They Really Should Cover Sibling Rivalry In Those Pre-natal Parenting Courses

My two youngest sons fight all the time. They are 13 and 16. Honestly, I thought we would be out of this phase by now. I was never naive enough to picture us holding hands and singing Kumbaya but I did think the constant bickering over who breathed which particle of air would have ceased by now. I was quite gullible going into this mothering thing, obviously.
I distinctly remember the day when my twins were 5 months old and I had them propped up in front of back rest pillows on the floor. I was on the floor with them and had handed each baby a book to flip through. It was adorable to watch my little, precious angels "reading" their books.
Until one of them decided he/she wanted the book the other child had. I can't even remember which little offender started the whole escapade but the next thing I knew, my two darlings were pummeling and hitting each other like champion prize fighters. At five months of age. Over a book.
I was devastated.

Later that day, my poor husband came home. In hindsight, I realize he must have had a mighty active prayer life during that portion of our lives. I imagine he drove the 20 minutes home with a voice in his head saying something like, "Dear God, please don't let me walk in and find that half eaten bowl of soggy Cheerios still by the sofa cuing me in that she hasn't eaten all day while still breastfeeding twins." Or, "Dear God, please don't let her have watched daytime TV and found out about the latest flesh-eating, highly contagious, debilitating and most likely fatal disease that she will think our kids already have even though they rarely leave the house." Yes, I bet those first few months with a post-partum, breastfeeding, highly neurotic mother of twins was mostly fun and games for him.But the day in question, I know he walked into the house and was met by a wife crying so hard that it must have been hard to make any sense out of what was going on. I was certain we had already failed our children completely. After all, they had only been on this earth for five short months and were already resorting to violence. Where had we gone wrong? Was there any hope?

Keep in mind, I am an only child. I had no familiarity with sibling rivalry until I gave birth to it. Fortunately, my husband has 4 siblings and had quite the extensive knowledge of what was occurring in our home. He told me to calm down, we had not already failed miserably in our parenting quest (that came later, I'm sure), and that our dear children were just showing their primal animal instincts.Which brings me to the animals I'm still trying to parent. I'm still at a loss as to why they need to fight and argue over every little thing. But at least I don't blame myself anymore.

I think I'll just blame my husband. After all, they didn't inherit that sibling rivalry from me.

(I have a giveaway here for a To Save A Life DVD.)