Purposefully trying to hurt brother?

[Lou0712]

I’ve recently overheard my 6 year old daughter telling her 3 year old brother to do things she knows will harm him. Like telling him to eat something we’ve told her can make you sick and end up in hospital. And touch things that will hurt him.
I was very angry the first time and the second time I tried to get her to explain why she does these things and she can’t seem to.

She’s always been very caring & empathetic with me and my partner - going out of her way to cheer us up and look after us when poorly etc. she’s also brilliant at cheering her brother up and being kind most of the time.
she has a very happy home and school life.

is this a developmental thing? I’m so worried as what if she tells him to do something worse?? He copies her and listens to her constantly. I’m sure she wouldn’t but I never thought she’d try to harm her brother in even a minor way!
they have a very best friend or worst enemy relationship.

she suffers with anxiety and throws up when she’s very worried about things like unknown activities etc so I think there is some emotional regulation issues which we are working on.

Just want to know if anyone else has experienced this? Maybe I’m overreacting??

Maybe she doesn’t want him following her and copying her all the time.

I think you're under reacting, not over...

I'm used to fairly extreme violence from children of this age (TA), including deliberately kicking pregnant staff in belly; attempts to break bones and stab eyes etc, but I've only known 1 child doing this kind of verbal encouragement to harm a sibling. This seems a more unusual behaviour, to me.

How have you been handling it so far when you have discovered her doing this? Has the smaller one had any odd 'accidents' in the time this has been happening?

There have been 2 occasions, both this week.
the first time I got very angry, explaining it was evil and not right and I must admit I lost my temper and shouted. Told her to stay in her room until she could convince me it would never happen again. She was very upset.

the second time I spoke calmly to her and asked why she was trying to hurt him. She said she didn’t know… and that she doesn’t want him to be hurt.

I’ve never witnessed anything beyond normal sibling arguments, snatching etc before and no, the youngest has not had any weird accidents.

I just don’t know how to ensure this doesn’t happen again / get worse.

She is only six and I doubt she has any idea what being so sick you have to go to hospital even means. Shouting at her and calling her evil isn’t going to help.

Personally, you just correct her when she says things like that. You’re not leaving them unsupervised?

I know it wasn’t the right thing to do. I felt awful and apologised after, I was just so shocked when I heard her and heard her brother saying no mummy says we shouldn’t do that as it makes you sick. He understands but she doesn’t??

I hope you’re right and it’s just a weird phase. They go off and play together while I cook etc but it’s a small house so I usually hear everything!

Hm, maybe she is testing him like a teacher would? to make sure he has listened?
You said she doesn’t want him to be hurt so I don’t think she is purposely trying to hurt him.