When your only child insists on a sibling

While the adults who say an “only child is a lonely child” are easier to silence and their judgment easier to ignore, handling a child making these demands requires a delicate mix of sense and sensitivity.

Create a distraction

By creating a distraction, some parents are able to give the child something in the realm of what he/she wants and yet don’t feel as arm-twisted by the situation. Some parents resort to bringing home a pet in the hope that fostering a relationship between the child and their pet will, in some way, plug the void the child feels. I’ve tried to go down that path but without much success considering my daughter wants a hamster. Other parents though, have had better luck.

Riyaaz Nathani has always had dogs as pets. He knew full well that a dog isn’t just a distraction; it’s a commitment like having another child. “I’ve never really been a cat person although my daughter had been wanting one for a while. Although all pets require care, cats while compared to dogs, are far more independent. I was clear that I wouldn’t have another dog and I didn’t think a fish bowl was my daughter’s idea of a pet. Our cat, who’s now two years old, really warmed up to my daughter, and my wife and I are truly at ease knowing that we’ve managed to handle this situation for now.”

Speak the truth

From financial and space constraints to compelling physiological conditions, from lacking the time to split one’s attention between not one but two kids, to just genuinely not being inclined to going through the process of childbirth all over again, parents have a whole host of reasons to not have a second child. While this is not a one-time conversation and would require the parents to systematically and age appropriately release information to the child, most people would agree that a child convinced is a child content.

Says working mother Neharika Khanna who stays with her husband, his ageing mother and his grandmother, “From the time our son was three, he’s been talking about wanting a sibling. We knew that the responsibility of raising him and looking after the elders would be squarely on us.”

Neharika didn’t dismiss the idea in front of her young son initially. Her responses were in the region of “Sure, that would be lovely, right?” or “We can’t plan this, darling, if God wishes for it, it might happen.” Ambiguity helps when children ask less pointed questions because they are younger and have lesser experience with friends that have siblings. As they grow older, the tactic would only leave the child feeling unsure of your intentions.

“When he was seven, I once asked him to give me one day where he’s handling everything for himself and his elders. Put the dishes away, remind his great-grandmother to have her medicines, get his bags packed, accompany his grandmother and the maid on the doctor-mandated walk, etc. At bedtime, I asked him how his day was, and he said: ‘It was so much fun helping the others, but I hardly got any play time for myself.’ That was when I gently told him how I felt about having another child,” she adds.

Practical pointers

Whether you create a distraction or eventually speak the truth—that this is a small family unit of three—there are wider implications. If you’ve made your child feel that you are better off being a family of three than four or more, you run the risk of your child inadvertently adopting a sense of superiority over unbridled access to his/her parents’ time, attention and their own toys. So, make sure that you repeatedly draw your child’s attention to the fact that everyone makes a choice that suits them, and nobody’s choice is superior to another’s because no two lives are the same.

There’s also the other problem of accidentally smothering your child with love and overcompensating the lack of a second child. By constantly being there for them and giving them what they want, we might end up raising single children who can only think of themselves and are incapable of facing a problem without turning to their always-accessible parents.

As much as the conversation about not having a sibling is one that requires balance, parenting an only child by making him/her world-ready as well as self-assured requires another fine balance; that of maintaining the equilibrium between the security of a close relationship with one’s parents and having a strong sense of responsibility and sharing that comes with close-knits friendships.