To leave one niece out?

[HipHipHippoo]

My sister has 3 DDs aged 12, 7 and 2. I have posted before about how the 12 yo is incredibly mean to her siblings, particularly 7 yo who has autism (not sure how to link to previous posts)

We have been away camping this week together with my DC and some incidents make me very angry/irritated with 12 yo niece.

For example:

She knows 7 yo is extremely particular about food - she barely eats and is underweight. 12 yo has stopped 7 yo eating at least 3 meals this week - by purposely knocking her plate across the table so her food would touch, by going on at her to try her meal and putting some of it on her plate (making 7 yo sick) and by coughing all over her food

Anything I or her mum say to anyone, she will answer. For example, I'll say to my DC "Sophie, please stop messing with the tent zips" and DN will say "I'm not messing with them!" even though their names sound nothing alike. She does this constantly

7 yo niece loves my dogs but every time they go near her, 12 yo calls them away so she can't stroke them

We went to some arcades and 12 yo won something she has zero interest in but that she knows 7 yo would adore. 7 yo never asks for anything and told her how lucky she was to win it. 12 yo made a big show of how she didn't want it so was going to give it away, making 7 yo think it would be to her...then gave it to a stranger and smiled smugly straight at 7 yo as she did so

Whenever 7 yo is sitting with or chatting to her mum, 12 yo will call her away then jump in her spot. 12 yo even races to get next to her mum before 2yo then gloats that she has Mummys hand

She corrects or argues with everyone constantly. My DC remarked it was a full moon and she insisted it was only 3/4 despite it clearly being fucking full! She asked where her bag was and I said on her sleeping bag, she kept saying no it isn't- I'm looking and it definitely isn't. It was very slightly off the sleeping bag but she could clearly see it, she just had to argue!

She is constantly after food, drinks and wanting to be bought stuff. She sulks and spoils it if anyone else gets a say in what they want to do and her mood brings everyone down.

I'm taking my DC camping in the summer and was going to offer to take my nieces too to give my sister a break but I really don't want to take 12 yo. I think her sisters would flourish with some time away from her, and that she needs to learn at some point that her behaviour is intolerable and that people won't want to spend time with her if she behaves in this way. However, taking her sisters away is rewarding her in a way as she then gets her mum's full attention.

What do you think? Am I unreasonable to say I don't want to take her?

7 yr old tries to stay away from 12 yr old but she keeps seeking her out. Whatever happens she'll say was an accident, or she didn't mean to, then she'll flounce off moaning that everything is always her fault. We have pointed out to her that if she stayed away from 7 yr old, these accidents couldn't happen and she couldn't be blamed for anything but she just won't leave her alone.

This child needs referring to a paediatrician for assessment.

That is the priority here .

I'm trying to demonstrate that it isn't because she's starved of attention, forced to look after the little ones, feeling pushed out

You don't know.
There's such a thing as bad positive praise. It can feel forced or false. Same for attention, etc.
Your sister needs someone who is unbiased to look at the behaviours and the parenting.
Even a professional would find it difficult from your lists.

Hope she gets the help she needs because she just sounds awful however it's dressed up she needs help my heart breaks for the poor 7 year old.

My DD1 has never behaved badly at school, she’s saved it for when she’s come home. Her jealousy of DD2 sounds like your niece with her 7 year old sister. They’re more evenly matched now they’re 10 and 7, which has helped.

One thing we did a few months ago was pay for 2 afternoons after school with a childminder, to separate the two of them, because it was too much. DD1 loves routine so it worked well. She also has a close friend who goes there too, which helped.

Sometimes a change here and there can make things easier.

Obviously she's not going to 'turn a corner' in one afternoon. This is years of hatred and resentment of her sister, for whatever reason, and quite possibly some independent issues in DN. That doesn't mean it is unfixable, but it's going to happen very, very slowly.

How do you think your sister would be if she knew that the first thing you do after spending time with her family is to go online and post long lists of everything bad her eldest daughter has done?

My sister is aware of this post. She has asked the GP for help but they dismissed it as sibling rivalry as school have no concerns about DN.

The whole thing sounds bizzare. IF she is so consistent in her bullying of her sister why are they allowed to continue to play board games etc together? Surely the situation is so serious that even if it means missing out on a holiday to pay for it your sister should be pursuing professional help. Whatever dynamic has caused this will have been going on for years and will not change quickly. Your post made it sound like 'well she had some time with her mum yet still behaved badly'. The issue is clearly far more deep seated than that.

It depends on what she told the GP.

The truth is that, for the most part, children's behaviour can be made a lot worse or a lot better through parental action.
Between the two of you, have you read any books about children's behaviour and sibling rivalry?
If so, which and what did you learn from them?

It's very common for girls with Aspergers to present as neurotypical in school so that's not a reason not to seek assessment. Angel at school and nightmare at home is often how undiagnosed girls with AS are described.

It's also quite normal for parents of these children to be repeatedly turned away when requesting assessments and support. GPs aren't trained to assess children for ASDs and often dismiss the subtler presentations as poor parenting or bad behaviour.

The best advice you could give your DSis right now is to join a support group for parents of children with ASD if she hasn't already and to start reading everything she can find about girls with Aspergers and masking. Googling Tony Attwood would be a good start. Several of the behaviours you have described point towards ASD and there may well be more. Talking direct with parents of children who mask and who were diagnosed later may help.

Your Dsis need to expect to have to fight for help for her DD, whatever is going on for her. The fight will be worth it if it brings answers and support.

I agree with posters feel it's unhelpful to write more lists of her behaviour on here. She's clearly very troubled and causing her sister great distress. Her parents clearly need some support to reduce the future damage to both children. If you do post more info, let it be about how to get that support instead of how awful the child is.

Dsis and I praised her and said how kind it was to include them as they were all so happy to be included and have her positive attention.

Oopsie. You and your DSis have accidentally been making your niece think that praise and attention are all about interacting with the other children. You should have dialled down the praise when she offered, you should have supervised closely to make sure she asked properly and that all went well, and given her some mild but genuine praise while and after she had done their nails. Not for how kind she was being but for how nicely she was painting each nail, the colours she was choosing, how pretty the look. Keeping her focus on what she was doing and not on the emotional mess. Save any praise for kindness til afterwards, when the other children aren't there.

You are both tempting your niece to get into situations that she can't handle.

Even when she has her mum's full attention

She has her Mum's full attention when you are there? I wonder. There could be some competition going on between the two of you for your sister's attention. I wonder if your niece sees you as a source of positive attention or as just another rival for her mother.

She had been alone with her mother, then you both let her go off (sent her off?) alone to do her sisters' and cousins' nails, leaving the two of you together.... until something kicked off. Hm.

Goldmandra I really agree with you. I haven't read the whole thread because i cant bring myself to read all thw negative comments about a child. girls with ASD are under diagnosed. She may not have ASD but she clearly needs help to understand her place in the family and relationships. She is only 12. Your sister can speak to any professionals involved with the 7yr old, hopefully they will help if she can share some of the issues with them. Good luck OP, and I hope your family can work together to build good relationships with each other going forward. You are right to raise the issues and can help support your family to address them.

And the way to do close supervision goes something like this:
"You want to do the girls' nails? Great idea, you do nails so well. Who will you do first? Claire? Let's go find her and ask her if she'd like her nails done. Now can I sit and watch, I love watching you do nails. You've chosen the pink for her, that's a beautiful shade." … etc etc.

This is not ASC-specific stuff by the way, I learned it at the children's hospital parenting workshop for extra-challenging kids

There’s some great advice on here, particularly from @AmaryllisNightAndDay about the nail painting episode, and others about ASD and girls, and challenging behaviour in children/girls.

One thing has become increasingly clear through this thread, and the last. This is that the girl and her family needs some professional help.

There are the unfortunate family dynamics, and the way all the grown ups around this troubled child are failing to get to the heart of the issues at work here. And all the while this child’s behaviour is screaming out for help. Im not saying you should accept her bad behaviour and ‘go all soft’ on her. And I’m certainly not saying you should judge her, punish her & rather enjoy getting some revenge on her in the process. But the adults in her life should start listening to what this girl is trying to communicate by her behaviour, which is that something is very very wrong here and she cannot fix it by herself. I suspect she will continue down this ‘naughty mean girl’ path unless someone steps in. Someone with insight and some strategies to help the whole family function better.

So please support your sister in getting some professional help.

I'm trying to demonstrate that it isn't because she's starved of attention,

Hippo this is a really difficult situation for all you. Your niece may not be starved of attention but some children do need a lot more attention than most. And she may feel pushed out even if that's not the objective truth. It is nobody's fault, not your niece and not your sister's parenting. There are strategies for giving needy children extra attention that your sister might try. But those strategies will need to be modified if your niece does turn out to have innate issue of her own, such as ASC, or they wont work.

the DC were all chalking/playing ball games/making up dances in the garden. 12 yr old was leading the dancing and bossing everyone

Unstructured play with other children looks like a problem for her so leaving the 12 yo to "play" by bossing the others around may not be the best idea. It is odd that she spends so much time playing with your family, doesn't she go to see friends of her own age? If she lacks friends that could be another sign that of a problem even if the school haven't spotted it yet.

12 yr old let 7 yr old win for the first time ever and we thought maybe we'd turned a corner.

Oh yes, I remember the corner The one we keep hoping will be turned and then everything will be fine. It took me a long time to accept that was never going to happen, that it would always be two steps forward and one step back and we would all just have to plod on.

It sounds as if she did make a step forward in letting her sister win. But that took all her resources and was all she was capable of right then. She couldn't sustain it and fell right back to her old bad pattern.

I just don't know why she has such a vendetta against her.

Well, her sister is the first person who crashed into her relationship with her mother, and at an age when she would have been able to put two and two together and blame her sister. Plus all the attention round the disability as well. Plenty of raw material for a vendetta, and it seems to have become entrenched. Poor seven year old

Sorry, wrong thread. Reported.

Your neice sounds incredibly immature and this kind of thing is not normal for a child as old as her. I think this needs addressing ASAP. I now having heard your latest update think your sister needs to come down hard on this from your niece strong discipline needs to be put in place and 0 tolerance needs to be introduced.

Some fantastic advice and insights above.

I completely agree with the advice from AmaryllisNightAndDay re close supervision.

I understand that you and your DSis will want to have conversations out of earshot of the children, especially given the challenges she is facign currently. You just can't do that at the moment.

Plan conversations for when the children are at school or in bed. when they are together, keep them under supervision and involve yourself in their activities in a positive way.

If your DSis needs to get on with things like cooking, she needs to insist that either the 12YO or the other two are in the room with her. The 12YO can help with the cooking etc. She may not like it but it's OK to explain to her that she can't be left with her sister unsupervised at the moment. It isn't a punishment but it is a natural consequence of the way she treats her sister. Protecting her sister needs to be prioritised over giving her opportunities to prove she can be nice right now.

Once she is used to this routine, it may help her feel more secure and allow her to relax and focus on something other than causing her sister pain and distress.

I know it's really hard work to supervise children every moment but, just now, that exactly what these children need.

Takethebuscuit
Just no. Not 0 tolerance. That’s an awful idea and what op has been suggesting. This child is suffering.

Just no. Not 0 tolerance. That’s an awful idea and what op has been suggesting. This child is suffering.

What about how the 7 year old is suffering by all this vile behaviour towards her. Surely you would agree this needs putting an end to. At the start I agreed but as more details came out I simply could not maintain that position.

What would zero tolerance mean, though? It may sound good, but how it would be implemented is the killer.

I agree with zero tolerance but it needs to be maintained by supervision, separation and intervention not by punishment. I agree with Goldmandra that protection for the youngster is the main priority. I am worried that the 12yo will react to punishment by taking it out on her younger sister when she gets a chance and that will only make it worse. The 12yo doesn't seem to have normal limits on her behaviour and I wouldn't want to to find out the hard way where her limits are. Given how aggressive she can be she urgently needs professional help both for her own sake and for her sisters' safety. And yes, she sounds developmentally delayed to me too. Just in a different way from her younger sister. Janie's suggestion about talking to the professionals who support your 7yo (without the girls present) sounds good to me.