Tonight DD11 attacked me

[AttackedAgain11]

I posted in behaviour and development but I does seem pretty quiet on the board.

I don't know what to do anymore I really don't.

DD11 has been prone to violent outbursts for as long as I can remember. Along with being verbally attacked she gets physical too. All this is only ever at me.

Tonight I asked her for her phone to check it. I don't check it every day as is recommended because she's a sensible kid and has always said she'd be open if anyone messages her out of the norm.

Anyway, she refused to hand it over and was quite vocal about not doing so, so I started to climb her bunk to get said phone. She started kicking me as I got to the top and managed to grab her phone so I jumped down as worried she'd end up kicking me in the stomach (I'm 6m pregnant).
This led her to jumping down off her bed and slapping me and screaming at me. As I tried to unlock her phone she found it quite funny that she had changed her pass code and refused to tell me it so I told her I was cancelling her contract and she can do without a phone at all. Told her she was being rediculous as I'm only trting to keep her safe and protect her.
Another rage ensured where she started throwing things at me (books, pillows, a plate) and started slapping me again (round the face pretty hard at one point)
I regrettably took a menacing step towards her to try and get her to back off and she threw herself onto the floor dramictally (sp) screaming.

I stepped away and went to sit on dd5's bed as she was getting rather upset, DD11 hit me again and said she was running away. I went to follow her and after her turning and throwing something else clipped her round her ear (I know, I actually feel terrible) I ran behind her downstairs to get all the keys out of the door to prevent her from leaving.
She carried on raging threatening to call social services on me and the police to have me put in jail for child abuse.

I told her she needed to take herself off to bed and calm down and I started upstairs to go sooth other DC.
She ran past me to the top and grabbed hold of me and said she was going to push me down the stairs. I replied with "go on, acting just like your dad" (he's my ex and once pushed me down the stairs when pregnant).
She gave me another hard slap around the face and sat in dd5's bed.

I stood at the bedroom door as was worried she'd attack her also. Kept getting told she hates me, neighbours will ring police as they will have heard me shouting etc saying "go on, keep crying and tell everyone how horrible I am and that it's all my fault".

I told her I was extremely disappointed in her behaviour, said how she has more freedom than most 11 year olds and that if she wanted to act like a baby she'd be treated as such. I left the room telling her to get into her own bed and said goodnight and dispite everything she believes I do love her.

She has come downstairs since and apologised saying she doesn't know what's wrong with her and we've had a good chat about how violence isn't definitely not the answer. Had a cuddle and she's gone to bed.

I'm not sat on the sofa sobbing my heart out not knowing what to do now. He bloody slaps hurt and my face is throbbing.

I really don't know what to do. She's agreed that she needs some sort of anger management.

I hardly this badly tonight I know I did 😔

I've never checked my kids phones and don't know their passwords - they are now 18 and 16 and have had significant issues over the years which we have talked about. I'd be pretty resistant to someone doing this to my phone. My work used to pay for it but I wouldn't have appreciated them demanding it to read all my texts and messages. I don't want an enforcement type of relationship with my kids, or one in which my paying for things is used against them. I would also never want to put my children into a restraint hold! I dont know if people saw the Panorama on people with learning difficulties being abused in a care home but restraint is very much a last resort and for very extreme circumstances. And no one should be held for more than a minute.

Clearly your daughter does need counselling and support. If she is aware her father was violent towards her mother or even witnessed any of it she could have been very traumatised by that or by the break up and now a new family set up. Being compared to him would not be at all helpful either and compound her sense of loss, hurt and pain. She really needs support to talk through her issues and find a safer way to express her negative feelings.

OP you should also think about getting some support and counselling. None of us are perfect and I have not behaved well at all on occasion - I hope you apologised too and can also get some support to look at de-escalating conflict situations and coping with it in a boundaried way. Walking away sounded like a really good option in that scenario.

Kokeshi Well the oldest ones are 25, 23 and 20 now so if they are up to anything on their phones it’s up to them.

But seriously, I talk to my kids. They weren’t bullied in school. They (hopefully) didn’t bully. My girls didn’t send naked selfies and don’t now. Nobody was groomed.

Don’t get me wrong: my kids aren’t angels: one is a bit wild and definitely partied too much at uni but didn’t keep any secrets about it. One struggled with self harming for about a year in her teens and I don’t honestly think looking at her phone would have helped with that; rather it gave her a safe channel to discuss things and vent with friends while we helped her get help.

They are very happy, self confident young people though and we have a very good relationship.

She is 11 years old, your her parent. I would remove her phone permanently and take her for a visit to The Police and let them give her a friendly warning what will happen if she ever does that again. If you do not nip this in the bud now, she will continue to attack you because there is no clear consequences to her actions.

To be fair Tinkly you're children are a lot older than 11. I think what children can be exposed to is much, much worse now than it was even 9 years ago when your youngest was the same age. And certainly when your oldest was that age.

Please don't get the police to 'warn' her OP. She needs to know that you are there to help her with this, not become scared of you having her 'sent to jail'.

Well that’s a fair point Ben but my youngest is 13 and I’ve never checked his phone either. I think he mostly uses it to look at videos of people doing daft things on bikes.

However he’s a different sort of character to the older three (quite alpha and sporty where they were more emo and geeky) so there will undoubtedly be different issues. He already has one girl pestering him to go on a date so we have had a talk about that.

What are people checking for then? Grooming, bullying, accessing dodgy sites? Surely all that can easily be deleted? And when do you all stop checking? Do you not feel that constant monitoring and micromanagement of kids’ lives can lead to anxiety and basically lack of resilience?

I was one of those parents who had the computer in the living room so I could vaguely see what they were doing and that they weren't on anything unsafe but didn't really check tablets.
That was until I found out that while at a friends house DD had signed up with her friend to a game that had a chat room, had added anyone who had added her and was in a conversation about making out with God knows who. She was 11 and still at primary at the time so damn right I checked her phone when she got one for secondary school.
It was how I found out about some very toxic behaviour from her now thankfully ex friend too.
I don't check now she's 16.

Hmm, I never let my kids have computers or consoles or even TVs in their rooms until they had laptops for sixth form. For some reason phones never bothered me.

Yeah, checking the phone of an 11 year old child is the issue here /sarcasm

I think you handled it pretty well all things considered.

Her reaction would make checking her phone even more urgent imo. I would assume that there is something there she cannot process/handle. Children often react non verbally (cry/lash out) when they literally are unable to process something, it is so outside of their world they don't even have words for it.

I agree that getting her into some therapy - not just for a week/month but for the foreseeable future. Having someone neutral to talk to and build a rapport with could be very helpful. Don't underestimate the effect of the early years with her violent dad, those are formative years for brain development.

I also agree that this is an emergency situation. She'll be a teen soon, probably similar size/strength as you, young siblings in the home. This fire needs to be put out before it becomes really out of control.

Do you not feel that constant monitoring and micromanagement of kids’ lives can lead to anxiety and basically lack of resilience?

Absolutely, @TinklyLittleLaugh, I agree with you there, but only if you handle it badly. I normally have a quick check when they're in bed - it was agreed before they got their phones that I could if I wanted to, I don't even think they think about it now. DS can have some things on his phone that I'm not thrilled about - normally rude jokes and language with his mates etc, that he would never use anywhere else, but I would never ask him about that because it's not a big deal, it's just normal stuff. When he was threatened (with a knife) that was a whole different ballgame.

I don't see that as micromanaging and I certainly don't think they do either. Unfortunately, your 13 year old will be.exposed to much more worrying stuff on the internet than your older children were. It's shit isn't it.

I'm off to bed now, it's nice to have a chat with someone on MN, especially with a difference of opinion, without it descending into a barney! 😂

'
Her reaction would make checking her phone even more urgent imo. I would assume that there is something there she cannot process/handle. Children often react non verbally (cry/lash out) when they literally are unable to process something, it is so outside of their world they don't even have words for it'

I would definitely agree with this!

All the civilised people stay up late Ben.

I so wish I could sleep. Chemo day today and the steroids keep me awake, I'm normally out for the count by half ten!

You must be shaken, sounds awful. Have you got option through school or local authority or docs to do parenting course such as family links or pre teen talking teens. There are definitely people who work with families and for on going disputes and changing family dynamics they are really good and positive. I did it through ds primary school and still refer back to the books when have something to deal with

She most certainly does not deserve privacy around her phone because she is 11 and you need to know what is on there.

She doesn't deserve a phone, she doesn't deserve a hug. She could have damaged your unborn child tonight, she has hurt you and you are blaming yourself. Does that sound right to you?

She sounds like a bully and you are the victim here. Take her to the GP because she needs some help. What you can't do is shrug it off because one day, if you don't sort it out, you will be visiting her in prison before too many years have rolled by.

Probably not a popular opinion but true nonetheless.

I suspect their is behaviour that you display that is not actually being admitted here.

Children raised in loving homes with supportive parents don't generally act this way at 11 unless there is something else going on.

I think the way you acted only escalated the situation TBH, you climbed on a top bunk at 6 months pregnant to snatch things from your DD then you yelled, engaged in intimidating behaviour and then slapped her across the face...... she sounds to me like she is mimicking your (and likely ExH's) behaviour right back at you.

I think you both need to seek help here and not just put it all back on her.

Also, I just want to add I don't mean that in a nasty way but an impartial, this is how I see it way.

I agree that you should have free access to her phone (and actually think at 11 she shouldn't have one anyway but that's beside the point, it's something you have chosen to give her which is of course fine) but I personally think the best thing to do would have been to remind her of the condition of you being able to check the phone if she wanted to keep it and then waited a few minutes for her to do the right thing and hand it over or left the room and said you were going to call the phone company to have the phone cancelled as she wouldn't let you check it.

And no, I am not a perfect parent but I do appreciate suggestions on different tactics I can try.

I'm a parent of slightly older teens. Since leaving an EA r/s, we had about a year of one or the other (one in particular) really acting up. A bit of shoving, LOTS of verbal abuse, lots of breaking things in the house.

That dc has not now grown up a bit and is much happier in his school life. I think the past abusive r/s in your case might be playing out right now, along with a fear of being less loved than the new baby with the new "good" partner.

Your reactions were understandable. I've had many a long night where I feel like we're wildly out of control and I just did not know how to handle it. I certainly snapped at times. The times when it went best for us were the ones where I tried to bite back my own reactions.

Issues often arose from phone or internet for us too. They're a bloody curse. Many the time I've cursed bloody Tim Berners Lee ;-) Anyway, if you are worried about content, your phone supplier can enforce kid friendly content on their mobile data (I did this and it keeps it a step removed from you). On one really bad occasion I phoned and reported my dc's phone stolen as I knew there was no point trying to wrest it from them. So that cut them off for a few days - fireworks the first day then just a bit of grumbling. Other times I have limited the broadband. You can do this by going to your IP address, I think it's called, like 198.168.1.1 or similar - google. Under advanced, you can switch off the internet. If you do it at the same time each evening, they get used to it. Blame the internet provider just to deflect a bit.

Good luck. This will pass. My really difficult (at the time) DC now feels terrible at the things they called me and their physical explosions. We have a lovely relationship again. They just grew up a bit I guess!

Phone taken away indefinitely. Tbh if it had been me and she’d threatened to run away I’d have held the door open for her. You can’t allow yourself to be blackmailed like that.

typo - "That dc has now grown up a bit!" ignore the "not"!

The other thing we haven’t addressed from phones and internet access is the whole “community” that kids access where they egg each other on. They will have perpetuated a group sense of entitlement “How dare my mother check my phone? Etc....” They will be bitching about the parents (no matter how supportive) from a them & us point of view. It’s how paedophiles normalize their behaviour as well. They get online and they say things they wouldn’t normally say out loud and it empowers them to act out.

I've had some violence and aggression from DD. Some really awful times actually.
She had never witnessed any violence or abuse and I've never smacked her.
She was horrendous for a while.
In our case there was SN and she wasn't coping at school at the time and I was getting the meltdowns and flack for it.

I don't think the ops later behaviour helped but she knows that.
Initially though she just stepped on the bunk and was hit kicked and slapped.

If the outbursts are regular OP ask to see Camhs.
Is she 11 at primary or secondary?
Many secondaries these days have a school counselor.

Listen most parent have lost it at times when a situation gets too heated, and says things or done something they regret. The difference between a good and bad parent is that you realise it’s not how you would want to handle things and looking to do better next time. A rubbish parent just wouldn’t care. So don’t beat yourself up too much, sit down and have a conversation about it calmly today, explain that isn’t how you should behave and apologise and then reinforce the rules about having a phone. Sending you lots of love xxxx

Sorry this happened OP ☹️

My instant thought was there’s something on the phone that she’s very worried about and that’s why she’s reacted so strongly. I’d suggest trying to check it ASAP.

Tbh if it had been me and she’d threatened to run away I’d have held the door open for her. You can’t allow yourself to be blackmailed like that.

I don't believe any decent parent would do this. The thought of my 11 year old running off into the night when she was heightened in this way makes my blood run cold.