Spare a thought for the child left behind

Katie has just started school for the first time. She seems to be okay with it; at five years old, she's mature enough to come home and try to address all the strange new activities and relationships that occupy her morning - by turning her bedroom into a schoolhouse and giving lessons to the cats. There have been emotional ups and downs, and we know there will be more. But we know as well that there are plenty of places for us to turn for advice on supporting our new schoolgirl - to parenting books, to her teacher, to gurus on the radio and even in newspapers. There's no shortage out there, either, of verbiage about our own sense of loss as she grows away from us. But there's someone else in the house for whom this is a devastating wrench. Mary is just two, just coming into her own as a social being - and now her friend and guide in the world of childhood, her big sister, has been taken away from her for five hours a day. "Where my Kay-Kay?" she'll ask, heartbreakingly. For a child who's not particularly prone to displays of misery, she can be very open about the source of her pain: "Me no wan' Kay-Kay go schoo'," she cries out. She loves bringing Katie to school early enough so that she can take a seat and a book and pretend to be a junior-infant schoolgirl, too. But this time there are limits to her imitation - "Would you like to go to school with Katie?" we ask.

"When me get biiiggg," she replies, clutching the grown-up's hand that bit tighter. Back home, for the first time in her life, she's getting hours of time with her mother, without her chief rival. Even then, though, her mentor is on her mind.

The other day, having carefully covered her fingernails with paint, she ran from the room shouting "Me show Kay-Kay!" Her heart visibly sank when she remembered that Katie wasn't in the sitting room, but much further away. Like every big sibling that ever lived, Katie can't help exploiting her power. On the way home from school, she showers abuse on her lovesick baby sister; sometimes she reduces her to tears by describing a playgroup where mammies aren't allowed to stay. Other afternoons, all is quiet, and we go to the bedroom door to see Mary sitting on the floor with the cats. "Now," Katie tells her, "you can be the new girl in class . . ."