Wow just like someone turned on the light switch and have forgotten to turn it off my boys are contantly aggrevating one another. The oldest is 8 and the youngest is 5. Seriously until just a month ago they got along wonderful. No rough play and kind words for the most part. But NOW! They are always pushing or wanting to fall into the other or sit on the other. Now they want to talk about hitting one another in the guts or try to wrestle. It's driving me bonkers! Oh, then one gets hurt, no surprise, and then of course they have to come and boo hoo about it to me. I keep telling them that they chose to be that way with one another and so they need to work it out between themselves. They need to tell each other what's acceptable and what's not because I don't know how hard one pushed or hit or stepped on the other.
I know boys will be boys and I'm probably pretty lucky that they've gotten along so well up until this point. I was just wondering if anyone out there had this same thing happen to them and are tired of being the ref. Does anyone have any good ideas on how to handle them or is what I'm doing by putting the ball back into their court the best case?!?
Thanks!
Well thank you for the advice. I figured as much as that they are just being boys BUT I may do some more separation times (more than usual) to show that I mean business and they don't have to be as rough.
I agree with separating them for a while each and every time - don't call it a time out call it a "cool off."
Take each of them and put them in their own room to play for an hour. They'll miss each other and have time to be alone. It might make the difference.
I had one carved in stone rule, noisy toys go into time out if they came in my space. When the fighting and arguing got to be too much the kids just got to go to their rooms to play for a while. They'd come out and do just fine.
What I finally did after an accident with a hockey stick is separate them EVERY SINGLE TIME. It was like 10 times in one day the first time. I think that they thought if they wore me down, I'd leave them alone. So into a separate room they went for at least 20 minutes, if not more. I made them see that I meant business. It worked. I highly suggest you start doing it now before you end up having to take one of them to the hospital...
Smiles!
Put them in a room and may the best man win. Lol. Only kidding. They are boys. They will fight. It's part of being brothers. However, they will protect one another on any given day if someone threatened one of them.
This is typical. Both for being boys and the ages. It's just typical. I raised 3 boys and it's no different.
What changed is that if I didn't see what happened, I'd yell at them both. When they got into karate, I'd use the same thing as the instructor and make them do push ups. That would not only make a distraction, but it was positive punishment. That is, they'd benefit physically from the punishment. They got used to it too.
Don't worry about it too much. Siblings are like that. My two oldest have finally bonded, where it was more rivalry and big brother/little brother mentality before. Now they direct the same stuff on the youngest brother. It will calm down.
I have four boys (11, 7, 6 & 4). They constantly fight. They punch, scratch, wrestle....you name it. They have always fought. The conclusion I have come to- they are boys. They are close in age. There are a lot of them. This is how boys act and there's not much I can do about it. I had one sister, no brothers. I am constantly (even after all these years) asking my husband if some of the crazy stuff they do is "normal." I have found a couple other moms who either have 3 or more boys or came from a family with multiple brothers. They are very reassuring in that their sons/brothers do the same physical stuff that my boys do. I think you are extremely lucky that your boys have been so pleasant up to this point! I have no advice other than to tell you that the way they're acting is the norm in my house and has been for years.
Well, I have girls but they do this as well. When things get too out of control I separate them and I reiterate that when playing roughly people get hurt.
I had three brothers that were all just a year apart. They were constantly doing these things. My dad used to just tell them they had to "take it outside." There was no tattling or figuring out who did what, they just figured it out on their own. I know it is hard to watch all the roughhousing but it's part of being a boy.
