I find Ashley difficult to handle when his hormones are out of whack.  There is a distinct difference and I would never deny that fact or hide it from others.  However, as Ive said to him many times, its not an excuse to be like that.  Mind you in all honesty, he only ever loses it when other people are mean in the first place.  All children handle things in different ways.  I have four boys here and they are ALL different.  Some are assertive, others are not so assertive.  I find Aran the middle one to be the most defiant ironically.  The fourth born (Kyle) is highly strung but then he has been that way since he was born basically.  Nothing we did as parents made him that way.  The fifth one is the comedian of the family.  He is only three and already does impressions of the other four and has them all sussed out personality wise.  It’s only when you have this many that you see how different they are personality wise and that how you handle them has absolutely no bearing on how they develop personality wise.  A shy child will always be shy no matter what you try to do.  An assertive child will always be so no matter what you say or do.  I think its’ best to go with it.  We’re all meant to be different anyway, otherwise the world would be a boring place to be IMO.  

Bullying:

Sometimes siblings to argue and bicker and --its perfectly natural---nothing wrong with it.  I would not shelter my kids from this type of stuff for the simple fact that the world and the people in it do this anyway and occasionally they are going to come up against people like this in life and need to know how to handle. 

Bullying, hitting is similar to assault though and it is wrong--but even then even if an ideal world this happens.  It would be nice if kids didnt do that but unfortunately they do.  Kids can be quite cruel.  But then so can adults.  I’d say not being accepted into a community is as bad as being bullied and hit when you consider it on a mental scale and the damage it can effect and it happens.  Bullying happens on a mental scale not just a physical scale should I say.  It’s often someone who is different that cops it.  Thats the way it is sometimes in life.  People that cop it most end up tougher than you could ever imagine.  :)