[morgtheborg]

I know that I come from a family of five and was starved for attention. My husband comes from a family of 2 and felt he always got attention when he wanted it.

Like some of my strongest memories are of leaving notes for my Mom about how I felt neglected and was in <x> room waiting for her just to BE there with me. She'd last about ten minutes before she'd begin multi-tasking. Not because she was a bad mom but because she just had so. much. to do with five kids and a full-time job.

If you're going to have a large family older kids have to take on some of the emotional labor or the younger kids are totally shafted.

[notch656a]

It's interesting how opinions on this change depending on how it's phrased.

Sometimes I see it phrased as older kids taking on some of the labor in what is perceived as maturity building activity that may serve them in adulthood.

Others use a completely different phrase, calling it "parentification" and then call it child abuse or worse, believing it's better for the kids to all fight for the resource of the parent rather than share the burden with older children.

I withhold a conclusion of what the results are. But it's funny to me to see how the opinions can be gamed based on how you frame it.

[navane]

A proffessional athlete was asked, in the context of a knockout tournament where different conpetitors had different waiting period between matches: "is it better to have more time and rest between the fights, or to have less time but more momentum?" She replied: "Whichever happens to you, you turn into a positive frame."