- September 6, 2018
- Psychology of conflict
- Daniil Belousov
In families with more than one child, idyll and excellent relationships do not always prevail. Often the long-awaited sister begins to enrage, seemingly without any serious reason. Sometimes there is a reason for this, for example, not all relatives have the same temperament, character and hobbies. If your sister turns out to be the complete opposite, then serious conflicts often arise. Sometimes the reasons lie in elementary jealousy and attention from parents. To understand what to do if your sister is annoying, you first need to find out the reasons for the appearance of such hostility. There are several of them.
Jealousy
It is possible that the little sister is annoying because she receives more attention and love from her parents. Subconsciously, the older child does not agree with this arrangement of things. After all, before the baby appeared, all the parents’ attention was concentrated only on him, but now warmth and care go to her to a greater extent. Moreover, the older brother or sister will also be required to be careful towards the new family member.
Of course, all this leads to jealousy.
What should you do if your brother or sister is upset?
If a brother or sister is upset, the first thing to do is let them talk .
Their speeches can be stormy and emotional, you should not be afraid of them and you need to be prepared for anything.
Leave all your advice for later, now the person just needs to feel that you are interested in his problems .
But during a monologue, you don’t just need to stand and watch, say a few words, agree, so that your family can see what interests you.
Hug your brother or sister, a person needs to feel warmth and love.
Hugs are the best way to express your concern. Be sincere, pat him on the head, put your hand on your shoulder.
Next, make sure your sister or brother is comfortable Give napkins, if necessary, bring them and cover them with a blanket.
Brew some tea, invite them to sit down and discuss everything over a cup of aromatic tea. Bring or cook some tasty treat or your brother/sister's favorite dish.
If a loved one asks for advice, then there is no need to rush and give a bunch of unnecessary advice. Perhaps now it will be better to just rest and “digest” everything, and the next day the right decision will not be long in coming. It’s not for nothing that they say that the morning is wiser than the evening.
Find out how you can help. Perhaps at this moment, your sister or brother will need help.
Be prepared to comply with their request. Try to make your brother/sister laugh.
Remember some funny and amusing incidents from your childhood, and laugh at them together.
Offer to go to your favorite place. Perhaps you have “your” places where you feel comfortable and like to spend your free time . Take a break from your problems and look there together.
And most importantly, always be there. If your sister/brother is very upset and has serious problems, then you should not leave them alone. Check on their well-being at all times.
But don't be too intrusive. Support them in every possible way and take care of them.
Parents' mistakes
The jealousy of one child towards another does not appear out of nowhere. This is primarily the fault of the parents themselves, who do not know how to correctly prioritize and dose their love. What to do if your sister is annoying? First of all, it is the mother and father who must intervene in this situation. Firstly, they must explain to the older child that when he was born, they also gave him warmth and care. Of course, he doesn’t remember this and therefore thinks that the attitude towards his little sister is completely different.
Secondly, parents of children must learn to distribute their love evenly. We must not forget that the older child still needs mom and dad and desperately requires their attention.
Example of father and mother
If parents constantly argue and claim that they annoy each other, then it is not surprising that children adopt this pattern of behavior and begin to find faults in those closest to them.
The same thing often happens when a father or mother also speaks negatively about their sister. In this situation, it is not surprising that children decided to follow in the footsteps of their parents. This is why psychologists recommend speaking very carefully about other relatives in the presence of children. Husband and wife should not quarrel in front of them and show them the wrong model of family life. It is because of this that sisters and brothers can have serious problems.
How to prevent fights between brothers and sisters? Psychologist's advice
Conflict is part of any human relationship; through fighting, children learn to express their desires, set personal boundaries and solve problems. You can't completely stop sibling fighting, but as a parent, you can reduce it and teach your children how to solve problems in a more civilized way. Famous psychologist Laura Markham from the USA gives some useful recommendations.
Empathize with children, but set some limits
Children have the right to their feelings, even if they do not yet know how to restrain them. But all people, even the smallest ones, must be responsible for their actions. You can try to explain this to the child in understandable words.
“When your brother messes with your things, you get really angry. You can tell him how you feel in words, without beating him.”
“You wish you could go to bed later, like your sister. I know that you are waiting for the time when you can stay awake for a long time. You can tell me about it, but don’t ruin her room.”
Brainstorm with your children about how to resolve conflicts peacefully
The psychologist invites everyone to create a checklist together and hang it in a visible place. Here is an example text:
- Talk about your desires calmly, without attacking the other person.
- Listen to what the other person says and repeat it to show that you heard.
- Remain respectful.
- Live in the present, don't bring up past conflicts.
Teach children healthy self-soothing techniques.
This is not the easiest task. Most of us never learned to regulate our own emotions as children, so we ourselves are not very good at modeling these skills to our children. When they are in a calm mood, have a game of making a list of healthy ways to calm themselves. You can hang it on the refrigerator and, in moments of anger, perform the points from it yourself.
Sample list:
- Play some drums.
- Write in your journal how angry you are.
- Breathe and count to ten.
- Put on your headphones and dance to loud music.
Tell children that anger is a reaction to pain or fear.
Acknowledging the underlying feelings of anger will help to dispel it more effectively. Simply labeling anger will only make it worse. It is especially important to make this clear to children who say they hate a sibling. Hate is not a feeling, but a position we take when we refuse to negotiate and work through problems in a relationship.
“You're so angry at your sister right now that you feel like you hate her. Sometimes when we are very, very angry, we feel the same way, even towards the people we love. Let's tell your sister how hurt you are that she hit you and how angry you are about it."
Develop empathy in your children
Encourage your child's understanding of others' emotions by wondering out loud about other children's feelings.
“Look at Misha. He is crying. I wonder if maybe his feelings are hurt?”
“This little girl is definitely crazy. I wonder why?"
“Katya harmed herself. I wonder if there is anything we can do to help her feel better?”
Remember these are children. It is important to prevent bad behavior towards others, but it is even more important to let your child know that you support and understand him. The child needs to hear from you that he is not a bad person, just still small.
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Competition
When two girls appear in a family, there is a high probability that one of them will be more sociable, popular and active. As a rule, the second sister grows up calmer and does not understand the frivolity of her loved one. Against this background, quite serious scandals often arise, especially if girls are forced to share the same room. In this case, while one daughter is trying to do her homework and be a diligent girl, her sister may start listening to music loudly, talking on the phone and disturbing her in other ways.
At the same time, relatives, neighbors and friends often speak flatteringly only about the daughter who is more beautiful. The second is forced to wait for the moment when her talents are noticed. To decide what to do if your younger sister is annoying you, parents first need to understand that young girls need personal space. If their interests and behavior are very different, it will be difficult for them to stay in the same room all the time. This very often leads to conflicts and difficult situations.
Having roughly decided on the reasons, it’s easier to figure out what to do if your sister pisses you off. Let's consider the main methods for solving such problems.
Childhood grievances only intensify with age
This happens in many families where brothers and sisters, having become adults, stop all communication. Sometimes grievances stored in the soul since childhood only intensify with age. Someone is suddenly struck by the realization that there has never been love for this person, close by blood. They simply lived side by side, shared a common bedroom, toys, food, a roof over their heads. They had different interests, different social circles, and each of them sought to win the love of their mother or father. Now that each of them has their own life, there is no reason to pretend and pretend that the relationship has not cracked. If fate has scattered them to different ends of the country, not one of them will leave their homes and go to see their brother or sister. And only occasionally, at the request of aging parents, can the family be reunited for a short time.
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Straight Talk
What should I do if my husband’s sister or even my own blood is pissing me off? If we are talking about the girl’s own sister, then the problem needs to be solved by openly admitting everything. You need to invite your sister to a conversation and explain your dissatisfaction in detail. It is also worth asking her what, in turn, causes her irritation. Perhaps such a conversation will take place in a raised tone, but with a high probability, by opening the soul to a loved one, it will be much easier for the two sisters to improve their relationship.
If we are talking about the husband’s closest relative, then this situation is a little more complicated. In this case, you can also talk to the object of hostility. However, in such situations, it is usually better to set communication boundaries and come to a compromise.
The ability to take the right position during family scandals
When considering what to do if your sister is annoying, it is worth paying attention to the fact that often girls begin to deliberately cause irritation in their address, since they are offended by their parents’ other daughter. As a rule, this happens due to the fact that the sister did not support her significant other by blood and during a quarrel with her parents took their position.
It is best to avoid such situations. Therefore, you should take a neutral position and try not to discuss your sister behind her back. Then she won’t have any problems with what to do if her sister is annoying.
Communication with a specialist
Sometimes no methods can help improve relationships between sisters. There is a great risk that mutual antipathy could even develop into hatred. To prevent this, timely measures must be taken. Therefore, it is worth contacting a psychologist. He will help you decide what to do if your younger sister is annoying you.
There are a lot of exercises that will help you understand the reasons for hostility. A psychologist can also bring the sisters into a frank conversation and teach them to treat each other more respectfully. It is also important for the specialist to communicate with the parents. If the cause of quarrels between sisters and brothers is jealousy, then it is the father and mother who should reconsider their behavior. Perhaps they “bet” on only one of the daughters, and subconsciously or even openly consider the second to be a loser and incompetent. This is a fundamentally wrong approach, and only an experienced psychologist can point out parents’ mistakes.
Why do sisters fight?
How does the sisters' birth order affect their relationship?
The older sister often plays the role of a “second mother.” This is simply a seemingly strong position. A girl who constantly helps her parents, such as fetching her younger sisters from school or warming up dinner, loses a certain carelessness in childhood. In adult life, such women may be well organized, but they also tend to be controlling and self-sacrificing for others. They think that everything rests on their shoulders.
In turn, the middle sister is often a person with altruistic traits who mediates the sisterly relationship, so she has very developed social skills. But such a girl may also have the feeling that she is being overlooked and not noticed by her parents. All her life, entering into other relationships, she also exists as “average”, belittling her own needs.
Many family systems specialists point out that conflicts in the family usually arise when the original hierarchy is somehow violated (for example, when parents are more concerned about the opinion of the younger sister, and the older one is ignored, when the younger one has children, etc.) .
The youngest sister, on the one hand, is often the family favorite: her parents spoil her more than her older brothers and sisters. So she might say that since the older children have met their parents' expectations, she no longer needs to focus on that. On the other hand, the demands placed on her by older siblings can become a double burden for her and make her constantly feel like she is “the worst of the kids.” How to improve relations with your sister, how to make peace with your sister when you have more than two sisters in your family?
Awareness of who is who in the family line organizes family relationships and gives them the right rhythm. Of course, it is impossible to predict all scenarios, but it is worth remembering the order, especially in the case of parents.
How to improve your relationship with your younger or older sister
You are both already out of childhood. Everyone has a family and children. But you yourself are no longer children. You live in different places, each leading your own lifestyle. You meet mostly at your parents' house. And when you meet, treat each other the same way you did in childhood. This is your mistake. In your parents' house, you remember the rules by which you communicated. For example, “I’m older - you’re younger.” Or “you offended me all the time - I gave in to you.”
You are adults now. The concept of “younger-older” was in effect during growing up. Now he's gone. Each of you is a self-sufficient person. The person who is being approved. Has valid opinions. Give up the relationship model you had in childhood. Don't bring it into the present.
How to improve your relationship with your younger sister
Tip 13
We need to accept her as an adult. You no longer warm up her food or wipe her sniffles. This is what you are already doing with your children. Your sister is not far from you in age. After 20 years, the difference as such is no longer felt. Drop the “you’re younger and should obey me in everything” model.
Tip 14
We must stop commanding and teaching. All the more so to order. Now in front of you is a friend, the best, dear, dear and very familiar from childhood. With this way of thinking, you and her will become closer. Find common interests and topics for conversation among adults.
How to improve your relationship with your older sister
Tip 15
Throw away the model of children's relationships. Your sister will no longer braid your hair. Monitor homework. No one leaves you alone with her for the purpose of education. You don't have to play with her older friends anymore. Who ignored you and laughed. Your toys are now forever with you or your children. And no one is going to take them away. All. You are adults, building your relationships, your families. There are boundaries between you and that's good.
Tip 16
Be Peaceful Set an example for your children on how to behave with their sisters.
Admitting the Truth
If we talk about what to do if your older sister pisses you off, it is rare, but still there are situations when it is impossible to correct the situation. For example, if resentment has been growing for many years. In such a situation, it is very difficult to rebuild. If your sister is annoying because she is a completely different person, then perhaps you should just keep communication to a minimum and not torment yourself.
If the reason is simple jealousy, then you need to understand that it is not your sister’s fault that the parents failed to correctly share their love between their daughters. Therefore, you need to try to understand the situation or accept the truth and come to terms with the fact that communicating with your sister does not bring joy.
Why do children fight?
- Tired: at the end of the day, from any activity, from excessive communication in kindergarten, etc. Unfortunately, most often tired children will not accept your attempts at parenting.
- Excess energy. If you know your child needs a lot of physical activity, try to satisfy this need with long walks. Evening walks are the best prevention of evening quarrels.
- Lack of your own space or opportunity to be alone. Every child should have at least a shelf above their bed with their “property”.
- Childhood crisis of one of the children.
- Birthday of one of the children. Most often, on such days, the attention of parents and guests is focused on the birthday boy, and other children suffer from lack of attention. [1]
- Competition for the love and attention of parents, envy of the success of another, resentment for the privileges received by a brother or sister, etc.
The good news is that these fights can have a positive side.
