Advent of a second child in the ASD household

[msagara]

I have written a lot about my older son, and very little about my younger son. This is in part because I didn’t start writing these posts until the oldest was old enough to give me what I felt was informed consent

Comments

[kuangning]

I wish I had managed to negotiate the same issues as gracefully as this when my daughter came along. Though, since there was only a two-year gap between the two, I don't know how much understanding would have been possible no matter how much explaining I did. We found something akin to peace by getting the two children identical toys whenever possible; eldest child was much more philosophical about having little sister grab for HIS toy when he could simply get up and get the other, identical toy. It didn't work for everything, but since they only ever came to hitting once before little sister outgrew grabbing his toys, I think it worked well enough

[msagara]

I think it’s way harder with a two year gap in some ways - but easier in others. Harder for parent. Easier because the two year old, after a very short period, won’t have strong conscious memories of time before baby; five year olds do. So it’s a tradeoff.

And also: time. Time, how much (helpful) family you have, etc., makes it easier.

There’s 13 months between my sister and I, and my mother found it hard because if she had to leave the baby crying for any reason, she had two extremely upset children in short order. I would start shouting “Mommy, mommy, baby cry! baby cry!” and I would ratchet things up if there wasn’t an immediate response.

[lyssabits]

I'm hoping that my son, now two, will be sorta used to having another person in the house when his sister arrives in October, since I've been doing daycare for an another girl since he was a few months old. He never minds when Charlotte cries. Sometimes, he thinks it's funny. *sigh* On the other hand, he definitely gets jealous. He tries to pull her out of my lap if I hold her, so I know he won't be totally cool with the new baby

[kuangning]

Oh, Lord. If I had ever been inclined to be the cry-it-out sort of parent, my eldest would have disabused me of the notion when baby sister came along. He hated it when she cried, and if I could not calm her quickly -- he was quite willing to help comfort her when the crying started, which helped -- it would end with him in a corner with his hands over his ears, rocking back and forth in distress. Thankfully, of my three children, he himself was the only colicky baby, and I co-slept with all of them because it made breastfeeding easier, so we really didn't have many of those extended crying sessions.

Also, music helped. Eldest would not always respond when spoken to, but he would stop whatever he was doing if I sang, so I was already singing near-constantly. The younger two adapted to that pretty readily, and once they had, it was possible to calm both or all of them in the same way at the same time. That alone may have saved (what was left of) my sanity.

[la_marquise_de_]

You and T confronted some very difficult issues here. And you did so fairly, intelligently and with compassion. Thank you. (I know slightly too many families where one child has been raised to be junior carer, and to see themselves as less than their siblings due to family circumstances.)
You are amazing.

[msagara]

(I know slightly too many families where one child has been raised to be junior carer, and to see themselves as less than their siblings due to family circumstances.)

I’ve seen a lot of the former, but not as much of the latter. It’s hard not to have older children be junior carers; it’s almost a role they take on in some cases. But I haven’t seen that result in any sense of inferiority to their siblings. At least, not from an adult-observer perspective.

I have seen children resent younger sibling for perceived privilege changes: “I had to wait until I was ten to do that, and they’re doing it at six!” but we kind of avoided that by not pegging privileges to age.

Otoh, there are a lot of disadvantages to not pegging privilege to age, as well. It’s an incentive to be happy about getting older: you can do more.

[kuangning]

I haven’t seen that result in any sense of inferiority to their siblings. At least, not from an adult-observer perspective.

*raises hand.*

Anything I had wasn't mine, it was to be given to siblings if they wanted it. I wasn't supposed to ask for anything for myself because it took up resources better spent on my siblings. If my school uniforms were expensive, my mother told my sisters their dresses were cheaper than she wanted because she'd had to spend too much on me. I felt a lot of times like my only value was in caring for the siblings, and it didn't help that my parents did things like forget to come get me from school (and leave me wherever I was overnight once they realised I was missing!) because until they needed me for some chore, I might as well have been invisible. I know for a fact that I'm not alone in that, though my parents were ... extreme.

[msagara]

I felt a lot of times like my only value was in caring for the siblings, and it didn't help that my parents did things like forget to come get me from school (and leave me wherever I was overnight once they realised I was missing!)

I am another oldest child - an oldest daughter. Five years separate me and the fourth child, so we were all pretty close in age, and maybe that makes a difference. I understood, growing up, that I was not to upset the younger children, and I was to mediate if they were having difficulties.

So in some ways, I was a junior care person - but we also developed small chains of command: I comforted my sister, she comforted the 3rd child (and oldest son), who watched out for the baby. The baby wanted a baby of his own because we all had one, except for him

[anonymous]

Thank you for sharing. I like some of your ideas and have been using them as my older son is on the spectrum but my younger son is not. Mine are closer in age (23 months) so we had less in the expectations of the older though at first he thought his younger brother was a sort of toy. This was both good and bad. I too have tried to be truthful with my sons about my older son. The interesting thing is because of the rules we had about babies my older son is very gentle around small children.