Tell me how to bring up my children so they are not alcoholic depressed nutters (or a policewoman)

[Caligula]

DS 7.5 whingey whiney, negative, always sees the downside before the up. Determined to hold on to dreadful scenarios. "What if we get lost?" when I tell him we're going somewhere. DD 5, cheerful, bouncy, positive, bossy, control-freaky.

I've become aware recently that I give in to her too often, because I'm so aware of making her confident and independent. To the extent that she wants to take control of everything. And DS gets pushed out because she can't bear him to get my attention.

And I think this may influence DS's negativity. 2 bossy mouthy females, no male role model and can't get a word in edgewise.

So I've made the effort to spend more time with him recently doing stuff with him on his own and refusing to allow DD to disrupt that (still doing stuff with her btw, and suggesting activities for her while DS and I are reading/ doing homework/ making stuff) The result is screaming 2 hour tantrums from DD every day after school. It's exhausting. Any suggestions?

Caligula, they sound exactly like my DS1 and DS2! And mine do have male role models, and it isn't a case of having two females, or whatever.

Oops, the alcoholic depressed nutter bit is because DS has lots of warning characteristics of depression - negativity, anxiety, unwillingness to see positive solutions to things. And the policewoman bit is because DD tells DS what to do "don't eat with your mouth open" "use your cutlery properly". Then she comes and reports him to me and demands action (which I usually refuse btw, my usual response is "don't worry about the way he's eating, concentrate on your own manners, thank you." Doesn't stop her policing him though.

And also, their father is alcoholic, depressive and so is their uncle and so was their grandfather. So not good genetic antecedents (and there's more and more evidence coming out that some of this stuff has a genetic factor).

Am hoping to avoid that for DS. And it needs to start now while i still have some input/ influence.

I honestly do think that it seeing the negative and being whingey and whiney is a total oldest child characteristic.

How do you deal with it Mrs PG (who are you)?

It drives me nuts.

I'm dinosaur. I am just having a stupid crush on Philip Glenister ( I think it's a midlife crisis).

Seriously, DS1's negativity and worrywart tendencies do worry me. He got in a dreadful state a few months ago because he was waiting to catch a train at a very small country station and he got himself convinced that he was on the wrong platform, and my dad had enormous difficulty in convincing him that it was okay, really.

Do you have both of them at home with you every afternoon after school? If so, would it be possible to arrange for DD to do an afterschool activity once or twice a week, to give you a bit of uninterrupted timei with DS? I do agree with you that spending one-to-one time with DS is vital, but it is so awful for all three of you if DD really can't entertain herself for an hour while you do that?

If there are no available afterschool activitities, could DD go to a friend's house?

Am thinking of trying to get her a dancing class or something. Somewhere she can go and prance about pretending to be a princess or a fairy, while DS spends some time alone with me.

Could you try Rainbows for her? Being made to line up by Brown Owl and wearing a uniform might provide an outlet for some of her bossiness and keenness to impose order on others...
From what you have posted caligula I can quite see why you are concerned about ds, but I think this pattern of behaviour is awfully common - it happens in our house too. Ds is far more, not anxious, but reserved and thoughtful, and gets trampled on and bossed around by dd, who is not even four yet but is generally agreed to be a force of nature.

they've not found a gene for it yet Caligula (thank gawd, otherwise I'm sure I'd have been written off in the womb!)

Is she too tired after school to do clubs? Could you find something on a Saturday morning (if you have a local leisure centre, they often do kids classes on a Sat morning like gymnastics, trampolining).

How's it going, Caligula? Has dd settled down to the new regime at all?

Not yet. It's causing major tantrums from her.

Have spoken to a psychologist friend of mine, who said she thought I'm giving him too many choices, thus making him anxious. This works on DD who is bossy and confident and wants to decide, but has the opposite effect on him because he can't cope with the responsibility of choice.

Sounds feasible...

hmmmm I empathise Caligula as I also have a lot of depression, suicide and other choice things in my family and my dd used to be very much like this.
I think what the other posters have said is spot on, you need some regular (chilled) one on one time with ds without the clamouring of dd, and dd needs to channel her teacherliness into brownies or something.
I worried for ages about this with my dd1, and then I found a book called the "enneagram of parenting" - an initially bonkers seeming system of personality description which actually and surprisingly helped immensely, and helped me be more positive about dds personality. Incidentally, she is a lot less like that than she was now that she is 8 and is really discovering who she is.

Thanks for the update Caligula, sorry it's not brighter news but very interested in what your psychologist friend said.

Yes it was very unexpected. We're constantly being given the advice to give them choices to make them confident. Now I'm being told giving choices makes DS anxious.