Seriously Dude.

I have a middle child (which is often comparable to being a second child.) Think for a moment of all the cliche's and quasi-facts out there about middle children (neglected, "birth order book", just to name a few.) Well, it would appear my child pretty much fits all those things. While I wouldn't say he is neglected, or even lacking in attention, he certainly has had to share his (and our) time with first, his older brother, and now, his baby brother (are you even allowed to use that many parentheses and commas in once sentence??) A short summation of the birth order book is that the second child will be the complete opposite of the firstborn child. Check. I could go on and on about the birth order thing, but I doubt you want to read it.

The reason I bring this up: we have been having Maxwell go through a series of "assessments". Crazy thing is, none of these assessors seem to want to tell me whats going on! Until today. Number Two is currently in a "trial" preschool. He will go for two weeks and at the end we will have a "meeting", in which we decide what it is that Number Two needs (poor Number Two, we all know what Number Two really means to little kids; in which case Number One isn't that much better off, but Number Three has missed that boat entirely!) Today, his second day, Mrs. W stopped to talk to me a little bit about what she has been seeing as they try to figure Number Two out. She would ask me a question, and after I answered, would say, "Yes, that is exactly what we saw." Why? Does she think I am blind? What would it mean if we weren't seeing the same thing?? Regardless, she gave me a few good ideas, and as she talked, a few things clicked in my head (yes, my brain does work sometimes.) I realized that this is all stuff that we did with Number One. Next, the guilt started to set in as I realized that Number Two was probably experiencing these difficulties because............well, I have no idea, really, except that by golly, I feel guilty. Maybe I'm lazy. Maybe I forgot I needed to do these things. Maybe I thought he would just learn from Number One.....or on his own. Then, I realized that I had made a "middle child" victim out of my son. Poor kid. He didn't stand a chance. I decided right then and there that I was going to make sure this same thing didn't happen to my Third (and last) Child. Of course, this then means that I would further victimize my Number Two child. Everyone knows that Number One gets everything, and that Number Three (if he's also the baby) gets away with everything. Or all the attention. And that is exactly what I would be doing! To keep Number Two from falling prey to the middle-child syndrome, should I fail Number Three as well?