What does the life look like with two children 4 years apart?

[DDW]

Me and my husband are trying to have our second baby. When the new baby arrive, our daughter will be around 4 years old. We wonder how life looks like with children are 4 years apart? Can they play togther? Thank you.

I have a nearly 4yr gap and they play happily together. It meant my mat leave gave me an extra year with my son to do stuff before he started school. The younger one knows how to wind up the older one very well. Sometimes I think I would have liked a smaller gap but my gap works for me. Just keep the older one’s childcare code going so you can alternate between the two to pay the nursery bill!

Hi. My two boys are 5 years apart. The eldest was in reception when I had the second and it was lovely having time at home with baby, while the eldest was at school. Eldest was always super happy showing off his baby brother and would entertain him lots. They would play together plenty. It changed when eldest started high school, as a 6 year old becomes worlds apart and was just seen as an irritant! They are now 14 and 9 and are getting on better again. But I always say that regardless of age gap, it’s how you parent them as siblings that counts and their personalities can be similar or different regardless.

There's 4.5 years between me and my sibling, and 5.5 with my own children. With both experiences, I'd say kids play together til the oldest hits puberty, and then it depends on the personality of the eldest child. I played a bit with my sister after 11/12 years old as I felt sorry for her otherwise, with my own eldest, they don't have that sense of duty! But by then, they have bonded over playing computer games together, and I do remember playing early computer games with my own younger sibling. My youngest is now a tween and does miss her older sister playing with her but she plays with us or she does her own activities and they still spend time together at some point in a weekend.

It worked well for us initially as I was on mat leave when the eldest started school which gave us the best of both worlds. For us though the gap was just slightly too much for them to have much in the way of similar interests. Younger one is a big personality and I sometimes think eldest would have preferred life as an only. However, as we’re moving into their teens I can see some glimmers of a positive relationship emerging again after a few rocky years so I am hopeful it will work out well in the end!

There’s 4 years between me and my sister.
When we were little we played together all the time - completely inseparable.
It was only when we were a bit older, around the time my sister started secondary school that the age gap became more stark - she was 11 and I was only 7, so I still wanted to play with Barbie’s etc but she was way too cool for that by then 🫠😂
We really drifted apart in our teen/young adult years, but I put the down to completely different pathways in life more than the age gap. We are in our 30’s now, and while we aren’t particularly close (again that’s down to lifestyle and distance more than anything) but we get along well.

That's a good point about parenting them as siblings, it's important to make time together as a family, encourage them to think of each other, make birthday cards for each other, share in each other's highs and lows. And personality clashes can happen at any age, even if they were close in age.

My husband and i both have 4 year gaps with our siblings.

One same sex sibling, one opposite.

lots of squabling and winding eachother up.
Neither of is got on/ had any friendship with our siblings until 18/21 so adulthood.

I'd say it was in part age ... in part strong personalities...

Mine are both firecrackers and less than 2 years apart and love to clock each other ( so not sure age gap has much to do with squabbling and violence 😅)

I have a 5 year gap with my DC ( girl/boy) . They are now adults and get on well.They did play together,though obviously more at some ages than others,the hardest thing was days out with No 2 childs friends when they were small enough that it was a mother/child trip but DC1 wasn't old enough to be alone and had nowhere else to be!
Family days out were fine.
My DSis and I are 4 years apart and we played together,got on well ( mostly - some ongoing warfare about our shared bedroom, and sibling winding up!) ,we are still friends as adults.

I have 3 years 9 months gap, two girls.
The good points have been:
older one less needy and didn’t need carrying around when I was pregnant and had a newborn
we never needed a double buggy
Eldest in part time school when second was born so I got time with just the baby and she got a change of scenery
Never paid for two sets of childcare (apart from wrap around care when older)
Was on maternity when eldest started full time school so was there to support her through that
Eldest sensible enough to be gentle around the baby, could fetch things etc, play with supervision or watch tv with me when in the newborn breastfeeding days.

Downsides have been at times they annoy eachother because of the age difference, wanting to do different things, sometimes we’ve split up one child and one parent and seen different films at the cinema, or one child each at soft play/playground due to different abilities.

They mostly get on though and have always played together. I thing the trickiest time was when eldest was 11-13 and didn’t want to play as much anymore.
They are now 11 & 14 and get on quite well, I’m hoping they will be good friends to eachother when they’re adults.

My brothers have a 4 year age gap too and they have always got on well

My eldest sibling was four years older and it was honestly fine. We played together loads, days out were fine and we played out in the street with a wider group of friends. I'll be honest and never understood the anxiety on here about a four year age gap. I thought it was just a normal age gap, I had loads of friends who had siblings in my siblings year at school.

And you're not just giving your child a playmate. A sibling is a relationship for life. Children are individuals in their own right and not just gifts or playmates to each other. There's new evidence come out about the benefits of a four year age gap and the positives it brings to both children and parents. The body has had a chance to heal properly and the eldest has had plenty of years of 1:1 time with their parent at a time when their development is at the most important stage and as they are that bit older and more independent and at school/nursery, it means the youngest also gets 1:1 time without the competing demands of a similar age sibling.

As I said before, sibling relationships are for life. My husband is six years older than his brother and while they maybe didn't play as much when younger they've had many many years of being best friends as adults.