Who's the boss anyway?

I have always heard that the youngest child is always a spoiled brat. I thought that was a myth though. I didn't realize that much of these stories come about after years and years of people pro-creating and discovering the reality of it all. The eldest really is self sufficient. The middle does usually get lost somewhere in the middle and the youngest tends to run the household. I'm finding this out five children and five years later.

When I speak of our youngest child Luci, I always seem to refer to her as the baby, except, she's not a baby. She is a month away from being five years old. I have undoubtedly enabled her to be as un-self sufficient as she could possibly be. I did this by pure accident, sub-consciously. I didn't realize this until she was three and a half years old and someone mentioned she must be wearing " big girl panties." I thought this was crazy! She was just a baby! Why would she be potty training? Then I remembered that Annah was potty trained by the time she was two! She was the first of course, I was bound to impress the pediatrician with my mad parenting skills.

I have had an issue that needs council. I refuse to let my youngest grow up. She is of course my last baby I will ever have, I supose many mothers think this way. This is how we end up with the "last child spoiled syndrome." Luci has never had to share, the other kids had to share with her, she was the baby you know! She never had to dress herself, I always did it for her. She still comes to sleep in our bed, and her brothers and sisters always help her get her shoes and coat on.

I did not realize this was a problem until the past week. Ok, perhaps there have been obvious signs for a year now. This past week though, she has been very whiney; too tired to walk down stairs, insisting to sleep in our room. She never has a tantrum, just wimpers. She has made her own rules such as " I will go to bed if YOU find my blankie," and steps, "step one, you find my blankie, step two you bring it to me." I couldn't believe my ears! The other day she told me not to give her that look! I responded with "I didn't give you a look and I'm your mom I can give you a look if I want." she said " you may be the mom, but I'm the boss!" That is when I knew I had a problem. Yes, indeed the last child syndrome.

I finally had a talk with her after our last senerio sittin,g her down like an adult at the table. I had asked her if she new where my keys were and she responded, "no, so deal with it." Again I could not believe my ears.
What had happened to my precious baby Luci. My " precious angel?" I know this is my fault. So while my eldest child resights the square root of pie and has a 4.0 GPA. I am spending my time trying to teach my five year old manners and how to put her own shoes on. If I had another baby I would be sure to not make the same mistake. However if I had another baby she wouldn't be experiencing the last child syndrom now would she?