Wits end with 12 year old DD, need help!

[Ifyouwantmeillbeinthebar]

My youngest of 4 DD’s (just turned 12) is driving me up the wall, I suspect NNT and she has in the past been flagged up as struggling with concepts at school but DH won’t really entertain it so we just continue with us all at logger heads with me normally being the mediator.

DH however is in the Forces and is currently away so it’s just me and today for the 1st time today have thought to myself I really don’t know how I’m going to cope on my own for the next couple of months.

She can be the sweetest child, affectionate, funny, very ourdoorsy, adores her animals, switched on (if anyone has ever lost anything she is the one to ask) however there is just no reasoning with her about anything and she has no ability to look inwards at her own actions and entertain anything she doesn’t want to do, from bed time, sharing chores, to wearing the correct school uniform, to taking things that’s aren’t hers, to eating peoples food, to leaving the house on time for school, the list is just endless, it’s all a constant battle.

Teaming that with the now dreaded Y7 personality transplant (been through it with all my DD’s,) hormones and her digging her heals in at doing anything quickly and her being the youngest and always trying to push the boundaries on things that are age appropriate, it’s just seems to the right mixture of elements to push me over the edge.

This morning she missed her school bus because she was trying to take her sisters tote bag instead of her school bag but big sis needed it, all hell broke loose, she was screaming, refusing to go to school, dragged her heals, spent another 15 minutes in front of her mirror putting lip gloss on, came down chewing gum loudly l, told me I was pathetic, now has to walk a mile to the main bus stop to catch bus but she isn’t bothered! I am though, she is only just 12.

I’ve tried everything, taking her phone off her, taking away privileges, shouting, sitting down and trying to talk to her, ignoring negative and rewarding positive behaviour absolutely nothing works.

This afternoon she will come in like nothing has happened and all will be forgotten till the next time that something isn’t going the way she wants and we will start all over again.

I’ve just spoke to my very unsympathetic DM on the phone who said I can’t believe you let her miss the bus, just make her leave the house (!?!!!) obviously if it was as easy as that I would, but I can’t physically man handle her out the house, the more I react, shout, touch her the more she becomes aggressive, defiant and we are less likely to get a positive outcome so generally my tactic is to defuse but then other DC say that it’s unfair and DD gets away with everything and they are right…

DD ended up taking the tote bag this morning as she wouldn’t have left for school otherwise.

I really would love to hear from anyone who has a child with similar traits, and any support, help, advice would be really helpful.

She is my 4th DD and I like to think I’m a good mum but I’m constantly wondering if I’ve somehow caused this behaviour.

That sounds really tough.

My youngest of 4 is the same in many ways - taking stuff etc but we never had such extreme behaviour. Her anxiety is awful though and the melt down when something isn't ok. School refusal in 6th form and then college.

She has matured and is better at 18 though. Covid was hell on Earth and made things much worse.

She got an ADHD diagnosis at 16.

DD ended up taking the tote bag this morning as she wouldn’t have left for school otherwise.

If this is what you've done since she's a toddler then you probably have caused this behaviour. You don't give in to a tantrum not with a toddler and not with a pre-teen. No means no.

However, the school flagging that she's struggling and your DH 'not entertaining it' is absolute madness. Use the time he's away to get your DD the help she needs.

My 12 yo DD is EXACTLY the same.

Almost word for word. I've used the word bipolar to describe her behaviour as it's unbelievable how quickly it will change.

I have found that walking away from arguments brewing is a massive help. This only works if we're not going anywhere. If I get abuse by text I ignore it. When I start reacting she definitely gets worse. It's so bloody hard though.

I laugh when people moan about baby or toddler years! They have no idea 🥺

You have to meet them where they are not where you want them to be. Look at her behaviour now and work out what will need to happen what results in the change required. For example if her consequences are removal of phone - how long are you removing the phone for? What is required of her to get the phone back? Even something as simple as the lipgloss or gum. Is that being bought with her pocket money? Perhaps her pocket money needs to be earned and not expected.

With my kids I’ve learned to look what has value and use that to shape behaviour. One is completely feral but access to screens or lack of access to screens keeps him focused. As he ages I’m sure it will be something else. I see raising kids as a game of chess and you’ve got to keep one manoeuvre ahead of them.

if you can keep the saying ‘never reward bad behaviour’ in your brain at all times you’ll get there.

As an aside there’s no way she’d have gone to school with her sister’s tote bag. That one thing was a reward for bad behaviour.

I understand everyone mentioning the tote bag and that is absolutely not the outcome I wanted! (It didn’t help that big sis shouted through from her room “it’s ok she can take it”) it makes me so frustrated that I gave it to her and totally agree I’m rewarding bad behaviour, but what do I do…

Just let her miss school because she is having a tantrum in her bed and is refusing to go?! like I said I’m my OP it isn’t the case of pulling her up for a hug, having a chat and reasoning with her, if I was was to even offer her a hand up the situation would explode, DONT TOUCH ME, I HATE YOU, there would be lots of kicking screaming etc…

So she took the bag? So she had a meltdown and got her own way. I guess your other dd's are used to this.

Im not sure at this stage - maybe take her phone and only give it to her once she's ready to leave the house after getting ready in a normal fashion. She sounds very immature.

When she's acting up all walk away and ignore her (like you would a 3yo). It sounds like she likes the attention. Just grey rock her, she'll probably tire of it quickly when she doesn't have an audience.

My DD is nearly 12 but also ND so we’ve had a lot of that behaviour in the last 3yrs. There’s some good advice on the PDA society website and Dr Naomi Fisher has some tips on low demand parenting that have helped us. I also have an older teen who has been a lot easier (so far..) to patent than my youngest. It’s not easy and it’s not bad parenting if you think of her behaviour as communication she’s trying to show she’s struggling with stuff and asserting her boundaries but your the safe space so you get all the shit to deal with unfortunately.

OP I think you've had good advice here but re: the tote bag you know what the priority is where others don't necessarily. For me getting to school would be the priority and you have to be v focused on that don't you. Additionally there's a chance she was using the tote bag to cause a fuss which would delay going to school so averting that fuss is a powerful gambit, to extend @RudsyFarmer 's chess comparison.

Can you identify her triggers? How is she at school and with other adults and children, does she argue and get into trouble there too?

You’ve identified that low-demand parenting is right for her - trying to avoid arguments escalating. If you can identify triggers it will help you all. Have a look at parenting techniques for oppositional defiance- she may not have this but the techniques are useful. If school are saying there are issues take them up on any assessment. Your DH can’t make her ‘normal’ by ignoring it, he’ll only make things worse for her and I’m sure that’s not what he wants.

Look up pathological demand avoidance

Some good tips for parenting this type of personality on here https://www.pdasociety.org.uk/

I think at 12 then yes she has to take the consequences for her tantrum. She goes to school late AND without the bag that caused the tantrum.

You could also reach out to the school and ask for pastoral help. If you could find someone in school you could touch base with about her behaviour at home it would allow you to feel supported and work together. I know many secondaries do have a pastoral side to their staff so it’s worth an email to ask.

if all else fails there’s a technique called Commando parenting. It’s basically where you provide the basics and no more. Bed, board, food, access to education etc. Basically what is required of you as a parent and nothing else.

Until she gets with the program everything else is shelved. I have coped with my youngests rages since the age of three so he knows I’m a determined bitch and I’d have no qualms doing this if it came to it. As it is I have worked so bloody hard on him for five years now and I think at the age of 8 he believes me when I give consequences for poor behaviour. I always follow through but always allow him to earn back privileges if it’s important.

It goes without saying that im also praising the good behaviour, spending my weekends sitting beside football pitches. All the positive reinforcements needed but any crazy batshit behaviour is a hard no. I’ve heard ‘I hate you’ so many times now I just tell him to write it in my Mother’s Day card 🤣

I think the problem is the then concept issue was flagged at Y3 parents evening and has never been picked up on again since, it was very learning based…

The analogy the teacher gave was if they are playing a maths game with buttons and told DD to work out a puzzle/pattern in a certain way, she could get the correct answer no problem but if they asked her for variable in the answer ie switch a patterns around all hell broke loose…

That has always stuck in my head though and I use when dealing with DD’s behaviour. You can try and get the outcome you want with her but the buttons need to be the correct order for her to understand and process, DH can not see that all all is much more black and white in his approach and it’s why they have far less positive outcomes, he is forever saying why won’t she just do as she is told!

I want to thank you for starting this thread @Ifyouwantmeillbeinthebar . I had a bad morning with my 12 year old too and though she would die rather than wear lipgloss (hers was flute-related) they sound similar. And once she'd left DH and I had a row about how we should have handled it. I'm finding this PDA stuff v enlightening.

@Ifyouwantmeillbeinthebar

on the Tote bag. I disagree with others.

if it’s her sisters, it’s between her and her sister whether it was ok.

so if I saw her taking it I’d say ‘hVe you asked DS if that’s ok?’

if the answer is yes, or when she asked DS said yes, that’s fine.

pick your battles.

does sound otherwise like neurodiversity though . So get her assessed and then follow the guidance for her profile. If your DH is going to be away I’d get it done and then send him to the assessor to get educated when he’s back.

standard punishment / consequences doesn’t work for some ND kids (but some versions of it can with others)

I’m going to generalise a bit here and say a father in the Forces is definitely going to have a harder time accepting a child that doesn’t just follow the chain of command. But some kids just respond much better to a less authoritative approach. If you can figure out the strategy (ala chess analogy) then you have a better game plan to avoid the tantrums and meltdowns as much as possible. Everyone wins.

I think @RudsyFarmer 's suggestion of "Commando Parenting" would be worth trying. After all, it's worth a try if you've tried so many things... what have you got to lose

Trigger stacking was a good concept I found. There’s lots of things you can cope with one by one during the day, but the energy used to maintain calm compliance gets more and more depleted until you get the volcano effect. Working out what the things are and seeing if you can minimise them or build into the day places to quietly recharge reduces the volcano effect.
For My DD that means we still have to do a huge amount of parental scaffolding around her at home to get her out the door for school on time. Literally ensure her bag is packed, her shoes are lined up to put on etc. to an outsider looking in we look like over pandering parents but this is what is required at this point in her life to function in a mainstream school. She hates transition of any sort my other child was fully able to do all age appropriate organising. It’s working out that level of scaffolding needed to reduce the defiance when they reach overload point.

I know you're thinking neurodiversity, but have you considered female autism specifically? The switched-onness and kindness paired with the total inflexibility is what flagged that to me. It would also explain why confrontation is usually going to trigger WW3. Autistic kids can be terrible at backing down. Can you try parenting techniques aimed at autism specifically?

Don't mean to be funny but the cause of this is the parents. No boundaries,rules,consequences so she walks over you

This attitude can lead to disastrous consequences for some kids @LadyJ2023. I could say so much more but I'm not going to.

I like those terms. That sounds really constructive. Any links to where those terms have come from? I feel like I’m doing a lot of that through trial and error. It would be interesting to read more.

In regard to trying to get a diagnosis I would not rely on that nor would I rely on school to sort things out. Honestly the cuts to resources means that they will prioritise those at the very top behaviourally. If your daughter is coping with school on the whole I’d be surprised if they’d push for a diagnosis and when I investigated the private route for a diagnosis it was a two year wait. So I just cracked on myself and just read and listened and watched and read some more to put in good techniques.

Consistency is key though. Don’t start with great intentions and then just give up because it’s too much trouble. Pick your battles but if you choose to war then make sure you win.

@RudsyFarmer “missing the mark” & Dr Naomi Fisher talk a lot of sense. Their FB feeds are good. The Explosive Child by Ross Green is good. We had to get a private ASD diagnosis for our then 10yr took 6mth wait still but so worth it in terms of unlocking lots more support & ‘reasonable adjustments’ at secondary school as her diagnosis now has protection under Equalities Act. It still felt like £2k for a piece of paper just agreeing with everything we’d been telling school for years! However she wouldn’t be maintaining attendance at school now if we hadn’t plus currently going through the EHCP assessment process now. Everything takes SO long to get in place.

Thank you everyone, this has all been so interesting and I definitely think some of the reading could benefit us and DD

In terms of getting a diagnosis what is the 1st step, school or GP?

Our GP wasn’t much help other than after having a chat said yes sounds like she could benefit from assessment. It was 2-3yr wait in our NHS patch, so I started looking for private assessment options. Local send Facebook groups often happy to share providers.
Some information here https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/topics/diagnosis/pre-diagnosis/parents-and-carers
there’s a lot of overlap between Attention Deficit Disorder and Autism especially as girls can mask very very well. I would keep a diary for a week or two to spot patterns of behaviour. It’s very common for girls to really struggle aged 11-13yr as the massive kick in of hormones at same time just completely destabilises them.