Mother of god I'm seriously going to lose my shit

[imgoingtoloosemymind]

Help help help

I have an 8 year old dd who is amazingly bright and whom I love with every fibre of my being. She is my whole world. But fuck I'm so fucking frustrated with her.
She does. Not. Fucking. Listen. To. Me.

It can be anything... DD can you please bring XYZ downstairs?
She will lift X and Y, and walk past Z. I'll remind her 3 times. She'll still forget.

Last week we were in the kitchen. She was reaching for a glass in the cupboard. I could see that she was going to knock it flying.
I asked her 4 times... 4.... stop... step back and be careful. Did she listen? No! She knocked the glass over and 2 others with it. Smashed all over the counter top.

We are sitting watching telly this evening. She's drinking lemonade from quite a thin wine glass style tumbler. I noticed she was tapping it with her teeth. 3 times I had to ask her to stop doing it. 3 times. Next thing I looked and the glass is in about 5 pieces in her hand. She done exactly as predicted and broke the glass with her teeth!!! Thankfully she wasn't hurt.

I'm beside myself with frustration.

When we are with family or out and about she will need to be told the same thing 4 and 5 times. It's so tedious and it's wearing me down.

She is otherwise bright, popular, funny, creative, kind etc. But she will not fucking listen to me. Help! Any ideas?

I don't even know what my aibu is... maybe it's aibu to fucking run to the moon???? 😫😫😫

I could have written this about my son when he was that age.

We left it until he was in year 5 before we finally paid to get him assessed by an educational psychologist and it turned out that he has both processing problems and a poor working memory. Google both of those terms and it will probably describe your child.

I really regret that we left it so late as I was always cross with him for so much stuff but it turns out, he just can't process auditory information and then, if he does, it drops out of him. It has made a massive difference to not only the way that we parent him but also his experience of school as they are not punishing him for the countless times he screws up.

Our son is also very bright - scores highly on IQ tests for reasoning but is also at the cusp of being learning disabled for processing ability.

Speak to your SEN at school about it but be prepared for a fight for an ed psych assessment through the local authority because if she can read, write and count, they won't do it. We paid privately in the end.

It could be that she isn't listening but she sounds a lot like my DS1 who has dyspraxia and ADHD. Might be worth looking into. DS1 drives me up the wall!

This is no solution to anything but managing your own stress levels (I have a DC a bit like this) - but have you noticed that you need to repeat something X amount of times before they notice you?

My DC's time is 4x times. So I might need to quickly repeat my request 4x and then it will be heard. That's how many time it seems to take them to "tune in".

It is frustrating. But once you notice the pattern it is less frustrating because you can sort of write off the first 3 times of asking. You only start to get cross when the fourth time is ignored...

You also need to ask her what is happening in her head when you are asking her to do something that she doesn't do. My son only started to be able to explain what was happening to him at that age.

I have no advice but your 8 yr old is most definitely related to my 9 yr old. I’m so tired of repeating myself that I actually can’t stand the sound of my own voice anymore!

Just to balance things out, my DD is absolutely the same and has no SEN issues. Great memory for school things, no dyspraxia or ADHD. Just head in the clouds.

She’s getting better now she’s 12 but slowly and still frustrates me. Some kids are just away with the fairies and it may just be a (long) phase.

This sounds like my Ds he has ASD and Dyspraxia.

Incredibly clumsy and seems careless, and has to be nagged repeatedly to do stuff or he just doesn’t hear me or forgets.

Could be a processing disorder as pp suggests above

My 9 year old is like this, however it’s very interesting that if I ask him to do a couple of things he can easily forget, get distracted etc but when he asks to play the Xbox etc and I say yes of course when you’ve completed xyz, the jobs are completed in record time and completed to a very high standard. 🤷‍♀️
I think it’s just selective hearing and that they are very easily distracted at that age.
The being soooooo frustrated is something my husband and I discuss a lot!!! xx

Your post could be my 9yo. It is incredibly frustrating. She breaks things, hurts herself, walks out of the room and forgets what we sent her to do ten seconds later.

I can kind of understand it, because I have similar traits. I am very much inside my head all the time. I often tune out the outside world because 1) there is too much information coming in and 2) my brain is an awesome place to be. I’m being kind of silly there, but I do think there is a type of very bright person that has trouble processing the world. The absent-minded professor may be a stereotype, but it’s a stereotype for a reason.

My parents got me to pay attention by being abusive. Obviously that is not a real solution.

I’m mostly posting to commiserate and hope someone else has some good suggestions because I am feeling pretty desperate these days.

I would say, step away from the glasses, I'll get it for you. Chewing the glass, I'd say, put the glass down now. You sound a bit wishy washy.

I think it's time for consequences. Tell her from now on, if she doesn't listen, there will be a price to pay. Devise whatever consequences you think will be effective and then STICK TO IT. I had to do that with my son many years ago and it worked like a charm.

Thanks all... I'm so glad I'm not the only one!!!
I will research as suggested the processing / dyspraxia issues.
@Aquamarine1029 I love this suggestion.., I will try this in the short term.
@Zulor why do I sound wishy washy??
I give her very clear instructions... I could say the same thing in a calm tone 4 times and she ignores. It takes me to raise my voice for her to listen. I can't just fucking yell every time I need her to listen to me. It's really exhausting 😫

Pay attention how she tells you things or ask her to reverse role play: get her away from the counter and ask her to tell you something you need to do” in her own words. Basically trying to map out her inner voice so that you can use similar way of addressing her.

I do think they are sometimes genuinely not hearing us / not processing the info

My 15yo ds only started to listen second or third time around aged 10/11. He's now 15 and at it again (worse when 'nagged') No SEN. I have just always gone with the flow, assuming it's part of parenthood. He is otherwise a very kind and loving boy. I pick my battles also.

This is a lot, if not most kids isn’t it?

I find if you start with a negative they just don't hear the don't or no part at all and just listen to the part after that so if you say no shouting they just carry on shouting.

With kids in school we were told to reinforce the thing you want them to do. So no running becomes walking please or slow down please.

Also making sure you stop them after making the request to repeat it back to you by asking what did I ask you to do. I have to use that a lot with dd1 (9) and dd2 (6) because they just don't listen either. They get 1 chance after that because I know they heard me.

Also ds has autism and I have to prefix any request with his name to ensure he knows I am asking him. This also works for the older two.

The serious voice also works, lower your voice and say it slowly then they know you mean business.

Stupid question but has she had her hearing tested?

Also, does she do this at school?

I know exactly where you're coming from. My 8 year old dd is exactly the same. I told her this morning that if I had to tell her to get changed into her uniform a fifth time I was taking her to school in her pyjamas. It is so draining it drives you crazy. Now I always give her a consequence if she doesn't do what I reasonably ask after the third time I've repeated myself. The only thing that seems to work is threatening her to not allow her time on her tablet when she does not do as I ask. I've told her I am going to give her a certificate in faffing that she can show her Headteacher......

I read your OP and thought Dyspraxia. With my DC3 (now all grown up and doing fine) I could never say "Clean your teeth, then find your shoes and get your PE bag" - he wouldn't retain more than "Clean your teeth". I had to wait until that had happened and then start on the shoe-nagging. You sort of get used to it after a while, and accept that sequences of instructions are just beyond them.

It could of course just be selective hearing and general wilfullness.

I think your best bet is finding out who the school SENDCo is and asking for a meeting. See if they've noticed anything and whether they'll do an Ed Psych assessment.

Another parent with a dyspraxic child feeling your pain! I did get a good tip from a mum of a NT child though, which also works, and it’s to physically touch your child (eg hand on the shoulder) while giving them the instruction. Not perfect but better...

Step in and remove her her from the situation.
If you know she'd going to break something , move and stop her.
Take away the glass, stop her her reaching for stuff. Prevent the accident.

Or buy a pile of plastic cups and tell her - and follow up on it- that she can't use the other stuff because she won't listen, and is therefore not grown up enough to use glass.

If she forgets something, walk her back and make and make her get it.
Rinse, repeat, ad nauseam.
She'll get it, but you'll have to move a bit, rather that instruct from a distance.

I had so many breakages from my lot being careless that I also posted a list on the fridge of what each item cost to replace, and deducted the amount from pocket money. That also helped.

Sounds like normal 8yo behaviour to me, if I had a quid for every time my dc ( 10, 8 and 3) didn't listen to a word I said...

My DS is like this.

He has a visual planner and he needs a bit of chivving along but the visual planner helps him get ready on school days.

He’s 9. He just completes each little task and ticks it off as he goes along. He has from 7.45-8.15 to do-
Snack and water, any sports kit ready, teeth, hair, spelling book, piano stuff. Depending on the day it can be 2-4 little jobs. Giving him the visual gives him the prompts as well as the independence to just do it.

He wears a watch and can be pretty good at being on time when reminded too!

My brother is like this. He’s very smart but just doesn’t have much common sense.

My mum thought my brother had a hearing problem when he was at primary school. The results of his hearing test were normal - he just wasn’t listening to her.
I have a similar frustration with DS1 who’s nearly 7. Whatever he’s thinking about at that moment is clearly more interesting that getting his shoes on etc.
Also I think it takes a while to realise what the consequences of your actions will be e.g you can see the glasses in the cupboard were in an unsafe position but your DD was just focussed on getting the one she wanted out.
I can warn both DS’s till I’m blue in the face that if they jump in puddles in their shoes they’ll get wet socks. Doesn’t stop them doing it though.