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A lot of trials and anxieties fall on the lot of young parents (how to take a tiny child in your arms, how to feed and swaddle, are you sick, are we educating correctly, are we teaching this?). But all this is behind. You did it. Here he is, your first-born, healthy, smart and obedient. Having a second child is no longer as scary as having a first. After all, now there is experience, and by raising a younger one, you can avoid many mistakes that inexperienced parents make.
This is how moms and dads think when they decide to have another child. And they are right, but only partly. You are right, because it is really easier to raise the second than the first — you know a lot, you can do a lot. And only “partly” because, firstly, with a new baby, many new problems will necessarily arise that parents did not encounter when raising their first child. Secondly, father and mother will face a task that does not exist for the parents of an only child: how to raise children as friends, not rivals?
In modern society, it is generally accepted that parents should love all their children equally, and brothers and sisters should have equal rights. Let’s try to figure out whether this is always the case in practice.
Older and younger children in the family
The Austrian doctor and psychologist Alfred Adler believed that children who have common parents, but differ in age and gender, develop in different conditions, even if mom and dad do not single out any of them. For example, it seems to you that the attitude towards the older child has not changed since the birth of the younger one. You give him as much attention as before. You have not stripped him of his former privileges. Do not make new demands on him. You love him no less than before the birth of your second child. All these conditions are necessary for the harmonious development of the personality of your son or daughter. See →
Reasons for having a second child
Unfortunately, often fathers and mothers not only do not help their children become friendly, but also interfere. Of course, there are hardly any parents who wish harm to their child. But many do it unconsciously. For example, have you ever thought about the fact that how the relationship between children in the family will develop is largely determined long before the birth of the second child? The basis of future friendship or enmity between the elder and the younger is laid not at the moment when you bring a baby into the house, but when you decide to give birth to another child. Much depends on how you answer the question: what prompted you to have a second child? This question is not as simple as it might seem, and the answer is by no means obvious. See →
Feelings of an older child
It happens that parents who love each other give birth to a second child to give life to a new person, and are ready to accept and love him as he is. Fathers and mothers expect that the birth of a second child will have a beneficial effect on the first child. The elder will take care of the younger, brotherly share with him things, toys, delicacies, which will serve as a good “cure” for selfishness. The firstborn will be spared from loneliness — children will be able to play and walk together. But for some reason, the older child is not happy at all. Instead, he suddenly begins to demand that the parents «return» the little brother or sister (taken back to the hospital, handed over to the store, given to the stork who brought him, etc.). Why is this happening and how should parents behave in such a situation? See →