This topic is the cause of more motherly heartache than most. Your child should always be special, unique, individual. Children develop at different rates and academic performance is not a very good indicator of long-term life performance, job security, moral values or any of the other things which matter in life. It’s akin to measuring the value of a car by engine output alone without considering tyres, driver or suitability for purpose.

Spare yourself the heartache and don’t compare.

It’s much harder to not compare your children to their siblings but even so, you can usually find positive points for each. Sometimes one child will be in ascendancy and sometimes the other will be. It just happens but it doesn’t diminish your love for all of your children. It’s not worth stressing over.