Hey, Jealousy

When people always warned me about jealousy between siblings, I assumed they meant on Faith's part. The day we brought James home, however, set the tone for the next year. She knew we were bringing a baby home and just wanted to hold it and see it and then she was done. There have been a handful of times that she's wanted to sit on my lap when I was holding him or wanted me to feed her food like I did for him, but for the most part she's been extremely generous with giving up her share of our time. She watches out for him, checks up on him, shares her toys, translates (uncannily) what he needs when all he talks is nonsense babble. As a big sister, Faith is awesome.


James, on the other hand, not so much the easygoing sibling. He is never willing to share the attention with Faith. When I hold her on my lap he will go to great and daredevil lengths to wedge himself between us. He'll climb up the backs of chairs just to launch himself over our heads and hopefully into my arms. He'll angrily squeal/whine (oh, that awful noise) when he sees me playing with Faith alone, or when I take something from him to give back to her. The worst of all, though, is the hair pulling. He knows that it's effective, so that is his favorite form of revenge on her. When we hear Faith yelp all of the sudden, we automatically shout for James to let go of his sister's hair.


The hair pulling in turn has resulted in Faith gritting her teeth and doing a awkward arm-swing maneuver that is her way of hitting without really hitting, I suppose. While I don't necessary support her reaction, I can certainly understand it. I feel bad for her most of the time. She never asked for a brother, and she got one anyway, one who dominates our time and attention, one who demands to be held constantly, and what does she get in return? Her hair pulled.
I guess the moral of the story is to keep one's hair in a ponytail as often as possible.