Twin Troubles

I have 18-month-old twin girls. The first year was easy with them, but now I have another challenge on my hands. The problem is that the one twin is constantly biting the other one's fingers when they play. She will put her sister's fingers in her mouth and then bite down very hard.

The one that gets bitten is very sensitive, gets upset very easily and takes some time to calm down. The one that does the biting is an angel and if she cries, you know that something is wrong. But she is bullying her sister. She also takes toys from her sister, pushes her down or knocks her over.

Let's call the quiet one who does the pushing, pulling and bullying, Angel. She is also the one who takes a while to tell you that something is wrong. Betty, the twin that gets bitten, is the sensitive one who easily gets activated, and once on the go, struggles to settle down.

It is quite normal for siblings to push, pull, squabble, grab and so forth. At the age of 18 months, they do not yet know how strong they can be and still try to figure out how hard to pull to get that toy, or how hard to push to get the other one out of the way. At this stage, it's all about them and sharing is a very abstract concept for them. Most of the time, the competition between siblings is quite harmless, as they really 'rough it' to get what they want immediately.

They have not yet mastered the skill of standing back and offering the other concrete gratification. They are still figuring out how to maintain posture and composure in space, and what they have to do to get more of the good and pleasurable stuff in life.

But when you observe your children and sense that what is happening is beyond normal squabbling, one must act immediately to nip the bad habits in the bud. Children of this age are not usually intentionally rude to others. If some biting with a mission happens, one has to investigate why Angel's antagonistic feelings towards Betty are mounting.

Betty is the one who gets upset easily, it means that she takes up a lot of your time. As she take a long time to calm down and it is possible that Angel could feel that she is not getting the same attention as Betty. Remember that the child who so obviously expresses 'bad behavior' is the one that should not be silenced. The message that the 'acting out' child is conveying is so clear to see. It seems that Angel does not cry as often as Betty does, and that she in fact the one in the background observing you comforting Betty, yet again.

What can you do to improve the situation? First of all, give more attention to Angel, not only when she has already entered the stage where she is behaving badly. Give her more attention when she is playing on her own, being 'quiet'.

This will satisfy her need for attention, as she will sense that there is focus on her when she is behaving well. When Betty gets upset and demands immediate attention, pick Angel up and take her to 'the positive place' where you just talk to her for a while in a kind voice. The cycle we want to break is Betty always receiving immediate attention, to the detriment of her sister.