When your kid does not like her best friend's brother...

[cuttiebearmom]

DD1 has a best friend that she has played with since she was about 7 mo. Her mother and I are very good friends and used to be neighbors. She also has a son who is younger.

DD1 is 5 and 1/2 and the younger brother of her best friend is just 3. They are like oil and water. She is pretty timid sometimes, he is all heart and soul all the time. He is very physical while she is very hands off usually.

DD1 loves her best friend and playing with her but recently we have had issues including or not including the younger brother in the playing. Half the time the four kids play by themselves with no issues. My DD2 usually will include the younger brother because they are closer in age but often will prefer to play with the bigger girls and they have no issues with this.

So, today DD1 says to everyone while we are playing that she does not like the younger brother. We've discussed the differences in age and ways of playing a lot and thought that she had accepted a lot of it but I guess not. I explained to DD1 that the younger brother was feeling hurt by what she said but I'm not sure that it really registered....we are all usually very easy going and these types of situations don't really come up.

What would you think is the appropriate response to something like this and any suggestions on ways to make the situation easier for everyone. The younger brother is really a sweet boy, he just wants to be included, but at the same time he has a harder time playing the ways that the girls want to be playing often.

It does not help that apparently the best friend and her brother play better together when my girls aren't there. Makes me feel great

Any thoughts? Thanks mamas!

[LynnS6]

I think that the older girls deserve a playdate, just the two of them, some of the time. Maybe you could 'swap' kids for a couple of hours. So, send your younger dd over to play with the younger child and the older one can come to your house and play with your dd.

When ds has a playdate, I always make sure that he gets some time where his friend is 'all his', and dd has to bow out.

Other times you can have family get-togethers where the rules are that everyone gets to play, as long as they are being kind.

[cuttiebearmom]

That's a good suggestion, I don't know why I had looked at it like that! We are about an hour away from the friends so it's a bit hard but I think I will offer to take the littler ones to the playground or something for a while next time we get together. The bigger girls would love that I am sure.

We talked about it this morning and DD1 was a little more understanding that the little brother is still learning to play well with other kids and she, with maturity beyond her years, has said that she will try to help him a little more.

Thanks for the idea!