To need help with our family dynamic

[Tiredflow]

I'm a very sleepy drived 3 month pp mum of two. We love newborn with all our heart. Our 4 year old DD however, has become increasingly tricky. This started prior to the birth and has only gotten worse as we are struggling to get a handle on things.

Dd is a lovely caring girl, she just has really explosive emotional outbursts. These are guaranteed to happen at least once a day. In these fits of emotion, her father (DH) is usually the target. He can get hit, bit, slapped, kicked, stuff thrown at him. I've also had my fair share but she seems to really direct her aggression towards him.

I concluded this is because I'm a sahm and she rarely sees DH since he works full time. She misses him immensely and when he comes back she craves his attention. Unfortunately she has now conditioned herself to get it negatively.

We have tried everything under the sun, special allocated time together. Reward charts, talking over emotions when calm, time outs, having things taken away as punishment, getting down to her level and hugging her/calmly explaining we don't hit. The biggest thing at the moment is dinner time and bed time. It's become a battle between wills with DD and DH.

My problem lies with not only dad's behaviour but DH's reactions. He has now taken to grabbing DD or pushing/pulling her when she gets physical. I get that it can be an immediate response to just get someone away from you who is being aggressive despite the age. But I have reminded DH many times that he is 4 times the height of her and older. That he should be able to control his emotions and walk away.

The other day he pushed her back when she went to antagonise him follow him around (which she does to get under his skin) and she whacked her head on the floor. Luckily no serious damage was done but I told him off for it and dd became hysterical about her head since she realised I brought it up.

I'm at a loss of how to navigate this dynamic. Dad's behaviour is spiralling out of control, we are at our wits end. DH seems so angry and worked up all the time. I've suggested him doing something for himself before coming home to wind down, meditating, going for a walk, what ever he needs to do to cope. I realise DD is intense and her violent attacks do HURT. I don't blame him but I think he should be responsible for his response to her action. How do I navigate this family dynamic. I feel so sorry for DD and recognise there has been a lot of change for her and she must be struggling. Dd is very emotionally aware and advance, always has been. She knows her own mind and is strong headed which doesn't help. DH just won't listen and has become stuck in his ways with her. I'm at a loss. Between that and a really overly needy crying newborn I feel like running away sometimes. Help!

It all sounds thoroughly miserable.
I have a husband who struggled not to push / grab our son to make him do things when he was going through a really hard age. My husband was and still is an amazing father. He knew it was wrong. He/ we all figured it out. He stopped. None of us are perfect parents and your husband is allowed to be finding this hard.

Is there anything you can do to change the requirements in the evenings? Recognise that they are times she is really struggling with. If dinner time is a struggle, maybe make lunch her bigger meal and change dinner to easy picky food that she eats while playing. Take as many of the bedtime ‘jobs’ away as possible. Do her second tooth clean of the day in the afternoon ( going to bed without freshly cleaned teeth for a few months isn’t going to be major in the grand scheme of things). If she enjoys a bath still do it, but just a fun one. Wash her hair less often and during a daytime bath. Don’t worry about what she goes to bed in (daytime clothes? Fine).
If you can reduce the number of triggering moments where you and your husband have to do something with her she doesn’t like it might help a bit.
Right now you just have to make it through the next few months while things sort themselves out a bit. Then you can try to do it more how you ideally want to.
Good luck.

I guess I have just kind of switched off. I've had so many talks with DH about how to react/get through her hard times. We've even had advice from a child specialist. The main thing is that we have created a complex around dinner/bed so not to rise or feed into it. For dinner a bigger lunch and less pressure ect. I tell DH to eat in another room but he just CANNOT help himself and always ends up falling into old habits by rising to her behaviour. Everything she does is to get a rise out of him and he lets her. He just can't seem to walk away and is so tightly wound up that he continues to get annoyed rather than disengage. I feel like I'm managing two kids and it's drained me. Now I just let them get on with it because if the adult isn't listening and the child isn't I really am at a loss of what to do!

Dd does know that following DH around and prodding at him will eventually cause him to snap and she does it to break him down. It's like bullying. He will warn her, tell her stop, be calm at the beginning but eventually he will lose his rag. It is literally the dynamic the two of them have gotten themselves into.

I am just worried as I said before ; DD's behaviour is now extending past just being inflicted on DH. She is starting primary school and I feel is getting to big and strong for these violent lashing outs. I'm worried it may seep into school life if we can't get ontop of it.

For DH, I'm worried he will accidentally really hurt DD. I'm also worried he will break and that the long term repercussion of DD's behaviour will escalate from him being fed up to just not wanting to be here anymore. I already get the impression it's starting to be the case. Even his own mum that came over noticed he is a lot more angry and irritable. I know he always feels on edge and stressed and I know how horrible it can be to come home to something like that. It doesn't matter if we try to give DD one/one time or treats or take her out for the day, as soon as our attention stops for whatever reason she resorts to misbehaving to get it back. It's exhausting as realistically we cannot give her attention 24/7 which is what she seems to need.

At this point we all dread family time and it's awful.

Oh here we go with the LTB. The man is at his wits end and he isn’t beating his child. Op you’re going to get lashed on here. If at all possible , try and tag team and step in when you see your dd and dh getting stressed . I know the feeling it can be so tough

It sounds awful, and you’ve had lots of advice here, can I ask if you look at what she eats and drinks? Food allergies and intolerances can emotionally upset people of all ages.

I'm sorry but my DS sometimes gets in a tantrum rage and he really hurts! He's bitten me, nipped, scratched, flung stuff. Yes I have "manhandled him' to stop him from hurting me, others, or himself. Sometimes I can see his mouth coming and I grab the top of his shoulders to prevent his teeth being able to reach me! I don't get angry, but I hold him still or move him into a safer position/place away from others and tell him that his behaviour is unacceptable and under no circumstances do we hurt people. You and DH have to take control of the situation. Every single time she hurts DH, tell him to pick her up, carry her to her room and say "we do not hurt, stay here until you've calmed down". Every single time she does it! You will be thoroughly miserable while doing this. But remain calm, and do not give her the attention. My DS now understands, if he starts being physical I don't even have to carry him up the stairs anymore, I just say "go to your room and calm your body down". And he does.

Sorry OP, no advice but just to say we are in a very similar position except our eldest is a 3yr old DS rather than 4 yr old DD. Exact same deterioration of relationship with DH, who also appears to be checking out. I think he might be developing depression from it as he’s essentially being attacked and abused twice a day in his own home.

Our current approach is for me to do as much as possible with DS but it’s tricky as I’m EBF and there’s a lot of cluster feeding around bedtime. I ask DH to take baby for a walk for 30 mins as that seems to distract her, while I do story and bed.

good luck to both of us xx

Dramatic.

What is the routine once your DH comes home? She wants his attention - does he give it to her? Does he get down on the floor and play with her? Take her outside to kick a ball around? Basically do whatever she wants for a while. I know he is probably tired from work but unf this is a reality of being a parent - he doesn’t get to clock off.

OP, we had this (pretty much same age gap as you). I hate to say this but have you considered neurodiversity? Our DC1 was like this - passionate attachment to me, would follow DH around to hit/hurt him. Arrival of DC2 led to the most dreadful meltdowns/outbursts (I never quite felt they were meltdowns as DC1 gave the impression of having a degree of control over the behaviour at times, although I question that in hindsight).

In our case, it generally happened when I was around. Does she behave like this with him when you’re not there? Because in our case DC1 was in this negative attention-seeking groove but knew they would get attention from both of us by doing this.

We tried everything. Leaving the room, not leaving the room, time out, time in, (gentle, age appropriate) physical restraint, putting child elsewhere (often recommended but rarely feasible as DC1 was a danger to himself in that mood and so provocative). None of it worked in the moment. The only thing that worked was to essentially stalk DC1 to try to prevent them getting so dysregulated in the first place, which is fine when you have nothing to do, no baby to look after, no food to prepare, etc…. And longer term, to get DC1 spending time with each of us on a one to one basis.

Most parenting resources don’t even acknowledge this is a thing. The one that I found helpful, which did, is Yvonne Newbold. Her view, loosely, seemed to be that the behaviour is driven by anxiety and a need to control. (This was spot on in our case.)

In our case, it turned out DC1 was autistic and a lot of typical parenting techniques just didn’t work. But it was a horribly upsetting, demoralising time and really affected our marriage as well as family life.

Honestly the problem here sounds like it might be your DD. Yea your dh isn't handling it well but it must be incredibly difficult to face that sort of antagonising every single day in your own home after being at work all day even if it is from a child .
I'd ignore all the super human posters who claim they would always react calmly in every situation every single evening.
i echo what many other posters have said. She has learnt that behaving like this gets us attention even if it negative . I'd stop giving it to her when she behaves like this. Remove yourself and your dh from the room . When she calms back down, talk to her as normal

@applebee33 I know, I feel quite silly posting this on here actually. Especially now I've seen the responses. I did worry DH would be painted to be abusive and me turning a blind eye. But again, I really feel that comes from a place of ignorance. It's easy to portray the situation like that if you've never dealt with a hard/violent child. I'm not blaming DD, but neither am I entirely blaming DH. I think they've both become stuck in their ways and although yes DH being the adult in the situation "should know better" I think people place such unrealistic expectations on parents to be better when really we are all just human and we shouldn't shame people for having usual human reaction. It's normal to get pissed off after being provoked day in day out and it's normal to be defensive when you are being attacked. DH knows it's not okay and doesn't want to be this way. We just need to find a way that works for us and is effective for both of them. Hence why I opened up this thread hoping to find it

You have a lot on your plate!

Your daughter's behaviour is pretty out of control. I suggest you read the book ' The Explosive Child' ASAP - it's regarded as a bit of a classic and will hopefully give you some helpful parenting strategies.

I would also try to get her some sensory processing help. This should help her to self regulate.

Your husband needs to get some therapy. He won't change. She is triggering something in him.

@Tiredflow "But again, I really feel that comes from a place of ignorance. It's easy to portray the situation like that if you've never dealt with a hard/violent child."

I know you're at breaking point but that really is very rude and probably a huge misjudgement.

I'm 18 years into parenting 2 autistic kids one of which is still in speech therapy and in special school. At 1 he could fully on meltdown for 2 hours solid - I remember watching the clock round and thinking I'd never believe it if someone said theirs did that. At 3 he was a prolific biter. Of course you know more about your 4 year old than I do. But I can tell you from all those years of trying and failing, reading parenting books, going on courses, having meetings, going to support groups etc - all we have been through which has utterly transformed how we parent - that the effective starting point in our life has become "behaviour is communication". Deciding she's just doing it because she's naughty and DH needs to stop eating with her until she decides to stop being annoying is not really helping anyone.

Perhaps unsurprisingly @ThisCatCanHop 's post chimes a lot with our experience. In DC's biting phase the most effective strategy was to watch him like a hawk and step in with a big sensory move like a hug whenever he was looking bitey. It felt totally bonkers but it was the single best bit of advice I've ever been given on an anonymous forum. We didn't know he was autistic then - he was "bright" and wasn't even diagnosed until he was 9. But without even understanding it at the time, we were actually doing exactly as @ThisCatCanHop describes - seeing the behaviour as communication of an unmet need (in this case a sensory one) and trying to anticipate and meet the need in a more socially acceptable way, rather than assuming the behaviour was wilful and the child can be corrected out of it, as people do often do at this age.

I think you are way off here. Your daughter is not deliberately ‘provoking’ or ‘attacking’ your DH. She is neither ‘hard’ nor ‘violent’. she has not ‘conditioned herself’ - if anything she’s responding to what you and DH are teaching her. You are using very adult terms to describe a very young child who doesn’t yet have much control over her feelings or the way she expresses them.

what’s the general routine? You are at home with her all day? Or she’s at nursery and you’re doing all the pick up / drop off? How is she at nursery?

Then you, her and the baby are home from what 4 or 5 pm? Then DH comes home… and what does he do? Walk in with open arms and a big smile and say ‘hello DD! It’s great to see you ! What do you want to do? Play football? Read a book? Go to the park? Great - let’s go!’

what happens in the run up to her outbursts and what can you and DH do differently? That’s always the question I asked when we found these dynamics emerging, having had a very similar set up. DH really has to step up and engage with her, however hard it is to do after a long day at work.

@rickyrickygrimes DH is exhausted when comes back. He manages and runs a business and has to do admin. Sometimes this can go on into the evenings. Depends how much work he has on.

He also helps with the baby as I'm ebf and never get a break. Baby is extremely clingy and refuses to ever be put down.

Then he will help with dinner. He puts DD to bed whilst I put baby to bed.

Because DD refuses to eat her dinner it can take up two hours and by then it's bath/wind down for bed time. It means that there is no evening time left for them to do anything inbetween all this and the arguments.

Me and DH are genuinely struggling with the lack of time right now. We acknowledge to each other there is just NO time to do ANYTHING. Certainly not for ourselves or together. By the time we put all the kids to bed it's usually around 9 and we just go to bed from being tired. We recognise this isn't forever though and so we are just milling through it.

I hear you OP, I had a very similar situation of a high maintenance first born, three year gap, sahm with an ebf baby and husband in a high stress job. I remember the days of swapping baby and toddler and no one ever having any time to themselves. I suspect you may already have one but a sling is a good investment for a clingy newborn when you also have to wrangle an older one.

What does your DD do during the day?

Is there anything that your DH can do to change his work pattern? It's not doing anyone any favours just now, him included.

So my main tool was always distraction. And I'm not ashamed to say that a big part of that was CBeebies at that age. We mostly didn't watch much during the day as we were out and about, but from 4pm the tv was on and sometimes yes, dinner and jammies happened in front of it.

Dinner should not take 2 hours. No one has time for that! What happens that makes it take so long? Can you e.g; say ok, clearly you're not hungry, let's have yoghurt / a banana / bread and butter and watch some (insert favourite tv show here) with daddy / mummy. Give loads of warnings - 10 minute warning, 5 minute warning, 1 minute warning, oh look how high these bubbles in the bath are - better get in there before they all disappear!

it will pass.

Absolutely agree with all this. When my DCs were younger CBeebies was on a lot, plus various dvds (watched Matilda and Tangled many times).

A poster upthread suggested activity to avoid their dc kicking off, this wouldn't have worked for my DC - often she was hungry and wanted food, not running around.

Dinner shouldn't take 2 hours. That length of time is likely to be counterproductive. Can you move the main meal to lunch time and have something snacky for tea?

Absolutely agree with @ThisCatCanHop and @Mosty. Your DD's behaviour is quite extreme for 4yo and in your shoes I would be looking into neurodiversity - definitely looking at ASD and possibly PDA.

One of the best bits of advice I had on here was that you can't damage a NT child by using ND techniques but you can damage a ND child with NT parenting techniques.

I would try

• visual timetable for daily routines and activities
• now and next board
• empathise about the noise when the baby cries
• a sensory den, have a look at what your DD"s sensory profile might be - it sounds like crash mats and a sensory sock might be more her thing than gentle light tubes
• a chewy necklace to redirect to when she is biting
• weighted bean bags to throw

And get your DH to introduce them so that he is the one associated with meeting those needs

Something that helped my DD at the same age was physically picking her up and taking her outside into the garden and getting her to throw bean bags, and we'd join in. Once she'd thrown enough bean bags she'd blow bubbles (we should have shares in bubble mix). And then after all that she would be pretty calm.

OP we had a very similar situation with our DD until around the age of 6...things also got worse around the birth of her sibling. We paid for a series of art therapy which helped. We also got the Early Support Team involved, you can refer yourselves through social services. We got so much support from them. At one point after trying everything and I mean everything, we had to restrain our DD for our safety and hers. It may be co incidence, but when we started to restrain her this is when her behaviour improved. Maybe get some professional advice on how to keep her and yourselves safe in this situation. We are also waiting for an assessment for ASD.

Yes -and see if you have an Early Years SEND team nearby. Ours were an absolute godsend. You don't need a diagnosis.

"she rarely sees DH since he works full time. She misses him immensely and when he comes back she craves his attention"

And your husband pushes or grabs her.

He needs to spend more one-to-one time with her, perhaps reading, watching her favourite programmes, playing with water/sand/Lego, or just helping her to have a bath/get ready for bed.

Speak to your health visitor. You need to get some outside help to manage your Littke girls feelings but especially a professional to speak to your husband. This situation is a serious accident waiting to happen.

What do you do when your daughter is following your husband around and trying to provoke him? Can’t you get involved as soon as you see it happening? How do you respond when she ‘attacks’ you? I can’t see that there is much choice if a child is biting you or drawing blood other than to push them away? What does your parents or your DH parents do when it happens?
Its really crazy that supper and bedtime take so long.
I agree with other posters that suggest getting outside help. Your daughters behaviour seems quite extreme.
I know your husband is getting slated on here and I can understand that he is dealing with it badly but it must be awful
for him too. Maybe having someone from outside telling him how to deal with this will come as a relief to him.

Does your DD get any of your attention? You say you're EBF and baby won't even be out down for 5 minutes. That can't happen with a 4 year old and needs to change.
Your partner needs to spend some time with her too. He can to that when he comes home and do his admin when she's in bed.
This little girl is angry as she is getting no attention at all by the sounds of it. From neither you nor her dad.