Why Your Child May Struggle with a New Baby Sibling
Why do children struggle when the family welcomes a new sibling into the home? Most people chalk it up to jealousy, but there’s actually more to it. While every child is different, here are a few reasons that some children may struggle with a new baby in the home.
There wasn’t just the addition of something new (baby), but a lot of other changes that accompanied the new baby.
Children often struggle with change. Actually, a large percentage of humans do not love change. Change can be scary, unpredictable, and leave us vulnerable and unprotected. Even “good change” can throw us off. Being vigilant and responsive to changes around us is actually a survival mechanism. Change can mean danger, so our stress response system promptly alerts us and readies our bodies to respond with the goal of survival. Think about how humans survived when they primarily lived outside among predators. A change in their environment, such as a new animal foot print, new animal feces, a new noise, smell, etc, could potentially mean that a threat was nearby; being vigilant of these changes and responding to them was a matter of survival. We still carry some of these survival instincts within us today, even though our environment is much different.
With a new baby, it isn’t just the baby’s presence that is novel. Think about all of the things you do to prepare for a new baby: painting a bedroom, buying new furniture, going to doctor’s appointments, buying clothes, setting up your nursing cart, etc. Many times, we make the mistake of thinking children aren’t aware of these things, especially young children, but children are actually very perceptive of even small things changing in their home environment. Because we may think that they don’t notice, we may forget to talk to them about what’s going on, and so they are left to observe these changes, and make sense of them on their own.
2) Your child may not understand what the change in dynamic means for them and their place in the family.
Your child may be used to being the only child in their home, or, if you are welcoming your 3rd, 4th, etc, child into the home, they still are used to how things are now, and not quite sure of how things are going to be. Does a new baby mean less special time with mom , dad, other caregivers? Does it mean I have to share my toys? Does it mean I have to move into a new room? Is there enough room for me AND a baby? As stated previously, if we do not talk to our children about the changes to come, and provide them with reassurance of their place in our hearts, and validate the feelings they are having, they are left to make sense of all of this on their own.
3) Your child may be experiencing a lot of big feelings, but is still too young to make sense of what they are feeling on their own.
Some parents may say, “Hey! You were so excited for a baby sister, and now you’re hitting her! That makes no sense!” The thing is, change often brings a mixture of feelings for not only children, but all of us. Think about it.: You are starting a new job, a job you worked really hard to get. Do you only feel one, single feeling about this new job? Not likely! You may feel excited, nervous, anxious, motivated, etc. So it’s perfectly normal for your child to be excited, and also feel scared, stressed, happy, jealous, sad, etc. Young children cannot self-regulate completely on their own; they depend on co-regulation (calming with) from us, especially when there is a big change happening, a mixture of feelings, and uncertainty.
4) New babies add new sensory stimulation to the environment, which can be overwhelming for some children.
If you’re a parent, you know that babies can overwhelm our senses in more ways than one. The first thing we think about is the crying, but there’s also the spit up on our clothes, the smelly diapers, the massive amount of laundry they produce, and more. Some children are more sensitive to this increased stimulation than others. We often become comfortable with the noises that occur inside of and around our home and we learn to tune them out. You may not notice the traffic outside or the sound of the neighbor’s sprinkles coming on much anymore, but the sounds and stimulation in your home suddenly change when you welcome a new baby. As adults, we can make sense of this and do things to regulate ourselves, but young children may feel overstimulated and not know how to express this or regulate themselves, and so they need our support in doing so. If you notice your child having a particularly hard time when your new baby is crying, overstimulation from noise/auditory input may be the culprit. It’s important to know that this may not be the only culprit, though. When the baby is crying, they are also getting connection from you, which your older children may also be struggling with.
5) Parents experience an increase in stress themselves, or tension in their partner dynamics, which may be felt by the child.
Welcoming a new baby isn’t just a big change for your little one(s), it’s a huge change for you too. As stated previously, change can put our stress response system on alert, and we may experience decreased frustration tolerance, overwhelm, fear, etc, in addition to all of the hormones and other things that come along with pregnancy. Our little ones are built to pick up on our stress; this is another survival mechanism at play. Your little one can feel some of your stress because you are their source of safety. If their source of safety is stressed and/or signaling that danger may be near, then they certainly need to be on alert too! Now, I am not saying that this means you need to freak out about your stress (hello, that’s just more stress), but it can be helpful to turn inward if your little one is having a hard time with a transition and ask yourself, “How am I doing?” Change and increased stress may also add tension to the dynamic with your partner. Just like you and your partner needed to adjust and find your groove when you welcomed your first child, you will need to adjust and find a new groove with this child.
So, now that you are aware of the potential reasons why your child may struggle with a new sibling, what do you do? There are a variety of tools you can use both before your new baby arrives, and after, that will set your older child(ren) up for success, lay the foundation for a strong sibling bond, and help you and your partner navigate this transition. Find these tools in my Sibling Guide and take the guesswork and stress out of the process of welcoming a new baby into your home.
