<p>Me and my wife are turning 60, and we have 3 wonderful kids. Twin Son and Twin Daughter are 15 y.o. high school juniors. Older daughter is 33 years old (college class 2002), and just got pregnant.</p>
<p>This large age gap always made for interesting comparisons between how things changed between raising our older daughter and raising the twins. </p>
<p>Is anyone on the same boat here, concerning age gap of siblings?</p>
<p>H is 5 years younger than his late sis and 7 years older than his bro. The oldest sib I have is 3 years older and youngest sub is 9 years younger (there are many sibs IB between as well). Her kids get along well with this younger uncle. </p>
<p>H is 13 years younger than his sister and is 9 years older than me. So, his sister is old enough to be my mother and her kids are less than 5 years younger than I am. When they started calling me aunt after I married H I told them I would smack them if I ever heard aunt in reference to me coming out of their mouths again. They immediately stopped, so I guess they were trying to be respectful and felt as weird as I did about it.</p>
<p>I have brothers 16, 13 and nine years older than me, so there is a huge gap. I was 16 when oldest brother had his first kid, so I am exactly in the middle between the two of them.</p>
<p>I’m sure it was really like raising two separate families for my parents. </p>
<p>@teriwtt: that is somehow the feeling we had too. Older daughter had gone to college and then we were expecting again. She wasn’t exactly thrilled by all the late-night crying in some of her visits back home. Though she’s always been in touch with her twin siblings, she told us she misses a bit the fact she never lived with them permanently (after college she went to medical school, and ever since always lived further than two states or a ocean away). The younger kids always liked to spend part of their vacations at her house, especially since she moved to Hawaii, which came handy in giving me and my wife some welcome rest every summer. </p>
<p>My siblings are 16, 14, 12 and 10 years older than I am. Totally separate family, no common history. As adults, I have no relationship beyond hello, how are you with any of them. My son is 9 years younger than my oldest. I always swore I wouldn’t have such a gap because I personally hated it, but with the pitter patter of little feet come one hundred thousand words to eat.</p>
<p>BayAreaFRP - I was two when B went away to college, but he went local, and would come home often. I do remember as a kid, if I was outside playing and I’d see his car coming down the street, I’d drop whatever I was doing and go running to him - he was much more affectionate than my parents. </p>
<p>Interestingly, he was able to fill me in on some family stuff that my parents never shared with me - things that happened before I was born or was too little to remember. But he did stay in the area after college graduation, so again, I saw him often enough. It was when I went away to college, that I never returned to the area (other than holidays). And we’ve now been in the midwest for 30 years, so we don’t see each other very often. But he’s the one I call when I have a crisis - he’s been extremely supportive in those times. So don’t give up on the idea that age differences will not necessarily make a difference in relationships. For us, it’s been more an issue of geography. </p>
<p>To this day, I am closer to my oldest brother than the other two who are only 13 and 9 years younger.</p>
<p>My youngest is 10 and 15 years younger than her siblings. She doesn’t really remember much about the older one living at home, but after his time in the military (he joined at 18) he has mostly always lived close by so she has a good relationship with him. now. He is a all about hands-on stuff, and her STEM school does many hands-on projects. He loves to help her and has volunteered there. He remembers my parents so he’s a good source of stories about what it was like being their grandchild-both died before youngest was born. My older was a bit of a snit as a teen and wasn’t that kind to the youngest, but they have fun together now-going shopping, to the movies, and they all love to play board games together. For me it is NOW like raising a second family-my older 2 were teens so long ago. </p>
<p>H has three siblings 10, 15 and 16 years older (his dad was in the military) and the older ones helped raise him. He is close to his older brother and one sister, but not the other. He is the youngest. The dynamic between him and the older ones has completely changed from caregivers (his father died when he was only 6) to peers and they very much enjoy getting together or talking on the phone.</p>
<p>My oldest/youngest are 16+ years apart, but with 5 sibs between them. We’ve moved multiple times, and it is like we have 3 different families–oldest two, next two, and youngest 3. We were just talking about this the other day–that our oldest kid, who left when our youngest was not even two, has lived a completely different life from our younger kids. He left 8+ years ago, and, although he has kept in touch/visited on breaks/holidays, etc., he still pictures his parents as they were when he was younger and doesn’t understand that we’ve had some experiences (mostly bad, unfortunately) since he left, which have changed us/made us different people/different parents to his youngest sibs.</p>
<p>What has changed for me is that I’m older now, and don’t have the energy to do the physical stuff that I did with my younger kids. I have to fight against the “been there, done that” attitude. I’m not so excited about celebrating every milestone (ho hum, another lost tooth, another birthday, another graduation. . .) </p>
<p>I am looking forward to grandchildren, though!</p>
<p>My dad’s sibs were 13, 15, and 17 years older. When he was born, neighbors gossiped that he was really his oldest sister’s baby.</p>
<p>S was 10 years older than D. No two children were more different than one another than those two. D wrote her CA essay about growing up with a much older brother who was her diametric opposite. </p>
<p>My sister is 10 years older than me. Brother is 7 years older than me. We aren’t really close. I wish we were. Sis and I shared a bedroom 'til she went off to college. After college grad. she moved to an urban area two states away. I was 12. She lives an alternative lifestyle so even as adults our lives are polar opposites. We get along when together but that’s usually once a year at Christmas. </p>
<p>DH and I retired/moved 6 months ago. Brother lives just 35 miles away from us now but he is heavily involved w/ his wife’s family(lives 3 hours away) and makes no effort to see us. The times I’ve seen him since we moved here were when I called and asked if DH and I could come visit for a couple of hours. He seems to enjoy seeing us when we’re there but never makes any effort on his part to see us. </p>
<p>So Christmas is coming soon and the burden of the annual forced march “get together” is all on me. I wonder every year why I make such an effort when nobody bothers to do so the rest of the year. Both of our parents are gone. Our mother once said that after she was gone the three of us would prob. never see each other again and it made her so sad. I guess that’s why we get together at Christmas. Nobody wants to be the one to say “what’s the point?”</p>
<p>My father and his only sibling, a younger sister, were 12 years apart, and they absolutely grew up in two separate families. My grandfather was making much better money by the time my aunt came along and they were able to do things for her that they couldn’t for my dad, although my dad had it much better as an adult. They had a good relationship but were never really close, and my brother and I were never close to that set of cousins, even though we were around the same age. Interestingly, he outlived her - she passed away in 2005 at 63, while my father died in 2012 at 82. </p>
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I am a Baby Scoop Era adoptee. When I was born, my birth grandmother was 42 , my birthmother was 20 and her youngest sister was 3.5. I’ve often wondered what my life would have been like if they had kept me, passed me off as daughter #5, and let people talk. </p>
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My dad’s sibs were 13, 15, and 17 years older. When he was born, neighbors gossiped that he was really his oldest sister’s baby.
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<p>I’ve heard of this sort of thing happening, but I wonder if that means that the neighbors never saw the pregnant mom? That seems odd.</p>
<p>When I was growing up, my dad had a co-worker who was raising his D’s twins that she gave birth to during college. They never told the twins that their oldest sister was really their mom.</p>
<p>I think I have the winner. Just heard from a friend this week that her 45 year old husband is going to have a new baby half-brother. His 70 year old father and 40 something “girlfriend” are expecting. The entire thing seems crazy to me!</p>
<p>My oldest is ten years older than our youngest ( second marriage for both my husband and I ) I see a big difference between their high school experiences mostly…a lot less social media , and a lot less drama back then :D</p>
<p>My husbands grandfather was in his mid-50’s when his fathers new wife claimed she was having his baby. He would have been about 80. When he went to the hospital to see the baby a nurse asked if he was the grandfather and he said no, that’s my brother! </p>
<p>My older sister was 14 years old than me - I was born on her birthday and there was no one in between us. And we had the same parents. I was 7 when she got married. My niece is closer in age to me - just 11 years younger. I thought it was pretty special but then, she was the best big sister ever. I had my kids when I was older so no chance to have a big age gap between the two. My boys are two years apart.</p>
<p>My older brother is 11 months older than me and 12 years older than our youngest brother. There are 2 other siblings in between.</p>
<p>When I was growing up everyone had such large families there were age gaps ranging from 10-20 years over the entire neighborhood.</p>
<p>I am the oldest of 5 children. My only brother is 15 years younger. My youngest sister is 7 years younger than me. As we’ve gotten older the age difference seems to mean less with my sister, and even with my brother to an extent. His wife is young enough to be my daughter (her mother is only a year or so older than me). His three absolutely, adorable little boys are 1, 3, and 6 years old. I get to see what it’s like to have a grandchild without my own children being married or having children yet. I absolutely love watching my youngest nephews play, and I get to enjoy running around with them-doing silly aunt things with them. They are kind of like “pretend” grandkids for me. </p>