I am very proud of my twin son. Even though his brother more than often gives him a hard time about everything, he still has the compassion to look out for his brother.
Yesterday, we had a bathroom incident at home, where my eldest had a terrible accident and didn't come let us know. Much to my saddened heart, my father-in-law was in the same room, and didn't catch on to the situation, or chose to ignore it, I don't care to ever know.
It was my 4 year old son who came to find me, sitting with my Wonderful Husband and my mother-in-law in the next room, who said that his brother didn't flush the toilet and didn't wipe his bottom.
Well, when I went to examine and resolve the problem, I saw the poor kid had a really upset stomach, which caused his pants to suffer too. How my father-in-law could have thought this was 'someone has stinky breath and needs to brush their teeth bad' as he loudly called out to all the kids, letting us overhear just a few minutes before, still boggles my mind and saddens my heart. My mother-in-law looked at us with the same surprise in her eyes as we both had, and said 'he must be joking with them.'
I helped my eldest get all cleaned up, while the whole time he was yelling at me that I was disrupting his play time...internally I was celebrating that he was being vocal with me about why he was frustrated. My inlaws scooted out the door, and I can't figure out if they caught on to what the real situation was...for as much as I know, they could have thought I was being rude and started the kids' baths without announcement...trying to hint for them to leave, which wasn't the situation at all.
Anyway, when I was tucking in my youngest son, I told him how proud I was of him for looking out for his brother. I assured him that we know it's not always fair that the eldest gives him a hard time, but that he is the best brother in the world for always helping him.
As a reward, I gave him 20 pennies for his reward jar...obviously helping your brother with a bathroom accident isn't on our 'list.' The highest 'paying' chore is only 5 coins. Boy, did he light up when I put 20 coins in his hand. Those coins were really well deserved.
I'm glad I can count on my son to help his brother...and not that we don't get help from my in-laws, because we do...but I'm still uncertain if they realize exactly what we are dealing with on a regular basis...I don't yet think they do, or they do and are just dealing with it differently...for my own sanity, I'm chosing to not care to know.
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