7 year old with bad attitude towards me

[sunflowerfi]

Looking for a bit of advice regarding my 7.5 year old daughter.
She is on the whole a good girl but sometimes when she is told off mostly for fighting with or attacking her brother or told no she will launch into a tirade of abuse 'I hate you' , 'you are the worse mum ever' 'you love (little brother age 6) more than me' etc...
In addition to this sometimes she will mutter things under her breath and looks at me like she hates me. Like today for example-my friend's little girl said to her mum 'you're the best mum ever' and totally unprovoked, my daughter said 'well my mum isn't'

It is really starting to get to me and is upsetting and frustrating. She has gone from absolutely adoring me and me being able to do nothing wrong in her eyes to me being public enemy number 1!

Any ideas x

[natmelt]

no ideas - but you are not alone….I've been tearing my hair out over my daughters' truculent & aggressive behaviour. She's nearly 8 and we have regular bouts of open defiance and aggression - 'you ruin my life, I hate you, you don't care about me…..' and downright rudeness. Its exhausting and depressing. She picks on her little sister - hits her when she thinks Im not looking, pulls faces at her, calls her a baby, corrects her endlessly….

Im all ears too if people have good suggestions for you!

[LastingLight]

That muttering under the breath really gets to me and I find it very hard not to react. However that is the best response... don't react. Deep down they don't really mean it. I told my dd "you have 5 minutes to throw your tantrum, if after 5 minutes you choose to continue you will lose x privilege." Or "go to your room, you can join us again when you can behave like a civilised human being" and "I'm sorry you hate me, I still love you". Then DON'T get into an argument about whether or not you love her... and I know this from experience!

Be sure to give her positive feedback when she does something right... "Thanks for sharing with your brother dd, that's a very grownup thing to do" / "Your room is so neat, I bet it feels nice to know where everything is" / "I know you didn't want to play with the blocks when your friend wanted to, you were a good host to do what your friend wanted".

[LastingLight]

Be careful not to create the impression that you only love her when she is being good.

[gatewalker]

I disagree with most of the advice here. Telling a child to go to their room when they are not behaving is a clear indication that some parts of what they do - and who they consider themselves to be - are so unacceptable that they need to be punished by shutting them away. I'm not saying condoning disrespectful behaviour, but sending someone to their room because they're not 'behaving like a civilised human being' does absolutely nothing to encourage communication and to enable your DD to feel safe to express emotions that so many of us find shameful and yet are absolutely normal: rage, anger, hatred, jealousy, etc.

They are normal and need to be acknowledged. She is normal for feeling them. We are all normal for feeling them. It's what we do with them that's usually the problem.

When my son tells me he hates me, I thank my lucky stars inwardly: that he feels safe enough to tell me what emotion - however intense and apparently 'unacceptable' it is - is moving through him. I don't take it personally at all. His expression of it is not being 'naughty'; it's entirely natural. If he were to take that hatred and act upon it by throwing something or trying to hurt someone, then that's when I would act.

Just another side to the the debate.

[mummytime]

Being set to your room isn't that bad a punishment. It can often be a chance for both sides to calm down - and moving away when you are very angry is a very good response to learn.

At 7.5 she still may not be fully able to "think" without vocalising. Selective deafness is a very good response - at least her mumbles show she has heard what you have said and taken them on board.

How often do you praise her or tell her that you love her? Children often reflect back what they hear.
On the other hand some children seem to just say how "wonderful" their parents are when they are in public, a bit like showing off. I think compliments in private may be more real.

One of my children used to be positively looking for another family to adopt her when younger. At other times she can be among the most loving. My DC often say I prefer another one of them, and all think the others have a much better/easier time. Unfortunately this is part of parenting.

They can on occasion be lovely - I try to remember those.

[natmelt]

gatewalker - your response is really interesting. What do you do when they do misbehave? The I hate you's that I get are usually because I have asked them to do something that they object to - picking their clothes up off the floor, or turning the TV off because its dinner time. do you sanction them for their rudeness or ignore it and move on? You must have more tolerance than me!

[SylvaniansKeepGettingHoovered]

It drives me up the wall, my 7.5yr old daughter telling me she hates me, shouting at me and basically not listening to me or doing as she's told. I do send her to her room, she would walk all over me even more otherwise. I don't take it personally as I realise she is allowed to express her feelings but I do have to let her know that behaviour is not acceptable and that it can't carry on unlimited, it's plain rude apart from anything. Other 'punishments' don't seem to work with DD (e.g. she doesn't really care if I take toys away or if I tell her she can't have pocket money). My DD is bossy by nature, and controlling, and wants everyone to do what she says, but it's exhausting for us as a family. She bosses her 5yr old sister around too much aswell.

My DD has perfect behaviour in school (so I'm told) but it seems that she bottles it all up and takes it out on me. Her attitude at home is, at times, pretty disgusting in my opinion. My parents (who we are very close to) have never, ever seen her behave badly - she only behaves badly in front of me,DP and DD2. I don't have the answers but I'm sure sending her to her room for a bit does reduce the behaviour.

[natmelt]

Sylvanian - I don't know if its better or worse that she doesn't act up in from of other people - I have got to the point where I dread taking mine to my mums because i can feel the aura of disapproval if she as much as makes one step out of line. I end up on tenterhooks all the time we are there ….

[Marga1]

I think that this behavior is certainly not limited to your little ones. I have found that screaming and yelling becomes normal if they do not get their way, which can be extremely frustrating when you are trying to get them to solve things verbally. I have even found that sending them to their room (where all their stuff is) has proven rather useless too.

[AllDirections]

Sylvanian Your DD sounds exactly like mine.

I've found it hard when DD3 screams that she hates me because my other 2 DDs didn't do this. But I know she doesn't mean it and I still get lots of little cards and messages to the best mum in the world.

This behaviour is disrespectful but kind of acceptable used in a minimal way, so shouting that they hate you in the middle of a tantrum is acceptable but your DD's comment 'well my mum isn't' would have really upset me. Your DD needs to understand the difference OP.

I don't think sending DC to their bedroom for this kind of behaviour at age 7 is a problem. DC at this age know what they're doing is unacceptable, especially if things have got physical, so it's a good idea to give them space to calm down and reflect. Not that doing this would make any difference to DD3's behaviour generally. It's hard when you have a child who doesn't respond to the usual consequences of behaving badly. It's even harder when people judge you for this. Try walking in our shoes!!

[SylvaniansKeepGettingHoovered]

natmelt it must be hard if your mum is so disapproving of your DD's behaviour. When other people judge, it makes you feel as though you are doing something wrong when actually you're trying your very best and still getting nowhere . The problem I have is that my DD is a different child in front of other people, a proper angel, therefore it can feel a bit like I'm going insane, and if I need to vent my feelings and tell anyone about her behaviour they tend to do a 'oh, hmm really??' expression as if I'm making it all up. So I keep it to myself and suffer inwardly. Of course, I am grateful that she's doing well in school. I worry about what she'll be like as a teenager.

Alldirections at least I'm not alone, it sometimes feels like it - none of the other mums at the school seem to have 'controlling' children (from the way they describe their DC). My DD is clever, and apparently quite advanced with maths and reading/writing, but to me she seems emotionally immature, as she doesn't care how her behaviour affects me and her DD, and consequences don't bother her.

Sunflower - do you get one-to-one time with your DD? How does your DD respond if you spend extra time alone with her? E.g. taking her to a cafe for a cake, or going swimming or something else that she might love doing with you? People tell me this can help improve their behaviour.

[shebird]

Glad my 7 year old DD is not the only one behaving like this. It is sooooo frustrating it have an angel in school but have the complete opposite at home. I wonder if it is my fault but her Dsis is well behaved so I can't be that bad at this parenting stuff.