Fellow blogger, Michele Cheplic, wrote an interesting blog asking, “What’s Your Breaking Point?” She shared a story about a mother of five who had finally had enough of her children’s fighting, called the police and asked them to arrest her 15 and 16-year-old.
She posed this question at the end of her blog, “Have you ever been so sick of refereeing your kids fights that you’ve been tempted to request police intervention?”
When siblings fight it can become very challenging to deal with. Throughout the years, I have experienced different seasons where the fighting amongst my three was rampant. When they were younger it was usually about toys. As they got older it turned into issues such as walking into each other’s room, taking each other’s things or who got in the bathroom first.
For the most part I have allowed my teens to work it out. Sometimes I end up having to intervene, especially if it starts to become physical in any way. But calling the police? I’m not so sure about that.
I can’t say for sure what the woman referenced in Michele’s blog deals with. At times being a parent can be exasperating but I guess I look at calling the police as a cop-out (no pun intended). Unless there was the threat of REAL harm, the police have enough to deal with. As a parent we have to learn how to navigate these waters, even when they are treacherous.
Calling a friend or family member for advice might help. Going online and looking up tips on how to deal with sibling conflict can also be a great resource. But for the most part, we have to learn how to deal with the challenges that are before us. Calling the police is a bit extreme.
In the end, children need to learn how to get along with each other. If they see that police intervention is the only way, what skills are they learning? It is our job as parents to teach our children how to deal with conflict.
Now excuse me, I hear some arguing in the other room that I must attend to…
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When Teen Siblings Don’t Get Along
Photo by Leonid Mamchenkov in Flickr