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???? 😫😫😫

Has she been tested for Autistic Spectrum disorder?

My daughter cannot remember more than one instruction at a time. She has been assessed for dyspraxia but now has a diagnosis of ADHD. Look up the signs of ADHD in girls, you’ll be astonished.

She sounds like a daydreamer..... that's all.
I wouldn't worry.
Do not let anyone try to pin a SEN notice on her.

We have Rule 1 do what you are told the first time.

Both my children have ASD. But no-one in the outside world realises they do. The teachers did not notice, my best friend whose son has ASD and my children have slept over her house for years did not notice. My daughter has only just been diagnosed and I did not even spot it myself she had it. Children can seem mostly neurotypical but have a few traits of something which affects their behaviour. They may continue through life without nonone realising that they have these traits - or something stressful might happen in their life that makes these traits more obvious. My son is very bright but it was like he was missing common sense. But what it was, was his Aspergers traits include him being very literal. He does not get pointing and if you give him an instruction it needs to be very literal. For example pointing to something and saying can you please move that over there - will result in him doing nothing as he tries to work out what you mean.

jellymaker same here except dc has such bad cognitive processing and STM issues he does have moderate learning disability. Otherwise he is smart, good at sport and funny. If this is the same with other children get them checked by ed psych as we were given specific exercises to do with and dc even had to go to special school where they are teacehing him in different way.

OP, I could have written your post. Like a PP, DD has been Ed Psych assessed and they said that she had poor concentration and memory and processing issues.

I did an Incredible Years course and they said that children don't listen to the first word or two, we had help from the local Family Support Network, and they said the same, so don't say "Don't run Daisy", say "Daisy, walk!", so you get their attention and give them an instruction at the same time. Don't ask them not to do things, but tell them what to do. Short sharp commands, not long requests.

My 9 year old dd is the same. Shes in her own world 99% of the time but yea, it's frustrating as f**k

Posted too soon. DD has to be told things several times, cannot retain information. Every morning we look at what is for lunch and 15 minutes later by the time she gets to school she has forgotten, so now she carries a menu in her bag.

Honestly, I could have written this about my DD at that age! But it was just a phase - she slowly grew out of it. She was as messy as hell too, her room was always a tip, but now she’s incredibly organised! She’ll get there OP. I wish now I’d been a little easier on mine growing up. They get there in the end!

I feel like you are writing about my daughter!

Me, my husband, her grandparents...we are all at the end of our tether! She manages to completely ignore any instructions given to her...several times I have wondered if she has a hearing problem! But we’re all pretty sure now she thinks she makes the rules and has no reason to listen to anyone.

So frustrating

Why don’t you try not swearing in your conversations with her, that might be a starting point ???

thought my son was deaf at that age as he never responded to requests or did as I asked. I took him to a specialist to have his hearing tested - turned out he was just ignoring me

I find fine if the posts on here a bit punitive. If you follow some of the advice when your child actually has undiagnosed SEN, you will be Harming her self esteem and your relationship. I’d suggest you do the SEN research before telling a child they’re not grown up enough etc. I have two teens with asd, dyspraxia and add and this sounds exactly like their processing issues.

Don’t rely on the school Senco entirely unless he or she impresses you. They are not necessarily well trajned in spotting these sorts of disability. Google on the dyspraxia society and asd friendly (forums for parents) to see if the kids there sound like yours. If you think they do, ask the advice of your gp as well as the Senco but be aware some of these conditions take years for the nhs/state system to diagnose and meantime they will if they are SEN, affect your child’s ability to get on in her school setting as it gets more and more focussed. For example in my area the waiting list for an adhd assessment is now 3 years. You may end up having to go private if you want action.

My 5 year old was like this, it became really frustrating but then we finally would shout STOP DOING THAT... he would say he never heard us the first time and would get so upset - genuinely so upset. Took him for a hearing test and he had Glue ear, ended up having an Operation and getting Grommets fitted. Best thing ever, they are out now and his hearing is back to normal.

We thought he was going through a "phase" of not listening - turns out he physically couldn't listen but through no fault of his own!

Some of the posts sorry

Silent physical prompting is what works with my DS7.
He's still small enough to get away with this, and it literally seems like what I ask him to do, even if only one thing at a time, directly addressed to him and me asking him to repeat, goes in one ear and out the other.
So before I blow my top at him, because he's a lovely curly-haired sensitive angel who hates being shouted at, I take him to where I need him to be and show him what needs doing (point at shoes, point at jumper etc etc). Gives me time to calm down, and helps him recall what he is meant to be doing. Even if your DD is older, I can see this working, like in the case of the wine glass etc? Obviously not a long-term solution but it works particularly in times when we're in a rush!

Hi I agree with the checks already mentioned and include hearing test too

This sounds like my 9yo, 7yo and even my 11 month baby.... I think its just a lot thing, they love ignoring parents. I swear my kids like to see how long it takes me to lose my shit....

I haven't RTFT - but it's only recently my 12 yr old daughter has been allowed a glass - and that's at family meals. Rest of the time - plastic tumblers.

Probably sounds as I've missed the point....

Kid thing not lot thing

Sounds exactly like my son, super intelligent so what is the problem?. We had him tested, he has hypermobility and slow processing. Now that we know what the issue is life has improved but he can still be incredibly frustrating. I suggest you get your daughter tested. Start by speaking with your SENCo department at school. It was my son's school who identified the issue.

Oh that sounds so familiar. My young teenage DD has just been diagnosed with ADHD with a working memory in the 5th percentile. She is astonishingly bright and can take in written information, but tell her anything and it's gone, or she doesn't hear it.

She has been in trouble at school recently for having to be told not to tap her pen, talk, swing on her chair - you name it, she does it and has to be reminded constantly. At primary school she was never in trouble as they expect kids to forget things and fiddle with stuff and she was doing very well, but in year 9 they don't put up with it. For this reason I got her assessed and she scored very highly for ADHD, terrible working memory, low average processing speed, and very high IQ.
I understand why she behaves this way now, she doesn't remember that she's been told and doesn't realise that she's doing it. I am so glad that I know now because yes it drives you mad, but I know that she can't help it.

We are now getting support and I am confident that she will learn ways to cope with her memory and she will be starting medication to help her focus on lessons when she needs to.

This might not be what you want to hear, but it might be worth an assessment. It's not the end of the world, it's just that the brain can work a bit differently.
By the way, I realise that I probably have it top to a lesser extent, but ADHD didn't exist in the 1970s when I was being told off for daydreaming and forgetting everything. And I constantly lose my keys and say "pardon" all the time because I miss what people are saying. Can't help it though!

Also haven't RTFT so apologies if already mentioned, but my DS needed to know reasons why he was being told stuff or he wouldn't do them. It started when he was about 3 and is only marginally better now (15). Would def agree with the SpLD suggestions to research - we also did this, processing and short term memory were also problems but ones that kids can grow out of, especially with training. Good luck OP

Oh and I went private for a diagnosis. Not cheap but worth every penny. Explained so many things. If I had gone via the NHS I would still be waiting for him to be assessed.