Lin is a talented woman at Peking University and a friend. The first time I went to her home in Hong Kong, the lively and cute boy was very obedient and quiet. At that time, we asked about things during pregnancy, until we got Lin's article, I didn't know that it was not a simple thing to take two male babies! It turns out that there are so many emotions and details to adjust in life. Therefore, we recommend this article to readers across the country for study and reference. Just in response to that sentence: it doesn't matter if you fight, as long as you have a deep brotherly relationship; although the two babies are noisy, the wisdom mother will get it done!
Lin/Text
As an only child, when I was a child, even my cousins were hundreds of kilometers apart, and I could hardly imagine the horror of having two male babies at home.
In addition to doubling the housework and financial burden, after having the second eldest, I knew that the home would become like this: endless racks, smashed things, always chaotic floors, never-ending noise, bottles and cans and gadgets were all dismantled, and internal parts disappeared, and any drug food liquid that was not covered and tightened must be knocked over within three minutes.
Both of our husbands and wives are working parents, without the help of the elderly, the Filipino maid who usually gets along with the children the longest, it is impossible to teach the children's behavior, after finally accepting that the two brothers can not automatically live in peace, they can only fight with the two babies day by day, little by little groping for the little peace that they hope for in their hearts.
Fortunately, after the eldest son passed the age of three and a half and the younger son passed the age of one and a half, the peaceful atmosphere in the family gradually showed signs of transcending war.
The best way to fight?
In a family of two boys, a fight is almost unavoidable.
In popular parenting, there are two diametrically opposed but seemingly plausible views about fighting: one is that children must be given early rules to make them realize that fighting is not an option to solve the problem. The second is that fighting itself is a necessary way for children to learn social and rules, and parents should try to interfere as little as possible.
Like most moms, I always want my children to have rules without disrupting their social learning, and in fact it doesn't seem impossible.
Even if the child is still young, as long as it can be solved through negotiation, a general solution can always be established: for example, snacks are taken out and everyone has to grab, but let the brother be responsible for distributing the amount of food that the two brothers can eat, even if it is not fair every time, the younger brother mostly has no objection - after this rule is established, at least four or five fewer fights are played every day from morning to night.
As for some situations that cannot be resolved through negotiation, or have been too late to negotiate, such as when the two are playing, the younger brother is too heavy, so that the fight is "fake drama is really done", it is best to let the two brothers experience and feel it themselves.
My experience is that although the child does not know the weight of the hand at first, after a few times, he will feel that some kind of strength may be too heavy to hurt the other party, and he will gradually adjust his own strength.
Hong Kong is a city that places a lot of emphasis on politeness, and sometimes even a little harsh on children. Children who go to school and play outside are not easy to experience "fighting". But if you're lucky enough to have siblings, you can have them have fun at home!
However, it must be emphasized that the premise is home safety. For example, in order to avoid serious injuries to children in the fight and chase, sharp items in the home should be placed at a high place as much as possible, and furniture should not be prominent, such as the handle of the drawer, and now there are hidden ones, which can prevent children from colliding and avoiding them from turning over the drawer.
Be fair and let the "war" not lose its feelings
Do two brothers often clash or even fight over things, will it affect their feelings? My experience is that as long as parents insist on fairness, it will not affect the feelings.
In fact, when there is more than one child in the family, the situation will force parents to integrate the principle of "fairness" throughout all aspects of life.
From the time my brother was born, my brother quickly realized that his parents' attention was occupied and he developed strong jealousy, especially when I fed my brother such a "private time", my brother would almost always come to disturb me, crying and asking my mother to play with him.
I soon found that for my brother's jealousy of my brother, if it is regarded as "disturbing" or even "making trouble", it will only have more disastrous consequences, and my brother, who has moved freely, can always find the opportunity to bully the baby.
For my brother, who was once the only focus of all adults, the feeling of loss had to be tolerated and accepted, so I began to call my brother over to talk, laugh, tell stories, and constantly describe the same scene when he was a child.
"Fairness" is sometimes even reflected in places that don't seem reasonable. For example, when we start carrying our brothers on our backs and taking them out to play, our brothers will ask the adults to hold and carry them more often, and they will not want to walk on their own.
For two or three months, Dad was forced to often hold his brother who was already more than thirty pounds on the walk, which was extremely hard, but fortunately, soon the brother was satisfied with this and regained his sense of superiority over his brother who could run and jump.
For example, when my brother could eat our food, we let him sit at the table at each meal while learning to eat by himself while feeding. At this time, my brother, who had been eating independently for nearly two years, was only willing to eat a few bites of his own meal at each meal, and then jumped down and stood in front of his brother's bench and asked us to feed him.
Under the principle of fairness, his "spoiled" requirements have also been met, after all, I believe that this will not make him lose the ability to eat independently.
Although some of the actions of older children may seem bizarre and outrageous, after some time has passed, it will be easier to deal with when the older children are truly convinced that their parents are fair and not biased in handling everything, and when there is a conflict between brothers.
However, it is still necessary to insist that even if the mistake is mainly on the brother's side, try to mention the younger brother's responsibility when mediating (such as the brother robbing the younger brother's toy, resulting in a fight between the two brothers), and give a way to deal with it that both parties feel is fair (such as arranging a new toy or game).
Popular educational ideas emphasize teaching children to "share" from an early age, but I often find that the more I want my children to play together, the harder it is for them to play together.
After we become parents, we will probably find that any empty concept that is to be forced into the child's brain will inevitably end in failure, especially boys with strong personalities, and even deliberately resist with the opposite behavior.
Put yourself in the shoes of adults, even if it is an adult, the basis for "sharing" is actually the value of cooperation between the two parties, and can bring benefits or fun to each other, and children are actually the same.
Playing together? Brotherhood does not need to be arranged
When you understand this, the eldest child in your family does not want to "share" toys with younger siblings who can't play at all, so don't be angry at all, just help them arrange different games.
Of course, I'm not saying that to learn "share" you have to have a lot of ability on both sides, even small children can sometimes bring fresh fun to older siblings.
For example, at the beginning of a few months, the younger brother would giggle when others kissed him and giggled at him, and the brother quickly took it as a game and enjoyed it until the younger brother was more than one year old, and the two brothers often crawled on the bed and rolled around to kiss and creak each other. What parents have to do is actually just take care of them not to fall and fall.
For example, when my brother was about one year old learning to walk, I was once tired of a lumbar disc herniation because I had to bend down and pull him to walk. But when the younger brother reached this age, the older brother took on the work with great interest.
Because the height gap between the brothers is only about a head, the brother's work is much easier than I was then, and the face-to-face learning process is more like an adult dancing ballroom dance, and the two brothers have a lot of fun, especially the brother is full of a sense of accomplishment.
Just as a child's future parents cannot arrange it, the fun and feelings of a child cannot be arranged by us. Therefore, "playing together" is really not forced.
But we will find that the younger brother has the nature to follow the older brother, which also becomes an opportunity for him to learn the action language, and the older brother plays a leadership and teaching role in it, and both sides enjoy it, so there is a basis for "playing together".
Behind the rules is love and understanding
Many times, it is quite difficult to determine "right or wrong" in a child's conflict, and it is easy to violate fairness. Much easier to do than this is to guide both sides to experience each other's feelings.
In fact, since Dabao began to understand things, I have found that when introducing rules, it is much more effective to talk about the feelings of others brought about by his actions than to be rigidly reasonable.
For example, when he throws blocks at home at night, he tells him that "the aunt downstairs is not happy to be noisy", which is obviously more effective than saying "don't make noise" and "can't throw toys", and can further let him imagine, such as "If someone upstairs throws something when you sleep, will you be happy?" ”
The same argument can be applied to the conflict between the two brothers. Children of several years old have much stronger compassion than adults, and whenever I use exaggerated tones to the party that grabs something or hits people, focusing on the feeling of the other party being robbed and hurting, most of them will soon forget their reasons for fighting and the emotions of dissatisfaction.
When his expression changed from anger to sympathy, and then let the two brothers kiss each other, everyone was quickly happy again.
Before the age of three, children need to master many basic rules of life, and if they are not the home of an only child, they are more likely to have several times more rules to establish in order to maintain peace.
It must be admitted that compared with girls, boys often have a tendency to not control their behavior, perhaps by nature, or by finding a way to vent excess energy. Many times, for your words, he seems to have no ears.
Raising the decibel of speech or even scolding may not be effective for "no ears", but although the boy occasionally has no ears, he always has a "heart", awakens his feelings, and experiences the feelings of others, which can be placed before the rules.
For example, as a mother, when the child behaves inappropriately, she can clearly express her displeasure and try to explain the reason as clearly as possible.
I have heard many mothers' friends talk about children playing with dishes and food when eating and making a mess, compared with loud rebukes, if you let the child see an unhappy expression at the same time as cleaning, and explain clearly the hard work of you cleaning things, many children will mostly stop their behavior, and even come down to help clean.
On this basis, children will slowly understand that they will be unhappy because of other people's bad behavior, and their families will also be unhappy because of their own bad behavior, so that everyone outside the family will feel the same way.
In fact, when we re-learn the rules of the world from the perspective of children, we will find that they are nothing more than establishing an appropriate distance between ourselves and others, and it can also be said that it is a sentence of "do not do to others what you do not want."
Therefore, families with two or even three or four treasures may have a more unique advantage to let children learn to pay attention to and understand others as soon as possible, so as to learn to adapt to the rules faster, and not rigidly obey, but to understand that behind all the rules, it is actually love and understanding for others.
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