7-Year-old Keeps Saying He Hates His Brother -- Is This Normal?

I think it is normal for a child to want alone time and also alone 1:1 time with a parent. I think you should not punish your older son for expressing his feelings, even if he says he "hates" someone. My son is five and lately when frustrated will say he "hates" people...so it is a normal thing to express feelings of being frustrated as saying "I hate..." Try to let your older son have special toys that he does not have to share with his brother and let him spend a little time each day alone, with his brother in cooperative play and also 1:1 time with a parent.

Consider that you older son knows what he means when he says he hates his brother. I know those words are hard for you to hear, but all the same, you don't want to shut down your older son's ability to express himself in life. It sounds like your older son has the sort of temperment where he wants to play by himself without his younger brother's meddling. There is nothing wrong with this. Some people are that way and they just need a lot of personal space and time to themselves. His desire to play by himself should be respected. If it is not, problems will arise.

I went thru this stage for some time with my three kids. Everytime the word HATE was used I would help them find better, words to replace it. Like your older son just wants to play alone sometimes (That is okay) I would remind him to say that his little brother is bothering him and that he would really like to be left alone for a bit...One day soon the words that big brother uses will really hurt the little ones feelings, and then the little one will also learn to use the same words and hurt big brothers feelings. Its a never ending cycle if you dont stop the big brother soon. It takes some time and there will always be some slip ups in anger down the road. We just helped our children learn better words to express themselves that would not be hurtful to the others feelings (as much) I would let the kids know that it is OKAY to be angry, annoyed, bothered (its a human emotion no matter how old you are) but what is important (as with any emotion) is to learn to express them in a way that will doesnt hurt someone feelings so badly that you will have a tough time being forgiven. God bless and good luck.

It sounds like you need to teach your older son a new word or way of expressing himself. It sounds to me, as others have said, that he hates being his younger brother's entertainment center.

So, practical suggestions...
1) Your older son must understand that he does need to learn to play with his brother, but limit it to a set amount of time, morning and afternoon, so he can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

2) If older son doesn't want to play with younger son, outside of the set times, you need to support that. But, the eldest should play quietly in his room, by himself. No special priveleges for being selfish with one's time.

3) Help your younger son, as mentioned in other posts, find fun things to do without older brother. (This is very hard, but worth it.)

If your sons are anything like mine, the older boy will ultimately miss the hero worship and gravitate back to playing with his little bro. It may come as a rude shock that little bro will have more fun without him. If that happens, you must support little bro in not having to play with big bro. Sometimes big bros have to learn the hard way to be careful what they ask for. I can't tell you how often my older son refused to play with my youngest and then felt left out. Today, the worst punishment of all is to not let them play together (my sons are nearly 12 and 15.5 years old).

Good luck!

Your 7-year old probably is really annonyed having the 3-1/2 year old around to pester him all the time and disrupting his play activities. He needs to learn how to play and share with his younger brother but it sounds like he also needs some time to do his own thing. I would suggest talking to your husband about setting up some kind of system that will allow your son to get his need for alone time met but also be a good brothter and friend to his younger sibling. It could be something like allowing your son to claim two half hour increments during the day to play on his own and the rest of the time he has to share and play with his brother. And I know it is not easy when you have things to do, but if you and your husband can make yourselves available to play with the boys during some of the cooperative play periods, it may help the 3-1/2 year old learn to play with the 7-year old and vice-versa so that there is not as much friction between the two boys.

Wishing you the best of luck with resolving this situation and Happy Holidays!

I have 2 kids, 3 years apart. While I am blessed that many times they do play well together, the older one really does like her space, and the younger one knows how to push her buttons. My older one calls her sister "irritating" pretty often. I think it is pretty normal. You can give him words that express his feeling without using the dreaded "hate" word. When he says that you can say "you are frustrated with your brother because he is messing up your toys". Discourage him from the hate word, but encourage him to express his feelings appropriately. Try to see to it that your older son has a way to "escape" from his brother at times, so that he does get to play with his own toys without the little guy messing up his creations. Then the times that you all interact together (or the two of them interact) will be a little bit easier.

I think only you know what and how well your son comprehends. His delays may have something to do with it all, but I am not a doctor. But I can tell you that my sons just turned 6 and they would totally understand (after some explaining about the word HATE) why we dont say that about people we love. We dont use it in our house, they dont watch tv, they are in Kindergarten but other than that they do not go to day care where they could be picking up all sorts of negative behaviors. So perhaps take a good look at his influences and see if that is where it is coming from. Maybe you need to create situations and activities for the two to do together so that they can bond better, learn to enjoy each others company. Or teach your younger son that we all need some alone time, and carve out some each day for the both of them to have. I also have a 2 1/2 year old and while they love playing with him and vice versa, sometimes they all just need a break from each other. But in my opinon, that should be the exception, not the majority of the time.

Hello, It sounds like your son is frustrated with having a little brother around all of the time. Unfortunately, that is just the way it is. Our two older grandsons (cousins) hate having the younger cousin around. The oldest one and the youngest one are brothers. What they can't seem to get is that it is such a good thing to have someone want to be just like them. I have talked to them and it seems to get better for a short while and then it goes back to them trying to ditch him. They are 13, 10 and 7.
I would try to explain how much his little brother wants to be just like him. I would also explain that it is not okay to say that he hates his brother. When he does say it, I would tell him, "It sounds like you are feeling frustrated with your brother. Maybe you can show him how to do something that will help him to play alone.", or something to that effect. I would just mirror what he is feeling in different words rather than "I hate him", i.e. "You might be angry with him right now.", etc. He is definately old enough to be able to learn how to use his words without hurting others.
Good luck with your precious family.
K. K.

you might try giving your 7 year old more alone time for himself. maybe he's feeling smothered by his brother since they're both home together.

Yes, it's normal. Yes, you can teach him a different word.
My son was about the same age 6-7 when I taught him to say "I need some alone time". Even when his friends were over occasionally he would go ride his bike around the block by himself because he needed some alone time.
I will be better for the little one too to develop a sense of himself-his likes and interests instead of what older brother wants. My little sister spent most of her adolescence trying to "discover" herself because she didn't have any sense of self outside of what I wanted or did. And as your older one gets older he'll be doing more things that you aren't going to want the little one to do.
You'll also notice that they play together better when they have some time apart. Let the older one do his thing, it may take a day or an hour, depending on how frustrated he is, but he will eventually choose to come in and play together. If it goes more than a week you have a serious issue you need to address.
Good Luck!

Hi B.,

Happy holidays! And, yes- this is absolutely normal behavior. Try to imagine if your husband came home one day with a new wife who was smaller and younger than you. Imagine that he introduced her to you and insisted that you love her, that you share your things with her and that you now take on the role of 'senior' wife. It's an absurd analogy to us, but really that is how children feel when a new sibling joins the family.

There is really only one effective way to handle this and that is to acknowledge and validate your son's feelings. Stopping him from verbalizing his feelings will not change the way he feels. Instead, let him know that you understand what is going on for him. Allow it to be OK for him to 'hate' his brother right now. The more you allow him to express that (obviously in a safe and responsible way), the sooner you will see the feelings begin to subside.

If I can be of any further help, feel free to contact me.
Be well,
G. B., M.A.
Child Development Specialist & Parent Educator
www.GilaBrown.com

Have you tried haveing them play to gether with you present encourge him to do things for eacher as they grow up they willlearn to love and help one another i have 4 children and 8 grandchildren it take a lot of patience to raise children give them lots of hugs and kisses seperately

Pretty much normal, though that does not mean that you should ignore it. Do you spend alone time with your each of your kids? It might help if both you and your husband do this. I have one of each (boy and girl) and we would have mom and son, dad and daughter day, then switch it- mom and daughter, dad and son. Also, my daughter went through a stage where she was saying that she hated her brother, hated me, etc, (at about 5 yrs), I told her that her emotions belonged to her, BUT she could not purposely say things to hurt us. If she felt it, fine, but she could not tell her little brother that she hated him (or me). If she was feeling that way, she could tell me that she needed some alone time.

Oh yes, one of the best things that we started in our house- when one of the kids was really acting up I (or my hubby) would ask them if they needed attention. Usually the answer was yes. Then I would ask if they wanted good attention or bad attention, and what kind they were getting with the behavior. It did not work over night, but it sure helped after awhile!