Sibling Love

Today, for the first time ever, Penny chased Rory around and tried to get him to play with her. Not play in the traditional sense – more like, forcing him onto a bouncy castle at playgroup and jumping on some stairs he was moving (as a joke. A joke he didn’t appreciate, but a joke all the same). She even threw a ball to him with a little bit of prompting. It got me to thinking about how, for the longest time, the kids refused to spend any time together.

From the moment Rory was born, Penny was not exactly enthused. She was only 2, so it’s understandable that she wasn’t all about him, but she had absolutely zero interest in him. It’s not that she hated him and got upset with him, it was more so that she didn’t acknowledge his existence.

She didn’t like when he tried to touch her toys. She didn’t like hearing him cry. She refused to touch him, and god forbid she ever give him a kiss or a cuddle.

Some time in the past year or so, that’s changed. I don’t know if it’s because Rory’s getting older or Penny is seeking more social interactions, but she is absolutely obsessed with him right now. We can barely get a picture of them together without her holding his hand or arm, or her kissing his cheek or neck. When he cries, instead of screaming while plugging her ears she’ll yell out, “Rory’s crying! Rory’s sad!” and then proceed to try to sing to him to calm him down.

It’s so funny, because we were trying to get them to bond forever, and one day it just seemed to stick. I remember trying a “play program” in Penny’s ABA therapy when they were younger, and it was a terrible failure. I tried to bathe them together to see if the proximity would foster some kind of connection – there was so.much.screaming. I kind of remember buying a doll for her when he was a baby, but she doesn’t play with toys so why I would do that seems silly now.

On reflection, the thing that seemed to spark her interest in him was asking her to help me get him ready for bed. We had tried that before, but the only reason I tried again was because Shamus worked a lot of night shifts at the time and I had to keep them both within my eyesight. So, maybe when the pressure was off it was okay?

Helping me get his pajamas on forced her to tolerate touching him, which eventually led to a hug, which led to “tackle hugs”, which led to the weird obsession she has now of squishing his cheeks, and at some point parallel play (which means playing near each other but not with each other) and apparently now attempting to actually play together. Keep in mind, this would have happened over a 1.5 to 2 year period. It’s rarely a straight forward pursuit in getting the kids to do new things, but it’s pretty cool to see the gradual progression.

They don’t “fight like siblings” either like my sister and I used to. As an example of this, recently Rory was obsessed with turning on an extra light in our playroom. Penny was not a fan. So, Rory would walk over and turn it on, then sit back down. Penny would walk over and turn it off, then sit back down. Then Rory would turn it on, Penny would turn it off, and it kept going and going and going. They never once got upset or frustrated, they just continually turned off and on the light.

Their newfound sibling love was totally worth the wait because they are so adorable with each other right now and I’m really appreciating it. Penny definitely seeks Rory out and he tolerates it for the most part (which is better than nothing). I love that even when he’s upset with her, as soon as he calms down she immediately goes after him again and he tolerates it yet again.

I leave you with some progression pictures of their relationship, starting with their first meeting in the NICU. Penny is definitely less thrilled than I was at that moment.

^^The first time Penny passively let Rory ‘cuddle’ her – Facebook tells me it was August, 2016 (Rory was born in January).

The next few are from this week and today. I love Rory’s ‘just tolerating this shit’ look.