I have 3 wonderful kiddos:

• Sweetheart – 12-yr-old girl;
• BudBud – almost 11-yr-old boy;
• MrCutie – 9 yr-old boy.

Sweetheart and BudBud are at that age where they are actually kind of starting to hang out. Sweetheart will invite BudBud into her room while she’s practicing her flute, and he’ll sit on her bed and read for a while, and they’ll chat, and it’s all good. They even play board games or card games together often, and will sit and work on a puzzle together for a long time. They kinda hang out together sometimes.

Sweetheart and BudBud will have been playing or hanging out together for 30 minutes or more, when MrCutie tries to join them. Within about 2 minutes and 12 seconds, pandemonium has broken out. They are all three yelling at each other and fighting and fidgeting and fussing, and nobody is getting along any more.

Now, Bud Bud and MrCutie will also build LEGOs together for a LONG time. They will play hot wheels or trains side by side. Being brothers close in age, they will often have these little spats, vying for position, and who’s better and bigger and badder and all of that. But they normally contain it pretty well, and they will hang out in BudBud’s room for a while and just ‘be’.

Bud Bud and MrCutie will have been playing or hanging out together for 30 minutes or more, when Sweetheart tries to join them. Within about 2 minutes and 12 seconds, pandemonium has broken out. They are all three yelling at each other and fighting and fidgeting and fussing, and nobody is getting along any more.

Sometimes Sweetheart and MrCutie will play store together, with these play coins and felt ‘store things’ they have. Or they will play zoo with stuffies and sort things out by type, put them into ‘cages’ and tend them together. Occasionally, Sweetheart will read in French to MrCutie – they are both in French Immersion at school. Often, MrCutie will suggest listening to some kind of podcast, usually Decoder Ring Theatre, and Sweetheart likes to listen to the same stories he does, so they listen together. They will be silly together, and sit quietly together, and in general just be together.

Sweetheart and MrCutie will have been playing or hanging out together for 30 minutes or more, when BudBud tries to join them. Within about 2 minutes and 12 seconds, pandemonium has broken out. They are all three yelling at each other and fighting and fidgeting and fussing, and nobody is getting along any more.

WHAT is up with THAT!?

I call it the Third Wheel Dynamic…

I’m NOT exaggerating this at all. It happens ALL the time! Now, granted, there are times when 2 of them will fight, and rare instances where the 3 of them all play well together. But those are short-lived and far between.

It’s part of what I ‘feared’ when having 3 kiddos – a sort of triangle effect where someone was inevitably left out. I wasn’t expecting this explosivity factor when adding the 3rd. It’s like instead of worrying about one being left out of their social interactions, I’d RATHER one stay out of the mix, just for all of our own sanity.

Now, there’s another weird part of this dynamic, though….

If 2 of my kiddos (any combination of 2 of them) are playing together, another child who is NOT their sibling but is a friend or even a stranger, can jump in and play with them just fine. THAT 3rd person might even cause the 2 already playing to play BETTER together, in fact. Having a 3rd, non-sibling person in the group is easier than having just my own 3 kiddos together.

It’s SO weird!

I know there’s some family systems dynamic explanation for it all, and I know that my 3 kiddos know how to press each other’s buttons for sure.

This last week all of this has been more apparent in some ways, and I wondered if my kiddos are the only ones like this.

Has anybody else noticed this weird 3rd wheel dynamic?