Tiny Tips for Moms and Dads #25 Bonding Siblings but Acknowledging Individual Identities-
Parenting Through Love
Tiny Tips for Moms and Dads #25: Bonding Siblings While Acknowledging Individual Identities
We as parents play a critical role in how our children interact with one another. Through our behavior, we also demonstrate what it means to love, honor, and respect each other. It is a daily task to find ways to remind them that, as siblings, they share a special relationship that is different from any other relationship they will have the blessing to hold near and dear.
This means drawing their attention to moments when they are not being loving and caring toward one another and engaging them in conversations about what it feels like to be treated unkindly, as well as what it feels like to treat someone unkindly. I believe in using their mishaps as opportunities to reflect and talk things through. There is no other time in our human experience when we have such a valuable chance to learn "how to be human."
We must instill in their understanding that, as siblings, they are connected not only because they may share the same parent or parents, but because they were gifted to one another. We must nurture their attentiveness and responsiveness to each other. We must show them that being siblings requires love, patience, compassion, and trustworthiness.
We must bring to light both the elements of their identities that are similar and the qualities that make each child unique. Could it be that what makes them different from one another is actually what complements the essence of the other? Could it be that recognizing each child's character and personality is what helps balance and strengthen the sibling bond?
Can they learn to appreciate and embrace the essence of their sibling's personhood to the point that, unlike almost anyone else in their lives other than their parents, they truly see and understand each other's authentic spirit? Is it this essence that they come to cherish and that perpetuates what can become a lifelong relationship?
The sibling relationship can be so profoundly special that, at times, siblings seem able to communicate without words or physical presence.
Parents have an opportunity to nurture and support the development of this relationship from the very beginning. When I say "the beginning," I mean from the womb. It is important that the child or children who will be welcoming a sibling become part of the entire journey.
Include daily talks with Mommy's tummy. Talk! Read stories! Let them see the sonograms! Create a "Big Brother" or "Big Sister" plan of action. Inclusion! Inclusion! Inclusion!
Guide them in celebrating each other's accomplishments, and make sure praise and recognition are balanced. Do not cultivate jealousy or envy between them. Help them develop an appropriate and healthy sense of care and responsibility for one another. They have each other's backs in this chaotic world.
Be intentional about creating situations and experiences that will produce positive memories.
P.S.
I know this may reflect a cultural bias, but I feel it is important for young children to share a bedroom with one another. Some of my favorite and most enduring childhood memories come from when my dad converted our attic into a bedroom. Four of the five siblings shared that room.
The things we did and the adventures we had at night when we were supposed to be asleep were filled with the kind of harmless mischief that bonded us into a close-knit clan. We each had our own corner of the room, decorated to reflect our individual tastes, but the center of the room was our gathering place—when we weren't sitting on each other's beds or cuddling together through nightmares and storms.
I would not trade that attic for anything.
When we became teenagers, we eventually got our own rooms or shared with just one sibling. That marked a transition into a different stage of brotherhood and sisterhood.
To this day, my siblings and I love, honor, and respect one another. It is such a special relationship that friends often tell us they wish they were part of our "sibling clan."
