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Also, my son finds it hard to share his feelings. What could be going on emotionally? We don't know many parents in the area and wonder what type of support we could get with this. Thank you!

Could you alternate who does bedtimes for each child - although your daughter will benefit from one to one so will your son - and as little disruption from the previous routines as possible. Reading to them both together could be even more competitive so if you’re both available continuing to give them individual time is ideal

Your little boy, quite rightly is feeling a little bit jealous. I would tell him that as he is now the big brother, he gets special privileges and one is being allowed to stay up a little later than his younger sister. I would then put your daughter to bed with her story and one on one time with you, and then i would put your son to bed with his story - and if he wants the same story as his sister then so be it - and then he would also get one on one time with you. It would also be a good time to then discuss with him any worries or concerns that he has. He just needs lots of reassurances from you that he is still special - remember he has had you all to himself for a long time before his sister turned up. You also need to carve out some special time for just him and you - whether that is a regular trip somewhere etc and let your husband look after your daughter which will help with their bond. as you are both tired, understandably, bring bedtime forward a bit so they are both in bed at the time that you want. best wishesxx

It is tricky when you need to spend bonding time with a new child. I agree that your son is probably feeling a little jealous and insecure - I think it's only natural, but it sounds like he is at school so could you do extra daytime bonding with your daughter? We had something similar with our two adopted siblings - and our solution was to alternate bedtimes as suggested above - we'd do a child each and then swap over the next night etc. Now our AD is 16 and doesn't get tucked in anymore, but Mr Haven and I still alternate with our AS, who is going on 11 (although we don't do stories much now). We have also always said lots of things that suggested we have no favourites, for example, "We wouldn't have two children if we wanted a favourite" and " love is like a tap that you can't turn off - it just keeps coming and there's enough for everyone in the family - no-one goes short". We were very very careful to be seen to make things as even as we could - down to the number of Christmas presents they got! How old is your AD? You said you didn't know many parents and I wondered if you were managing ways to get out and meet people, which sounds like it could be good for you - is she young enough for mother and toddlers groups or Bookbugs at the Library, that sort of thing? Best of luck. It's a tricky balance, but I'm sure things will get better. Hxx

I'd suggest either staggering the bedtimes as mentioned above - though that can mean using a lot of time out of an evening (but must have been what we did back when ours both needed putting to bed) or alternate who does which child. We did that for years with dd2 who needed lots of prep time and couldn't always settle. But eventually she told us she preferred 3 consecutive nights with one of us as she got used to our slightly different approaches and didn't like switching every evening.