Preparing Older Sibling For Baby’s Arrival

We have been most blessed that none of the children have had exhibited great animosity against the new baby. Many friends & couples with bb #2 on the way, have asked us how we did it. Especially since we do not have extra help in the house & I am alone in the house with the children most of the time. So I thought it would be good to put it down in writing to be as clear as possible.While the other points are in no particular order, Point #1 is the most important :

#1 – Pray! We start to pray almost immediately for good sibling relationship. That the older sibling/s will take well to the baby & the baby will also take to the older sibling/s. God has given this blessing to us as a reward. Surely He will not want the family to be torn apart because of sibing rivalry! So when we pray for sibling closeness & acceptance, we can be sure that we are praying according to His will.

#2 – Refer to baby by name if possible. This especially so if you had been calling the older one “baby”. Then he feels that not only has his position as been usurped, even his name has been taken over!

#3 – Start disciplining now. Whatever issues that are bothering you about his behaviour – deal with it now. Do not wait & do not hope that it will go away when the baby comes. It will not & it can only get worse. 

If you only discipline when the baby comes along, you will find that he starts thinking along the lines of “It is all because of the baby that I am being disciplined.” You are not sowing seeds of closeness but resentment.

#4 – Change whatever you want/need to change before baby arrives. Eg. sleeping or room arrangements, getting a maid, putting him in childcare/school (*). Again, the principle is to not have issues that cause the older one to assume that all these changes are targetted to getting him out of the way coz of the baby.

#5 - Tell him in a matter-of-fact tone that babies need to feed alot & they will cry a lot too coz they can’t talk. Explain to them that crying is the only way the baby can communicate with us. This way, they won’t feel so puzzled or worried that the baby is either feeding, crying or sleeping.

#6 – Start getting him to be more independent. And no guilt trips please! You are not depriving him of his childhood just coz he feeds himself or dresses himself! Stop babying him & he will stop behaving like a baby & be the toddler/child that he already is.

#7 – Start staying home more. If you have been bringing him out daily or very regularly, you should start cutting back these trips in the last trimester, esp in the last month of your pregnancy. Unless you are able to continue this pace after the pregnancy, of course. Otherwise, the older child will face disappointment that he can’t go out anymore because of baby!

#8 – Plan ahead! If you are going at it alone, then you need a plan! Be it for food or day-to-day activities, you need a plan to help you feel organised & not overwhelmed. You need not follow your plan like a robot. But on days where you feel you can’t function (because of sleep deprivation!), the plan will tell you what to do & you won’t even have to activate your brain cells! Ditch the plan & do something fun & spontaneous when you are feeling more up to it!

#9 – Prepare the older one for delivery. Unless you are having a scheduled c-section, only God knows when the baby is coming out. So prepare him in advance what will happen when it is time for baby to come out.

Talk him through it in simple terms. Eg. When it is time for baby to come out, Ah Kong & Ah Ma will come & look after you. Then when the baby is out, you can come & visit baby & me in the hospital. No need any other details to confuse him.

#10 – At the hospital : Do not push the baby aside just coz he is there. I always make it a point to carry baby in my arms while welcoming the older child/ren. If I am nursing baby at that time, better still coz then I can tell him that the baby needs to take a lot of milk from mama to grow big & strong. It is nice to get the older one/s to see that baby needs mama from the beginning.

#11 – At home : go back to your normal routine immediately, unless you have a medical condition that does not allow you to. Eg. If you were the one who had always bathed him, then quickly go back to that routine. He misses you & he is adjusting to many changes. At the very least, keep his feeding, washing up & sleeping routine fixed – something he knows for sure is still the same.

#12 – Do spend time with the older child. But do not try to re-create the “old times” for him. For one, the “old times” can never happen again. The faster everyone agrees to that, the faster the child will adjust. Secondly, when you try to re-create the “old times” you make the older child miss it even more! And he starts wishing for the “old times”. And guess who’s reponsible for the “old times’ being gone? The baby! How do you think he feels towards the baby, now? Not a good feeling, right?

#13 - Related to the point above is refraining from either asking him “Are you jealous/angry that baby is here?” or saying in front of him “He’s having a hard time adjusting to the baby.”

Any questions/comments along these lines are not helpful at all. And if anyone should ask him these questions, make it a point to refute them infront of him. Focus on his positive points instead. Eg. “Oh no! He’s doing great! He’s a very helpful brother!”

#13 – Get him involved. Praise him when he helps you get the baby’s diapers or clothes or when he entertains the baby. I find that the older ones start feeling a closer affinity to the baby when I look for opportunities to say things things like “Oh look! The baby seems to be smiling at you!’ or “The baby is looking at what you are doing!”.

Before I end, I just want to address the (*) I put next to putting the older one in childcare when the baby is due.

I personally disagree with this option because firstly I am a SAHM, I do not see why I should put my children in an institution since I am home all the time. Going from the warmth of the home to an instiution is often very scary for the child, no matter how much you prepare him. The younger the child (4 & below), the more terrified he is of being left alone especially since he has spent his entire childhood thus far, with you only.

Secondly, I feel that it only delays whatever reaction the older one has against the baby. Whatever issues he may have towards the baby does not go away just because you removed him from it. It will re-surface later on. I’d rather deal with it as quickly as possible.

Thirdly, the child who goes to childcare brings home many germs & often passes it on to the newborn baby whose immune system is not fully functioning – breastfed or not.

And so this is how we have handled the addition of more & more children to the family. I hope this has blessed you & I have provided an alternative view on how to handle it instead of resigning yourself to sibling rivalry as a guaranteed outcome.