Fed up with DD 14 uncontrollable behaviour

[toomanytimes]

I am at my wits end with DD who is extremely selfish and we are unable to control her behaviour. Many of you know that I have posted previous threads on her behaviour and that we have support from SS, CAMHS worker and various other networks in school, but none of this appears to be doing any good. This week DD's BF has now been let out after being grounded since the beginning of Sept after they disappeared for a night, DD has now been going out every evening and whilst we give her a set time to come back in, she constantly takes the piss but turning up 45 mins to an hour late. (I am trying to relax over letting her out at night in the dark but it is hard as I worry over safety) we set the time a 7.00 - 7.15 because I feel that this time is late enough during the week. Last night she went out and told to be home at 9.00 (15 min leeway) but she texted to say 10.00, we replied no and she did not answer, she finally came in at midnight after a long exhaustive texting session where I threatened several time to call the police to report her missing. She came in and was not concerned that she was out so late. Detentions come thick and fast, with her not turning up to attend them, she has now got a Sat detention but she states she is not going. In order to try and bring her back to earth and behave as I have truly had enough of her behaviour we have now stated that she must earn her pocket money by coming in at the set time or she will lose her credit for next weeks pocket money (obviously this would be on a daily basis), she replied don't care. my concern is that she will walk out anyway, but (a) start stealing and (b) have sex for money (god I hope not) I am I right to stop all money, otherwise how can we make her see what she is doing to the family and risking her safety. Do we just let her get on with it, but it is hard and my sanity cannot take this. Should I stop her phone credit but how will she text us with no credit. Any help or advise here would be great. CAMHS worker feels that she might have mild ASD.

[toomanytimes]

Very stressed mother.

[Errmmmm]

I feel for you, we're in the same position and it's absolutely exhausting, isn't it? We've also had her go missing, multiple detentions, saturday detention and coming in later than she's supposed to.

I wish I had an answer. We usually confiscate the phone first, and then grounding. She often seems a lot calmer when grounded - I guess she gets tired of all the rebellion too and has the excuse to opt out of things her friends are doing because she's not allowed out.

Is she unhappy at school? we're in the process of transferring our errant teen and she is behaving slightly better as a result.

It's extremely frustrating because every part of me screams that we should be coming down like a tonne of bricks on her, but all the advice we've had is to go easy because the chances are she'll run if we are too harsh

Let me know if you find any answers! thanks

[toomanytimes]

Hi Ermmmm

Don't think she is unhappy at school, she usually goes and most of the time gets there on time, which is a bonus. Tried the whole grounding thing, believe me this does not work as she just tends to walk out of the house anyway. Money always seemed to work as a threat but even that does not work now, however we will see, she was told that if she wanted money she would have to obey out set times and rules, she went out this afternoon and the rang me up, expecting me to come into town and give her money for lunch, not a chance!! told her so and then received a very horrible text message. Lets see if she comes in at 6.00. As for taking her phone away, tried that too it resulted in her staying out all night without contact, so even if she has her phone at least we can get a text message from her. Besides last time we took phone away resulted in some pretty heavy physical abusive with a threat to stab DH.

I am dreading Christmas, as probably will stay at home

[Emjxxx]

No words of advice I'm afraid just to say you are not alone. My DD is 13 and we are having all the same problems. We have help via the school counsellor and link worker,her teachers especially her head of year are very very good and tolerant of her and she has outside counselling. None of it is helping in anyway shape or form. Grounding her doesn't work, she just walks out anyway, she's never home on time at least 45 minutes late and never an apology. We have had to report her missing and have had half the police force out looking for her, eventually found after 9 hours at 530am in the morning.Her bedroom looks like and smells like a tip! Latest was her refusing to go to bed and keeping us all up. At 230am I had had enough and stormed into her room to find her on the laptop!!! she had sneaked downstairs turned the router back on and from some internet site had got some sort of password that over rid the security and time lock. She was on FB! talking to older men and sending them very provocative photos of herself. I went mad (as you would)she was threatening to hit me and smash my face in and she did actually hit and push me a few times, she ended up jumping out of her bedroom window (this is at 230am). She sat on the ledge thing that's just below her window over the front door and realised she couldn't jump down but also couldn't get back in her window. She then went on to wake the whole street up by screaming and shouting at the top of her voice, calling me every name under the sun. We have at this moment in time taken all luxuries off of her including hair dryer and straigteners! We have told her that she either has to get a paper round and buy her things back off of us or go to Cadets and prove she deserves her things returned to her. She's chosen to go to Cadets.......we will wait and see. It breaks my heart when she behaves in this way as I feel I have completely failed her, I can't begin to imagine what it is that is making her so unhappy and miserable that she acts like this, i have begged and pleaded with her to tell me what the matter is. I love my little girl so much. What's even more frustrating is that she is, despite her behaviour, doing well at school and based on her recent test results she heading for A's and B's. Her school report said that her attitude is holding her back from reaching her full potential :(

[Errmmmm]

As for taking her phone away, tried that too it resulted in her staying out all night without contact

Yup, I get you there. We had a missing weekend where she had no phone too.

The most useful thing that I've done so far is to take a list of numbers from her phone when it's been in my possession, so now if she goes missing again I have many numbers I can try to attempt to find her. When I got calls from 'parents' who were obviously under 20yrs old, I did 1471 and recorded those numbers, then googled them, and stored whatever information I could from the results (they were always teenagers)

The other useful thing is to be able to access her facebook account. I'm not on her friend's list (she won't let me and quite frankly I don't want all the crap yack from her friends all day every day), but I can access her wall via my younger dd's account. Teenaged dd is daft enough to keep updating who she's with even when she's off the radar, and it's proved useful when tracking her down. She hasn't figured out how we're finding her yet, but I guess it's only a matter of time.

We have been warned by the police, who have been involved a couple of times in her disappearances, not to manhandle her and we feel like we're over a barrel. It's nasty but we can only hope that it's a short lived madness and that all the people (with grown up kids) are telling the truth when they tell us that they went through the same but that now their kids are in their 20s, they are lovely.

[asdx2]

I'd suggest negotiation and rewards rather than punishment tbh the last thing you want is battle lines drawn.7 o clock is really early to expect a teen to be home IME and will cause resentment and disobedience.Try asking what time her friends go home,how they get home and what she could do to reassure you that she can be trusted to come home safely at an agreed time.My older ones are 23,21 and 17 and have managed to come through unscathed because we talked things through and negotiated.You really have to face facts that you need their cooperation because you can't force them to comply however much you try.

[GypsyMoth]

another here with an errant teen. she has calmed recently tho. i'm a lone parent and her head of year hinted this was why she was misbehaving....i told her this,and she's turned herself around now...seemingly!!

[toomanytimes]

Gosh Emjxx, reading your post was like looking at our life, it really mirrored what we are going through. Exhausting most of the time isn't it.

Ermmmm. We are unable to access phone or facebook as password protected, I am on her friend list but she often is on the chat link so unable to see what she is upto.

7.00 for coming in is plenty late enough during the week, she stays out a little later on non-school nights. Besides it is now winter, very dark and heightens the risk to safety. I am sure there will be many parents or people out there who would be the first to say, what was she doing out at that time, this time of year, especially as she is not going to a friends house but congregating at the park or down at the shops.

If she were going to a friends house it would be a different story, but we know she isn't.

[Emjxxx]

Hi toomanytimes, yes it is very emotionally exhausting.

I completely understand about the FB thing, we have got set up on the computers at home family safety and the computer is blocked to all sites each site requires permission and a password which only me and DP know, however whilst out and at school she accesses FB etc via friends phones and friends computers, this is also how she found these hack sites that give you all sorts of help and passwords and phrases to over ride family safety/ parental controls!!

Its all very draining and upsetting we are trying our best to reach compromises with her with regards to internet access etc etc and we even agreed to allow her a FB account as long as we were friends and we restricted her friends to 60 (she really and truely doesn't know 60 people) but even then she took the biscuit. We thought she was being very good and kept her friends to only the people we knew and her conversations etc were very well mannered, only to find out she had set up another account that she was using and it had all sorts on it, it was actually very upsetting, provocative photos, the most awful language, "friends" with total strangers and men that were older than I am!! she was telling the most awful lies to people (like I was in a coma or that I had cancer)

At the moment there's not a day that doesn't go by that she doesn't call me an awful name, she talks to me and DP like we are something she has stepped in, but then demands that she is taxied around and that activities are paid for etc. We have been told by all counsellors not to ground her from her out of school activities so we haven't but we do get cross at this as we are ferrying her around and spending a lot of money and she doesn't appreciate it at all.

We've compromised on the time she comes in, at this time of year as it's very dark and horrible weather we said 8pm she said 9pm so we met in the middle at 830pm even then though she takes the mickey and we are lucky if she's in at 9pm! I wouldn't mind so much if she was at a friends but she's not she's hanging around in the park!

I hate the hostility in the house, I dread her coming home from school, I never know what mood she's going to be in. I cry everyday and feel so bad about failing her :(

[KathH]

These posts could be coming from me - we're going through exactly the same thing. Has come to a head now as on Saturday night she announced she was getting her tongue pierced. She had a major strop because she couldnt believe at 14 I wasnt going to let her. She then went upstairs and chucked a bottle of water over ds's tv. DH went mad and really, really shouted at her. She gave him a mouthful of abuse and stormed a few doors down to her best friends. Dh went to get her back but as best friends mum was out the pair of them switched the lights off and wouldnt answer the door. Dh came home and said best to leave her there till morning. When I got in this afternoon she'd been in and gone out telling ds she'll be back at 11. DS then told me that she told the school today that DH tried to strangle her and threatened to kill her. Apparently the school have informed Social Services. Am really really at my wits end

[desertmum]

We went through a terrible time with DD when she was 13/14 where she sneaked out at night etc. One night I locked her in her room with a bucket in case she needed to wee. If she started all that crap again that is what I would do again to keep her safe. However, I don't live in UK. All this 'don't manhandle them' stuff is, imo, complete crap. If my children need to be manhandled to keep them in the house then that is what will happen. Teenagers are not rational human beings and unfortunately the powers that be in UK have given them far too much power over their own destiny. It is not good for the kids or for society either.

I am not advocating beating or hitting your children but if you have to hang on to them to stop them leaving the house and putting themselves in danger then you should be allowed to do so without fear of repurcussion.

Sorry, bit of a rant and not terriblt useful but it makes me so mad when parents are unable to parent their children appropriately due to rules and regulations that are ridiculous.

[SecondhandRose]

Having read a few books but am no means a guru. It is all about attention, pushing boundaries and reactions.

Clear written boundaries with clear written consequences.

You can keep her home by sitting on her all evening if you have to or perhaps handcuffing her to you (am not joking). She needs to know that you are in control and not her. At the moment SHE is in control and upsetting you at every turn.

Make life interesting at home. Have movie nights, get some popcorn in with just your family. Make her sit down, put a blanket over you all and hold her hand under the blanket. Teenagers still need constant love and reassurance.

Ask her opinions on things.

Hug her every day and tell her you love her.

Tell her to invite a couple of friends over one night and you will pay for a pizza.

It is not acceptable to be out late/over night at 14 especially with a boyfriend.

Take the reins and stop letting her run you ragged. Stop arguing - you will never win!

[GypsyMoth]

i hide all her shoes!! she cant go out then,and wont wear mine!

[SecondhandRose]

Ha Ha, I like that one Tiffany, you are DEF in control!

[toomanytimes]

Emjxx

It really does seem as though we are living in parallel lives. As for clear boundaries and written consequences, been there, done that and well and truly got the t shirt. She will conveniently forget and then state don't care.

As for sitting with the family, that would be horrifying for her, we can't even get her to stay in the room for more than 30 minutes before we bore her or she wants to watch something else. We have done the friends thing and she knows that friends can come over. Hopefully by informing her she has to earn her pocket money by coming in on time will work. So far, she has come in on time or stayed in, tonight she was home a whole 30 minutes before curfew time, nearly fainted, be interesting to see how long it lasts. Its not just home which is causing problems, she is rebellious at school with a bad attitude. Again the House Leader had to speak to her about her behaviour. We do seem to go through peaks and troughs.

I am sure we will come out of it the other end, but just sheer hell and exhaustion getting there.

[SecondhandRose]

Maybe you can give her a tiny reward when she does do as she is asked. Maybe try breaking her pocket money up into 50p tokens and you give her a token and at the end of the week you can exchange them for cash. I would suggest you don't take tokens away though.

Do you have a DH/DP? Is he involved enough?

[toomanytimes]

Well can it get any worse.

DD has just be excluded from school again, this time it may be all week and then she will have to go up in front of the school governors and maybe expelled. She was excluded because she tore up a reminder note to state that she had a detention tomorrow (sat) in front of the whole class, so she was sent to see the Headmaster, but she could not be bothered to wait to see him and walked out of school when the bell went. Received this phone call from the House leader to tell me this at the same time as being at the vets to my poor old pussy cat to sleep. Hence I am totally fed up with her. Nothing appears to be working, even the separating the £1 credit every time she attends school all day and turns up for detentions. Had a chat to the social worker today, not much use in fact she spoke to DH and he was really getting frustrated with her, he said she kept talking to him as a child. She asked him what did he want, feel, wished, he stated that he wished he had a magic wand and fast forwarded 4 years so she would be 18 and old enough to leave home and family life gets back to normal. He also felt brat camp would be a good idea but there is not one around.

In for a good weekend (not!!)

[GypsyMoth]

Same position. DD 14 has been truanting. Due to be excluded now as her behaviour is rubbish in school and very bad at home.

What do they do during exclusion?? Send work home?

[toomanytimes]

No, this is the 3rd time that she has been excluded and no work has been sent home, therefore in my eyes this is not punishment, she can go do what she wants except be on school grounds. It is meant to be that she is now allowed out, but who is going to stop her as both DH and I work and certainly do not have any A/L left to take, as it is booked over Christmas.

There certainly needs to be a BRAT school that these lovely children can go to that does not cost the earth.

[toomanytimes]

That should read NOT allowed out

[Tortington]

my mantra for the kids was that they could always walk out - i wasn't going to manhandle them! they are nigger, taller and stronger than i am,,,so yes...walk out, its the getting back in again thats th problem. this led to an incident i have recounted on Mn many times where my son spent the night in the shed.

if mine were late for kerfew ( at 14 it was 9pm) then it went down the next day minus the extra time that they took that evening - so if they wwaltzed in at 10pm - the next day would be 8pm kerfew.


Regarding the poster who said her dd had told the school and got ss involved... i think its always important to remind them of this...if ss get involved your dh won't be removed erm...she will, i think they think that you are going to get into trouble, like telling your mums mum - they haven't thought it through.

i remember dd had a talk at school and they had a secret number they could ring that wouldnt show up on the phone bill, during a furious row, she threatened to call ss, and i said v. calmly " Darling, if you don't want to live here, just say so, pass me the phone and i'll ring them myself"

the ....penny....slowly...dropped!

[Tortington]

bigger* i have false nails on! sorry