Stop a Bad Habit from Becoming a Problem

Lately I’ve noticed that my two older children have been picking on their younger sibling relentlessly. At their ages, the couple of years that separate her from the tweens seems to be a wide gap. She doesn’t get their jokes, or understand their math homework. Her tales of drama and woe from elementary school aren’t nearly as fascinating as the Junior High scene.

And they don’t let her forget it, either.

What started out a few months ago as light-hearted razzing has all but turned into a form of tag team bullying. Once they start picking on her, they can’t seem to stop. Every chance they can find, they are certain to get another dig in.

She hasn’t complained. Why would she? This is the only experience she has known, and to her, this is just what it’s like to be the youngest child.

But I notice. It bothers me.

Mama Bear comes out

I took each of my older kids aside this week to have a brief discussion on the way they are treating her. Naturally they responded by protesting that they are just kidding. It’s difficult for kids to know where to draw the line between light-hearted ribbing and accidentally damaging someone’s self-esteem through incessant bullying.

When I pointed out the behavior and asked them to start paying attention to how often they are zinging snide comments her way, they both realized that this pattern is simply a bad habit. It is not a reflection of how they feel about their baby sister – and their intention was never to hurt her feelings.

I’m actually relieved to know this is just a bad habit. The way I see it, a habit is relatively easy to break, once you’re aware of it. This situation could be much worse if the older siblings genuinely disliked the younger one. Yikes!

In the movie, “Parental Guidance”, the character of a young child says to his older sibling, “Hey, that was a put down! You owe me three put ups!” How synchronicitous that we opted to go see this movie together at the cheap theater over the weekend and it reinforced to my children that a bad habit, such as picking on each other, can be changed by bringing awareness to it.

Bring Awareness to Bad Habits

As I contemplate this period of time in the evolution of our little family, I’m grateful that my children are genuinely kind, compassionate, sensitive and loving souls. I also think about how often all of us find ourselves in patterns that become habits which are not accurate reflections of who we really are and how we really feel.

• Do you recognize times in your life when you have accidentally slipped into a less-than-desirable habit?
• Once you became aware of it, how did you stop the bad habit from becoming a problem?

I look forward to a discussion on overcoming bad habits. Leave a comment below!  

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