Siblings Without Rivalry: How to Help Your Children Live Together So You Can Live Too

by Adele Faber

“It’s one thing to be the child doing the fighting. It’s another being the parent who has to cope with the fighting.”

Don’t let the discord go to waste. Write down the incidents or conversations that distress you.

It’s almost as if two forces are at work: one pushing them apart as they use the differences between them to define their unique, separate selves; the other pulling them together so they can come to know their unique brotherhood.

“we can see how comforting it is to have someone who will listen to our negative feelings. Children are no different. They need to be able to air their feelings and wishes about their siblings. Even the unsavory ones.”

“It’s important to make a distinction between allowing feelings and allowing actions,” I replied. “We permit children to express all their feelings. We don’t permit them to hurt each other. Our job is to show them how to express their anger without doing damage.”

“It is unnerving to be in that in-between place where you know what’s wrong, but don’t quite know how to make it right. No wonder they were all worried.

“It seems to me that you have two feelings about your brother. Sometimes you like him a lot and sometimes he makes you mad as the dickens.”

If you want your son to be able to consider another point of view, make a simple statement that gives him credit: “I’m sure you can imagine how that would feel if that were done to you.” Now he has to think, “Can I imagine it? What would it feel like?” But he doesn’t have to answer to anyone except himself. And that’s good enough.

Tell her what bothers you.”

Insisting upon good feelings between the children led to bad feelings. Acknowledging bad feelings between the children led to good feelings. A circuitous route to sibling harmony. And yet, the most direct.

‘Never compare yourself to others. You’ll become either vain or bitter.’

Whatever you want to tell this child can be said directly, without any reference to his brother. The key word is describe. Describe what you see. Or describe what you like. Or describe what you don’t like. Or describe what needs to be done. The important thing is to stick with the issue of this one child’s behavior. Nothing his brother is or isn’t doing has anything to do with him.”

even a favorable comparison could be harmful.

Studies of people in schools and business settings show that when competition becomes intense, people tend to develop physical symptoms: headaches, stomachaches, backaches. And emotional symptoms. They become more anxious, more suspicious, more hostile. Let our homes be a haven from this kind of stress.”

“Children often experience praise of a brother or sister as a put-down of themselves. They automatically translate, ‘Your brother is so considerate’ into ‘Mom thinks I’m not.’ It’s a good idea to save our enthusiastic comments for the ear of the deserving child.”

You’ll never go wrong if you describe what you think the child might be feeling (‘You must be so proud of yourself!’) or what the child has accomplished (‘A lot of practice and perseverance went into winning that medal’).

“The trick is not to add, ‘I’m so thrilled, I can’t wait to tell Dad and all the neighbors.’ The passion and excitement you feel about a child’s achievement should be saved for a moment when just the two of you are together. It’s too much for the other siblings to have to listen to.”

If they want to show each other their report cards, that’s their business. What’s important is that they know that Mom and Dad see them as separate individuals and are not interested in comparing their grades.”

That was when I realized how futile it was to ever try to make things equal. The children could never get enough, and as a mother, I could never give enough.

“To be loved equally,” I continued, “is somehow to be loved less. To be loved uniquely—for one’s own special self—is to be loved as much as we need to be loved.”

“I hope,” I said, “that I’m not giving anyone here the impression that we should never give the identical item to each child. There will be times when that will be the obvious and right thing to do. All I want to point out is that if you decide not to give equally, for whatever reason, that’s all right too. The children who fail to receive won’t go under. Your understanding and acceptance of their disappointment will help them to deal with life’s inequities.”

The only thing that is necessary is that we take another look at the less favored child, seek out her specialness, then reflect the wonder of it back to her. That’s all we can ask of ourselves, and all the children need of us. By valuing and being partial to each child’s individuality, we make sure that each of our children feels like a number one child.”

CHILDREN DON’T NEED TO BE TREATED EQUALLY. THEY NEED TO BE TREATED UNIQUELY.

The next afternoon I stopped what I was doing and sat down on the couch next to her while she was watching her soap opera. I didn’t say a word. I just watched with her. The next day I watched with her again. And yesterday she called me in to tell me the show was about to start.

She never even asked me how I felt about her sisters. She just wanted to know how much I valued her.

We needed to explore, not only how a given role affects each child individually, but how each child’s role affects the other siblings, and ultimately their relationship with each other.

too. I think we tend to project our own weaknesses onto our children. I know I’m always accusing my son of being a ‘procrastinator,’ yet I’m the world’s champion at putting things off.” “Also I

“I can tell you from experience that it’s no picnic for the child who’s been given the privileged role either. It’s a lot of pressure. My parents always praised me for being the most ‘responsible one,’ and I lived up to their expectations. But it came at a price. To this day, my brother and sister still play helpless, and I’m stuck with all the family problems.”

life demands that we assume many roles. We need to know how to care for and be cared for; how to be leaders and followers; how to be serious and a little ‘wild’; how to live with disorder and how to create order. Why limit any of our children? Why not encourage all of them to take chances, explore their potential, discover strengths they never dreamed lay within them.”

there are children who do have great natural gifts, and those gifts should certainly be recognized and encouraged. But not at the expense of the other siblings. When one child stakes out his or her area of special competence, let’s be on guard about excluding the others from that area. And let’s make sure that the others don’t exclude themselves. Let’s be wary of statements like, ‘He’s the musician in the family’ . . . ‘She’s the scholar’ . . . ‘He’s the athlete’ . . . ‘She’s the

artist.’ No child should be allowed to corner the market on any area of human endeavor. We want to make it clear to each of our children that the joys of scholarship, dance, drama, poetry, sport are for everyone and not reserved for those who have a special aptitude.”

Instead I took him by his shoulders, spun him around, and fixed my eyes upon him. ‘David,’ I said fiercely, ‘you have a superior capacity to be nice. Use it!’ “He grinned sheepishly. But the teasing stopped.”

she shouldn’t have to worry about being wonderful. It’s not fair to her. She’s a kid. She should feel free to make demands. She shouldn’t have to tiptoe through her childhood in order to compensate for her brother’s problem.”

Kids deserve the right to be ordinary—and to have their ordinary needs be just as important as the child with the problem.”

reason, certain dynamics go into motion: • The problem child becomes more of a problem. •The burdened parent begins to make demands upon the ‘normal’ children to compensate for the problem child. •The needs of the normal siblings are brushed aside. •The normal siblings begin to resent the problem child.

“What I’m seeing now is that it’s up to the parent to set the tone, to make it clear that no one in the family is ‘the problem.’”

Finally, as parents became convinced that seeing any one child in a negative role ultimately harmed the relationships between all the children, they renewed their efforts to bring to light what was positive about each child and positive about themselves as a family.

1. Start by acknowledging the children’s anger towards each other. That alone should help calm them. 2. Listen to each child’s side with respect. 3. Show appreciation for the difficulty of the problem. 4. Express faith in their ability to work out a mutually agreeable solution. 5. Leave the room.

“Children should have the freedom to resolve their own differences. Children are also entitled to adult intervention when necessary. If one child is being abused by the other, either physically or verbally, we’ve got to step in.

Yet our tendency as adults is to make light of our children’s quarrels, to dismiss them as just ‘kid stuff,’ and hope that they’ll somehow blow over. But it’s important for us to be aware that some of the problems between brothers and sisters don’t ‘blow over.’ They persist and become a major source of stress and concern to the children.

When parents take the stance: ‘In this house I’m the one who’s going to decide who has to share, who gets to keep; what’s reasonable, what’s unreasonable; who is right, who is wrong,’ the children end up becoming more dependent upon the parent and more hostile towards their siblings.

Basically we try not to interfere, but when we must step in, it’s always with the thought that at the earliest possible moment we want to turn the children back to dealing with each other.

He said he told his kids that he expected them to really listen to each other and work out their differences on their own. But if they’ve made a good-faith effort and they’re still stuck, he’s always there to help.

“If any one of you sees someone doing something that could be dangerous, then you’re to report to Mom or me as fast as your legs can carry you. We all have to look out for each other’s safety in this family.”

“We’re going to the beach, because that’s what the majority voted for. But I want everyone here to know that one person is disappointed. Andy was really looking forward to going to the park today.”

If a child’s relationship with his brothers and sisters seems to be dominated by hatred, intense jealousy, and constant competitiveness; if he can never share; if he’s always abusing his siblings physically and/or verbally, then it would be wise to seek professional help for this youngster. The parent might want to consider individual therapy for the child or family therapy.

But this time I wasn’t going to get sucked in. I told them I expected them to work something out that would be fair to each of them.

The minute I heard the first put-down, I stopped them. I said, “Hey, no toxic talk!” Or, “That’s a killer statement.” Or, “You have a choice, kids—pleasant conversation or no conversation!”

I listened in wonder. How swiftly understanding frees us to forgive. What an enormous relief it must have been to let go of all those bitter feelings. And what a great gift her mother gave her, just by listening.

“By the time we left each other, we each had a sense of completion, as if we had found a missing part of ourselves. And we knew we were both okay. It wasn’t as if either one of us was an evil person. He was a nice guy, and I was a nice guy. Just two nice guys trying to grapple with the frustrations of being brothers. And two nice parents who had tried to do their best.”