"He said".... "She said" - The Sibling Squabbles: Part 2

In Part 1 of The Sibling Squabbles we discussed the developmental stages of children and what we might see emerge during sibling conflict. Looking at sibling disagreements from the angle of a”it is a teaching opportunity” no matter what stage of development. Children don’t master social skills until early adulthood.

As promised, Part 2 of The Sibling Squabbles will look at some tips to help us as parents manage and work through these parenting challenges. When siblings squabble, our children want us to pick sides, the blame game emerges, the finger pointing, the tears, the behaviours….

It can be very overwhelming and exhausting not to react. Our chaos or calmness can be infectious. Remember when our children are arguing, the spot fire has been fueled and we don’t want to add more fuel to the fire through the way we respond or react.

Here are some tips:

• Don’t join their emotional chaos with our own emotional intensity. Yep, their squabbles are going to push our buttons so before we respond check-in with yourself and take some deep breaths if you need to.

• Be mindful not to take sides. I know its so hard especially when a child has behaved in a way that may go against the family rules or expectations. We need to eliminate blame as it keeps children in a cycle of pointing fingers, excuses and avoiding feelings.

• Instead of approaching the squabble with “who started it?” Lets remind ourselves that they both played a role and explore what the conflict is about and how they were left feeling. For our toddlers and preschoolers keep it simple, state what you see and notice about the situation and what you observe them to be feeling, “I can see that the block tower has been knocked over. Sally you seem sad and Ben are you angry?”

• Brainstorming solutions is a great skill to teach children as it is connected to compromise, negotiation and empathy. Before we get to the step of problem solving successfully, children have the need to feel heard and validated. This can sometime rely on us as parents and the way we facilitate the discussion. My advice is to listen to what children are telling us and reflect back to them what we are hearing. Once a children feel understood we can help them think of ways to repair the situation and relationship. We might provide our younger children with two solutions and for our older children we can allow them some space to figure it out together and then ask them how they got to that solution.

• We don’t always need to step in and solve the conflict, except for those situations where it becomes verbal, physical or family rules are broken.

• Be mindful of how we as adults role model conflict resolution in our own relationships. Our children are watching and our primary school aged children and teenagers have more understanding of our style as they watch us.

• Consider your child’s temperament - do they quickly get angry? or do they hold their emotions in? For those children that go from 0 to 100 within seconds, before launching in to find out what has happened take a moment to ‘pause’ and allow them to calm down. When children are in heightened states, its going to be tricky to rationalize with them as they are emotionally charged and the belief that all brains have in heightened states is that “i’m 100% right and its not my fault.” For those children who are more withdrawn; the focus maybe on naming the emotion, sharing your observations of their emotions, inviting dialogue with open questions and repeating back what you have heard.

• For primary school aged children and teenagers give each child an opportunity to talk about the conflict. You might like to use this little formula: Allow Child 1 to answers these questions

  • What did their sibling do?

  • How you were left feeling?

  • What I did

  • How that would have left their sibling feeling?

Child 2 might be bursting at the seams to talk especially as they hear their sibling respond to the first two questions. Once they hear their sibling talk about their own actions and take responsibility for their actions it allows the other children to feel seen, more open to the discussion and take responsibility for their actions as well. These four questions are great for empathy development.

Overall, seeing our children squabble can be difficult just remember as they grow it gets easier, they are learning life skills and it is a very common issue within families. There are so many factors that influence squabbles – temperament, age, social skills and environment.

Let's Enter Into The World Of Play

We have been our children’s playmate for a few months now whilst the covid-19 restrictions have been in place. I know that playing with our children can feel uncomfortable, repetitive, boring… but to our children play is their world.

Play is where the magic of development takes place. Social skills, language, problem solving, fine and gross motor skills flourish.

Sometimes, it is our own feelings that can impact the way we play. We might choose what to play just so we know that there is an end point or because our minds are so preoccupied with the numerous amounts of task that we need to complete on our ‘to-do’ list. That the thought of just sitting and being can feel overwhelming. I know for me when I am playing barbies with my girls, I start playing and somehow drift into tidying their barbie house, fixing their dolls and just like that my attention has shifted.

So, I started thinking about children and play as I watched and heard my girls playing. The laughter, the fun and the sheer joy (and no it’s not like that all the time as they do squabble). Play is truly powerful and purposeful! When we join in with our children, play enriches families. Let’s take a moment to consider how children view play with us… special time to connect, laugh, have fun and be silly. Children get to experience us in a different light or role. Have you noticed that when we leave play with our children they often say “just one more round”, or “2 more minutes” or “please play a little bit more”. That’s because our children love to be with us.

If you think about the influence that play has on our families, it is heart-warming. It brings positive energy and fills our house with optimism.

I want to set you a challenge, to create a family tradition centred around play. Give yourself permission to put the ‘to-do’ list on hold and allow yourself to simply be with your children, it doesn’t have to be for long hours. Small burst of time is better than none. As parent’s let’s lighten up a bit… let’s have a dance off, a fancy tea party, shoot some hoops… anything that brings a smile and some laughter to our face and that of our children. In my family, we regularly have a board game night with Beat the Parents Board Game a belly laughter of a game. It is a technology free zone, no phones, no TV… some special treats and silliness. I know that babies and toddler do demand more time in play with us than do our school aged children. Just consider what play means to you, your children and your family.

Let’s create wonderful memories that fill our heart and theirs with warmth.

The Mysterious World of Tantrums and Toddlerhood.

Whining, screaming, hitting, biting, breath holding… are all behaviours that we might see when our children are in melt down mode. I’ve had some doozy of tantrums with my children when they were toddlers, some have taken place in public… even the wonderful back arching or stiffening of body have made an appearance in carparks and shopping centers.

Before we go any further, I want us to consider the developmental transition from infancy to toddlerhood. Although toddlerhood comprises of 2 percent of the lifespan, it is one of the most remarkable and busiest times of development. This period brings on dramatic changes in the body and brain to support the emergence of a wide array of motor, perceptual and cognitive capabilities. We see the beginning of language and our toddler takes their first steps which are all signs of our child making a shift from dependence to autonomy. At this stage of development our toddler is very egocentric as social and emotional skills are immature. Their ability to see others needs or express empathy is very limited.

Let’s normalize tantrums. All children experience them and they are apart of child development. They are equally common in boys and girls and we tend to see tantrums emerge at the age of 1 and are at their peak between 1- 3years.

So, why do they occur? There are a number of underlying reasons why tantrums occur, let’s explore them:

• Toddlers under developed language skills contributes to the difficulty they have in communicating their needs. Toddlers find it difficult to say what they want, feel, or need, a frustrating experience may leave them feeling misunderstood. As language skills improve, tantrums tend to decrease.

• Toddlers are eager to explore the world around them now and assert their newly found and growing independence. Wanting to feed themselves, walk rather than be pushed in a stroller.

• Tantrums are how toddlers show their emotions, they are yet to make the connection nor have the emotion vocab to put language to their feeling states.

• Toddlers don’t have the executive functioning skills to put the pieces together to help interpret situations and the world around them. Sometimes their world is very overstimulating, that tantrums are communicating that they are overwhelmed.

• A child’s temperament also influences how quickly and strongly they react to situations.

• Now that toddlers have created an attachment to a familiar caregiver, separation anxiety cause tantrums as they become upset when the adult they rely on leaves.

When our child is in these states it can be challenging to support them. My go to, even now that my children are 6 and 10 is to eliminate the following: are they hungry, thirsty, overstimulated or tired?

The number one rule for tantrums is to remain calm. I know our children’s behaviour can be really difficult during these times especially when we are out and about. We can feel pressure from onlookers to quieten our child or discipline them. We can really take their behaviour as a personal attack “I’m not a good parent”, “my child doesn’t love me”. Staying calm through our tone of voice and body language can soothe our child.

There are a whole range of strategies that people talk about when addressing tantrums: planned ignoring, time out, distractions, thinking mat, sticker charts, praise etc. Yes, I have used these in my early parenting years. How we respond to our toddlers tantrums depends on the cause. Maybe we can look at tantrums through a different lens an ask ourselves “what is my child struggling to communicate?”  When we answer this, we can implement the right of strategy.

Identify Tantrum Triggers

When tantrums start to emerge we may quickly see a pattern and start to identify what sets off a tantrums. When we can identify triggers we can plan around them. Here is an example on how you could track tantrums focus on time of day, what was occurring before the tantrum?, behaviour and response

Tuning In

My go to when I know that tantrums are fueled by emotions is to “Tune In”. Tuning in and stepping in at this early stage of development helps our toddler to develop skills. By tuning in we are supporting our toddler with feeling words so that they can make a connection, we are giving them language so that they can learn new words to communicate with. While tuning in we are modelling ways to calm down our body. For example “Did you throw your car because it wasn’t working and this made you feel angry. Our toys are special, we need to care for them.” Toddlers who are in danger of hurting themselves or others during a tantrum should be taken to a quiet, safe place to calm down.

Planned Ignoring

We can see tantrums emerge when we have refused something, staying calm and don't give a lot of explanations for why your toddler can't have what they want. Move on to another activity with your toddler. If a tantrum happens after your toddler is told to do something they don’t want to do, it's best to ignore the tantrum. But be sure that you follow through on having your toddler complete the task after they are calm. You might do it together. As your child is doing what is asked, it the perfect opportunity to encourage and praise the positive behaviour.

Controlled Choices

As toddlers are thriving on their newly found independence you can give controlled choices. “Would you like to brush your teeth before bath time or after?”

When we have given our child too much information when we are asking them to do something. Remember toddler’s attention span is very limited and their ability to hold and respond to our requests draws on their cognitive capacity which is still developing. So, one instruction at a time with some guidance and lots of praise.

And finally, we need to be consistent and calm in our approach. I know this really hard. I have given in plenty of times, just so the whining would stop and boy o boy did my children remember.

So, I hope you have found this helpful and reassuring when tackling tantrums in toddlerhood.