qualities. She felt safe and well taken care of by him as she had with her brother whom she admired. Over the years, however, she began to have bouts of depression and lethargy, during which Pierre ran the household. She started thinking that her identity was being eroded by Pierre’s take-charge way of organizing their lives. She did not know much about his childhood and simply began to think he was a born dictator.
During a number of therapy sessions, Pierre began to be aware of the anxiety that lay behind his impulse to take over a situation and start giving orders. His entire self-image was at stake. He feared that if he did not fulfill his prescribed role of leader when things got tough, he would not be accepted and the whole family would fall apart. He found his wife’s reactions quite puzzling at first because he genuinely believed he was just being loving.
It helped his wife to hear that Pierre’s anxiety about being accepted was what lay behind his behavior. She learned to see his actions in a different light. Although he felt tremendously vulnerable, Pierre eventually learned not to go into automatic take-charge mode when things got rough. He learned to feel more comfortable with his vulnerability and to appreciate his wife’s abilities and her input into joint decision making.
Even at play many oldest children work hard and are high achievers. It’s not enough to jog, they have to run — and win — a marathon. It’s not enough to have a friendly game of tennis, they have to attack the ball and demolish the opponent.
They are more likely than others in their family to experience jealousy and express anger. Unless their parents have been abusive physically, oldests most often express their anger verbally, which is quite effective since they tend to have high verbal skills. If they have experienced intense jealousy over the youngest, these feelings may be transferred to other scapegoats in the future — minorities or “welfare bums” — whom the oldest perceives as “getting away with things” and getting ahead “without doing a day’s work,” just like a younger sibling.
b. As A Spouse
Many oldest children have unhappy marriages. Spouses often find them impatient and demanding. Oldests who only have same-sex siblings have a particularly difficult time because they have no experience of living intimately with the opposite sex.
Oldests usually do better when married to someone who was a youngest or middle sibling and may do quite well if they both had opposite sex siblings. They tend to believe in the importance of marriage and want to stay married no matter what. If the marriage ends, they are prone to strong feelings of failure and guilt.
When married to a typical youngest, oldests often see their spouse as less competent and take over doing everything, but then come to resent having to do everything. Oldests often don’t feel loved by their spouses and in their anxiety compensate by dominating the household and trying to be more in charge. They do more of what they are good at, thinking this will bring the love they want.
c. As A Parent
Oldests usually want to have children and are responsible parents. They may be very nurturing and loving or overprotective and strict, sometimes harsh, in their childrearing. They often appear to their children as cold and distant people, whereas inside they crave the respect of their children.
They are more likely than others to demand adult behavior in their children. Since they try hard to be a perfect parent, they often pressure children to walk, talk, read, etc., before they’re ready.
The oldest children of small families are usually happier parenting than the oldests of large families who may have been overburdened and burned out in childhood by caring for many younger siblings.
d. As A Friend
Partly because they use their power to get their own way and partly because they tend to be undemonstrative and serious, oldest children find it difficult to make friends. They usually have just one close friend. They tend to be sensitive to personal slights. Though anxious to please those in authority, oldests are often less popular generally than those in other birth orders.
Although they appear to be independent, they need the approval of others and without it have a low self-esteem. Researcher Margarete Lautis found in her work with oldests that they were “adult-orientated...serious, sensitive...conscientious.” They may be “shy, even fearful or self-reliant, independent and undemonstrative.” Their difficulty with revealing their weaknesses inhibits the development of close, intimate friendships. They tend to “keep up appearances” even with close friends because they don’t want to lose the admiration of anyone.
Oldests have had the experience of always being the leader of the other children in the family and are used to being the best at everything and having the most power with siblings. Therefore, they are used to being able to say, even demand, what they want and will more often be confrontational than manipulative. Just as they ended up being loyal to their parents, they will be loyal to other people in their life and expect loyalty from others. Often, the merely independent actions of others seem like a betrayal to oldest children who may have been surprised and hurt by the rebellion of their younger siblings.
e. At Work
Oldest children tend to choose careers that either put them in positions of authority or allow them to work independently. Their need to perform well makes them so anxious as employees that they tend to do less well than if they are in charge or are working without supervision. As employees they can often find themselves in conflict or at odds with their boss if the boss is not also a hard-working oldest. They know better than their boss about how a job “ought” to be done.
They go into helping professions or leadership positions to gain admiration and respect. They often become managers, ministers, teachers, lawyers, and judges. They also do well in intellectual work that requires disciplined, abstract thought with little emphasis on personal relationships — areas such as engineering, physics, higher mathematics, architecture, and chemistry. They are less often in creative work and if they are, they tend to be more conventional than later-birth-order artists.
Eminent scientists and mathematicians are overrepresented by oldest sons. Well-known theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, author of A Complete History of Time, is the oldest of four children. He grew up wanting to figure out how things worked and developed the modest goal in life of having “complete understanding of the universe.”
Oldests are also frequently found in academic careers, especially in medicine, law, and psychology. Pioneering heart surgeon William DeVries is an oldest child. Albert Schweitzer, missionary-physician, philosopher, theologian, and music scholar, was an oldest who combined both the intellectual and the nurturing capacities of oldests in his life’s work.
Oldests may seek positions of authority where they can use their natural aura of authority in either an ambitious climb to the top or an idealistic effort to change the world for the better. Oldest child Rene Levesque, former leader of the Parti Quebecois in Canada, fought for the sovereignty of Quebec by leading the separatist movement away from terrorism and into mainstream politics.
f. To The Parents of An Oldest Child
You can help your oldest child most by putting less pressure on him or her to succeed and openly giving more love and approval just for existing. Admit your own mistakes to your oldest to show that mistakes happen and no one is perfect. Avoid criticizing the accomplishments of your oldest or re-doing something he or she has done less than perfectly. Point out what’s right about the attempt, not what’s wrong.
