Why are my girls like this-I need some serious advice

[cocobambino]

My girls are 22 months apart, and all they do is fight, hit, punch, dob, scream, yell, whatever they can do to be nasty to each other, its driving me mental, they have had to share a room because im pregnant with #3 and that just made it worse, they dnt have their own space, when they want their own space one will slam the door in other ones face causing ANOTHER fight and tantrum and more screaming for me to deal with.
They dnt listen to me, i have tried discipine like time out. taking away toys (which they dnt have alot of coz they wreck or loose them). On the weekend when they are both home I am totally exausted by 1pm and hanging out for bed time as bad as that sounds.
They can be loving towards each other but it lasts all of 1min before the other one gets sick of it and it turns into stuffing around.
I tell them 100000 times a day to not run in the house, to not throw themselves at the wall, its like im spending ALL day saying "dont dont dont"
I need something somesort of method because ill have a newborn soon and i just cant have them running riot around the house and waking him every 10seconds..

[blue_hebe]

I can't say I have any experience with this (ie no children of my own)....It sounds incredibly frustrating. My sister and I were about 3 years apart and did our fair share of fighting when we were younger. We shared a room too...

Are there any activities that your daughters can do by themselves (ie not together)? Is it any better that way, or so they just try to distract each other?

Would you older daughter enjoy teaching your younger daughter something new? I remember my sister learnt the recorder at school and I loved it when she come home and gave me a lesson!

Do you have a library nearby? Perhaps Moni (I've just noticed the names in your signiture!) could choose some books for Miah to read to her.

Good luck!

[cocobambino]

Miah tries to read to moni but Moni gets sick of it in the end, miah even tries to teach moni to read but moni will eventually just get sick of it and push the book away.
They will sit down and draw but moni doesnt like it when miah is quiet so she will try be nasty & scribble on miahs drawing or put dots on it or bump miah so she messes it up, same things happens at tea time, moni will put food on miahs plate or touch her food with sauce (miah HATES sauce) I have to put one at each end of the table at meal times.

Im starting to think Montana has some sort of behavioural issue but then again when she is on her own she is magic.

[Lulu]

You just have to keep them busy. It's the only thing that works for me, but its hard because they can't play together (have to have the same crayon etc), so I have one at one end of the house and the other with me, then I swap.

[cocobambino]

You just have to keep them busy. It's the only thing that works for me, but its hard because they can't play together (have to have the same crayon etc), so I have one at one end of the house and the other with me, then I swap.

But how do u manage to keep one at one end of the house while the other is with you, my girls wouldnt have a bar of that without MAJOR crying and "thats not fair" statements

[Lulu]

I do it by stealth...

Get one absorbed in one thing (tv, blocks, drawing), then quietly grab the other one and start an activity down the end of the house, but usually I give them little housework jobs to do with me.
Generally, the older one likes to get stuck into something interesting, but the younger one does all she can to thwart him, knock things over etc. So I say sympathetically - 'here, I'll get her out of your way darling" and he is thrilled to be left alone..

I only get about 30 mins each time, but I break up the day as much as I can. Sometimes I even pit the little buggers against each other to see who can pick up more toys at cleanup time

Although now DS is more patient I'm looking for activities that will have them working together to achieve things so they can appreciate each other more.