Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, YOU ARE THE PROBLEM!

Why am I the problem?

You are being mean to your older daughter.

Five year olds don’t have empathy at this stage in their thinking. Your expectations that she be kind to her sister in her refusals to engage or allow playthings to be used are too high. Model good manners. Don’t equate inability to consider her sister’s point of view with meanness. It’s not. All five year olds are egocentric, meaning their own needs and wants are really all that is in their agenda.

Anonymous wrote:OP, YOU ARE THE PROBLEM!

Why am I the problem?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your older daughter needs time and space to herself. She's not your babysitter.

If you are using her as your babysitter then she has every reason to be mad AT YOU. Older children are not your babysitters. You chose to have more kids and you take care of them.

Op here - good lord I am not using my 5.5 year old as a babysitter. I am in the room with them when the fighting breaks out.

OP, YOU ARE THE PROBLEM!

Anonymous wrote:Your older daughter needs time and space to herself. She's not your babysitter.

If you are using her as your babysitter then she has every reason to be mad AT YOU. Older children are not your babysitters. You chose to have more kids and you take care of them.

As a younger sibling, I expected to see examples of true older sibling meanness -- deliberate cruelty and pranks; leaving out someone on purpose; teasing; ugly nicknames; physical fights.

This is not meanness. This is an older sibling who doesn't want to follow a younger sibling's agenda all the time. Nor should she have to.

This is more of a parenting problem than an older child being mean problem. You're DD is 5.5 yo, she is going to behave like a 5.5 yo and not a teenage babysitter.

Anonymous wrote:Your older daughter needs time and space to herself. She's not your babysitter.

and her sister shouldn't be allowed to play with her things unless she has permission.