To be worried about 5 year old's empathy?

[Devonmum2020]

DD is 5.5 and I'm being driven crazy by her complete lack of empathy.

She bites her younger brother constantly and when we do the "look what you have done, this hurt DS" all I get back is a blank "well he made me mad".

She attacked me badly on Tuesday and I showed her the marks. Her response " I was itchy"

I have been unwell all weekend, DS has been giving me blankets etc and understanding when I have said mummy can't do x because I'm poorly. DD is just kicking off over everything. When I explain that mummy really isn't feeling well there's literally nothing there. She absolutely does not care and it has been meltdown after meltdown.

I don't know how to get her to get it but I'm getting so frustrated :(

I know kids don't develop empathy until 6 or 7 but Aibu to think she should have more than she has? DS is a young 4 and he seems to be able to grasp it.

My ds is the same about consequences. He just can't link them to what he has done, he just sees me as being mean. As a result their impact is limited. It does work better if I tell what the consequence will be before he does something. He also bit way past the age he 'should' have grown out of it. I think it was because it was the worst thing he could do. Empathy isn't his strong point....

You could be describing my 5yr old son. He can be quiet aggressive, biting us as you've described and never seems to get that it's hurting as such. But yet, if watching tv, or playing with his toys, and something happens, he's very empathetic towards the characters. It's frustrating that it doesn't carry over into real life for him. He knows he's doing wrong but doesn't appear to have the impulse control to stop himself in the moment

I'd be wondering about ASD as well tbh,esp The 'I was itchy' comment and the constant meltdowns.

My dd is on the ASD pathway for a diagnosis and was similar at your dds age...

She doesn't like blood or people bleeding but that stems more from her fear of blood rather than it being because of the other person being hurt, if that makes sense?

We showed her emotion picture cards and she can identify the basic happy/sad/mad but she absolutely can't apply it in practice. I Don't even think she looks at people long enough to be able to

I have one child who is (and always has been since before he could crawl) extremely empathetic (to the point where it’s problematic) and one who was a stereotypical self centred arsehole toddler with a good dose of not giving a fuck thrown into the mix.

But both didn’t even begin to develop proper empathy in the way we understand it until closer to five. much like @LaurieFairyCake described. The older one was mirroring in the sense that he felt what others felt but it took a long time for him to understand that they weren’t his own feelings (which in a very intuitive child led to a lot of problems with him picking up adult emotions but being completely unable to understand them, poor bastard is probably destined to become a depressed poetic type after the trauma he was out through in this way). The other one again didn’t seem to fully understand the boundary between his feelings (also his wants and desires) and other people’s (hence being quite self centred). The awareness that other people even have feelings of their own only really seemed to dawn on them after four. They’re still not anywhere near the level of empathy to be able to rationally predict and manipulate emotions (although the younger one does it intuitively since he figured out that other people feel what he looks like he feel iyswim but it’s not in anyway intellectual in him).

I wouldn’t worry too much about the empathy at this age, most adults lack the empathy themselves to understand that the kind of empathy that young children feel is very different. Parents in particular have a tendency to impute the kind of empathy and affection they hold for their children onto their children so are quite deluded. However your daughter seems to have behavioural issues which I would seek help for, the behaviour you describe us completely abnormal for her age. PPs have mentioned ASD, there are also a number of other neurological conditions which in themselves won’t cause biting but can result in children becoming violent because of the stress they cause. In particular if she is behaving this way when tired/hungry that could suggest that the biting is just a response to stress. Also consider any other signs of stress she may display such as teeth grinding or lip biting etc.

I don't even think she grasps that I have feelings of my own. She has started lashing out at staff at school and is struggling with the idea of needing to do things that she doesnt necessarily want to do she is on school's radar but it's very much being put down to parenting although DS has never behaved anything like this.

I expect you’ve tried this already, but it can help to try and name her own emotions too.
‘Oh, your drawing isn’t going quite right, you must feel frustrated’
‘Oh, you dropped your ice cream, I can see that has made you feel angry’
Etc.

@Thingsthatgo we do lots of emotion labelling like that. Doesn't feel like it makes any difference at the moment

Hi @HollowTalk I have before now removed the ipad for two weeks until his behaviour improved. He doesn't use it excessively, he gets one hour with it after our evening meal, he only plays Minecraft he does not watch rubbish or anything.

And he doesn't really behave any differently when he's not got access to it at all, he has a comfort type thing (a sort of stick) that he uses to run around making lots of noise with, it's hard to explain but he says he's imagining things when he's doing it and it's a bit like he goes into his own little world. He does this several times a day and seems to get some sort of relief from it. He gets angry and upset if he's interrupted while he's doing it, and this causes a lot of his aggression.

My DD1 is like this. If I am poorly, it is an inconvenience to her; a change to her routine. She is 7 and was diagnosed with autism last year.

It sounds like possible ASD. Girls are much harder to spot. When you mean on school’s radar, do you mean for this? Is she below age related expectation for Personal, Socail and Emotional development.
Is she the same in school, or does she find it easier in the setting? Is this why they are suggesting parenting? Often children present differently in different settings.

I’ve been there with my middle child, currently referred to CAMHS. It could be a sign of something underlying.

On the plus side my son has come on leaps and bounds recently (8yo). His view of reality is slowly changing to reflect what actually happened and he’s starting to empathise irl, previously it was only with tv characters.

It helped us to take a video of the behaviour and play it back for discussion later when he was calmer.

Was also going to say that we see that type of behaviour from my DS who is a similar age and has ASD. We haven’t seen biting for a while actually, but hitting, shoving, kicking, yelling. When he’s angry nothing will get through to him. The naughty step has never worked. Discipline for him is very hard. Definitely worth a chat with the GP

@LaurieFairyCake

You don't need to worry about empathy until 8.

They don't start to cognitively understand empathy until 6 or 7.

Under 6 they're just mirroring.

Pure nonsense.

No I don't believe it, I know it

That link doesn't say what you said. At all. It says that in many children, empathy "comes into its own" at 6/7. Not that no children feel empathy before 7/8 and until then are only pretending.

She's 67 months (months is relevant for EYFS) and they have her as low to mid 30-50 months in some areas including social and emotional areas. She won't meet any of the early learning goals. She was doing well at school and they saw no issues until February time and has deteriorated to the extent they now provide her with a 1 to 1 at all times as she is a risk to staff and children but they are saying it's learnt behaviour from home and that I allow her to control everything and I need to put boundaries in place so that she knows she can't control others. There have been safeguarding referrals made to social care implying she has learnt this from home too but social care have closed each time with no concerns.

I have also heard that about empathy developing after age 6.

Have you ever looked at 1, 2, 3 magic? Start with a family meeting to agree the rules. Any unacceptable behaviour gets a 1. Next time a 2. Next a 3 which leads to a time out 1min per age. Sounds simple but pretty effective. The book works through lots of scenarios, eg won't go for timeout willingly. The first time I said that's a 1 to Dd5 and she said OK and stopped what she was doing, I had a party in my head!

It says exactly that

Mirroring is not pretending

I find it totally bizarre that school are saying she needs (and providing) a 1:1 and haven’t referred on to CAMHS or whoever diagnoses in your area. She needs to be evaluated so that you can make sure she gets the best support

What you're describing (including school issues) is very similar to my son. He was finally diagnosed with autism at 8 after so much pushing of professionals and failing by the education sector. Now he's 10 and totally thriving in an autism specialist school, doesn't need a 1:1 or is in any way a danger to anyone (all things previous school said to me). If brains are wired differently, those brains need treating differently to thrive.

In their view if I fix things to make her behave at home then she will naturally start to behave at school. I'm just so frustrated. My younger child doesn't behave anything like this, even when she isn't melting down everything is just so difficult

Op I also just wanted to say that I'm struggling with my 5.5yo too (although with different things). I think it's quite a tricky age. Sympathy. And surely there must be more that school can actually do!

LaurieFairyCake

No, it really doesn't.

Sorry OP, this sounds very tough and frustrating. Can't advise from personal experience, but there are some books recommended here that might help: www.empathylab.uk/2020-read-for-empathy-collections

Good luck