"That's MY spot!"

[witch's mom]

My DDs are 10 and 7. In the last two weeks, they've had at least 10 arguments--huge, shouting, door-slamming arguments--about who sits in one coveted spot at the two-seater kitchen table. Last time things escalated to such a point, I told them that if it happened again, I'd have to remove the "spot" that was causing so much trouble and creating this situation that they seemed unable to work out. These girls are old enough to negotiate with each other, to work things out, when they want to. But when they get into these power struggles, there's no solution. And if I get too involved, like helping them negotiate, they each try and get me to take sides and things get worse. (I've been lurking on the "Working It Out on Their Own" thread.)

This morning, another fight broke out about the "spot." I gave them a verbal reminder to work it out, but they were unable to. Big DD had her book there and was all set to sit there and eat her breakfast; then, while she was at the toaster buttering her toast, little DD came downstairs and slipped into the chair. (I don't think little DD knew big DD planned to sit there.) Big DD said, hey, I was sitting there, little DD refused to move and from that point forward, it escalated into them screaming at each other about "you always want your own way!" Classic power struggle. I stayed out of until I'd had it with the screaming. At that point, I instructed little DD to get out of the chair.

Then I quietly removed the two chairs from the kitchen table. There is no more spot.

My older DD accepts this, and has approached her sister to solve the problem so the chairs can come back. Younger DD, however, is having none of this. She views the whole situation as huge unfairness against her. She lives in a constant state of resentment about potential unfairness, and tends to view any situation that does not obviously favor her as unfair to her.

Any ideas for how to handle this? Should we just go chair-less?

[ComfyCozy]

When did you kidnap our daughters? No advice here...we've had this going on for at least a year. Now our ds's fight over a spot at the table. hehe And the baby doesn't want her spot.

[sapphire_chan]

There are 2 chairs and they're fighting over them? :

7 is right about the age to have that view of unfairness. Since things just happened this morning, I'd give her a few days to chill, and I'd tell oldest dd to do the same. "I need a break from all this."

[gsmommy]

don't know if this will help but it worked like a charm when my sister and I were little. We used to fight over who sat in the front seat, so my mom solved it like this. On even days of the month, my sister sat in the front and on odd days, I did. My sister's bday is on the 6th and mine the 17th, this is how we determined who got even and odd. There was never any fighting because you didn't really have a case.

It might be worth trying. I remember doing this for a loooong time, probably even years. hope it helps!

[HappyAgain]

Oh my kid's tried this a few times too.

My answer; We don't have "spots" at our house. Who ever is sitting there, it is their "spot". "I don't want to hear about it". And I think taking away the spots is a great idea.

[mamaduck]

I think that however you choose to solve it at this point is fine. If you choose to leave the two chairs put away, that is fine. They can cope. If you would rather, you could assign seats at the table. Or you could do the odd/even day thing. But I really think that at this point, with all the drama, it is legitimate for you to step in and solve the problem for them. They have had plenty of chances to solve it themselves, and you need a break from the fighting.

[maya44]

I assume putting the chairs away means nobody is sitting? If so that is obviouly not going to work. I would defintiely make a rule to keep my sanity. The odd/even rule is one we have used. It's fair and easy to administer (no "remembering" whose turn it is)

And I have to add that when I did impose that rule, very very quickly (like within a week or two) they stopped caring about the "spot" (in our case it was a spot on the bed.)

What I always made of this was that it was more about the "fight" then the "spot" and as soon as I took away "the fight" they stopped caring.

I do remember growing up my brother and i switched places every night for a favorite chair though and this lasted prettty much our who lives, so who knows.