To give dt1 more attention...

[twintroubles]

I'm so fed up of thinking about this issue. I'd love another perspective, or several. Dt1 (6) is very challenging and needy. Dt2 on the other hand is relaxed and not needy at all. Therefore i find a lot of my attention goes on dt1.

Example: dt1 cried all morning because she didnt want to go to school. I tried every tact. Nothing worked. inevitably a lot of my attention was on her. She was a puddle of utter misery. To complicate matters, i was desperate for her to stop crying partly because dt2 gets really upset when dt1 is upset. This is the only thing that does get to her. Dt2 also hates it when I'm firm with dt1 and send her for time-out in her room or tell her off.

This happens all the time, whether its at school or during the extracurricular they do together or at home. Dt1 is frequently upset and that upsets dt2.

Another example of dt1's behaviour: i told her to stay in her seat when i was making pancakes, multiple times. She keeps getting up and comes to cling on me. Makes pancake-making very difficult, especially as my other children are talking to me all at once. I raise my voice and tell her to sit down. She punches me in the stomach. I send her to her room for ten min.

So consequently i try to help dt1 with her behaviour both for her sake and for her twin's sake. But this puts a lof of my attention her way. Any tips or common experiences?

I do do special one on ones with dt2, but the problem is dt1's issues are almost constant the rest of the time.

I also need to point out that punishment has never on my list of techniques that I used for deal with the dcs, neither with dc1 noot with dc2, which made the comment even more tricky to deal with.

I sis use to send the dc in theoir room though. NOt as a time out 'you have to stay there for 5 mins' type of things. But as a way to ensure the safety of everyone and to give them space to calm down They've always been aloowed to come out when they were clam again (which has always taken much longer than the 5mins of time out)

Hi. I have twins too (7yo), but it is actually my older ds who has the 'ishoos' and therefore gets more attention. I think there are some wise words here about rewarding the good behaviour/ ignoring bad. However, I do also think some children do have more emotional needs - perhaps it is just the way they are born, a mental issue, where they come in the family, things which happened at certain times in their lives, even the class they end up in at school and interactions they have in that environment. I have no idea. I just know Ds1 definitely has more emotional needs and I think it's a combination of all the above not JUST attention seeking.

In this case, you can't treat the children 'equally' as one has greater needs so therefore it wouldn't actually be fair. You have to try and get the attention seeking ones separated from the genuinely anxious ones. Which just takes wisdom and thought, I think. For example, crying before school could be a genuine anxiety about the school situation (not uncommon), whereas getting out of chair and hitting you at pancake time is attention seeking. Try and think about the most common situations and what each may be so you can think of an appropriate response as opposed to just ignoring all of it.

I try to spend a lot of one:one time with ds1 at bedtime to calm his anxiety and just to talk/ mess about/ have fun before he goes to sleep. Sometimes he will tell me stuff, sometimes it's just fun. I would also try and explain to the other children what I am doing and why eg. "O is feeling sad about going to school, so I'm just going to spend a couple of minutes giving him a hug. It's difficult for him to go to school." You can do this with the other twin, more occasionally eg. when ill/ visit to doctor/ any time feeling upset about something so they know it is a special time with mum when feeling upset - just one of the twins feels upset less often.

I dunno, just my thoughts. It is extremely hard being a parent, trying to be fair and take everyone needs into consideration.

one : one

I think the was because of the colon!

Thank you so much loveboursin and merrymarigold. My instinct has always been that there is more going on than just attention seeking, and the thing about her having greater needs is something i have repeated many times to family members (all of whom obviously have their opinion) as another perspective on it which i worry does get lost, as i am so often told that i just need to ignore her/be firm with her. Not that i disagree with that advice but its so difficult to know what to do for the best. She is always so miserable and her twin by contrast is so happy.

I agree, it's not easy to actually implement! All I can say is that for each situation, think: What can I best do to ignore DT1 and give her the least focus possible, and give my attention to the others? Unfortunately this doesn't mean that her presence won't be very much felt by all - if she stays, you will all be trying to pretend you can't hear screaming, shouting and crying dominating the scene, if you have to remove her then that's obviously going to disturb everyone too. However, just remember that the KEY thing is that you're doing your best not to reward that behaviour. And as NotQuite says, it will probably get worst before it gets better. Don't forget to give her positive attention when she calms down, and tell her you love her.

argh my posts are lagging behind the conversation again! Too slow at typing!

I always do ceebie. We have a very close, very loving relationship fortunately. Im not sure how i would cope with her otherwise. Although it makes it all harder in some ways. I know how much she wants to please me and then she messes it up for herself and feels terrible about herself and my heart breaks for her.

I think you can implement the 'ignore' strategy during bad behaviour, and spend extra time dealing with anxiety / issues when calm again. The two are by no means mutually exclusive.

Doesnt matter! I know what you're responding to!

Yes i see that ceebie. Its so hard in the moment working out what is what and what the right response is to what but thinking about it like this always helps clarify things in my mind. The school related distress is very new so i, just working out how to assimilate it into the whole picture.

Do you think there could be an element of trying to establish identity within a twin ship going on? So she's polarising from her more laid back sister? Has there been any history when it's been 'the twins this....' Or 'the twins want...'?

I do get that worry about real/manufactured anxieties. The reality is that it's probably both. A deep seated insecurity driving a level of attention-seeking behaviours. Throughout my daily running commentary of our lives I try to talk a lot about the importance of being a decent human being and about how to ask positively for attention/help. How to contribute to a house that feels nice to live in.

The positive attention is like coins in a piggy bank. The more you manage to find things like, sitting at the table, solving a problem, organising school things, helping without being asked, and rewarding it by noticing and commenting positively and warmly, the more you will fill the space in them that drives their need for your attention and warmth. 'Attention-seeking behaviour' is, after all, a maladaptive way of trying to get attention that IS actually needed.

Agree with all the great advice on this thread.

One other thing I found worked really well was when one of the DDs was crying, hysterical, whining, shouting etc, I would just say mildly "hmm, I can't understand that whiny / shouty / crying voice. I guess if you want to tell me something you'll have to use your normal voice" and then just walking away or carrying on. "I can't understand DT1 when she shouts like that, can you DT2? Hopefully she will calm down and talk to us in her normal voice. So did you play on the monkey bars at school today?" sort of thing. Then TONS of praise and positive attention when she does use her normal voice. "Oh DT2 you are using your inside voice, very well done my beautiful girl! I can understand you perfectly now! It is so nice to have a lovely calm conversation with my two girls. What did you want to tell me?" or draw her into the existing conversation.

It worked wonders.

Good luck

Btw, I don't want you to think I'm getting this right! I can happily regurgitate all I learned, and I can verify it works, but by god I do get it spectacularly wrong as well. Every day a new day!!

I dont think so notquitesoonedge because they have been so different from the very start. As new born, dt1 would thrash about and dt2 would lie there and coo. Literally. Ive never understood it when i asked people about baby's characters and they look at me blankly, as in, we don't know yet, because our babies had such distinctive personalities from the off...

Right i am from now on visualising a piggy bank.

Well I know I have struggled in the past with dc2 and actually had similar questions than you when he was about 4~5yo.
I choose to look after his emotional needs rather than looking at it as a way to demand attention. I am vey happy than I did that as it became very clear some years later that it was really an issue with needing more support rather than attention seeking.
In particular, it was really clear he was going into a cycle where he would loose it completely, be sent to his room, calm down a bit and then realise what he had done and be inconsolable about it. So moving from screaming and crying to ...well more or less the same, lots of crying and screaming. I had to be VERY careful about looking at each situation and analyse what was going on to try and give the best answer to that particular situation (support when really overwhelemed by what he did, told off when he did someting wrong, help to manage his temper and the Red Mist etc...).

Another thing I have learnt with dc2 is that there are plenty of things we expect children to learn automatically but some don't.
So we expect them to learn to control themsleves as they get older and find their own ways to keep their temper into check. We expect them to somehow learn how to do it on their own. Most children do, dc1 did, dc2 didn't.
We expect them to learn to find solution together and somehow to become more cooperative. Again dc2 didn't. (Well tbf, a lot of adults don't know how to do that either. You just have to read MN to see that)
Everything had to be spelt out VERY CLEARLY and in small steps.
I also learnt that what I thought was obvious wasn't always obvious, especially the cause - consequence thing, eg you did xx, therefore yy happened (behaviour lead to consequences, whatever it was was) didn't mean he understood 'Ok OK I shouldn't be doing xx because otherwise yy would happen and I don't like that' or any little thing which were suposed to be infered from the situation.

Now I'm not saying that's th sort of thing that is happening with your dt but maybe have a look at what he finds difficult and check if he is always clear on what's going on etc... If he is anxious, there is a reason for it. What is it?

What helps is thinking about this with people who have also thought about it, which you obviously have notquitesoonedge, so thankyou. As opposed to the constant refrain of 'be firmer, be tougher' i get from all around me. I need more nuance people!

I agree that 'attention seeking behaviour' comes from needing attention.

not saying you aren't giving it but maybe twin is really unhappy at School?

I'd check that out as genuine anxiety about School (which we've had in bucket loads) affects everything.

Thanks heartstrumpdiamonds. thats a handy way of ignoring whilst also giving her a strategy for making herself heard in a non confrontational way and including her twin. Brilliant!

xpost

I'm actually thinking that, in some ways, I have done a lot of what NotQuite has been talking about but coming from a diifferent perspective. Interesting how you can start from a different angle and end up doing similar things !!

Loveboursin i think thats really important, and this thread has really highlighted it for me. There is no blanket response. I have to be thinking clearly on the spot. Yes, most of the time ignoring and giving the well behaved twin the attention is appropriate, but not all the time, and sometimes, dt1 may need some extra support. And also i need to remember to praise dt1 and dt2 both for all the good they do.

I also like the idea of ignoring but in praising the other children for their good behaviour simultaneously indicating to dt1 what she needs to do to get the attention she desires, because as loveboursin pointed out, its not always obvious to children what they need to do.

The point about attention seeking behaviour translating to needing attention is interesting. Honestly i dont think she's lacking in attention. I would say i fairly shower my children with attention... I make myself completely available to them when they are home, play with them, do stuff with them, talk to them, read to them, cuddle them, because thats what i believe in. The only thing is there is a lot of them, and they are very close in age, and she is a twin, and her twin is very very well liked, so i suppose it could be that... But surely not...

How many children do you have, OP?

I do think some of it is just a character thing? Ds1 drives me mad with his negativity about everything - everyone has more/ better etc. I don't think the needing attention is necessarily that they don't already have a lot of attention, but that there is an emptiness which is very hard to fill. Perhaps she has some mild developmental problems (ds1 does) in terms of processing info/ sensory stuff/ social skills etc, which just makes life generally harder. Is she finding school harder academically or socially?

Unwanted behavipour can be linked to lots of different things, not just wanting attention. That is a way to look at things that is much too simplistic.

The reward the good and ignore the bad system is based on the fact that getting attention is a scarce ressource and that having more of that is a treasure you don't want to miss.
It also assumes that, like a Pavlov dog, the child will learn if do xx, then I will get attention (which the child is supposed to carve). It is also assume that the child has enoough control over themselves and their emotions to make a choice.

However, a child that is anxious might display unwanted behaviour just because of that. He might well not be able to 'control' that anxiety at all or will not be able to think when he is in the middle of a full on anxiety/overwhelmed episode. He is not likely to be thinking 'well I shouldn't be doing xx because I won't get attention'.

Rereading your OP though, one thing jumped this time. It's the fact that both dt are doing the same extra curriculum activity. I assume they are in the same class too? Would ensuring that they do different activities help? I'm thinking lack of comparaison but also the fact that when dt1 is doing xx, then you can give dt2 you attention and when dt2 is doing yy, she can do so undistrubed by dt1.