Making friends and twins
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I am feeling heart broken, I have 6 year old twin boys. One is very dominant and we did have them in separate schools in a bid to let them both be themselves. They both came out of school this year around Easter.
Submissive twin (st) finds making friends more difficult than dominant twin (dt).When they are together st joins in but will not join comply with the natural rules of play that kids fall into, he always wants to change things.....I guess that this maybe due to his brother always domineering him and he is therefore trying to assert himself in front of friends.
When at school, I was able to invite a friend for each and it seemed alright, but now dt at all home ed things makes friends and st is often ganged up upon.
St twin had a breakdown this evening and I feel desperate for him, he really only has one friend from school, who we usually see weekly, but due to various reasons we have not seen him for over a month....he feels dt takes all the friends and leaves him without. Dt thinks that st should just find other friends......would appreciate any thoughts experiences of twins/sibling, as I feel so desperate for him.
Submissive twin (st) finds making friends more difficult than dominant twin (dt).When they are together st joins in but will not join comply with the natural rules of play that kids fall into, he always wants to change things.....I guess that this maybe due to his brother always domineering him and he is therefore trying to assert himself in front of friends.
When at school, I was able to invite a friend for each and it seemed alright, but now dt at all home ed things makes friends and st is often ganged up upon.
St twin had a breakdown this evening and I feel desperate for him, he really only has one friend from school, who we usually see weekly, but due to various reasons we have not seen him for over a month....he feels dt takes all the friends and leaves him without. Dt thinks that st should just find other friends......would appreciate any thoughts experiences of twins/sibling, as I feel so desperate for him.
Meredith
"emmahowitt@..." <emmahowitt@...> wrote:
Some kids are like that as an element of personality - it might help you to step away from thinking of your kids in terms of dominance and submission. It sounds more like one is more outgoing and one is more of an introvert - but I know from personal experience that there's nothing submissive about being an introvert! We can be very strong willed, we're just not always the most socially facile.
If your more introverted guy likes to be in control of things, he may need your help to smooth things over in social situations so he can get some of what he wants without stepping on too many toes. He may also need your help asserting some control when it's just him and his brother. When the two of them are together, the extrovert may very well seem more dominant by dint of being more overtly expressive - but that doesn't mean the other doesn't have things he wants to express.
That totally sounds like complaints between an introvert and an extrovert! Because for an extrovert "just find other friends" is easy. But for an introvert, one lousy extrovert can ruin the whole party and he won't even get a chance to meet people.
It's really important to make sure your introvert gets enough time to play with his own friend(s). For an introvert, relationships happen over time.
You might want to do some reading on the subject of introverts and extroverts so you can start to explain the concepts to your kids. Ray was either 6 or 7 when we started talking about the difference between the two - he's a big time extrovert and my partner and I are both introverts. It surprised him to know that everyone else wasn't just like him. It could help your introvert to know his brother isn't deliberately stealing people away from him.
Do they have different interests? It might help the introvert to be in a club or something separate from his brother so he has time to meet people and get to know them.
---Meredith
>When they are together st joins in but will not join comply with the natural rules of play that kids fall into, he always wants to change things...***************
Some kids are like that as an element of personality - it might help you to step away from thinking of your kids in terms of dominance and submission. It sounds more like one is more outgoing and one is more of an introvert - but I know from personal experience that there's nothing submissive about being an introvert! We can be very strong willed, we're just not always the most socially facile.
If your more introverted guy likes to be in control of things, he may need your help to smooth things over in social situations so he can get some of what he wants without stepping on too many toes. He may also need your help asserting some control when it's just him and his brother. When the two of them are together, the extrovert may very well seem more dominant by dint of being more overtly expressive - but that doesn't mean the other doesn't have things he wants to express.
>>he feels dt takes all the friends and leaves him without. Dt thinks that st should just find other friends...**************
That totally sounds like complaints between an introvert and an extrovert! Because for an extrovert "just find other friends" is easy. But for an introvert, one lousy extrovert can ruin the whole party and he won't even get a chance to meet people.
It's really important to make sure your introvert gets enough time to play with his own friend(s). For an introvert, relationships happen over time.
You might want to do some reading on the subject of introverts and extroverts so you can start to explain the concepts to your kids. Ray was either 6 or 7 when we started talking about the difference between the two - he's a big time extrovert and my partner and I are both introverts. It surprised him to know that everyone else wasn't just like him. It could help your introvert to know his brother isn't deliberately stealing people away from him.
Do they have different interests? It might help the introvert to be in a club or something separate from his brother so he has time to meet people and get to know them.
---Meredith