Those with toddlers close in age

How do you deal with sibling rivalry and one child being violent towards/picking on the other?

The gremlins are forever scrapping and it often gets physical. Mercedes is rougher than Sienna, if she doesn't get her own way or Sienna has something she wants she'll push or bite her or pull her hair, but Sienna does give it out occasionally - this morning she bit Mercedes coz Mercedes took her toy.

I'm trying to be really consistent and putting the instigator into their bedroom immediately for 2-3 mins even if it means putting lil miss down mid-feed to deal with them (coz of course they always play up when I'm busy feeding!). And after 2-3 mins I go into the bedroom and sit with the instigator and explain why they are in their room and that they can come out when they're ready to play nicely. I don't think they get it tho - the other day I was trying to explain it to Mercedes but she was too busy giving me the lowdown on her soft toys.

I'm also trying to distract them so that they don't argue in the first place but that's easier said than done. They fight over everything - if Sienna has a dirty nappy and I go to change her, Mercedes will attack her coz she wants *her* nappy changed first, even if it's not dirty. And if one picks up a toy/book, the other inevitably wants it and snatches it and if I intervene and give it back to the one that had it first the other will attack. They even pinch each others food.

I'd love to hear how others handle this sort of behaviour coz atm it seems like Mercedes is a bit of a boomerang backwards and forwards from her room, she spends more time being put in time out than playing.

I try to spend one on one time with each of them regularly, to help reduce (I hope!) some of the rivalry. I've also been looking at the kids' personalities: Kryssi loves attention and to make people happy, so removing her from the limelight is the best thing for her. Briona is quieter and just wants everyone to be friends so she is a better one to negotiate with/on behalf of.

But ugh... I don't really know what I'd do with two Kryssies!! Twins are my scariest nightmare

They don't actually have any time apart. I could take one out at a time when the nanny is here but then the one that stays at home gets really upset and they fret for each other. It's funny coz they are so, so close, if Sienna is crying, Mercedes will come up and hug her even if it was her that made Sienna cry in the first place! But they are also totally vicious.

Emma, i know Anne used to pay attention to the Twin that had been bitten & totally ignore the twin that bit. In her case it was because G was talking & J wasn't (or vice versa, can't memba) so J would bite G cos she was jealous that G could get the message across better than she could.

oh goodness, well maybe giving attention to the one that was hurt might work then? at least that way the one that did the hurting is actually missing out. i think from memory Anne used to be very obvious about the attention she was giving i.e. obvious that the other one was missing out.