Sat here crying about DD’s behaviour

[Cantfeelmuchthesedays]

I can’t take much more of it.
She woke up at 6 am, shouting she wanted to go downstairs, kicking me in my back.
Asking me to help her to do things and then getting angry as I’m doing it wrong. Constantly reacting and shouting and screaming. Following the dog around annoying her.
She’s not very pleasant anymore, at all and it’s causing huge problems between Dh and I, he’s stressed at work then comes home to shouting and screaming and taking ages at bedtime to sleep etc. Weekends are hell also.
We don’t have much patience anymore and I’m starting to dread waking up, my only peace is when I’m asleep.
I just don’t know what to do and if any of this is normal and a phase and will pass or something else. Taking her out is a nightmare, spending the day at home for 12 hours is worse.
As awful as it sounds, I miss my old life so very much, I don’t enjoy motherhood anymore and don’t know what happened to my lovely girl, I don’t know if we’re to blame or if it’s normal and we’re not emotionally strong enough.
Will this just be our lives now

What do you do when she gets into your bed every night?

4 is really tough. My DS is almost 6 and I look back and shudder. A book I found absolutely brilliant was How to talk so little kids will listen(make sure you get the little kids one rather than kids). There were so many good tactics in at that I found helpful with my DS, things like being playful so if we were battling to get him to go to bed instead of getting frustrated and arguing and so on we'd say let's pretend to be monkeys and we'd start acting like monkeys going up the stairs, or we'd make up silly songs or make silly faces. It worked really well, that's just one thing, there were loads of different tactics

Has anything changed - you describe her as being happy and cooperative until relatively recently, has anything happened like a house move, family changes, changes in her routine etc that might have shaken her. Remembering that things which aren’t much in an adults experience might be major for her and difficult to process. What is she trying to communicate through her behaviour? Is she struggling with pre-school if she’s used to being home with you? Flexing and testing her boundaries? If you can figure out what’s underlying the behavioural part will make more sense and be easier to manage.

It's a bolshy age, and they can be very full on and challenging.

Just because they have a great vocabulary and use the loo and can be a little more independent than toddlers doesn't mean they have any real understanding of the reality of other people all the same. They are very ego centric and will be for a few years.

If you let her watch children's programmers, make sure they're uplifting shows which promote kindness and consideration for others, and avoid adventure/ problem solving or adversarial themes. In this latter category I would place the vast, vast majority of Nickelodeon, including garbage like Paw Patrol. There are a lot of older American programmes from PBS which are excellent - episodes of Curious George, Caillou, Mister Rogers' Neighbourhood... See if you can find material like that instead of the flashy Nickelodeon dreck.

A TV screen is a lot better for children than a tablet or other small, private screen.

I would investigate what's going on in her preschool. Sometimes children imitate the behaviour of kids around them, or there is tension there that they act out at home. Sometimes kids can feel insecure at preschool for various reasons.

Ask your daughter to play preschool with you one day. She is the teacher and you and some stuffed animals are the kids. She can tell you what the rules are and you can play out little scenarios like needing to use the loo or spilling a drink at snack time, or what happens when two kids want the same toy, or when one kid is mean to another.

In general, participating in acting out scenes can be very instructive if you listen carefully and don't try to direct the scene.

I would be very clear that she needs to leave the dog alone. You need to intervene gently but firmly every single time she bothers the dog. Encourage empathy by suggesting she draw pictures of the dog, make up happy stories about herself and the dog, and give her jobs like helping to feed him. Give her a stuffed animal who resembles the dog and promote gentle touch with the toy. But you have to watch interactions like a hawk amd step in to protect your pet, ultimately to protect your DD because bothering other dogs coukd result in disaster.

Your DD is not too young to include her in chores around the house and cooking. She could help sort laundry, hoover her room, polish, put away groceries, put away her own clothes - all with you at her side. Read together and discuss stories you have read, focusing on how she thinks the characters feel in the situations they have encountered. Talk about what she watches on TV, focusing on the feelings.

Yes, I agree with all of the above

Excellent post @mathanxiety

The diary is a really good suggestion. Descriptions of the meltdowns written just after the fact will be really useful for any health care workers. Unusual feelings, how it started, possible triggers, mood beforehand, mood afterwards, tiredness level, hunger level,... Plus it will help you to see the patterns which are probably there.

If you have any parenting/relationship concerns, then as a teacher you know this already but praise the good, try to ignore the bad. The 'good' attention has to outnumber the bad by quite some way so they can start responding to the positive. One of mine was difficult a total little sod and I genuinely couldn't find good because he was so negative. So I had to contrive ways to offer praise. " DS, please could you be really helpful and help me put this bowl in the dishwasher - wow, thank you that is really helpful, well done"

(FWIW, he has a few ASD traits, and a few ADHD ones - functions OK but the concentration difficulties are still there)

Is it a fear response? In retrospect, DS maybe couldn't read facial expressions well, and got scared of me getting annoyed at him. It felt at the time like he went to 100% negative instantly but now I think he went to 'scared, can't cope, shout NO and scream'. And then I'd get annoyed... (Sorry to suggest it - but it never ocurred to me and I wish it had.)

Things which generally helped as he started school were moving bedtime 30 mins earlier. And making sure he didn't get hungry while tired - so a snack in the school playground. Hunger or tiredness and self control went out of the window.

You said your DD is tired at the moment - is a nap possible?

And do choices help at all? Getting dressed isn't negotiable (actually, we dressed multiple times in the playground because he had 100 % refused at home...) - but a choice whether it's this blue or that red t-shirt gives them some feeling of control over the situation. For my DS, feeling control was important.

Talk to the preschool - the seniors will have seen a wide range of 'normal' before. If there is something up, they are likely to spot the evidence (both my DC were sent for eye tests on the advice of their preschool - they were spot on)

Good luck, it sounds like you need a hug x

I would second the suggestion of a full physical from AcrossThePond.

Children of four often wake at night because they have worms, which I'm sorry to say are rife in preschool settings.

They get them because they don't wipe themselves properly, scratch their bums, don't wash their hands frequently enough, or before eating, etc.

Disturbed sleep has massive knock on effects on behaviour. It also affects your energy and your ability to stay calm.

Getting up at night and wandering into your bed needs to be addressed. Start with an investigation of why she's doing this.

Don't rule anything out - worms, hunger, disturbance outside, flashing light outside, train or plane passing, neighbour revving car/car lock beeping, her own farts (I kid you not), clanking water pipes next door, bad dreams or nightmares arising from school situations or TV or general fears (kids of four start to become aware of death, disaster, the evening news and the con wrns of other adult concerns, good and evil I'm a general sense) but they can't process any of this.

I have kids similar ages.

My advice is to increase preschool. Your sanity is important.

This. My heart goes out to that poor dog. Rescues would never let a dog be adopted with a family with young children. They're not toys ffs

So. She expects your undivided attention all the time.
Stop that. Have specific times when you will play/read/whatever. Other times she entertains herself/has screen time/draws, colours etc.
Immediate consequences for 'spiteful' behaviour. Time out, remove toy, whatever works
Reward and acknowledge good behaviour.
Check she isn't over-tired or hangry
When she won't get in the car - pick her up and put her in
When she won't get dressed - threatento take her out in pyjamas (with her clothes hidden to change into when she calms down) and do it if necessary.

And do NOT make her your world. Too much pressure

SuperNanny technique to knock that on the head

Take her back, gently, every time.

@Theblacksheepandme I’m ok with her coming into bed, it won’t be forever.

Oh God yes, rule out fucking threadworms. My DD has had them a couple of times and both times I had no idea why she was being SUCH a miserable, aggro little fucker until she began wetting the bed and I had a lightbulb "ooooooh" moment. Vile little parasites but easily cleared up with a couple of doses of Ovex. May have nothing to do with it but well worth eliminating as a possibility!

@AcrossthePond55 sadly you can't just see a paediatrician in the UK unless your GP refers you and even then the wait could be years. Even the private paediatricians have long waiting lists now and we have been on an NHS waiting list for 6 months and that's after having paid thousands out of our own pocket for private assessments and treatments of various kinds (after no referrals could be made in 2020 for obvious reasons).

Support for parents in this country is generally crap.

Cantfeelmuchthesedays

@EmeraldShamrock1 What atmosphere? The fact we’re worried sick about our child because her behaviour has become so challenging? We’re a happy home with lots of love

I don't think there is any advice that people can give you here. You are determined that you are living in a happy home with lots of love and your daughter is the problem. This makes me very sad for this little girl.

This this this EXCEPT you have to actually be calm. They can tell if you fake it, in my experience! As pp said, unruffled, calm, boundaries, kind.

You're really upset, stressed and triggered by her behaviour and so is your DH. If you can move past that and regulate yourself, work out why it's bothering you so much, it will help.

Trust me. I've been round the block a few times (and am still going round) with a child who's been a more extreme version of this, 7 years and counting.

I wonder if she might be anxious about something.

Did she jump on your while you were on your phone?

Why do people STILL think that Supernanny knows what she’s talking about? She doesn’t even have children of her own.

@Theblacksheepandme I'm not saying my daughter is the problem 🤷🏻‍♀️😔but is she like this because of us then, is that really it? Even my parents said she’s more hyper than children they’ve seen and my mum was worried about her and suggested getting her checked out.

Nothing to add to thr excellent suggestions here OP except empathy. I remember being v smug that we had escaped the Terrible Twos and then Omg, we hit the Effing Fours.

Really feel for you. Can just say, it does pass. One step, one hour, one day at a time. Then they hit 5, 6 and are lovely.

and I didn’t manage to keep my cool. At all. But DD is 16 now and we get on great. So don’t worry about losing it from time to time, we all do.

@Tigofigo No, it’s like she just changes and has these moments, she runs around, spins, shouts and screams in a high pitched way, it’s really hard to control, I feel out of my depth I’m holding my hands up to it.

Before, she wanted a cup of milk, so went to the fridge to get it, she asked me to open it, I was just putting the dinner out and said ‘I’ll just put your dinner here’ and she got really angry and impatient and started shouting saying ‘Do it! Do it now’ and there the milk carton at me, it’s like a rage in her or she changes. She was fine before this, we’d bought some stickers from the shop today and she was sticking them on the paper with us. It’s like a total impatience and anger takes over her. I can’t speak to her calmly easily as she gets angrier and angrier and louder and louder, I don’t attempt to reason with her at that point. But later when she’s calm, I’ve asked her what’s going on and why is she getting so angry and said we want to help her, she says she can’t stop 😔it seems really extreme to me
I feel like I’m living on my nerves when it’s like this and she wasn’t like this ever before the last half a year I’d say, it’s increased since she started Pre school.

The gp can still rule out some physical issues. I saw someone mentioning worms, or some vitamin deficiencies.

I’ve read somewhere omega 3 deficiencies can give some behavioural or attention problems. I give my little one a multivitamin gummy that includes this, she has very good concentration. I give it to her as she was born small and is a bit fussy with food so wanted her to have bit more nutritional help.

It does sound like this situation is a lot more than a normal phase. This girl escalates to an unusual level, there some underlying problem there, some physical issues, or issues at preschool that she takes home, or the parents don’t know how to descalate and make it worse.

Inconsistent behaviour from parents (too tired to establish boundaries, sometime doing it, sometimes not, or not doing it at all), even when parents are well meaning , escalates bad behaviour a lot. I’ve seen it many times. One of my friends has screaming rows with her DD who is 6 now, and they always had. I’ve never seen her doing it, but I’ve seen her DD do, but I believe it’s a learned behaviour and in private they shout at each other. My friend loves her daughter and is embarrassed by her outbursts, but she doesn’t know any better. And I don’t feel like I can tell her much, she will take it personally. Her relationship with her DD will only grow worse, unfortunately.

@Itslookinggood Thank you 🙏I feel like an utter failure at the moment and scared I’m doing something wrong. She was always headstrong and energetic, but nothing like this.

@Itslookinggood What behaviour did your daughter have?

*Threw the milk carton at me