Having a Favoured Sibling
While parents generally claim that they love all their children equally and there is no favouritism – and this may be true – this is not always evident to their kids. Often, this is just the complaint of a disgruntled child who has been refused an unreasonable request or
a misbehaving child who is constantly being disciplined. However, sometimes there is some basis for the child’s belief that one sibling in the family receives favoured treatment. When this occurs, the other children believe this favoured sibling is more important to the parents, while they are unimportant, which underpins feelings of low Self Worth. There may also be
resentment towards the ‘favoured sibling’ and some degree of anger (repressed) towards the parents.
Talented sibling
One child in the family may be outstanding in a particular field of sport or the arts (such as singing, music or dance). This Talented Sibling generally gets the lion’s share of family resources (money, parental time, effort and involvement) in lessons, coaching, uniforms, equipment, transport to training and events, watching events, and travelling away to competitions or matches. The Less Talented children are likely to be seconded (as part of the family resources) to assist the parents in their efforts to promote and support the Talented Sibling. The Less Talented children are not necessarily untalented, but they risk being overlooked and not fulfilling their potential. The Less Talented may feel unimportant to their parents and resent (repressed anger) what they perceive to be favouritism shown to the Talented Sibling. If they have to help with the career of the Talented Sibling, they may feel that their acceptance by their parents is not unconditional but is conditional on them sacrificing their needs and aspirations for the Talented Sibling.
Chronically ill or disabled sibling
i) A chronically ill child may require constant care by Mum and a disabled child requires a lot of day-to-day assistance or going on outings and being transported in the family car. The Healthy Children may be expected to help out a lot around the home and also help with the Disabled Sibling. They will be expected to be more self sufficient in doing things for themselves from a young age. Treatments, medications, equipment and ongoing therapies are a serious drain on family finances so the Healthy Children may have to ‘do without’. The Healthy Children are likely to feel unimportant and resent this and resent their needs not being met. However, the Healthy Children can see for themselves that their sick or disabled sibling genuinely needs the extra attention. They realize that the parents’ allocation of attention is not their choice and does not reflect any feelings that the sick or disabled sibling is more important and more worthy of attention than the Healthy Children. Consequently,
the Healthy Children may feel ashamed for feeling resentment towards their parents and the sick or disabled sibling. Feeling shame or guilt does not get rid of any repressed anger, but simply creates an additional problem of inner conflicts.
ii) Often, a child who is sick as an infant and a young child actually ‘grows out’ of the condition and has the capacity to become more self sufficient. However, the child has become accustomed to being the centre of Mum’s attention and is not willing to relinquish the favoured position in the family. The mother is likely to be over protective out of fear of the condition
relapsing and is also unwilling to relinquish her role of ‘feeling needed’ (particularly if the ‘carer’ role was her source of validation as a child).
The Healthy Children can see what is happening and may regard the formerly sick child as being manipulative and attention seeking. This results in the Healthy Children feeling resentful towards the now-healthy sibling. This will be increased if the former sick child is still not expected to do their share of household chores and other difficult or unpleasant tasks. Mum is probably unaware that she is encouraging this child to develop a dependent and avoidant personality. Avoidance as a coping style is often a consequence of a mother being over protective in shielding the child from anything that is distressing or confronting. Mum is also unwittingly reinforcing manipulation as an adaptive strategy that the child will continue to use as an adult - ultimately to their own disadvantage.
iii) A step up is the Designer Child whose birth was planned and genetically designed as a ‘match’ for the sick sibling who needs some form of transplant (such as a kidney or bone marrow or blood or cells from the umbilical cord). This is not to say
that the parents do not love the Designer Child, but the fact remains that it was created for a purpose. The Designer Child will constantly be reminded that he saved his sister’s life, well-intentioned as an expression of gratitude, indicating to him that he is special. However, the message the Designer Child is more likely to receive is that his acceptance, even his whole
existence, is conditional on saving his sister’s life – whom he perceives to be more important to their parents than he is. The sick sibling (even with the successful treatment) will still need lots of ongoing care and the parents will be overprotective. Hence, the Designer Child, like the Healthy Child, will get less attention, confirming his belief that he is unimportant
and his acceptance and existence are conditional. Consequently, he may feel low Self Worth plus resentment
towards the sick sibling and the parents. Of course, this is concealed from the parents, so the anger is repressed.
Beautiful sister
A Beautiful Sister may be the favoured child in the family and the other sister feels like the Ugly Sister. The Beautiful Sister is usually a very cute baby and strangers stop in the street and admire her. Hence, the Beautiful Sister is fed a steady
diet of praise for her beauty all through her childhood, adolescence and into adulthood. The Ugly Sister hears all this praise for her sister but she is ignored. If she is noticed, it is in the nature of a patronizing crumb or consolation that she will be able to have her sister’s cast off boyfriends (thereby sowing the seeds of belief that boys would never choose her once they caught sight of her Beautiful Sister). Mum may dress them identically when young, but the Ugly Sister feels like a poor imitation of her Beautiful Sister and this just serves to highlight the contrast between them. Compared to her Beautiful Sister, the Ugly Sister always feels too short or too tall, too fat or too skinny, her lips too full or too thin, her hair is too frizzy or too straight. The Ugly Sister may deliberately dress daggy or masculine to show she doesn’t care about not being beautiful. If the Beautiful Sister is entered in beauty contests, the contrast is reaffirmed for the Ugly Sister. If the parents appear to give more attention to the Beautiful Sister, the Ugly Sister may feel she is not beautiful enough for acceptance by their parents. To gain
parental approval, she may aim for acknowledgement and set out to achieve in areas where she has some talent (A-grade student, sporting prowess, music) and if she doesn’t have any talent, may seek validation by becoming Mum’s helper or do anything to get attention (eg, become a comedian or get into trouble) or just retreat into the background and spend lots of time on own.
As she grows up, the Ugly Sister may develop into an attractive young woman but no matter how often she is told, the Child Ego State representing the young girl who thought of herself as the Ugly Sister will constantly remind her that she is still the Ugly Sister. She may even feel insecure about relationships, believing that boyfriends would really prefer her Beautiful
Sister and would dump her if they thought they had a chance with the Beautiful Sister. There will be a Child Ego State who believes she is the Ugly Sister and ‘not good enough’, ‘not beautiful enough’ for parental acceptance. Even though the ‘formerly’ Ugly Sister as an adult may receive compliments and can see the evidence for herself in the mirror, the Child Ego State representing the Ugly Sister will be hard to convince.
Comment
Regardless of circumstances, regardless of the talents and needs of individual children in a family, parents do need to make an effort to treat them equally and not expect them to sacrifice their needs for a Favoured Sibling. Validation given to Less
Talented or Healthy Children needs to be for their own attributes, talents and achievements, not just as resources serving the requirements of the Favoured Sibling
a misbehaving child who is constantly being disciplined. However, sometimes there is some basis for the child’s belief that one sibling in the family receives favoured treatment. When this occurs, the other children believe this favoured sibling is more important to the parents, while they are unimportant, which underpins feelings of low Self Worth. There may also be
resentment towards the ‘favoured sibling’ and some degree of anger (repressed) towards the parents.
Talented sibling
One child in the family may be outstanding in a particular field of sport or the arts (such as singing, music or dance). This Talented Sibling generally gets the lion’s share of family resources (money, parental time, effort and involvement) in lessons, coaching, uniforms, equipment, transport to training and events, watching events, and travelling away to competitions or matches. The Less Talented children are likely to be seconded (as part of the family resources) to assist the parents in their efforts to promote and support the Talented Sibling. The Less Talented children are not necessarily untalented, but they risk being overlooked and not fulfilling their potential. The Less Talented may feel unimportant to their parents and resent (repressed anger) what they perceive to be favouritism shown to the Talented Sibling. If they have to help with the career of the Talented Sibling, they may feel that their acceptance by their parents is not unconditional but is conditional on them sacrificing their needs and aspirations for the Talented Sibling.
Chronically ill or disabled sibling
i) A chronically ill child may require constant care by Mum and a disabled child requires a lot of day-to-day assistance or going on outings and being transported in the family car. The Healthy Children may be expected to help out a lot around the home and also help with the Disabled Sibling. They will be expected to be more self sufficient in doing things for themselves from a young age. Treatments, medications, equipment and ongoing therapies are a serious drain on family finances so the Healthy Children may have to ‘do without’. The Healthy Children are likely to feel unimportant and resent this and resent their needs not being met. However, the Healthy Children can see for themselves that their sick or disabled sibling genuinely needs the extra attention. They realize that the parents’ allocation of attention is not their choice and does not reflect any feelings that the sick or disabled sibling is more important and more worthy of attention than the Healthy Children. Consequently,
the Healthy Children may feel ashamed for feeling resentment towards their parents and the sick or disabled sibling. Feeling shame or guilt does not get rid of any repressed anger, but simply creates an additional problem of inner conflicts.
ii) Often, a child who is sick as an infant and a young child actually ‘grows out’ of the condition and has the capacity to become more self sufficient. However, the child has become accustomed to being the centre of Mum’s attention and is not willing to relinquish the favoured position in the family. The mother is likely to be over protective out of fear of the condition
relapsing and is also unwilling to relinquish her role of ‘feeling needed’ (particularly if the ‘carer’ role was her source of validation as a child).
The Healthy Children can see what is happening and may regard the formerly sick child as being manipulative and attention seeking. This results in the Healthy Children feeling resentful towards the now-healthy sibling. This will be increased if the former sick child is still not expected to do their share of household chores and other difficult or unpleasant tasks. Mum is probably unaware that she is encouraging this child to develop a dependent and avoidant personality. Avoidance as a coping style is often a consequence of a mother being over protective in shielding the child from anything that is distressing or confronting. Mum is also unwittingly reinforcing manipulation as an adaptive strategy that the child will continue to use as an adult - ultimately to their own disadvantage.
iii) A step up is the Designer Child whose birth was planned and genetically designed as a ‘match’ for the sick sibling who needs some form of transplant (such as a kidney or bone marrow or blood or cells from the umbilical cord). This is not to say
that the parents do not love the Designer Child, but the fact remains that it was created for a purpose. The Designer Child will constantly be reminded that he saved his sister’s life, well-intentioned as an expression of gratitude, indicating to him that he is special. However, the message the Designer Child is more likely to receive is that his acceptance, even his whole
existence, is conditional on saving his sister’s life – whom he perceives to be more important to their parents than he is. The sick sibling (even with the successful treatment) will still need lots of ongoing care and the parents will be overprotective. Hence, the Designer Child, like the Healthy Child, will get less attention, confirming his belief that he is unimportant
and his acceptance and existence are conditional. Consequently, he may feel low Self Worth plus resentment
towards the sick sibling and the parents. Of course, this is concealed from the parents, so the anger is repressed.
Beautiful sister
A Beautiful Sister may be the favoured child in the family and the other sister feels like the Ugly Sister. The Beautiful Sister is usually a very cute baby and strangers stop in the street and admire her. Hence, the Beautiful Sister is fed a steady
diet of praise for her beauty all through her childhood, adolescence and into adulthood. The Ugly Sister hears all this praise for her sister but she is ignored. If she is noticed, it is in the nature of a patronizing crumb or consolation that she will be able to have her sister’s cast off boyfriends (thereby sowing the seeds of belief that boys would never choose her once they caught sight of her Beautiful Sister). Mum may dress them identically when young, but the Ugly Sister feels like a poor imitation of her Beautiful Sister and this just serves to highlight the contrast between them. Compared to her Beautiful Sister, the Ugly Sister always feels too short or too tall, too fat or too skinny, her lips too full or too thin, her hair is too frizzy or too straight. The Ugly Sister may deliberately dress daggy or masculine to show she doesn’t care about not being beautiful. If the Beautiful Sister is entered in beauty contests, the contrast is reaffirmed for the Ugly Sister. If the parents appear to give more attention to the Beautiful Sister, the Ugly Sister may feel she is not beautiful enough for acceptance by their parents. To gain
parental approval, she may aim for acknowledgement and set out to achieve in areas where she has some talent (A-grade student, sporting prowess, music) and if she doesn’t have any talent, may seek validation by becoming Mum’s helper or do anything to get attention (eg, become a comedian or get into trouble) or just retreat into the background and spend lots of time on own.
As she grows up, the Ugly Sister may develop into an attractive young woman but no matter how often she is told, the Child Ego State representing the young girl who thought of herself as the Ugly Sister will constantly remind her that she is still the Ugly Sister. She may even feel insecure about relationships, believing that boyfriends would really prefer her Beautiful
Sister and would dump her if they thought they had a chance with the Beautiful Sister. There will be a Child Ego State who believes she is the Ugly Sister and ‘not good enough’, ‘not beautiful enough’ for parental acceptance. Even though the ‘formerly’ Ugly Sister as an adult may receive compliments and can see the evidence for herself in the mirror, the Child Ego State representing the Ugly Sister will be hard to convince.
Comment
Regardless of circumstances, regardless of the talents and needs of individual children in a family, parents do need to make an effort to treat them equally and not expect them to sacrifice their needs for a Favoured Sibling. Validation given to Less
Talented or Healthy Children needs to be for their own attributes, talents and achievements, not just as resources serving the requirements of the Favoured Sibling