To wish I’d had my kids the other way round

[Boyfirstthengirl]

I feel bad saying this but I am from a family where I’m the youngest and a girl/woman (obviously …) and I have an older brother. We get on well enough now and I do have nice memories of us together as kids, it isn’t all bad. But he was always so rough when we were young, would beat me up, call me names and so on.

To be honest I don’t think my parents dealt with it particularly well as they’d get angry with us both although to be fair to them I probably instigated some of it but my memory is selective!

Anyway, I have a boy who is 3 in January. I also have a baby daughter who is 3 months and history looks set to repeat itself … he hasn’t taken to her at all and tries to hurt her a lot. I am very worried about having horrible family dynamics. I want to manage this as best I can but struggling with DS - I can’t seem to get through to him, I know he’s jealous but I can’t think what else I can do.

I know I’ll get slated for this but everyone I know whose eldest child is a girl is excited and happy about the baby. I feel like she’s in a really vulnerable position growing up and I have to protect her but that’s also going to alienate my son

This OP.
Start early so that you can nip it in the bud.

Well i can assure you that girl first is no better. I am an older sister to a younger brother.
I did lots of horrible things to him as a baby/child etc. We have an awful relationship still.
I also know families with 2 girls where some pretty vicious fighting occurred.
So basically small children are always brutal.
It's your job to ensure your children get on better than you did with your own sibling.
Work on reducing the jealousy.

I feel angry in the moment when he’s hurt her, but I’m not angry with him day to day. I’m concerned that I’m going to end up with unhappy children. My worry is both feeling like I’ve prioritised the other. Laying into me (and some posters are very abrupt with their replies) is not going to change that. Actually telling me how to change this might

Where's the dad in all this? I would get your partner to focus on your son for a while, to take him out, do special things with him, so your son feels a bit special and that things are more 'even'. Just to get him through this period of insecurity and jealousy.

Also, having grown up with an older brother and now having a daughter as the oldest child, the big advantage of having a boy as your oldest is that girls tend to mature more quickly so they’re more likely to be equal playmates as they get older.

Yes! This has been our experience too. They grow out of things (interests, etc, not clothes) at the same time which leaves me totally catching up. This year they've both moved on from Santa, last year they both believed were willing to humour me.

2 year olds really don't care about babies from what I've seen. 3-4 year olds have a much greater understanding and empathy. Can you keep DD mostly in a sling when you are at home? Then you have 2 hands to do things with DS? If you can afford it I would definitely be sending him to nursery a couple of days a week. It is really boring for an older toddler to be on the schedule of a newborn and hard for you to muster the energy to please everyone.

I currently have two girls and my eldest was 6.5 when her sister came along so that made a difference. However, my youngest is now 3 and can be brutal! She’s very physical towards her sister which we are working hard on to stop and I’m pregnant with DC3 so I’m worried she will be towards a baby. She loves babies though so she might not.

Your DS is still so little and coming to terms with having a new baby in the house. It will get better!

Also, perhaps buy your son some special crayons or toys, and make it clear they are only for him and not for his sister. You could say they are rewards for being nice to his sister, linking them to a time when he's been gentle and kind to her.

One of my earliest memories is of hating my baby brother, because he was allowed to 'stay up late' with my parents and I was made to go to bed!

I have 4DC, OP, and my most difficult stage was going from 2 to 3. DD2 did not take at all kindly to my older DS when he was born and spent most of his first year trying to flatten him (literally!). She was very jealous but was only just over 2 at the time. They are now teen/preteen, he has just started at her secondary and they get on really well and probably are the two with most in common.

There are 3.5 years between my 2 DSs and he absolutely doted on my youngest from the off, it was lovely to see. Things are a bit 'livelier' now, but standard siblings, I think.

I did have to watch DD2 like a hawk for that first year, but probably would have anyway due to her age.

Good luck, he may well surprise you, little boys can be so loving.

My oldest is a boy and is the classic loving protective big brother.... it is possible to achieve. I would suggest putting together a box of really special activities that the pair of you can do whilst holding the baby and a box of activities for while she is sleeping/contented in a bouncer etc... then direct him to the appropriate box and distract him from the pinching/hitting. Repeat the phrase gentle hands and physically hold his hand to stroke baby at the appropriate force level... he's not being mean he just doesn't know better. You have to teach him.

@Bear2014 i do like slings but I do have various issues with them. I can’t bend down for one or sit. I also end up drenched in milk - my supply still hasn’t stabilised very well - and also DD is then just sort of shoved away. They’re great in other contexts but mostly problems start when DD is being fed. I think DS knows we’re both a bit stuck then.

So in the coming in for a cuddle situation. If at all possible put DD down and just give DS a massive cuddle. If you can’t put her down because say she’s mid feed then tell him ‘I really really want to give you a special DS cuddle, I know it’s really annoying having to wait while Dd finishes feeding, could you go find a book you want me to read you when she’s done’ or something like that. Vocalise what you think he is feeling - the jealousy, frustration etc.

Also do remember that you are NOT going to end up with unhappy children and it’s really normal to feel this awful guilt and being torn in two when your DC2 comes along. My DD was an absolute dream with DS1 when he was a baby (it hasn’t always lasted, ha!) but I still felt like I was being a but if a crap Mum to both of them a lot of the time.

This can happen the other way round too. My friend had a daughter first and she loathed her brother when he was born and tried to hurt him constantly. She said horrible things to him, demanded attention if he got any, said she wanted to kill him. It was awful to watch. He developed significant mental health problems at age 11 and I'm sure the way his sister treated him had a bearing on that.

Sorry, OP, I missed that you have already had some issues, it may well change as she does, it did for us once past that first year when they could play more.

@Motomum23 i have tried I really have … I’m not sitting there ignoring it. Unfortunately he ignores me, or laughs at me. It’s hard not to feel like I’ve gone horribly wrong somewhere as a mum

For us it was just having consequences and sticking to them religiously. We did time outs, some people hate them but for us it worked well as we didn’t have to do it much. Also sticker charts, depending on your child’s understanding, helped with positive reinforcement so even on days that felt negative there was some praise, for being kind to the baby, for helping out you, for listening well, for playing nicely etc. It doesn’t really matter what you do so long as it works for you and you are consistent.

I was going to say - I had a really rough time with my two younger brothers too! The middle one of us was quite rough with both me and he youngest brother, but equally the two of them would gang up on me with teasing, teasing, teasing which was exhausting and has given me a very short fuse for certain things for life.

Its the way the parent deals with it that’s important, not the order of the children. My Mum didn’t do anything about it - it was all “oh they’ll stop if you ignore them” - so putting the onus on me to change my reaction, not on them to stop. My recollection is she would sometimes even join in laughing at me.

So I’d say it’s really down to the parent!

My older sister beat me and called me names. Mum did similar to yours...not much.

You don't know what your children will be like. I wouldn't ear mark your eldest as a potential abuser.

Funnily enough, I’ve generally heard people say the opposite: that it’s harder with an older girl and younger boy as girls tend to mature at an earlier age than boys which can make the age gap feel a lot bigger than it is. But it doesn’t help to generalise with kids - nor to project your own experience too much into your own situation. I thinK being mindful of potential pitfalls can help you to avoid falling into them.

@goodkidsmaadhouse hed ignore that and clamber on anyway. I’d have to stand up and walk away. He is definitely coming to hurt her - it’s not because he wants me then gets annoyed he can’t. He has a certain smirk and gleam in his eye.

I think you're expecting too much too soon. Three months isn't very long for a 2yr old to accept a new baby into the family. Plus newborns are blobs who aren't fun or interesting at all. I also wouldn't let your assumptions and experiences colour your worries – I know several toddler girls who have been nasty AF to their newborn siblings. My DH is also the little brother to his older sisters and had a similar dynamic of roughness and teasing with them, despite them being older.

I don’t think he is an abuser. I think he could cause her a lot of physical and emotional pain and distress if I don’t manage to encourage a better sibling relationship. It’s just hard to know how to do that.

I don’t know that the order really matters. I have a DD 10 and DS 7 (nearly 8) and they hit and kick each other a lot and argue. Other times they are best buds. I don’t think having an older girls solves the problem!
I think all you can do is make sure you stop any hitting etc straight away (which I’m sure you do) and be consistent. A 3 month old is fairly boring to a toddler, as she gets older he will be more interested in her and they may get along great. My neighbour has an older boy and younger girl (roughly the same ages as mine) and they get on great.

My DS had just turned 3 when his baby brother arrived. He wasn't too impressed. Didn't hurt him or anything but not that interested, bit put out by the whole thing as new babies are so dependent and need so much attention.
Now he's the sweetest big brother in the world, if I'm giving 1 year old a cuddle he will come over and join us, give his brother a kiss and say how much he loves him 😍🥰 most mornings when I go in to get them up he's climbed into the cot with his tonie box and they are singing together, which is just adorable if not very tuneful 🙉
2 is so little and 6 months is an absolute age in the life of a child so young. Don't despair yet! Love bomb your eldest so he knows he's still your baby too. I sometimes cradle DS4 and pretend he's a baby, he roars with laughter and protests that he's a big boy but I actually think stuff like that helps him feel secure in his place in the family if that makes sense.

It will be much easier as your baby gets older. She will be more robust and you won't need to interfere for every little thing. Once she is on the move and into everything, they will have a much more equal relationship and you won't need to be quite so on the alert the whole time. It will be a different dynamic when she is no longer the precious baby being protected from a marauding toddler, although of course you still need to supervise closely.

My two have a bigger age gap, but DC1 can still be a bit rough and over-exuberant with DC2. However, DC2 is much more able to hold her own now and will let him know in no uncertain terms if she doesn't like something (or she wants something 😂).