Daughter has wrecked the walls

[whatthehell1e]

8 year old daughter in a tantrum as I told her off for her behaviour yesterday (she painted the wardrobe in my room with her paints). I walked upstairs and she has sprayed her room, my room, hallway and her brother’s wall in baby oil. Whole brand new bottle. I have wiped it with towels but it’s not coming off. It looks like it has but after 5th attempt the wall dries but oil marks very visible. I’m really stressed. We cannot afford to decorate it all and it looks horrendous. I actually thought it was damp before I saw the empty oil bottle.

To the poster who made the pathetic comment as to why a child would have access to a ipad 🙄

its 2023, not the 1980’s! - we live in a computerised world.

Most children’s homework is now set on educational apps, how do you think most children received online home schooling during covid?

Teachers weren’t delivering pen and paper to every students home each day.

Pathetically stupid and unnecessarily bitchy comment!

Back to the OP, you’ve been given loads of help with the removal of the oil, hopefully some of those will work.

I’d be sitting her down and asking what’s going on, something is upsetting her to be acting out in this way. I’d be trying by to get to the bottom of this, she’s only 8 so is possibly unable to communicate what’s going on, yes she will know right from wrong however she may be lashing out because she’s confused and not understanding of the issues she’s upset by.

whats her normal character like?

All behaviour is communication.
this is not a proportionate reaction, and I would be wondering what on earth is going on

Thank you so much everyone for the support. I really feel I can’t cope with her behaviour. I have another child too and I keep wondering how I went wrong with her, I know we shouldn’t compare but I don’t understand how she turned out like this. If anything I have given her more love and attention than youngest, maybe that’s the issue! She’s not jealous of the youngest as the tantrums existed long before he was even born.

Why does everyone automatically jump to the conclusion she has suffered some kind of trauma or is ND....she could just be a brat!

I don’t think anyone has automatically came to the conclusion of anything, rather than asking to find the root cause of the lashing out.

OP needs to understand why she’s doing this, if she’s simply being a brat then OP can think of a suitable punishment.

If she’s had a trauma/been upset and she can’t communicate this, then OP needs to also find out what’s going on and address this in an age appropriate way.

Indeed but I have found it has been worth every single penny.

The oil will likely have soaked right into the plaster or plasterboard and no amount of washing is going to get rid of it. At the very least you’ll need a very heavy duty stain blocker before redecorating.
If its that bD I'd be definitely looking at an insurance claim.

Agree. She made the mess, she needs to clear it up.

Homework, for starters. She's 8 years not 8 months

I wouldn't call it a tantrum because that mispresents the situation. She's 8, not a toddler. She's old enough to know better, and she chooses to behave in a destructive way.

In my experience, the 'popular' girls at school weren't the nice, well behaved ones..

This is the kind of thing my DS would have done at that age. CAMHs sent him to anger management aged 9 and he was diagnosed with autism aged 13.

My other children would never have done anything like this.

I don't have the answer on how to handle it. In our family, after the initial disapproval DH would redecorate. The consequence for DS would have been that DH didn't have time to do things with him for a few weekends because he was decorating. I'm not saying that is right, just how we handled it.

Right okay then... so... the apps I was advised to use, including visual communication apps for my child who was completely mute and fucking nonverbal have damaged their plastic brain? Am I getting this correctly? I've damaged my child by assisting them to gain the power to speak?

Said child is half the age you're mentioning, in a special needs school and funnily enough USES A TABLET THERE TOO. Would you like the school name and my own personal details to report me to the police for this supposed damage we are doing? By allowing my child to gain as much independence and knowledge as possible?

Some children are just brats.

see thread on feral children. Not helped by people not wanting punishment for this appalling behaviour.

Let’s just remember that young children and teenagers do have big emotions and tantrums sometimes and their brain/ pre-frontal cortex isn’t working well enough to always predict the outcome of an action.
It sounds like something is going on there OP, emotional or otherwise.
Can you get her at a calmer moment and ask why she felt like doing that etc…?

She's 8. That's not a normal tantrum.

Bit of a sweeping statement.

Can you post a picture of one of the walls because I can better advise on repairing the damage

As another poster said, she should be scrubbing the walls with you.

As for the ipad - I'd confiscate it permanently until you have work outed how much it cost vs how much it's going to cost to fix the walls, and explain to her that it might need to be sold to get the money to fix the walls.

I'd try Talcum powder. It absorbs oil really well - works wonders on oil on clothes. Try wiping it on, leaving overnight and vacuuming off?

In my experience children only tantrum because they are getting something out of it, even if it’s only negative attention. That needs to be squashed.

Have you been to the GP? I think it sounds like you need to investigate.

This behaviour is disgusting for an 8 year old. There would be serious consequences for me-starting with cleaning up the mess herself!!

Are you still with her dad and if you are what is he doing to help?

At eight, consequences need to be as immediate as possible and related to putting right the crime. Otherwise, as far as she's concerned, you're just taking vindictive revenge on her in the same way that she took vindictive revenge on you, which in her mind will justify her taking counter-revenge and escalating.

You’ve taken the iPad away for a week?

No. After this you should take it away for good.

My 4 year old would never do anything like this.