Minor and grown siblings in typical biofamilies compete
for physical and invisible family "things." Their vying can
range from good-natured to bitter, and camouflaged to obvious. Kids in
divorcing families, and new stepsiblings, often have more reasons to
compete with each other for several reasons.
Because bonding (emotional attachment) in new stepfamilies is usually
much weaker than in healthy, intact biofamilies, rivalry between
stepkids can generate major discomfort in and between their
co-parents and other relatives. It usually is one of many
concurrent stepfamily
surface stressors.
This
article offers perspective on stepsibling rivalry, hilights typical surface symptoms of it, and
proposes five common primary
problems underlying excessive rivalry, and options for resolving each one.
Perspective
Who or what does the word "rivals" bring to your mind? Have you
ever "rivaled" or competed with someone? What kinds of feelings and
thoughts did that generate in you and them? How did it shape your relationship? How did your rivalry affect your
communication and ability to problem solve?
Who else did your rivalry affect? Was your competition a "problem"? To whom? Why?
Would you agree that rivalry is a natural part of all human groups -
specially groups who live together, and share common resources?
A
probable challenge to group leaders like you stepfamily co-parents
is "how do we manage the rivalries among us?"
Why
do kids and adults compete? You may respond "Duh - to win or get what you want!" OK, why is that
so important? Why is human (and your personal and family's) history
spattered with stories of people lying, cheating, stealing, and breaking the
law in order to "win" or "triumph"? Why have rival armies
destroyed landscapes, populations, and whole regions questing for
"victory"?
Why does some sibling rivalry reach the point that the
brothers and sisters don't speak to each other for years?
Would you agree that some rivalry brings out the best in the competitors and
the worst in others? What makes the difference? How does this difference
relate to your present home and stepfami-ly?
Can you co-parents find
a way to use intra-family rivalries to bring out the best in you
all?
Timothy Gallway's brief, timeless book
The
Inner Game of Tennis gives us an interesting example of intentionally
learning to "bring out our best" by competing non-competitively (!)
Our mammalian cousins compete for survival and procreation:
i.e. whales and mice compete with their peers for territory, food, water, and
sexual partners. The thin cortex brain layer we humans have evolved raise most
of us "civilized" people above this daily survival rivalry to
compete for different things. What things?
Most (all?) children are "egocentric" - their governing subselves
instinctively focus naturally on filling their own needs first, unless they're
shamed for that. Think of what mattered most to you at four years old. How about at age 12? 17? Were you rivals with anyone then for key things? How about vying for
these
invisible prizes:
-
feeling safe (secure) from
rejection and abandonment; and...
-
feeling
by key adults
and kids; and...
-
protecting
territory
(boundaries) and prized belongings from possible loss to
another child; and...
-
protecting against loss
of family rank and identity - "I'm the cutest /
smartest / most helpful / best looking / most entertaining /
best-loved boy / girl in this home / family, not you!; and...
-
feeling
potent and
competent to
get your needs met while keeping these other four treasures.
Can
you think of other primary emotional prizes (comforts) children compete for,
at home, church, and school? Note that each of these competition prizes is
a primary human
- i.e. instinctive, vs. learned from parents or others. Do you see
any difference between these and what we adults compete for?
Think of the real and fictional hero/ines
who most influenced your childhood years. One at a time, imagine asking
them "Please tell me your attitude about rivalry and competition."
Would they praise and admire people who strive to win and beat
the competition, or would they disparage that drive as
selfish, egocentric, stupid, silly, or despicable? Would some say
"Winning or losing don't matter. What matters is how you
play the game."
Whatever coaching you
got, you've become an adult with some core right/wrong, good/bad
attitudes about submitting, competing, winning, and
losing. You've also forged part of your own identity as
"I am a winner (or loser, or...)."
As your caregivers'
perceived values and attitudes shaped your own,
your attitudes
have been affec-ting if and how your family children compete, and whether
they feel guilt and shame, pride, indifference, frustration, contentment,
or (something else) about competing. The same is true for your other key
stepfamily adults' attitudes about rivals and competition.
Many kids of divorce grow up
experiencing their parents fighting as opponents, vs.
problem-solving as teammates. Sadly, the
can
amplify this antagonism example with "endless" parental
legal battles.
These inherently aggressive contests always generate "winners" and
"losers," though emotionally everyone loses, long term.
Divorce court fights breed
or amplify toxic emotional stews of bitterness,
distrust,
disrespect, and
resentment
which usually take many years to heal or fade.
Typical minor kids
lose optimism, maturation-time, security, hope (of reunion), stable
caregiving nurturance, lifestyle quality, and perhaps respect for one or both
parents.
Legal or not, parental fighting and
arguing often exalts disrespectful rivalry and winning, rather than family
members disagreeing respectfully, compromising, and helping each other get
their current primary needs met well enough.
More perspective on stepsibling rivalry...
Because kids of divorce and parental
death have experienced the reality of physical and/or emotional abandonment,
they are usually more sensitive to (scared of) their custodial parent
leaving them. This is a primal
that has nothing to do with logic. That
implies that verbal reassurances won't entirely quell the need to compete
for parental time, attention, and approval. Time and experience
gradually build your kids' lost trust that "I am safe enough from
being alone."
Subliminal terror of (and
expectation of) abandonment can be more intense if a child experienced
their primary caregiver - usually Mom - as being physically or emotionally
unavailable. Some clients have told me their
(overwhelmed) parents tried to force compliance from them as young kids by
threatening to "leave them at the garbage dump" or similar.
Kids
who have experienced a forced (e.g. court- ordered) shift from an
overwhelmed or abusive custodial parent's home to their "other
parent's home" can deeply distrust that they're safe from abandonment, and feel powerless to prevent it.
Sons and daughters with
significant
prior insecurities (as judged by them) can feel
"irrationally" scared of emotional abandonment when their
custodial parent re/marries - specially if the new adult has kids
of their own. Depending on their age, some such kids can't articulate
their terror verbally, but their faces, body, and sleep behaviors scream
their fears.
Most new stepkids feel
compelled to test how safe
they are from demotion and abandonment. Step-sibling rivalry
can be a great way to test who their custodial parent sides
with (prefers). If one or both of their stepfamily homes are
stepkids' testing can last for years. What's the
nurturance level (low > high) in each of your kids' current homes? Their
birthfamily homes?
Another generality that may apply to your
stepsibling rivalry situation is that adults and kids of divorce are more prone
to significant
("I'm basically
worthless and unlovable") and
("I've broken some major rules.") than peers in intact, high-nurturance
biofamilies.
Where that's true,
adults
and kids are more likely to compete fiercely and persistently for
precious self, co-parent, family, and social approval and respect
than their non-stepfamily peers.
people will typically deny
they're competing, justify it, and/or feel significantly ashamed and guilty
for doing so.
Another rivalry factor is kids'
Kids with "male brains" and hormones are more apt to act
aggressively and instinctually seek "to fight and win." Female
brains (biomoms, stepmoms, aunts, and stepsisters) usually value cooperation,
"relationships," and community. You probably know excep-tions, fiercely competitive
females and males
who promote peace, mediation and harmony.
So - your step/kids can vie more intensely for the six invisible prizes above than their
intact-family peers. The intensity of their rivalry can cause major
and relationship
in and between your homes.
These
add to other concurrent relationship
conflicts and
tasks you co-parents are
working to master, which stress
re/marriages.
Recall: current estimates suggest that over half of typical American
stepfamily re/marriages don't make it. An unknown percentage chooses to
endure major unhappiness every day. For some re/divor-cers,
major stepsibling rivalry was a symptom of the
real
problems.
Key Premises
See
how you feel about these proposals: "A(gree), D(isagree), and (?) it depends
(on what?)
-
Stepsibling rivalry is
"excessive" or "significant" when any stepfamily
member says it is (A D ?);
-
Such rivalry can be a
"significant" problem (emotional stressor) for any of the
rivals, and/or for any of the people they live with and/or
care about them (A D ?);
-
Excessive
stepsibling rivalry is usually a symptom of deeper individual or
problems, so focusing on the rivalry alone often
will not "work" long term; (A D ?)
-
It can be hard to separate
"excessive rivalry" from other major tensions between stepsibs
like dislike,
distrust,
hostility,
jealousy,
and disrespect. These relationship
conditions share some basic underlying primary problems, so working
to heal one of them may improve them all. (A D ?)
-
All of your
related co-parents share responsibility for acknowledging
"excessive" stepsibling rivalry and reducing it to
"tolerable;" (A D ?)
-
Punishing a child
for excessive rivalry shames them, and ignores the
that are causing their behavior. This means those needs will keep surfacing
in some other ways until they're filled well enough or the child gives up (A
D ?); A last premise is...
-
You co-parents can significantly
reduce excessive stepsibling rivalry - i.e. the primary problems
promoting it (below), over time! (A D ?)
If
you don't clearly agree with these ideas now, what do you and each
of your other co-parents believe? Your beliefs and attitudes will shape how you respond to
your kids' battling and whether the fights escalate or not.
Let's use this perspective on competition between
stepsibs (i.e. any kids) to explore...
What's the (Surface) Problem?
I
assume that you're reading this article because someone in your home or
family feels two or more stepbrothers or sisters are "fighting" too much.
"Someone" can be a child or an adult, or several people. What are common
signs of this? Examples...
-
11-year -old Mathew gets deeply depressed again
when his father praises his stepsister Annie for getting an A+ on a school
test.
-
Continuing a pattern, five-year-old Monica
pries her young stepbrother Jeff's hand out of her mothers hand as they're
walking, and triumphantly inserts her own. Jeff looks sad and confused,
and her mother rebukes Monica for being "not nice," but
continues holding her hand;
-
Nina is overweight and not athletic. She
announces at dinner that she's trying out for a high school cheerleading
slot, soon after her stepsister Wendy is elected class president. Nina
radiates discomfort as her co-parents congratulate Wendy for another in a
string of school and social achievements.
-
Brent borrows and "loses" his
stepbrother's CD player. This is the fourth incident in six weeks where
Brent has taken or misused Bill's clothing or belongings, despite being
chastised by his co-parents. The "dislike" between the boys is
making everyone uncomfortable in both their homes.
-
Manuel continually taunts his stepsister
Antonia as being "stupid," "dumb," "ugly,"
and "a bitch" - to her face, and behind her back. When his
stepfather complains and his Mother grounds him for the latest insulting
behavior, he sullenly glares and mutters "So the princess gets her way again,
huh?"
A
non-stepfamily reader might say these are examples of "normal sibling
rivalries." Yes and no. "Yes" they're normal attempts to fill important
emotional needs. "No" in that...
Patterns of rivalries like these
(vs. single incidents) are much more likely to cause groups of serious
and
relationship
in and between co-parent's homes. These contribute to re/marital
stress;
The emotional
(genuine caring and loyalty) between stepsiblings are usually weaker than
between bio-brothers and sisters, and...
The odds of major personal insecurities,
and the related intensity of needing the "prizes"
above in each child, are higher in typical new blended stepfamilies
than in intact,
biofamilies.
Surface problems here are Mathew's
"depression," Monica's "being not nice," Nina's risk of
self-shaming, Brent's "selfish, uncooperative behavior," and Manuel's
"rudeness, bad attitude, and insulting language." Co-parents trying to
correct symptoms like these risk not...
Identifying and Resolving the
Primary Problems
In
your version of rivalry situations like these, there are probably a cluster
of underlying problems like these...
Primary Problem 1) - unawareness.
You three or more co-parents aren't yet (a) aware of, or (b) unified on...
-
How to distinguish between
your family members' current surface needs and their underlying
and filling primary needs solves household and
(step)family relationship "problems;"
-
How to help each other identify ineffectual
(superficial) changes, (e.g. most diets) and replace them with second-order (core attitude) changes;
-
The seven
that empower you to resolve any
divorced-family or stepfamily relationship problem, and how to
your present communication
to see if you have any of these common communication
-
(a) the
four sets of needs that typical stepkids like yours have,
(b) the status
of each child with their set of needs, and (c) how this status
relates to your kids' surface rivalry-behavior symptoms. And you
may not be aware of or unified on...
-
the three levels of
what your homes' and stepfamily's grief
values
and
are, how to assess you co-parents and kids for
of
blocked grief, and if blocked grief is contributing to your
stepsiblings' "excessive rivalry"
Solution options: Adopt the inquisitive "mind of a student," (alternative: "I know enough now"); and a long-term family-building time-frame
(e.g. the next 25 or more years). Then recall the
promo-ting
widespread U.S. re/divorce, and the
co-parents can work at to build a flourishing re/mar-riage
and stepfamily, over time. Then study these
stepfamily basics.
Finally, follow the links in each point above and study and apply
what you find there.
Request (vs. demand) that your other co-parents
do these steps with you, and discuss and apply the learnings you get, as you
go - as caregiving
If
you can't follow some version of these steps as married partners and co-parenting colleagues, you adults have deeper
to resolve than stepsibling rivalry.
Primary Problem 2)
Your three or more co-parents may not yet be clear and unified about how to
(a) set and (b) enforce effective
behavioral
(limits) in your
respective homes. That is, you may not
be as clear and consistent at providing effective child discipline as
you could be.
Or you adults may currently
stymied by child-discipline
and related
and relationship
and/or someone other than the resident adult/s is
often in charge of one or both of your kids' co-parenting homes. If
any of these are true, your young "rivals" may be getting confusing
messages about limits and consequences in and between their homes. That
increases their confusion and insecurities, and potentially their
"rivalry."
Solution options: read
and discuss these articles on
effective
(stepfamily) child discipline. Add to what's already good about your
co-parents' limit setting and consequence enforcing, rather than blaming and
shaming someone. Note
that child discipline in typical divorcing families and stepfamilies can differ
in up to 20 environmental ways from that in intact
biofamilies!
Use the seven
communication
to help each other spot and resolve any
boundary, discipline, conflict, and
triangle problems. Then reassess your stepsibling "rivalry" problem to see
if anything has changed. If you feel it would help to change some aspects of your child
discipline, keep the difference between first-order and second-order
in mind.
(ref. problem 1 above.)
Invest time and effort learning to draw a
of the residents and relationships in each of your kids' two
homes. The objective is to affirm or clarify who's needs are really directing
the energy and decisions in each home. Don't assume that it's the adults.
If it isn't, you have
than stepsibling rivalry!
Another root cause of your stepsibling "rivalry" problem may be...
Primary Problem 3) One or more
family adults or kids may be using
inappropriate (biofamily) expectations with which to judge yourselves and
other family members. These mis-assumptions may be contributing to (a) your
stepsiblings' competition, and/or to (b) how you adults are
responding to it.
For
example, if you don't yet accept that you're a normal stepfamily
which differs from typical intact biofamilies in
up to
60 ways, one or more of you may expect your stepsiblings to
love each other like (idealized) biosiblings. If you chastise
your step/kids for not being loving, they'll probably feel confused, judged unfairly ("attacked"), self doubtful
and guilty, ashamed, irritated, and resentful. This stew of
feelings and related needs may manifest as stepsibling "rivalry"
and/or related behaviors.
Solution options: you three or more co-parents (a) do
and
honestly and patiently. Then (b) teach what you learn to your kids
and supporters, over time. Help each other use the skill of
to get clear on what you expect of yourself and each other in your many
complex (step)family roles and relationships.
Primary Problem 4) The
"stepsibling rivalry" may be unconsciously aimed at
deflecting your collective awareness away from some scary adult re/marital,
financial, legal, and/or health problems like
law-breaking,
or serious depression. Human groups like your
have the protective ability to use a form of mass
illusion. The classic metaphor is "Let's all agree to pretend that there
is not an elephant in the living room."
Solution options: We adults
and kids unconsciously use denial (a form of
like this because we're afraid, ashamed, and guilty, and we don't know how to communicate safely about these or heal them
These are usually symptoms of a deeper problem...
Primary Problem
5) One or more of you co-parents and probably
some or most of your minor and grown kids, are unaware of major
among you.
Combined with
they are combining in some way to cause home and
stepfamily conditions that promote the other underlying primary "stepsibling rivalry" problems above.
Solution options: With a
long-term view and your descendents' wholistic-health in
mind, study these Project-1 articles in the order you see
them. When you understand their concepts and purpose, honestly
for false-self wounds.
First evaluate yourself for significant dominance of a
Then
assess each of your co-paren-ting partners, and each of
your kids. Guard against faulty conclusions and fears
by reading and discus-sing the baseline Project-1 articles before doing
the worksheets. If your false self is too
wait to form firm
conclusions from the worksheets until after you read the supporting articles,
including the introduction to
Increase the benefits of your
solution-choices by thoughtfully reviewing these
premises
about all relationships, these ideas on what an
effective
parent is, and the general factors promoting a wholistically
healthy relationship.
This site proposes that
most relationship problems have surface symptoms, and
primary
needs that cause them. Co-parents helping each other
and
fill on these
will enjoy earning the long-term satisfaction of "fixing" their
complex role and relationship problems permanently.
Recap
This Solutions article focuses on some perspective, common surface
symptoms, and five probable primary factors causing "excessive
stepsibling rivalry." The primary
factors also promote excessive stepsibling (or biosibling)
dislike,
distrust,
disrespect,
hostility,
jealousy,
and/or disinterest.
Your best overall strategy for improving any mix of relationship problems like
these is to:
-
your
co-parents for false-self wounds, and begin proactive healing (Project 1);
-
learn the
that threaten most re/marriages and how to
against them. Then...
-
set clear
bio-family-merger and
long-term stepfamily
together as caring co-parents, and help each other clarify and agree on your
co-parenting
-
get and use
appropriate
while you
help each other...
-
stay
and work to forge an effective
for your kids'
sakes. The capstone to this strategy is to
-
learn
to enjoy the process enough
along the way!
Are you all up for this world-class adventure? Committing and sticking to this
difficult, complex long-distance strategy is likely to yield deep
satisfactions in your old ages! If you help each find and empower your
true
Selves, you can do this!
+ + +
Reflect - why did you read this article? Did you get what you needed? If so -
what do you need to do next? If not - what
you need now? Who's answering these questions - your
or
The Web address of this article is
http://sfhelp.org/Rx/sibs/rivalries.htm