DSD2 (16) is really struggling socially in year 11 and I'm looking for some advice. I'm sorry- it's quite long.
For background, DSD2's parents split when she was 3 months old.
From 6 months of age, DSD2 has had the same consistent 2 sets of parents (Mum & Stepdad, plus Dad & Stepmum).
Age 6 months to 10 years was spent 50/50 care in both homes.
At age 10, DSD2 moved to sole care of Dad and Stepmum, with contact currently at 2 hours per week with Mum. The reason for care change was DSD2's escalating violence (since age 2/3) towards Mum/ Stepdad/ Siblings in Mum's house. Since moving to Dad's house, contact with Mum has been sporadic over the years, with periods of several months 2 hour visits per week, ending abruptly with a violent episode; resulting in several months of no-contact at the insistence of either DSD2 or Mum, before restarting contact again.
For history, DSD2 has a long history of CAMHS involvement from around age 3. Late to talk, so SALT intervention. Frustration from lack of speech we initially believed led to violent tantrums, but once speech issues were resolved the violent behaviour continued at DSD2's mum's home (until present day). Physical violence from DSD2 towards Mum/ Stepdad/ 2 siblings in Mum's home occurs to varying degrees of severity at every single contact time. Physical violence from DSD2 towards Dad and Stepmum has occurred just twice since toddler-hood, and never towards 2 siblings in Dad's home. However, the over-riding daily issue is DSD2's lies and fantasies, which are stopping her from functioning normally in all aspects of her life.
Over the years, both parents and step-parents have attended numerous parenting style classes/ "parent child game"/ TAC meetings/ School intervention groups/ Group family therapies/ most recently NVR group (Sep 2017) etc.
DSD2 has attended anger management/ parent child therapy/ 4 different teen counselling services/ outward bound style confidence boosting trips/ personal counselling with CAMHS worker. She was diagnosed with ODD at age 8, and then un-diagnosed at age 12 when the CAMHS family therapy at that time resulted in a decision that anxiety was the correct cause of her violent and dishonest behaviour.
DSD2 has gained and lost 2 part-time jobs after just a few weeks due to making up awful lies about new colleagues.
She makes friends very easily, but has never kept a friendship longer than 2 months as she tells so many different lies to so many different school and hobby peers, that she is always found out and ostrisized from social groups. She bounces from one social group to the next, until eventually she has annoyed so many that she is left alone. She was expelled (managed move) out of her first secondary school in year 9 due to causing daily/ hourly issues with the lies she made up about nearly every pupil in her year group.
Within a few months of her new secondary school, the lying behaviour re-surfaced, and so we made a renewed referral to CAMHS in the hope that we could try to pinpoint if it was anxiety/ some kind of attachment issue/ an undiagnosed SEN that was causing her destructive/ almost self-harming behaviour. After an 18 month wait, we were accepted back to CAMHS in November 2017/ allocated a new case worker/ had both child and separate parent interviews, and a neurological assessment should be taking place in the next few months. Over the past 18 months DSD2 has been excluded or in isolation countless times, has been involved in physical fights with peers outside of school resulting in police visits at our home, has stolen numerous peer's property, has started to display reckless sexual behaviour. She has had a complete sleepover ban since year 9 (due to lying about her whereabouts), and a complete internet ban since year 10 (due to her lying or bullying peers over social media, and her seeking out older strange men on social media).
No drinking/ drugs, and never disobeys curfews or groundings, but without fail refuses to leave for school until she's sure everyone will have gone in to class. Will put herself in isolation or stay with school counsellor during break times and after school. Occasionally will be verbally abusive (1x 2-3 hour meltdown per month) to Dad and Stepmum in response to being grounded. Perfect sense of right and wrong when something untoward is aimed at her, but absolutely no outward signs of guilt/ empathy/ comprehension of the suffering she has caused to others. Genuinely doesn't seem to understand some social ques- often misinterprets facial expressions or believes people are screaming when just using low authoritative tone. Never ever admits to a lie- will insist that teachers/ police/ peers/ peer's parents are lying instead for their own agendas. But she's also funny, quick-witted, clever, charming to older relations, caring and loving, generous and kind to her younger siblings, thoughtful and sweet with random favours and treats to Dad and Stepmum, hard-working in her animal hobby, mostly happy to lend a hand with chores, never demands money or favours, is appreciative of lifts and special treats.
It's like she's a Jekyll and Hyde with the different ways she acts around either her Dad's family or her Mum's family or her school environment- all 3 environments agree that they cannot "see" or imagine her acting in the way that the other describes as they are completely different characters.
However, the current issue is that her latest lies have caused such uproar at school that DSD2 has been kept in isolation for the latter half of last week whilst the school investigates. DP and I have been asked to attend a meeting tomorrow lunchtime to discuss the school's concerns. DSD2 has only 4 months left until her GCSE's finish, and so although we are hopeful the school will have a plan of how to handle DSD2's destructive behaviour for the remaining time period, we equally fear that the meeting tomorrow is to inform us that the daily issues are so detrimental to the rest of the year group as they approach their GCSE's, that the school may wish to manage move DSD2 out yet again as her impact on the other students is simply unfair to them at such an important time in their education.
I'm not quite sure what I'm asking for- perhaps any insight if any other parents have dealt with persistent lying, or how to handle the school tomorrow, or what education laws I should be looking up. I know DSD2 is entitled to an education, and if she had a diagnosed SEN or a statement/ IEP then we could request adjustments to help her, but with just an undiagnosed destructive student while we're waiting on CAMHS, I feel we don't have a leg to stand on. I'm really worried and I don't feel we're supporting her to the best of our ability.
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DSD2 (16) constant lying
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KittyConCarne · 26/02/2018 00:01
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