in thinking my rules for dd are fair and reasonable

[Cleofartra]

following on from 'at the end of my tether' thread the other day, have booked myself and dd a double appointment to see gp about her sleep and emotional issues.

Have also spoken to the teacher who's in charge of pastoral care at the school who agrees that dd needs counselling and maybe to see the ed. psyche.

I'm now in the position of needing to set some very clear boundaries (or re-establish them - they were there before but weren't being properly adhered to) so have typed up a list of 'rules' which I'm going to laminate and stick on the fridge. I want dd to be very clear about what we expect from her in terms of behaviour.

Can you cast your eyes down it and say if you think I'm being over prescriptive. The reason I've picked on these particular things is because these are things we currently have issues with at home with dd.

Get up within ten minutes of being called in the morning and without being rude.
Shoes, books, homework and uniform put ready the night before.
All homework printed out and in bag the night before it?s due to be handed in.
Eat breakfast or take it with you.
Either make your own packed lunch or take the one which is prepared for you without complaining.
Behave properly in lessons. Write your homework down.
Get back from school by 3.30 if you don?t have an after school club or detention.
Hang your blazer and coat up, put your bag in your room and your shoes on the shoe rack.
One hour of academic work to be done every night - not in front of the television. No emailing or surfing the internet while doing schoolwork. If you haven?t been set an hour?s homework I will give you work to do.
During the week schoolwork done before television or surfing the internet.
Twenty minutes piano practice every day including at weekends.
When mum and dad say ?no?, don?t keep asking ? persistent and aggressive demands constitute harassment and are not acceptable.
No name-calling or swearing.
Respect your and our home and possessions ? any deliberate breakages or wilful damage will have to be paid for from your pocket money.
Don?t take food without asking.
No rudeness and complaining about meals. If you don?t want what?s on offer then politely decline and help yourself to fruit and toast instead.
Keep your hands and feet to yourself ? no pushing, slapping or pulling at people?s clothes.
Bed time is at 9pm during the week. Main light off 9.30pm. At the weekend you can go to bed an hour later.

It does a lot of it boil down to what giyadas says, but then if an 11 yo is doing all those things, then maybe it would help to spell it out, crystal clear, in that laminated list way.

but it will only work if the OP mother sticks to it too, no point at all having rules if you then ignore them. What will happen if/when she doesn't do these things? And how will you stop things escalating with so many possible infringements?

(Personally I'd remove the laptop and tv time for starters, til the behaviour was massively better. and the sleepovers. and similar privileges and treats. And then reinstate them as behaviour improves)

sounds spoilt to me too!

I think hormones may also be playing a part in the behaviour if she is craving so many carbohydrates. Has she started her periods yet?

There is a simple solution, dont buy the stuff. If its not in the fridge, she wont be able to take it.

"where is she getting the money from to enable her to do that?"

It's her lunch money if she doesn't take a packed lunch. She scrounges food off her friends during the day then buys crap on the way home (which she shares with her mates).

That's a hell of a lot of rules at once.

Esp setting her work to do if she has less than an hour to do.

She clearly isn't deprived of material possessions but they aren't making her (or you) very happy are they?

It is, imho, ridiculous to be allowing your 11 year old to decide what is going to be watched on the family television and certainly, she should have a bedtime - 9 is quite late enough for school days. Why does she have enough money to buy fried chicken and coke on the way home from school? Why does she have her own laptop and apparently completely unrestricted use of it? Because all these things are in your control.

Only she really does seem to have you wound round her little finger yet she comes across as a deeply unhappy child. So yes, she almost certainly does need more structure in her life but I doubt you'll achieve much if you replace the current way of going about things with an endless list of "rules". Quite frankly, her current behaviour comes across as a cry for help.

Think how you would feel if you were feeling angry and disaffected and someone stuck that list on the fridge.

Have you tried sitting down with her and coming up with a few family rules you ALL have to keep, rather than rules for her and her alone?

Oh, and I would drop the piano practice and extra work ones particularly - in the grand scheme of things they stands out as "it doesn't matter" ones.

I think it is too prescriptive. I think she Will just feel trapped and may well rebel. She has nothing to lose.

The extra work is a big no no. She is a child and needs downtime to be essentially a little girl

Rather than dictate she eats the food YOU prepare for her, how about getting her involved in preparing the meals?!

My 6yr old and 5yr old DDs both sit with me on a Sunday afternoon and we decide as a family what the meals will be for the following week. That way they get a bit of what they like, and we get a bit of what we would like them to eat! They also help in the kitchen if it isnt too dangerous, and by 11yrs old I would hope they would be helping an awful lot more.

Our household slogan is

Remember, we are a FAMILY. We love each other and we help each other.

I don't think any of the rules are ott, except maybe for giving her a night off homework, if she doesn't have any
But the tone is awful, very confrontational and aggressive
I would re-write the whole thing in a much softer way.
Any way you could start off with a few and then add the rest in. If you are having problems with her, that's going to send her over the edge
Haven't read any other threads but reading between the lines, I am guessing it's serious and you need to put your foot down.
As a set of rules they are ok, but I would take advice from the school counsellors/pyschiatrists about how to word it or how to put it to her.

I think you need some help with your parenting skills. This is not the way to go about things. Is there a course you could go on locally?

she does sound rather spoilt sorry. Massive list of DO NOTs make it about 5 at most. Stop taking her out for lovely trips whilst she behaves like a monster. Maybe save the treats out for if/when her behaviour improves or she manages a week without a major fit. Its very negetive there has to be something positive in there for her. Good luck.

dont give her any lunch money then.. make her a packed lunch, and give her no money..

she wont die of malnutrition if she doesnt eat.. she will become the size of a house if she carries on eating the crap she is eating though...

I can't understand wanting to set her homework if she doesn't have any! I am DELIGHTED when ds doesn't have any.

I don't think what you are asking is anything too major but the way you are asking is awful and I agree with the person who said you are setting yourself up for a fall if you write all that lot out!

Is there any chance you are clamping down on her a bit too hard and if you eased off she wouldn't have so much to rebel against?

"Shes not your slave"

No - absolutely. I'm HER slave. She refuses to do anything for herself so DH and I have to do it all for her - packing her school bag, sorting out her uniform every day, picking her dirty clothes up from the floor, tidying her room, carrying her dirty plates through to the kitchen. etc. etc.

Re: food - just wait til you find out the reason your 4 year old doesn't want the meal you've prepared for him is because he's quietly gone into the fridge when your back was turned and eaten tomorrow's dinner for 5. I'm sure you'll be hugely tolerant. Especially when it happens on a regular basis.

It sounds like too many rules to me, and they sound quite negative. Can you word them in a more positive way? The whole list has a feel of doom about it.

hmmm. its a bit much the list. why don't you break it down into morning, afternoon, evening and bedtime so there are 4 separate routines. then i think you should build in incentives; for example if she eats her dinner nicely and does her homework THEN she can choose what you watch on telly after the others have gone to bed and build in that she can't if she won't.

you could do some charts too and think about reviewing pocket money. for example if you do a reward chart for each segment of the day and decide how many ticks she needs for each one you could offer her another £1 on pocket money she gets 80% of the ticks (or whatever you feel is appropriate - my dd is 16 mnths so i have NO idea how much pocket money and 11 year old owuld get)

think of it as an exchange. you say to dd 'right......i am happy for you to chat on the phone, play on the net blah blah whatever it is she does BUT i need this (insert lists) from you'

you could also say to dd that this is a trial for x number of weeks and that you will review it after period you feel is appropriate but tell her when that is.

hth

and deffo leave her clothes/shoes/room...if she wants a creased uniform, then so be it!

i am also 100% with ither posters about not setting extra work. i think that ought to be 'if you do your homework on the days you have it properly then on the days you don't you may spend an hour doing xyz - again an exchange.

meanwhile....i recall a yp i worked with few years ago with this kind of behavioural issues. she was alwasy dying to spend more 1 - 1 time with her mum. obviously this may not be the case at all with your dd BUT worth considering/trying. for all i know you might have loads of time together like that - it just reminded me of that kid who was similar age.

If she is eating that much food, then she is heading for some sort of eating disorder or already has one.

Get the crap out of the fridge. Remove the temptations of processed meats, brie, chocolate.. I am assuming YOU are the one doing the shopping.

No - absolutely. I'm HER slave. She refuses to do anything for herself so DH and I have to do it all for her - packing her school bag, sorting out her uniform every day, picking her dirty clothes up from the floor, tidying her room, carrying her dirty plates through to the kitchen. etc. etc.

Why???? why do you do it? Who is the adult in this house? You cant make a child pick up a dirty plate?

Let her go to school in a dirty uniform.. she will soon change her tune when she gets the piss taken out of her for looking scruffy and smelly when there is no need for it.

I think the homework and piano are the least of the problems.

"Shes not your slave"

No - absolutely. I'm HER slave. She refuses to do anything for herself so DH and I have to do it all for her - packing her school bag, sorting out her uniform every day, picking her dirty clothes up from the floor, tidying her room, carrying her dirty plates through to the kitchen. etc. etc.

Just dont do it.

I dont do it for my 5 and 6yr olds.

My 6yr old has got as far as the front steps in her PJs before now for messing around not getting dressed in the mornings.

Sounds like she needs to grow the hell up, and she cant do that if you are running around after her.

I don't think she sounds spoilt but I do think your parenting is all about extremes....wildly indulgent to let her chose what to watch in the evening yet bossy and prescriptive in terms of piano

You also seem to have written a wish list rather than rules.

I like madamesdefarges list - simple and clear.

And have a think about why you have a long list of her poor behaviours - including physical stuff which would be a huge no no fir me - and a very long list of sly the treats she has had some of which are enough to make a few mners say ' spoilt'

Thecreaction to consistent poor behaviour here is a withdrawal of privileges including phone, tv, evenings out, lap top etc.

You need to ramp everything down. And bear in mind the link between food and behaviour.

I don't think the rules are too bad, but to rewrite them in a softer tone may be helpful.

It seems like you're at the end of your tether with a little girl who seems to have taken over the house.

No doubt you've realised that she's only taken the lead where she's seen an opening.

Are there any things that can be done differently to reinforce your role as the parent and her's as a child?

I can only imagine how tough this has been for the whole family and truly hope that a positive solution is found.

I have to disagree with what appears at a quick glance to be the majority. I have a DD who is very simialar to Cleo's from the sound of it and I would - and do - have very similar rules and I am draconian. I have found that it's the only thing that works. Maybe Cleo, you fear that if you don't reinforce such firm boundaries now your DD will reach the age that mine is (14) and like me you will still be struggling?

I would only question the extra work and the piano practice. I'd ditch the first and give her a choice on the second - either she practices daily or you no longer pay for lessons and/or sell the piano (assuming that no-one else in the family benefits from it of course).

Additionally, to those who say that the DD "should" be going to bed at a certain hour/should not be dictating what's on television etc, I quite agree with you but in practice what the feck do you do with a child who refuses... utterly refuses despite all sanctions and even bribes ... to do as she is told? Drag her up to bed screaming? Slap her into submission? For some of us it simply doesn't work to just say, "You're in charge, she must do X" - we don't all have "normally behaved" children.