To be quite concerned about SD and her mum ?

[NotMyProblem202039]

I've name changed for this as it's potentially quite outing...

I've got a feeling this is going to be quite long, so grab a coffee, get comfy..

I've been with DH 6 years, known him 7, married 2 of those. SD is, shared care no issues abd things are pretty ammicable alround and i have a good relationship with SD, just so we get the basics out of the way.

Every since I have known SD her mum has had form for taking her to the Drs for quite literally every cough and sneeze. For the last 2 years DD has been on antibiotics almost continuously, she quite literally finished one course and with in a fortnight she has been to the Drs for another, usually for either an ear or urine infection but occasionally for other things. SD has seen specialists regarding the reoccurances of both and there has been nothing found to explain why she gets them constantly. I'm beginning to think there isn't actually much wrong with SD and her mum is 'forcing' these problems on her?
As I've explained DH has SD roughly 50% of the time, only a handful of times over 6 years can I recall SD getting ill at our house, just usual kid stuff, may be a cold or an upset tummy. She's very rarely had difficulty breathing, ear pain or symptoms relating to the reoccurring infections she seems to be getting. Even when she stays with us for longer periods over the school holidays, but I can guarantee if SD has been with us for more than 7 days, within 48 hours of her going back to her mum's she is ill, at the Drs and back in antibiotics.
Ads mum for the last 12/18 months has requested SD always wears a coat outside, fair enough when it's cold, but also a hat, scarf and gloves regardless of weather. If it's not t shirt weather this is what SD has to wear, if she doesn't it results in hour long phone calls ranting at DH that SD is ill again because she hasn't worn them. At our house currently SD has a cream, bought over the counter, for a skin condition SD apparently has, though DH has never seen it, a spray for her ear, again bought over the counter, that SD has to have at specific intervals, and 2 multi vitamins she has to take, all her mum insists she needs. In the past we've also been given an unlabled jam jar with a yellow tinted clear, oily liquid in, that smelt of onions and slightly like chlorine, that SD was supposed to have a spoonful of morning and evening... No explanation as to what it was, just it would stop her getting ill so often.

Normally I stay out of this, DH doesn't seem overly concerned and presumably a Dr wouldn't prescribe or recommend something unnecessarily, but we've had SD for the last 10 days and I'm starting to question what is going on.
SD arrived fine, no complaints of pain or anything, at tea time after being told to eat her veggies she screwed her face up, bent over in pain clutching her stomach and claimed she was going to be sick and felt really unwell, all a bit concerning so DH suggested laying on the sofa a bit and having a slice of toast later. Of SD went into the living room, when I went back in she was dancing to the theme tune of her face programme she likes. She made a miraculously recovery in time for pudding (as kids do) and never mentioned her stomach again until DH asked her how she was feeling just before bed and she did the same doubled over in pain, claiming to be in agony scenario again. Next morning she seemed fine when she woke up (DH works nights so he isn't around for breakfast) seemed fine and ate her breakfast, I asked her how she was and she said she was ok, until I asked her to take some of her stuff back into her room and she went through the same dramatic claiming to be in pain again and she needed to go lay down, I told her to take her stuff with her as she went and she was fine for the rest of the day, running playing and just being normal.
The second thing that has really got me thinking is a phone call between SD and her mum. As I said SD has been fine all week, she's due to go back to her mum's tomorrow. Whilst on the phone to her mum, her mum asked her how she was and SD put on a really sick voice ( think the voice you used to use calling in sick cause you were hungover when you were 18 sort of voice...) and told her mum she had been really poorly and couldn't stop coughing, which given the current situation Sent her poor mum into a full on panic demanding she was coming to get SD immediately. DH happened to be in the toilet at that particular moment so I called SD out on her blatant lie, I've been home with her everyday and she's not coughed once, and she proceeded to lie further and claim she has been but I mustnt be able to hear her. SD has past form for lying to her mum, saying she doesn't do anything at our house (before lock down we used to go out often, do lot of craft activities SD loves) and also for saying DH leaves her alone in the house (again not true)

If your still with me at this point I guess my AIBU to think something isn't quite right and to be quite concerned about the amount of medication SD is taking that she potentially doesn't need. I know I'm not medically qualified to make that call but it just isn't making sense. SD has moved Drs surgeries at least one before if not twice despite living in the same place, and I'm starting to wonder the reason behind this. If I'm not being unreasonable, how on earth do I go about trying to get SD some help to sort this out, as I've said DH isn't overly concerned, he's of the mindset if she's prescribed it then she needs it but it is an awful lot of antibiotics to be taking and combined with the unusual behaviour it's making me question things a lot.

Get DH to share your concerns with the school nurse. They will be able to access medical records and take appropriate steps if something doesn't look right.

Not sure one of the symptoms of epilepsy is lying to your mum about what you do at your dad’s.

NC for this as my sister is also on MN. My sister is exactly like this with her two DC (ages 13 and 9). The 13 year old attends school less than 50% of the time and the 9 year old is also starting to get that way. The older DC has been attending hospital as an outpatient for 3/4 years now since her “illnesses” all started - she’s had lots and lots of tests including a couple of MRIs, X-rays, numerous blood tests, etc but nothing has been found. At the hospital, she also sees a child psychiatric nurse (who has 1-2-1 sessions with her without my sister present). Despite all of this, no physical or mental condition has been diagnosed.

The 9 year old is starting to go the same way. I can see the pattern emerging.

My sister and I used to be close, but our relationship has definitely suffered in recent years as I’ve tried to balance an appropriate level of concern with interfering. I think I’ve probably overstepped the mark a few times and this normally ends up with us not speaking for a few days until we’ve both cooled down.

It’s heart-breaking to see two lovely kids have their lives disrupted like this. But I’ve come to accept that she’s their mother, she clothes and feeds them, puts a roof over their heads and is probably doing her best. I actually think the problem is with her - this is another thing I’ve tried to discuss with her, approaching the topic in a number of different ways. But she won’t have any of it. She’s separated from her DH and I know from the small number of conversations I’ve had with him that he’s very concerned. However, my sister is very over-bearing towards him (part of the reason they split up) and, although he’s a nice enough bloke, he just seems to have accepted it.

It’s a terrible situation but I honestly can’t see how it’s going to resolve itself. I feel for you, OP.

One possible explanation could be that, the girl did at one point have an awful infection, mum anxious and concerned took her to the doctors, was prescribed antibiotics and the mum looked after daughter and gave her lots of attention and love and made sure daughter was well cared for... so then the daughter noticed the added attention and that having an infection gets you lots of attention so now she could be making up symptoms so anxious mum takes her to the doctors again, mum looks after daughter, extra care, extra attention and the cycle started again because it gets the girl what she wants every single time. It is obvious with what you said that she pretended to be in pain when you asked her to do her chore.

I'm surprised that they've continued to do so without disputing the need and potential future health concerns from excessive antibiotic consumption. It's relatively easy to fake urine and ear infections , ear to sore for doc to look at, not able to produce a sample. Doc will sometimes just go on patient history. I think Dh does need to look at this more seriously and query the amount of medication a young child has been taking for years and why. The potential complications for ds are serious both physical and psychological.

May not be in the same league but watch The Act, a true story about a mum who says her child has alot of different things wrong with her. It's scary and so easy to believe it's very true, especially from the child's side.
She obviously loves her mum and may get extra special attention when she's 'sick' which could be the reason your SD plays up to it. It's not healthy and her Dad should really intervene before it gets out of hand.

You could write to the G.P.

I've seen situations remarkably like this before and they often follow a pattern of a genuine illness which shows a child how nice people are to them and what allowances get made when they're ill, so it ends up meaning that they feign or exaggerate illnesses to get the desired reaction.
I would say though that utis can be very hard to get rid of completely and it's possible that she keeps getting symptoms. Your DH really needs to look into this properly and insist that he comes to any specialist appointments and insists on a meeting with the Dr and the little girl's mum to ask the doctor directly what could be going on and if any underlying issues have been ruled out, what the next steps to take should be. That's what any concerned parent would do so if the mum isn't having any of it then I think you have your answer. If the mum is enthusiastic for the dad to participate in speaking to doctors then you know this is coming directly from the little girl herself

I would be concerned too but obviously you need to tread very carefully to avoid a fallout. Finding a way to look in to it further is a good idea I think though. You obviously care about your SD and making sure there's nothing odd going on is in her best interests.

I’d be doubled over in pain an hour after eating toast or cereal . Because I’m gluten intolerant.

Just mentioning that in case it’s a factor among all the other things going on.

Do you think it’s her mum or your DSD who is fabricating the illness? Some of the responses on here suggest that it’s your DSD but if it is fabricated then I think it’s her mum and your DSD has learnt from her mum how being “ill” gets her out of doing things and she may even have become part of it with her mum subconsciously as she knows that her mum “needs” her to be ill. I’d be surprised if it’s your DSD pretending to be ill and her mum genuinely believing she’s ill, kids aren’t that good at pretending.
You need to get your DH on board though to be able to do much

SD is a bit of a drama lama, it is a possibility she's having her mum for a fool?

Nice

Is SDs mum polish or Russian? I have a couple of lovely polish friends and they both insisting going to the doctors for everything. One has a lot of antibiotics. Plus when one met the other, she joked that I knew she was polish too, before I even spoke to her due the amount of layers her child was wearing in summer. Obviously small sample, but very obsessed with hat scarves and getting them to wear big jumpers in the house. Plus both now I think of it have their houses boiling hot.
My Russian friend won't let her child out if they are minorly ill , say a runny nose, they would stay off school until every drop of snot is gone. Just a different attitude for illness maybe?

My parents being very British are the carry on types, if you weren't dead you go to school attitude, I have this too.

Your husband should carefully step in and assess the situation for at least a couple of month to try to understand exactly what is going on there. What is done in infancy is difficult to undo afterwards, she cannot have all those medications for no reason.
A child is not supposed to take pills every day, vitamins now are made to look like sweets. There is something off for sure.
Some parents are hypochondriacs and tend to have offsprings just like them. Right now, the child is not sick but has learned that mum bends when you are ill, this too has to be fixed, she knows when she is lying.
Maunchensen ( isn't it vey rare?) is an whole other level of scary and danger.
Trust your instinct, better safe then sorry,

It sounds as if your dsds mum has triggered this behaviour in some way. She sounds obsessively worried by her dds health. I am not saying this is completely driven completely by her mother. From what you have described I would think this perhaps is more likely this is learnt, attention seeking behaviour and they have some kind of weird co dependent relationship. This is all very difficult to tell even for experts and I’m a lay person so this is just my take.

Time for your dh to get his head out of the sand and deal with it. Your DSD has some kind of psychological issue to be put to putting on these symptoms. The role her mother has played to reach this point seems pretty reckless - taking constant antibiotics is dangerous and will be playing havoc with her body. What happens if your dsd develops antibiotic resistance and then she needs them for real?

If your dh doesn’t start to acknowledge the issue, your dsd could perhaps never fulfil her adult potential. The behaviour you’re described so fully engrained may stop her from attaining good qualifications due to school hours missed, getting or holding down a good job and so on. And what sort of life partner would she end up with? One, who encourages this behaviour would be awful.

I think it's more like the child has munchausens rather than the parent by proxy. The child seems to be instigating it

When I was younger I used to pretend to have tonsillitis if I wanted time off school. The Dr would always give antibiotics to me, barely looking in my throat so it's not that ridiculous that the docs is over prescribing.

I would send a letter to the daughters doctor ,detailing everything you have told us ,tell the doctor you are just giving him the information of what she is like at your house .
Or make an appointment with the doctor, you and your dh go and discuss this ,it’s his daughter so he should be able to have access to her medical notes and be able to discuss them with the child’s gp

Some of this reminds me of my DM, who worked very long hours but used to go into overdrive when my siblings and I weren't well. So we did learn to play up to get her to notice us, because, at other times, she hardly seemed to notice us at at all except to smack us when we were naughty. (She says our F used to smack us too hard and she didn't like it, but she's conveniently forgotten that.)

And yes, we did used to exaggerate illnesseses to get our DM to show us love, because it was actually the only way that would happen. And the insistence on us dressing warmly was also something she was into, and worrying about us catching cold.

The really tragic thing is that she failed to see what was actually going o behind the identified conditions like me having very bad thrush at the age of 3, my DSis breaking her coccyx at the age of 12, my DB having a complete personality change as an adolescent. She went into overdrive worrying about the symptoms, whereas the truth was that my DSis and I were suffering SA at the hands of our F and getting pregnant as a result. (She was obsessed with the fact that I was overweight so focused, as always, only on putting me on a diet.)

I'm obviously not saying that anything that sinister is necessarily going on, but just pointing out that there are all sorts of things that could be the reason why your SD would make her DM believe that she's unwell. And yes, either pretending/imagining that she has COVID-19 is something that I can imagine that we would have done.

My adopted DDs (11 and 8) exaggerate their symptoms, too, to get attention from my DH and me. Or they blatantly pretend. They have attachment issues and anxiety because of their adoption and this is on way in which it manifests itself.

It sounds as if your SD's DM might be trying too hard to overcompensate for her parents splitting up? Maybe she needs to challenge her DD sometimes. If I think one of my DDs if I think they're exaggerating. I'll say, 'If you're off school because you're ill, you can't then go outside to play of go to your friend's house after she's back from school.' If they're not I'll, they'll make a very swift recovery.

And there could be something else going on, like bullying, which can make children complain about being ill, so that they can stay off school. (Another thing that was true of me growing up.)

Whatever it is, questions need to be asked, as this isn't at all healthy for a 10 year old.

Sorry you are going through this.
Just wanted to add to comments above as I am concerned about the amount of antibiotics your DSD is getting....is it possible she is getting them online? Possibly from abroad? It's just a thought as I know GP's are now very reluctant to prescribe antibiotics due to increased resistance and it seems odd that they haven't insisted on any swabs or samples. PP's have suggested it may be easier than I realised though, so it is just a suggestion!

Good luck managing this. I know how worrying it can be I used to have the same concerns about an old friend of mine and it is difficult to know what to do and understand what is going on from the outside.

My DSC has a undiagnosed condition which causes pain and unpleasant symptoms, there have been quite a lot of investigations over past few years but no diagnosis.
They don’t often mention it and occasionally I will ask how they feel or how their X body part has been this week etc. And then they will say “oh it hurts” or “I don’t feel well” etc. But until I asked there was no mention of it and like your SD two minutes later they will be happily playing and scoffing sweets...they never ever have symptoms on the days we are doing something they enjoy or if they are due to go to a friends party etc.
I’ve also noticed a trend of them saying it hurts when we are busy and other people are getting the attention or focus or they aren’t getting their way (for example at an adult birthday dinner when SC couldn’t sit where they wanted).
There’s definitely a condition, no doubt about it (although I suspect it’s somewhat lifestyle related), but I’ve 100% noticed a pattern of child playing up the symptoms for effect when they want.
sounds like your DSD is doing something similar, possibly caused by an actual event or real illness at the start but has learnt that she gets favourable treatment as a result.

I think you have to sit your partner down and without over dramatising it, say you are a bit concerned, somethings don’t make sense and can you have a sensible, logical discussion about it. Then list out the facts you have. Try not to put your opinion too forcefully, just present what you know and what has happened.
Hopefully he will agree it’s strange and be prepared to speak to her GP and access her medical records (as is his right if he has PR).
Poor kid. Hopefully you’ll get to the bottom of it’

When things are back to normal, your husband needs to go to see his daughter's doctor to ask about why she keeps being prescribed antibiotics and talk through his concerns. He could also contact her school now to see if they have worries about her attendance and whether they have encountered the claims of sudden stomach pain etc.

When I was younger I used to pretend to have tonsillitis if I wanted time off school. The Dr would always give antibiotics to me, barely looking in my throat so it's not that ridiculous that the docs is over prescribing

This is very true, I’ve phoned up the doctors before and only been able to get a call back appointment where I’ve been prescribed antibiotics just based on my description. It’s not out of the realms of possibility that this could be happening.

What nationality/ethnic background/culture is the mum from?
Could then unifldentified liquid be a traditional medicine?

Rather than the Munchausen line of thought I'm thinking the mum is suffering from health anxiety in regards to her DD.
She is hyper-vigilent looking for signs of illness in her dd ( and probably herself too?).
Mum is likely picking up on small everyday illnesses kids pick up and which the body would fight off/ward off itself given chance and exaggerating the length of time and severity of the issues in order to get medication to 'fix' it.
I'm betting that mum has dreadful anxiety issues.