Sibling rivalry is an unhealthy competition between children born of the same parents. It is also a seemingly insignificant matter, like a two-year-old asking his or her mum to put down his or her younger sibling who is a newborn so the mother can carry him or her; or one child refusing to share toys, space or other resources which a child believes should be his or her sole property with siblings.
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Parenting coach and a family enthusiast, Chinekwu Oreh, noted that parents might inadvertently drive sibling rivalry through unhealthy expectations and unhealthy comparisons amongst their children.
“Sometimes, parents gloss over the issues that lead to sibling rivalry, but proactive parenting demands that parents should start from an early age to deliberately nip every trace of sibling rivalry in the bud before it spirals out of control,” Oreh said.
Oreh stressed that research has shown that family factors such as parenting styles, parent-child relationship and sibling interactions could either drive sibling rivalry or promote good sibling relationships. Other factors that could be responsible for sibling rivalry if not properly handled are family dynamics like birth order, age and gender of children, or the presence of a child with special needs.
She therefore stated that to ensure that sibling rivalry is well managed, it is important to create the right family values. Your family values are the standards of behaviour and principles that govern your family life. Having the right value system goes far in shaping your children, and will go a long way in handling the root causes of sibling rivalry. To promote sibling bonding, you should ensure that team-building, mutual love, respect, empathy and care are part of your family values.
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These values should be communicated and expressed to your children at every opportunity. Make looking out for one another and celebrating one another’s success a norm in your home. Likewise, set rules for acceptable behaviour at home.
Celebrate beauty in diversity and discourage unhealthy comparison as it comes as a result of a fixed opinion on what success should mean. A child might be excellent in sports, another in nurturing relationships and yet the third in cerebral activities; every child definitely has an area in which he or she is good. Success should be defined as being the best version of oneself. Every parent should therefore work towards helping their children identify who they are, encourage them along that path, celebrate the beauty in the diverse nature of their children and encourage the siblings to celebrate one another.
It is also important to proactively promote equity over equality. Equity means giving every child what he or she needs per time and this differs greatly from equality. Equality says every child gets the same treatment, so this may translate to mean, for example, if one child gets an injection because he is ill, all the children will get the same. You see, parents sometimes make the mistake of promoting equality and when this is not possible, children will revolt and see the unequal treatment as being unfair.
Teaching conflict resolution skills as parents is necessary to help your children resolve conflicts amongst themselves. If you step in whenever there is a misunderstanding between them, chances are that resentment might grow if someone thinks the other party is more favoured in the resolution. When they are able to solve their problems amicably, with the right skills, they will bond better.
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