As my title states...my 7 year old is not adjusting well. At all. First and foremost I would like to say that he is highly intelligent, kind, generous, and loving. Yet he is also highly sensitive, stubborn, and very demanding of mine and the big man's attention. We did everything we could during the pregnancy to prepare/excite him. After our youngest was born (it's just the 2 of them) he immediately showed dislike for him. Nothing physical of course. Just ignoring him and saying mean things about him from time to time. We've tried all we can to get him closer to his brother...to no avail. Asked him to help with little things such as fetching the lil one something to wear, pick out toys they can play with together, read to him, cuddle, doing many things together as a family,and the list goes on and on. Now with 6 months having gone by we hoped to see some improvement. I'm at my wits end. I do understand that he had us to himself for seven years so it may take a bit longer than normal. Shamefully I will admit that I told him that I was going to treat him the way he treats his little brother (which of course I never will!). He started crying and begging me not to. I than said, see if you don't want me treating you the way you treat him, than why do you treat him that way. He didn't know. And he did try to treat his lil fella better...for about 1 hour. Than it was back to ignoring. I've tried explaining to him that instead of me and him playing together or just him and his dad that we ALL need to spend time together (we do time alone with just our eldest also). I feel like this is a rambling mess now and I apologize for that. I'm starting to feel like an utter failure. I don't know what to do. On one hand I feel so bad for the littlest because he absolutely adores the oldest. On the other I feel guilt that I'm not doing all I can for our eldest. Should I wait it out. Or is it time to perhaps seek outside professional help?
What exactly are you expecting of him at this stage? At his age a baby is a major pain in his butt. Babies cry, fuss and take mom and dad’s attention. Eating outs a pain. Traveling anywhere requires a mountain of crap. Spur of the moment trips to get ice cream etc are fewer and further between. He is enough older than the baby that they will never ever truly play together. He will eventually get used to the baby and love him. But your expectations of him playing with the baby are setting you up for frustration. Your older son is entitled to his feelings and the more you try to push him to like the baby the further away you will push him. Stop trying. Treat them both with love and let him adjust on his own.
I’m not sure exactly what you are expecting him to do with the baby? I don’t think you should make such a big deal about it. Spend one on one time with him, have your meals all together, do family activities but don’t expect him to cater to the baby. He just doesn’t have any interest. It will get easier for him when the baby gets bigger and they actually can talk and maybe do SOME things together but frankly, 7 years is a big age difference. As long as he isn’t saying mean things to him or physically abusive, I would just let it be. JMO. Good luck.
I agree with Sherry and Osohapi. There just isn’t anything interesting about a baby to anyone except the parents and grandparents! Your 7 year old can’t go anywhere without a fussy baby who needs a nap and a suitcase full of gear, he has to be quiet when the baby is sleeping, and helping with a diaper gets old after the first 3 times. He can’t get “closer” to someone who doesn’t do anything! I adored my own baby but I certainly didn’t expect his 2 older stepsisters to care that much about him. In another 6 months your baby will be walking, and your 7 year old will be expected to keep his toys out of the baby’s mouth, the basement door closed, and the scissors out of reach. This is not fun, and there’s no point in expecting it to be. You can ask your older one to read and cuddle, sure, but what does he get in return? Nothing. The baby doesn’t really “adore” the older child - he’s entertained maybe if your older one makes faces or jiggles a toy, but he’s an infant and he doesn’t have the emotions of an older child yet. So it’s important not to ascribe significance to smiles that are nothing more than superficial entertainment. I don’t doubt that someday your baby WILL adore the older brother, but he’s not there yet.
So I’d say to get a sitter every 2 weeks for some big-kid time, and trade that off for a tiny bit of help and the start of some role-modeling. I’d give your older one a choice - he can entertain the baby while you get dinner and then you’ll have more time to do X or Y with him, or he can take out the trash or so something else helpful. But the 7 year old didn’t ask for this baby, and while he doesn’t get a vote on it, he shouldn’t see the baby as the cause of his new chores. I do think it’s fine to say that your older one can choose the movie or go for a bike ride because the baby doesn’t get to do that yet or enjoy it because he’s too young, so isn’t it special to be so much older and have more privileges. But everyone has family responsibilities (you and Dad anyway), and baby has restrictions, and the 7 year old has some of each. It’s okay to require him to be a responsible family member with some chores, but you can’t make him love anyone.
He doesn’t know why he does this - he’s not there yet emotionally to understand any of this. And he certainly doesn’t understand what you expect of him in terms of love, devotion and interest in a crying, peeing, pooping creature! Try to cut him some slack, understand that he is only 7, and do what you are doing about drawing the line at anything mean or abusive or dangerous. That’s all you can do. One day, when you aren’t looking, your toddler will laugh like crazy at his big brother, and you’ll be happy you let it all develop naturally.
I think you’ve already done too much. Let it go and let him be 7. He doesn’t need to pay attention to his little brother. He just needs to be a good 7 year old.
I’ve never understood why people suggest you involve older siblings by having them fetch diapers or throw them away or bring you the baby’s bottle. That just turns baby into even more of a burden.
I always feel bad for older siblings when baby is first born and every relative and friend who visits asks them about the baby and how they like having a baby or being a big brother/sister. Enough already! We get it. Life before baby is over! Don’t rub it in their face!
Let him just be him. He doesn’t need to just be a big brother. He can have his own interests and be his own person without his little brother. Forcing a relationship the way you’ve been trying to is just telling your oldest that he doesn’t matter … except as a big brother.
As his brother gets older he will have periods of time when he adores his little brother. But that needs to happen naturally. It’s not something you can force.
Just let him be, and he will be interested sooner than you think.
Stop trying to make “him” focus on the baby too. To me it’s sort of like rubbing his face in it that the baby gets special attention. Like showing him that the baby is more important. I know that’s not what you’re meaning to do but that might be what he’s feeling.
Don’t ask him to help with the baby, don’t ask him to play with the baby, don’t try to get him to stop what he’s doing to give up his time for the baby. He needs to come to his own terms with that. You just get dad to spend time with the baby and you and the older guy go do stuff then let dad do stuff with him too.
WTH, he’s a seven year old kid, he should be running around, playing with friends, going to school, etc. it’s YOUR job to take care of the baby, your son has no interest in that (BECAUSE HE IS A CHILD) so maybe you need some parenting classes or something?
You are trying to force a relationship - and that NEVER turns out well.
There’s 7 yrs difference in ages - they may never be close.
They will always be a vastly different development stages.
Your 7 yr old didn’t have a baby - you did - so quit expecting your oldest to parent his younger sibling.
Also - attention stealing little bundles of joy can really shake up the older siblings world - you’ve replaced him - AND you’ve openly told him you’ll abandon him for the baby (telling him you were going to treat him like he treats the baby was just cruel) - it’s no wonder the older is having issues.
ALL YOUR KIDS need unconditional love from you.
And you SHOULD try for some one on one time with each child as much as you can.
Your oldest doesn’t have to love the baby - they may never even like each other - but he should be about as polite as he’d be to any stranger.
They can’t be allowed to hurt each other.
You are hyper focused on the baby right now - but your oldest is still your baby too.
He feels a bit like an orphan - try to cut him some slack - and don’t force the baby on him.
I agree with the moms below.
By talking to him during your pregnancy, trying to help him to adjust to the new change, I think you just focused too much on the baby. I didn’t talk about the baby coming when I was pregnant with mine - I focused on my free time with the kids I already had. I get that you wanted to prepare him where he’d been the only one for so long, but I think you over did it.
Again, I think you’ve overdone it with all this liking the baby, being nice to baby, helping me out with baby …
My older kids had zero interest in my babies. The babies in our house were placed in their bouncy chairs near the older kids, they were not the center of attention. My kids were.
My kids would pass me a diaper if I was struggling with a squirmy baby and they were right there but help me with the baby? Nope. Even now, I have to pay them to babysit as a job.
So drop all this be nice to baby stuff. You let him go off and be the 7 year old boy he wants to be. You let someone else care for your baby once in a while and do the one on one as you say you do. Do it more. But mostly just stop any talk of the baby for now. Just drop it all together. See if in 2 weeks he’s not better. I’m sure he will be.
Good luck 
My kids are 5.5 years apart, so I know a little of what you are going through. It has only been 6 months. You need to give it time. In a couple years your son will barely remember when his little brother was not around. He may never be interested in playing the kinds of things his little brother wants to play, but once the little guy is running around they may start to have more fun together. My oldest would push my youngest around on a toy car we had. They would make up chase and hide games together. They would like to have dance offs where she would copy everything her big brother did. They are 11 and 5 now and yes, my son (the oldest kid) easily gets annoyed with his little sister. But they do have times where they are really enjoying each other or he tells me she is so cute or so funny. Even after 3 and 4 years of having his little sister around he would tell me he liked it better before she was born and he got all the attention. But other times he would get quiet and say he loves his sister and can not imagine life without her. So…it depends on his mood. Kids are very self centered. I think you should focus on giving your oldest special mom-son time once a week. Tell him he is so special to you and you know it has been hard for him to have to share his mom with a new baby. Once a week plan a mom-son date and the two of you go off and do something together. He needs to know you love him. You are not a failure. This is something that is hard for him and will take time. Siblings may or may not be close…don’t worry about that…just make sure he treats his little brother with respect. (Wait till little brother can crawl/walk and is getting into his stuff…this is another hard phase! My son would get pissed!)
I don’t see anything wrong with saying “well Sam, I’m going to treat you the way you treat your little brother, I want you to know what it feels like”. I’d do this from breakfast to lunch one day and then have a very “adult” sit down talk with him. Talk about feelings and how all of us have feelings, even babies. “It hurts my feelings that you are not acting nicely toward your brother.” Have him spend a little time with your little guy (when he’s in a good/playful mood) and point out how much the little one loves playing with the big one. “Do you see how much your little brother loves you?” Lastly, I believe your very intelligent young man is manipulating the situation and basically throwing a long term fit. “Your little brother is here to stay, GET OVER IT.”
Good Luck
Exactly what use does a 7 year old have for a baby? You really need to ask yourself that. When you were 7 did you think oh my god I wish I had a baby to cuddle with? To listen to them scream? Play with baby toys? I mean come on, be honest, your friends were a lot more fun.
Also the six month old adores his brother? Come on!
Stop making this some grand fairy tail that isn’t working out and see it for what it is. Age wise they will not be friends for a very long time. That is no failing on the part of your older son. I just can’t imagine how I would feel at 7 if my mom thought something was wrong with me because I can’t find a use for a baby. Pretty sure it would hurt a lot.
I just want to point out as well, as a mother of 27 and 16 year old boys and 25 and 14 year old girls, they are just now hanging out with their younger counterparts!! They are finally developing the fun relationship I took two minutes to figure out wasn’t going to happen when they were little. If I had taken your approach I am pretty sure the older two would have moved across the country and lost their phones by now.
I don’t see why you expect a 7 year old to have any interest at all in a baby. They are loud, often smelly, messy and pretty boring to interact with. The baby has no clue it is being ignored and certainly not spoken about occasionally. Are you wearing the baby? If you do, you should be able to play with the 7 year old without too much interruption. What is it you want all four of you to do together? Babies seriously don’t do terribly much - certainly not terribly much that requires 3 spectators.
sweetie, i understand your concern and hope you take this the right way. i think you may just be over-interfering with your little fellow’s feelings. it sounds as if you went over the deep end ‘preparing’ him (not surprising, many of us do that) and now you’re hyper-focused on his aversion.
it’s hard, i know. but try to just let him be. acknowledge his feelings, but stop trying to make him feel one way or the other. it wouldn’t work for you. it won’t work for him.
let him ignore the baby. don’t force him to interact. i myself would probably frown and say something like ‘i don’t want to hear that. if you’re going to say nasty things, do it out of my earshot’ when he says mean things.
and he’s only saying the mean things to get a reaction from you. so ignoring them is probably even better.
i seriously doubt he needs professional help. he just needs some space to feel how he’s feeling without judgment. if you can just back off managing his emotions for a while, i’m betting that he’ll start to come to you, hesitantly at first, maybe, to share with you. and when he does, resist the impulse to fix ANYTHING.
‘the baby’s too noisy? i hear ya. babies can’t communicate any other way, but sometimes that caterwauling is enough to make you nuts, isn’t it?’
‘babies can seem stupid. they just haven’t been around as long as big boys and need time to grow up and figure it all out, like you.’
‘hoo, brother! babies do stink! i think this one stinks even worse than you did, and that’s sayin’ something!’
‘if you hate him right now, honey, go do something else. you sound fed up. tell you what, once i get him bathed, we’ll get the stroller out and you can get your bike and we’ll go see what’s happening in the neighborhood.’
if you can find a happy medium between ignoring his feelings and seizing on them, you’ll help him navigate his way through his very normal 7 year old reactions.
khairete
suz
My son was 8 when my daughter was born, he just turned 9 and she is 8 months today. My daughter adores her brother,. We have had a very postive transition in our household at the beginning. Now it is starting to get slightly tougher as my daughter needs more attention. I would give it some more time, everyone is still adjusting, I know we are. Having two kids after having one for only 8 years is difficult on all, the 7 year old maybe feeling the strain of everything. We have really focused on making sure my 9 year old still is involved int he same activities and such obviously with some adjustment but also just having family time where we do not have too much scheduled. This is hard but having time for the kids to interact naturally is nice. Getting your 7 year old involved in positive interactions with the baby is also something that has worked. We started before my daughter was born making decisions and prepping for the baby as a family unit. Maybe changing things and approaching activities with the baby as family unit, having the 7 year old help make decisions in an activity to do with the baby or what type of outfit for the day. I do not think you need outside help but you can always speak with your 7 year old’s doctor or maybe the phsycologist at school can help out if you do have concerns.
From personal experience, this is way too big of an age gap for the 7 year to be interested in or have the patience to learn about baby things.
I recommend you organize as many playdates as possible for him, both in and out of the home and if at the park, great, you tag along with the stroller.
I do think you were onto something about telling him you’re going to treat him as he treats the baby…that clearly hit home. He’s totally old enough to rationalize and I would have used a less direct approach, as in 'How would you feel if I treated you the same way?" And you can still or continue to ask that question when you witness inappropriate or rude behavior towards the baby. He’ll start to hopefully see his behavior for what it is and stop being disgruntled.
Honestly, babies aren’t interactive enough for a busy 7 yo boy. Keep him busy with age appropriate friends and activities.
My son, who is 11, has always been squeamish around babies. He finds them annoying, but will tolerate them when we have company over that have little ones. He doesn’t interact with them at all. He also gets extremely jealous when I hold them and talk with them. I know being an only child, he loves having all the attention. I can imagine if we had had a baby around the age of 8, my son would have had a hard time adjusting too.
With that being said, I would allow him space to find his own relationship with his brother. These things cannot be forced. If they are, resentment takes its toll, and also behaviors that are not warranted.
Instead, allow them time. Putting so much pressure can be suffocating.
Please don’t force the baby on your son, or you risk making it a battle ground and something that can turn into deep resentment. He will come around in time, but be sure that you’re doing everything you can to make your older son feel secure in his relationship wtih you. Once the baby is able to be more interactive he might find him more interesting.
“We did everything we could during the pregnancy to prepare/excite him.”
“We’ve tried all we can to get him closer to his brother…”
“Asked him to help…”
You might be trying too hard. You’ve been highlighting the baby since before he was born, and you’re still trying to force the issue on your 7-year-old.
Try backing off and letting him come to his own conclusions in his own time. It is quite an age gap and they are not peers. They might become close during childhood, or maybe not until adulthood, or they might not ever bond. You need to be okay with that.
Babies find everyone interesting. He doesn’t adore his brother any more than he would adore anyone else that was around all the time. His feelings are not going to be hurt at this stage if his brother blows him off.
This is not a failure on your part, nor does it mean something is wrong with your older child. You have a vision of what you wish your family was like that may never happen. You’re focusing on that instead of on what you son really needs from you. Mourn the loss of your wish, make peace, and let it go.
I would tell him that he doesn’t need to adore his baby bro, but he needs to treat all the family members with the same respect he’d want for himself.
I’d also talk to him about how he’s feeling - even though my SD was much older, I know there were resentments toward DD when DD was very little. We worked hard to make things as normal as possible for SD (like not missing her plays) but we also had to understand that the baby crying all night was hard on her, too. I think that it was important to be able to hear SD when she had a legit complaint even if it didn’t change things. I think she needed us to say,“Yes, it’s hard on us, too, and I’m sorry that it’s not something I can change right now. I appreciate your patience while DD learns x and y.” Similarly, as DD grew, we taught her respect for SD’s things. When DD got into SD’s makeup as a toddler, I replaced it all and DD knew we were VERY unhappy. SD got a baby lock on her door handle after that. SD needed to know we cared about her still.
I would accept ignoring the baby if your son is not otherwise mean IF it’s not malicious. Like if the baby comes to him and tries to engage him and the older boy walks off - that is mean. I would allow your son, especially if he’s highly sensitive, to determine when he’s up for being crawled over and drooled on, and when he just wants his own space. Forced family time rarely goes well. Everyone needs to realize that 7 years is a good age gap and the boys will not be at the same stage or level for a very long time. Accept their differences and try to do things both individually and as a group. When we went to the lake, I made sure to take DD to a toddler event and DH took the older kids rafting, but we all visited a waterfall together.
And if you notice that little bro is happy to see big bro, you might quietly say, “Aw, you made him smile.” Big bro might still come around as little bro gets more interactive. Tiny babies are harder to relate to and many fathers struggle with babies that young.