My wife and I work largely opposite schedules. I’m typically home during the day, while she holds down the fort at night. On Saturdays we’re home together, and we sometimes find that, in each other’s absense, our parenting styles have drifted apart. I don’t mean drastically, just a bit.
For example. This past Saturday, we were all home. The kids were in the playroom, threatening each other’s lives over some toy. My wife was closest to the room, and I flashed her my “here we go again” look. Strangely enough, she didn’t go into the room. “You, ah, going to step in there, hon?” I asked. “Nope,” she said. “But they’re going to kill each other,” I said. “I let them work it out,” she said. “And no, I won’t let them actually kill each other.”
It irked me to let them argue and struggle, and I eventually succumbed and broke them up. “They aren’t going to learn if you don’t give them the opportunity to deal with each other effectively,” she said. “Someone was going to get hurt,” I said. “William doesn’t understand her and she can’t understand that…the whole thing would have escalated into violence.”
She disagreed. So, what’s the right call? What do you do? Intevene, or let them work it out?
The best thing would of course be to teach them to be nice to each other and not get into the situation to begin with. But that doesn’t always work. I’m more on your wife’s side and think you should let them work it out. At least until things get very nasty. Failure is an important tool in learning new things. Besides, how bad could it possibly get? You are both nearby and unless they are playing with knives they are unlikely to do real damage.
I always WANT to intervene regardless if we are at the playground or at home. But I force myself to stand by as long as possible. It’s very tough for me to do this but I think it’s better in the long run for my son.
Best of luck
AD
This is a tough one for me as well. My 2 are 21 months apart and at 5 and 3 have been playing together since my youngest started walking. I started out intervening at every moment – mainly because the little one always got hurt. But I have since learned that she tends to instigate some of the “abuse”. So, I have had to force myself to hold back, which is really hard, and let them figured out how to solve their own problems. I probably should have done this to begin with but it’s not my natural instinct!
Good luck!
Might I recommend a fantastic book called Siblings Without Rivalry? Not one to be the advice squad often, but it has some pretty good ideas for doing both – interceding and getting them to work it out themselves. William might be a little young for the ideas, but they’ll come in handy.