Big Sister, Baby Brother

I am not the best person to help my daughter through her ongoing transition from being the baby in the family to being a big sister.

As her mother, I’m always reminding her that she has to be gentle with her baby brother, that he’s just too little right now to understand that it isn’t nice to hit someone over the head with a plastic sieve beach toy during a co-bath, so she has to cut him some slack. But as the youngest of two children, I’ve never been in Lucy’s shoes, and I kind of feel like a hypocrite when I defend the boy.

I know I did plenty of things to annoy my big brother, and he just had to sit there and take it. I remember doing things to bait him so I could then holler, “Mom!” to get him in trouble when she came to my rescue. In fact, I kind of remember smiling about it. Of course, if I can remember a situation like that, then it took place when we were older than Lucy and Isaac are right now, so I am right to feel guilty about it in hindsight.

Lucy, who is 3, is actually very good with and quite tolerant with her brother – Isaac can actually get away with whacking her over the head with the beach toy for the moment. I think she finds it pretty funny, probably because at nearly 11 months old, his little arms don’t pack much punch.

Nevertheless, I’m trying to teach him to be nice, telling him no, shaking my head and reminding him he’s not being nice while I gently pry the plastic tool from his hand. Isaac doesn’t seem to get it yet – he usually laughs and keeps whacking away at Lucy, or pulling my hair, or whatever rapscallion behavior he’s engaging in that I’m trying to curb.

This is going to wear thin on all of us, eventually. For Lucy, it will probably happen any day now, as soon as Isaac masters the art of crawling and is suddenly able to get into her things and make a mess of them. Maybe his pokiness at crawling will buy me just a bit more time to figure out how to make a 3-year-old understand that her brother is on a steep learning curve and we all have to practice some patience with him.

For now, I’m hoping that his baby status, along with his baby blue eyes, hold onto their power to charm us all. If not, on this matter, Lucy is going to have to start consulting her father, who as a big brother will at least be able to commiserate.