to revisit those feelings of being special and to prepare
for what having a new baby in the house will be like.
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Try to maintain your family's daily rituals during the pregnancy.
Even small things, such as eating family meals at the same time,
help children feel more secure because some important aspects
of their lives are consistent during this time of dramatic change.
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