Conflicted after DS hit DD and she fought back and beat him up?

[ForAmpleRobin]

Bit of sibling drama today and I’m not sure if I’m handling it right.

My DD is 9 and my DS is 11. Lately there’s been a bit of tension because she’s actually stronger and faster than him at a lot of things like running and general physical things. DD and my niece have started doing cross country and the girls have been practicing whilst we’ve been out on family walks as well as racing each other. DS is quite competitive and I think it bothers him more than he lets on that DD and his cousin are faster and stronger than him.

They were messing around earlier in the garden doing races and silly “strength competitions” like who can get who on the ground first and DS got increasingly annoyed when DD and DN kept winning. It escalated into him hitting his sister and trying to subdue her but she fought back.
She ended up properly beating him up. DN quickly came and told me about it and then I had to carry him inside and DH took DN home. He is covered in cuts and his bruises are starting to show up.

Obviously I’ve told them that hitting isn’t acceptable, but if I’m being completely honest I also felt proud that she’s confident and doesn’t back down. At the same time I know DS is feeling humiliated by being beaten up by his younger sister and that DN will spread it to the rest of the family. However this would help him learn his lesson!

AIBU for feeling conflicted about this? How would you handle it with both of them? I feel like I don’t know what the best punishment would be? I was thinking of grounding them both for fighting but then DD was in self defence so is it unfair and shall I just ground DS?

It doesn't sound like he's learned any lesson except be bigger and stronger and - especially in the context of the manosphere stuff - you need to be very very careful. You don't fix whatever is going on with him with punishment, especially not cancelling a birthday treat. You need to avoid doing anything that would feed him feeling picked on for being a boy. That's from his perspective not a logical one.

As a side note, my (younger) sister was extremely violent to me for years. To the extent that we couldn't be left alone and much of our teen years were spent in separate homes. The last beating I remember she dragged me round the house and hit me repeatedly. She was inches taller than me and stronger. And yet, I never needed to be carried anywhere when it stopped. I was never covered head to toe in bruises.

I think you need to think again about what your daughter did. That was beyond escalation.

I misread it initially so Im giving other posters the benefit of the doubt that they might also have misread it, but its a 'strength game' which involves who can push who to the ground first

So wrestling each other to the ground

The boy is weaker so will lose each time

Apparently thats his fault if he plays the game

Sounds like the 2 girls were wrestling him to the ground, the girl sounds thuggish to me and I suspect he lashed out in self defence, to be met with more violence

But this site is so anti male, it really doesnt matter that this child was subject to that, he's male and so is therefore some sort of violent perpetrator.

Girl power!!!

He was beaten so badly that he struggled to walk and has cuts and bruises.

I'd be worried about internal injuries to be honest.

The OP is completely negligient in so many ways and being proud of physical violence in the home- words fail me.

Absolutely this, I can’t believe what I’m reading, is this the world we live in where a child can beat up a sibling and the mother is proud of the bully.

Agree with this. This was a powder keg ready to go off.

Cancelling his birthday is too harsh.
I would see what you can do to repair the relationship

“strength competitions” like who can get who on the ground first

I completely misread that as who can get on the ground first.😊

Thats exactly why I misread it, I thought it was about burpees or something.

Not sure that's what people are saying tbh

Absolutely this

there are some shocking responses on this thread, taking delight in someone beating up someone else jus because “he deserved it”

Is it possible that some of the cuts and bruises he got were from the game and he had been hurt in the game and he hit/pushed for them to stop and then sister hit him back harder.

If OP has encouraged/ignored play fighting in the past then did her son just hit DD in the same way they normally do in play fighting and she hit back but in a stronger way.

They are both too old to be playing ‘games’ like this.

If it was a strength competition then you need to be similar strength and size (and gender). And they are getting to the age where, as they could hurt someone or themselves, they need to be doing it in a regulated way in a regulated place ie martial arts. Martial arts teach you there is a time and a place.

also, do we think that if the son had beaten the daughter up so she couldn’t walk and was covered in cuts and bruises that the responses would be “tell them both off” or “she deserved it”

of course they fucking wouldnt

awful behaviour from her and the op being proud of it is just shocking

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. I tell my daughter that if any little scrote in school hits her (which has happened and telling the teacher did bugger all) that she is to hit him back as hard as she can, preferably in the balls. I’ve told the school that I will not accept her being in trouble if she has to defend herself in future.
It’s time to hammer home to your mini Andrew Tate that hitting girls is unacceptable. I hope he’s learned a lesson.

That's exactly what a lot of posters are saying - i.e. he's a violent misogynist that can't handle losing to a girl and he got his just desserts.

But it's ok that his sister battered him? Perhaps the answer should be violence isn't acceptable full stop.

Rolls eyes hard.

Nip this is the bud now before your son gets much stronger and batters hell out of his sister. The teenage years are not far away.

And this is a prime example.

Calm your pride in her defending herself because it’s unwarranted.

1. when she is an adult, it’s likely that more than 97% of men will be able to overpower her. Men are hugely stronger. Fighting them is idiotic. Protecting yourself as an adult female comes down more to being careful than physical scrapping. I say that as a 6ft very well built strong tank of a woman. I am under no illusions that the vast majority of men could easily take me down. My size is a minor deterrent and my size lets me pass for a man if it’s dark and my hair is hidden. But in a physical fight, it’s useless and I’ll be overpowered easily.

2. she is not in a “girl power” situation with her brother. They were engaged in childish competitions that played to her strengths and things she’d trained for. They had a childish fight which she took way too far if she ended up properly beating him up.

also the cognitive difference between them is likely smaller than the age gap with a boy/girl that way round at those ages.

they both need to behave themselves and control themselves.

especially because once he’s into/through puberty, if she tries to beat him up again and he fights back, he’ll annihilate her.

@BeardieWeirdie they were playing a stupid game in the first place where the girls were throwing the weaker child to the ground. It’s quite possible she had hit him first (or he thought she had hit him)

OP has encouraged/allowed play fighting between the 2 different sexes siblings. So he has been getting mixed messages. Boys don’t hit girls unless it is your sister.

They are too old to be playing games like that

Beardie, you presumably do realise that if your dd assaults someone at school, she could face severe consequences - expulsion/police etc. They don’t care about provocation, you cannot just use violence in that way.

You’ll get a lot of boy hating comments on mumsnet telling you he deserved it.

But honestly op, this is disgusting behaviour from both your children and it needs nipping in the bud NOW.

You sound gleeful that your daughter really hurt your son. It won’t be long until your son grows up and if you don’t stop them fighting someone will end up injured. You shouldn’t be proud of your daughter for hurting your son.

You should be warning them to stop fighting or there’ll be consequences. I was never allowed to physically fight with my siblings and I’ve managed to function perfectly well as an adult without resorting to violence.

So now I have realised what the "game" was-does that mean that he was being bullied & couldn't walk away when he'd had enough though?

Either way his sister either went way over the top "defending" herself or just out & out beat him up.

Physical violence against each other is something which should have been left behind when they were toddlers.Would a disciplined sport help both of them?
Please don't feel any pride that your daughter beat her brother up.
Were you not at all concerned that your son's school would report his injuries, it's really worrying if they didn't/ don't.

You sound like it's just up to you, maybe his father will just take him regardless if he thinks that's right.

Sadly so many answers here seem to think because the massive overreaction was by a female on a male it’s fine. The DS doing what he did is objectively wrong and utterly unacceptable. For the DD to render him unable to walk and covered in cuts and bruises is the same. That is NOT self defence.