Lately, #1 has been in this insufferable stage where everything in the world is inadequate, she doesn’t want to do anything that is asked of her, and just about asking her to do anything resorts in complaining, screaming and fighting.
Whereas for a while, #1 was the chill kid who was amenable and open minded, I wouldn’t say the roles have necessarily reversed and #2 is the zen chill child now, but it’s like I’ve got two strong-willed little girls apt to put up the Great Wall of China-level resistance at a moment’s notice if they simply feel like it.
The good thing is that the kids seem content to keep the crazy for when they’re at home, and after parent-teacher conference week, I’m at least happy to learn that both of them are rather good students, with #2 turning in the equivalent of a straight-A report card in her first try. They’re good to their peers and good to their teachers, but it’s when they come home does the insufferable whining really begin.
Complaining to me, complaining to mom, complaining to the au pair, it’s really quite endless at times, and unless she’s doing precisely what she wants to be doing, there’s usually some whining going on. Unfortunately, what a lot of what she wants to be doing usually involves being lazy slugs in front of televisions or iPads or Switches and vegging out to some screen, and yeah no, that’s not going to fly with me at this juncture of their lives.
However, whenever I sit down with #1 and try to actually speak with her and try to get the bottom of where all this angst is coming from, more often than not, I’ve been getting a lot of:
I feel like you like/love/want to do X with/care more with sissy than me
And no matter of explanation of how incorrect such an opinion is doesn’t seem to matter, because once she gets this idea in her head that she is less favored than her little sister, it’s effectively over and absolutely nothing is going to bring her out of the funk except a little time and maybe going to bed for the night.
Where this defeatist, martyr complex came from, I have no idea, but there’s a lot of things that she’s seemingly picked up in short order this school year that has me no real other choice to believe than things she’s picking up from other students, because I try my absolute best to be fair and equal to both my kids, and I try to be cognizant over the attention I give each my kids because I know this is always inevitably bound to happen. And frankly if I’m being honest, I probably spend more time with #1 than I do my younger child, mostly because she’s the elder, and there are some things that we do together that her little sister isn’t capable of doing just yet, like reading more complex books, practicing reading and math together, and other things that separate a six-year old from a five-year old.
Doesn’t matter though, for whatever reason, #1 has gotten into this martyr complex phase where woe is me, nobody likes her, she lives in a home completely devoid of love and care, and as a result is just blowing up at everyone all the time if she hears one thing that doesn’t jive with her at that very moment.
Fun times in dad land.
