When siblings share a room...

[Codi]

Ds is newly 6, dd is newly 3. Right now they have to share a room. Ds has a bed in there and sleeps in there. Dd sleeps in our bed with us, but it is still "her" room too. Her toys, and clothes, etc are in there as well as his. It is a shared room.

But they CONSTANTLY fight about the space. Ds is always trying to kick her out but she wants to play in there too. He says a lot that he "wants to be alone" and I get it. But that is just not always probable.

How do you handle these situations if your dc share a room?

:popcorn

[Proverbs31]

If he has a strong need to be alone, can you find another "alone" space for him? Use a screen or curtains to make him a corner in another part of the house where he could read in privacy? (or whatever else he likes to do) Teach him to lock himself in the bathroom for a while? :shifty

I really don't think most people need entire rooms of their own. The vast majority of people who have ever lived don't/didn't even have that as an option. But some people *do* need times to be alone. There are ways to meet that need other than devoting a whole room to one person.

[Psyche]

Sub

[Codi]

He gets a lot of alone time in his room every morning. And I try as best I can to give it to him during the day when he requests it. :yes I have been contemplating dividing the room some how. It is pretty decent size so they would both have a good amount of space.... :think

[momyshaver]

:cup

[Proverbs31]

This chair is also WONDERFUL: http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/40100253/

Kids can pull down the lid for privacy. The spinning is fun and a good sensory thing.

[Jenny]

:cup Lurking for ideas. :) Our boys shared a room for a while and we ended up moving the youngest back to our room because they were clashing so much. There's a 6 year age difference, though, so that didn't help. Baby #3 is coming soon and we only have 2 bedrooms, so there's a good chance the boys are going to have to find some way to share again at some point.

[WanderingJuniper]

When my girls first started sharing a room my younger was the one trying to have alone time. We turned that 4 foot by 8 foot closet into the younger's "alone" space. It had her favorite books, a floor pillow, was decorated with her favorite things on the wall and the door was removed so it was just a curtain.

Now that they are older and they've shared for a while now it is better but not perfect. I really want to build a cubicle wall to divide the room a bit more but have not had the time or money to do it. They'd each essentially have an 8 foot by 10 foot room that way.

[Codi]

We plan on purchasing a home this year (instead of renting) and 3 bedrooms will be my minimum. :yes

We are due with #3 in a few weeks and my plan is that if it's a girl, the girls will share and if it's a boy, the boys will share...


Until then though, I need ideas...because as well as these two get along...they can fight just as good!

[cbmk4]

I grew up sharing a room with my younger (very messy) sister. It was just a fact of life.

My youngest dd's, who are three years apart, share a room. It works out most of the time. If they want/need their own space, one sister can play in another room. We never allow the person wanting to be alone to kick her sister out of the room. The sister wanting to be alone is the one expected to move to another room. That's just the way we've decided to deal with it. It probably is easier that both of our youngest kids are girls and they share toys anyway.

Right now my girls have a loft bed/trundle bed in their room, so the oldest dd feels like she can have more privacy up on the top bunk. My dad made her a little shelf for her books up there and she has a clip on reading light so she can stay up a bit later than her sister reading at night.

[Codi]

I really like the idea of, "If you want to be alone, you are free to GO be alone, but you may not make others leave you/kick them out in order for you to accomplish that." Ill have to think about how I would put that in action here. :think (I'm thinking about when he wants to be playing lego's alone and his entire bucket is in the room and it would hard to get them to another area....)

[cbmk4]

I really like the idea of, "If you want to be alone, you are free to GO be alone, but you may not make others leave you/kick them out in order for you to accomplish that." Ill have to think about how I would put that in action here. :think (I'm thinking about when he wants to be playing lego's alone and his entire bucket is in the room and it would hard to get them to another area....)

Would it work for your kids to alternate days as to whose turn it is to have "first priority" for playing in the bedroom, maybe hang a sign on the doorknob that can be flipped over with each child's name on one side to designate whose day it is? Just trying to brainstorm. I think my girls would just fight over such an arrangement, declaring it unfair for some reason or another, but may some kids might be pleased by the clear-cut "rule."

[sprout]

our two girls share a room. they are aged almost eight and almost five. we have full over full bunks. alone time is on their own bed where there is books and a light.

if one needs alone time while sharing toys, then they are expected to inform the other person of that and go find a space. The other person is expected to be respectful and not go and follow.

that is how it is working out for us at the moment.

we have a rather small home too.

so, we are thinking of adding a tree house out back for kid space as well.

[MomtoJGJ]

We only have one who needs alone time right now, so that works out well. We also have very few toys in their actual room (all 4 share a room) so there is little playing in there. We have two rules. Their beds are theirs, no one elses unless someone else is invited into the bed. The other rule is that if they need alone time they tell us and we will allow them to shut the door for a brief period of time and we will keep all sisters out of the room and away from the door.

The thing about their beds being their space is huge though. They can do whatever they want on their bed and no one can bother them. And if more than one want alone time they can go into their bed.

But we do not allow selfish alone time if that makes sense? You can't just kick a sister out because you are doing something they might mess up. Work together, teach the younger ones what you want them to do, etc but no telling them they can't play with you.

[Codi]

Im also wondering how to handle when ds is already in the room playing alone, and dd wants to play in there too. Do I make her wait? Or make him deal with her being in there?

Ds's bed is the bottom half of a bunk bed we just have never put the top half on. :think He's been begging for bunk beds lately. I just see fights over who get's the top bunk if we do that. :doh :giggle

[sprout]

there is a sticker on our bunk bed that says you have to be seven to sleep up there.

that sticker settled it for us.