To wish I didn't have my daughter

[gingerbreadbunny]

I have 4 children, 3 are lovely easy children and 1 who whinges and whines all day about anything and everything.
She's really hard work, the other 3 go straight to bed but not her she's up fussing back and forth for hours, it's exhausting.
She doesn't ever want to go anywhere and will make everything about her by just being difficult and awkward, she won't do as she's told,
if she doesn't get her own way she screams and tantrums and ruins everyone else's day.
She constantly and deliberately upsets her brothers and sister who have had enough, she'll only play with them if she gets her own way and if they don't want to play her way she'll ruin it for them or won't play.
She's 6 and I love her but I just know life would be so much happier for us all if we hadn't had her.
I feel like she sucks all the energy out of me every single day.
She always wants everything to be about her and will deliberately talk over any siblings who try and talk to me.
If I hold another's hand she'll pull them off me so she can hold my hand instead.
I just don't have any energy left, she's completely depleting me and dh.
She is full of anger and hatred and is wearing us down.
She can be lovely when it suits her but it's usually short lived, just until something doesn't go her way.

Was going to say the same, my daughter was similar and much later was diagnosed with ADHD.

I have 4. Coincidentally my second youngest is similar to yours. I was losing the plot a 3 years old. Mentioned to nursery. No issues there. Then great in school. Definitely had the coke bottle effect. Private therapy then managed to get a GP referral to CAMHS at 8. CAMHS tried to help with the anger with play therapy. Eventually referred for autism assessment. Nearly 12 years old before my child was diagnosed with autism, score was very high that the psychologist wondered how we got to the age of 12 without diagnosis.
Simple answer is good behaviour at school.

I would like to point out that there is no extra help after this stage. But it helps us as parents have a level of understanding.

So you fall into my second category then… you think inflicting physical pain on a small child is an acceptable thing to do. As I said, you need help.

And if it worked as a deterrent… surely you’d only have to do it once?

With my children, I think I gave my 1st child a very rare light smack after verbal warnings. My other two realised that 'I tell you once. I tell you twice. The third time you will have a smack' was a promise. They don't seem traumatised by their upbringing. We have lovely relationships.

A light smack? So did it hurt, or not?

Actually don’t bother answering. You just tell yourself whatever you need to to justify inflicting pain on someone much smaller, much weaker and much more vulnerable than you 👍

This is a fab positive post.

Also worth noting I had to get him privately assessed for dyslexia (he is) because when moaning to my mum about the behaviour she said "that's what you were like". The shear frustration of coping with school, knowing something is different about you but being hyper vigilant because the humiliation of not being able to read, spell, answer maths questions was too much to tolerate. I guess add it to your list of ND things to consider and research.

Lol at the suggestion that gentle parenting = any parenting technique that doesn't involve smacking your child.

Honestly didn't realise so many people ardently believe in assaulting their kids in this day and age in the UK.

I'd like to add that because it's less common to be smacked now, the psychological impact of being smacked when you know your peers aren't is likely to be much worse than at a time where smacking was the norm.

I remember my best friend's horror when I told her I'd been smacked (this was 15 years ago), and finding out that other kids weren't smacked made me feel even worse about the whole situation.

Yep I don’t know anybody in RL who thinks smacking is okay.

In the same way I’d be horrified if a man decided to give his wife a smack because she’d displeased him, why would that same action be okay on a smaller, defenceless child?

So you used physical pain as a threat and have on occasion carried out that threat, purposefully hurting your child to punish them.

It's not a healthy dynamic between parent and child. Not even close.

Yet I think sending to room or any form of isolation is cruel.

Have you ever taken pause to think you might be wrong? Hitting children is crazy. We give out to children for hitting their peers. How does us hitting them reinforce that message? The poor kids must be totally confused. It's entirely possible to parent a kid without slapping them

Out of interest @Snippysocks would you smack a child with a physical disability? If the child was blind, say? Blind children can still misbehave! Or if they were wheelchair bound? Would you smack them then if they misbehaved?

You say you wouldn’t smack them regularly. How often counts as regularly and how often counts as rare? I just wonder where the cut off is as to what is acceptable and what isn’t?

You say “only a light smacking”, but how light would that be? Enough to make a red mark? Or is that too much? How hard does it have to be to be effective?

Same. It’s not one or the other, is it?

I wonder if when you’re old, weak and vulnerable @Snippysocks your kids might start smacking you when you don’t behave how they’d like you to.

Out of interest do you smack anyone else, or just those you know can’t fight back because they’re weaker than you?

Absolutely. We all have overwhelming and negative feelings, but to actually write those down without pause or self-criticism is bewildering to me. This relationship is totally unbalanced, a child cannot have this much negative impact on a well-adjusted family life. The onus is on the parents to ensure they are able to absorb a new child into the family, considering the child won’t be a clone of the previous ones. Everyone wants a baby, rarely ever sparing a thought to the fact they grow up or might need more resources. Hope you get help for that little girls’ and her siblings’ sake.

OP is showing zero self-awareness. I read about a “terrible child that shouldn’t have been born” and immediately my attention goes to bad parenting. My money is on little child has never had undivided attention from parents, siblings often boss her around because they are compliant and constantly reassured they are golden children, she shines at school because her efforts are recognised and she’s not always being compared unfavourably. These parents chose to bring a 3rd child into their family, the onus is on them alone to make it work. Poor child.

Until OP has a diagnosis that her little daughter is ND, people need to stop using that card to justify the horrible language OP has chosen to write down. She and husband aren’t helpless, and it’s not the kids’ fault.

What's more likely to help this overwhelmed mum? Your posts, or some of the helpful ones where people suggest ways to manage the behaviour?

100% this! I can’t imagine a parent writing how they wish they didn’t have their 6yo daughter. Yikes! Language matters.

For me, my and other people’s posts’ not coddling an OP who refuses to take any responsibility for her part in her little child’s behaviour and chooses to voice that her child is ruining everything is the most helpful, but that’s because in life I’ve sought to know the truth to sort out problems. I totally understanding being that self-centred in feelings, but to actually write down the amount of terrible things she wrote about a 6yo child makes me doubt she’s got a grip on anything. Rude awakening and not coddling are often the best ways to learn. All I hope is that she figures out she isn’t hopeless and stops blaming her child for everything, for all their sakes. ND is a spectrum and seriously most people have strong ND traits. This is most likely purely family dynamics.

Most people shit too, but if you're shitting all the time it's probably because you've got a disorder.

Off to fuck with your ableist comments.

It’s testament to your inability to co-exist with others in society that you feel the need to use aggressive language. You should look into that.
Kid has no diagnostic, OP blames 6yo child for everything and so many people here feel called out (projecting their own substandard parenting skills) that in their defensive minds the only possibility is the child is ND. Kid is, despite biased description by OP, demonstrating standard behaviour for a third child who is only 1 year younger than the next oldest, and only 2 years older than youngest, who undoubtedly noticed she isn’t considered in the same positive light as the other “easy” children (poor them also! The pressure alone to be compliant!), and who seems to never have 1-1 quality time with parents. They might be ND but choosing to see non-compliance and anger as ND is a bad take. Kids should be encouraged to see themselves as NT unless nothing else can explain destructive incapacitating behaviour, which isn’t the case here. People cheerleading for children to be labelled and put on a psych/medical pathway need to give their heads a wobble. Good parenting is very hard, and good parenting just isn’t for everyone, sadly.