To find my 3 year old impossible to live with

[Caterpillarhopping]

I love my little girl. She's 3, the middle of 3 children (adopted for context, but 100% my children).

She whines, cries, tantrums constantly. She can be sweet and funny. She can be affectionate but she whines more often than she's happy. She is defiant and controlling and nearly every time you ask her to do something it's a no or a battle and tantrum. She's completely out of my control and on her own agenda. Every day it's like she's never been asked to put on a shoe before.

She's always been a tantrum and whiney child and just isn't growing out of it. I am now on antidepressants from the exhaustion of the incessant whining. It's soul destroying.

Her brothers are more chilled, the older one probably autistic but aside from some meltdowns is largely a sweet child.

I feel so sad that I just find her so hard work. I find myself thinking that home life would be so much nicer and happier if she just stopped whining and being controlling and defiant.

She's my daughter and I love her, but I struggle every day with the battles and I'm worried about the impact it's having on my husband and I and her brothers.

Some pretty unsympathetic comments here.
I have two DS with severe SEN and their behaviour wears me down and has a big impact on me. I don’t think it’s their fault but YANBU to be emotionally affected by your child’s behaviour.

Sorry to ask again, but are you getting any post adoption support?

Is she under a paediatrician? Have you sought any specific help like speech and language, occupational health?

When my adopted daughters were being challenging as toddlers, many professionals seemed to think that I could wave some magic wand and everything would be fine.

Over the next 18 years they were diagnosed with a huge range of conditions. Autism, adhd, learning disability, genetic chromosome deletion, executive functioning disorder, severe dyslexia, PDA....

I started investigating and getting them help when they were 3 and 4. Apparently the average age for looking for help is 7 - that's years of trying everything you can think of yourself.

Love isn't always enough. Professionals input is a necessity.

My DD is 4 and whines constantly. She also tantrums much more than my eldest DC ever did as a toddler so we've always been on high alert that the smallest thing could set off a tantrum. At times I think she is improving, then we get a week of her whining and screaming/shouting/crying so unfortunately not outgrown it yet.

Things I've found that help:

1. Lots of praise for all the little things she does well, especially if she asks nicely for something instead of whining to get her own way.
2. Gets reminded once to use words instead of whining, e.g. please say what you want/need using words.
3. Consequences if whining continues. She loves dolls so she loses a doll for a period of time if she continues to whine after the reminder. However, if she asks properly using words following her reminder then she gets lots of praise.

Sometimes all the above fails and I have to let her just get the tantrum out of her system after which point I can talk to her about her behaviour. It can be really draining and it's quite overstimulating when she's screaming the house down.

Anyway, i suggest you investigate PDA - my younger daughter has it. It seems to strike a chord with a lot of adopters.

She wouldn't qualify for any support. Learning, speech, development is within normal limits.

It's crossed my mind that PDA is a possibility but that terrified me as it means this situation is permanent. I'm not daft though. Her brother is likely autistic.

My DD was 6 when she was placed with me, and has been significantly impacted by her early years. Yes to “defiance”, dysregulation, needing lots of very close care all the time, yes to feeling like every day was a new experience - needing prompting for every single routine task. You can’t explain how exhausting it is to constantly need to help your child regulate, the vigilance and the struggle to do the most straightforward tasks.

What I would say is that textbook therapeutic parenting was absolutely hopeless for her. The boundaries were too woolly for her, the lack of structure made her anxious, which increased the “defiance”. I put that in quotes because for my DD it wasn’t that she purposely was being disobedient, she couldn’t retain and process what was being asked of her because she was so uncertain.

She needed routine, lots of predictability, visual timetables, pictures and lots of scaffolding. Lots of direction, very short instructions (as in two/three words at most), no long explanations or stories. The book 1,2,3 magic helped because it focussed on getting through activities without too much chat.

It’s very hard, it’s hard to constantly try to co-regulate a child that feels like a bottomless pit. Don’t listen to people placing blame at your door for not being Mother Earth 24/7, you’re doing your best. Read through the threads on the adoption board and you’ll see your experience isn’t unusual, and you’ll find your people.

op, have you looked into pda? My daughter was very hard work at 3 - defiant, whiney, violent meltdowns and I also got regularly called into school. It was really tough and at times I wished I could walk away. She eventually got a diagnosis of autism with a demand avoidant profile (pda). Her anxiety means an obsessive need to control everything and that’s added to sensory difficulties like misophonia, selective mutism, other autistic traits of struggling in social situations and not coping with change meant she was constantly disregulated.

edited to say sorry I see you’ve mentioned pda. Yes it is tough and permanent but it would be worthwhile keeping a note of her behaviour and any demand or sensory factors that may have caused it.

That sounds really difficult for you. I know it might be different due to the trauma of adoption and whatever happened with drug use in pregnancy, but some 3 year olds are so much work! One of my children was so hard to care for at 3, but at 5 is delightful. Hopefully her strong will is going to be good for her in life, standing up for herself and knowing her own mind, although it's hard to manage it now. It sounds like you are the perfect Mum for her, with your background, and it's hard but you can get through it:)

You are her parent, it is on you to be resilient enough to raise her not on her to be easy to raise.

You have adopted children so I'm going to assume, like myself, you had fertility struggles? So you know the pain of not having a child when you want one? The reality is children are individuals and some are a LOT of work. My eldest at that age was a collosal amount of work BUT at no point did I think my life would be easier without him because I love him so much that literally just how much I love him makes it worth it.

The very fact you'd state your life is otherwise perfect is actually the entire problem

Just to say @Jellycatspyjamas advice seemed very sensible.

Can social services give you any support? There’s increasing pressure on local authorities not to just drop adoptive parents after the legalities are finalised nowadays.

Don’t feel bad about venting to us; it sounds very hard. I ended up on sertraline for PND and I highly recommend it, and I didn’t have anything like as challenging a situation as yours.

My DS has ADHD; as hard as it is, try and love her for who she is and accept who she is right now. It won’t last forever and she will grow up. But do seek help from every source, including adoptive MNers.

I too ended up on anti-depressants within a year of adoption. The challenges and demands on me impacted my mental health. Not at all my kids fault or responsibility but I had challenges that overwhelmed my usual coping mechanisms before I had time (or capacity) to develop new ones. Parenting from a standing start isn’t for the faint hearted, it has an impact and it’s ok to say that.

Who says she wouldn't qualify? All adopted children are entitled to post adoption support. Attachment therapy maybe? Play therapy? Family therapy for all of you?

Do you know if she has a genetic deletion? If she has sensory issues? If her speech and language is ok (we had no idea but our daughter had a clinical disorder and we only found out when she was 10 after we had her assessed privately).

There is clearly something going on. The problem is to work out what it is and get the appropriate support.

Btw my daughter with PDA is fine. She is an adult now, with a job and a boyfriend - they live together. She took me for lunch on mothers day....pda is not a disaster but it responds to certain parenting strategies and not others.

I'm wondering if your GP husband is telling you she's fine so you feel you can't ask for help? I saw paediatricians in the early days who were very dismissive of my concerns - these children are harder to decode than most professionals realise.

That's very different to parenting them and I'm not trying to be unkind or difficult but parenting a child with trauma is very different to traditional parenting and your language around this send up red flags

Solidarity. 💐

I'm not suggesting her child's behavior is because of her parenting, I'm suggesting she has a difficult child from a traumatic background and may need some very specific parenting learning and support to help her to do her best with that situation

My 3yo daughter is exactly the same. Everything you've written. Ive never seen the like. It's been a huge shock to the system, her elder brother is very different and I stupidly didn't realise it was possible for them to be like this (lol). It is incredibly hard work, I have no answers at all, im exhausted to the core but you are not alone!

While her learning etc may be within normal limits, she may need support with social learning (reading cues, being part of a group etc). My DDs SALT assessment showed she had difficulty with language processing, she was a chatty soul and masked really well but couldn’t retain sentences more than 5 words long, her comprehension fell apart so she’d try to work out what had been asked of her. Throw in some hearing difficulties and she was really struggling to understand the world around her.

I’d start with hearing tests, ask for a SALT assessment, look for play therapy through post adoption support. Also look at theraplay activities you can do with her at home. While she may be meeting expected milestones, I’d treat her as a younger child - her developmental age may be younger than her chronological age, so work with that.

Something that helped me hugely was to remember she’s not doing it to you, she’s doing it in front of you.

My son can be like this and I adore him but I also cried tonight as he hit me in the face on the way home as he wasn’t allowed a lollipop when another child he saw was eating one. Fiery strong willed personality!
I am also former teacher and can usually charm little kids into oberdience so I’m feeling very de skilled too

OMG what am I reading people???

Stress is a major cause of depression and it’s clearly very stressful dealing with her behaviour!

OP I feel for you as really do. I hope things improve soon. 💐

Your own kids are not the same as school kids and will behave worse for you.

Also if you taught a different age, that's difficult, different expectations.

She's three, it's not unusual.

I don’t know about adoption and the trauma associated, so my reply can’t cover this aspect. Professional experience can’t prepare you for your own. The separation of emotion in a professional sense is essential but inoculates you from the reality of parenting. The behaviour is not unusual in a 3 yo. They’re beginning to understand that they are an individual and to make sense of a very big world. Miss granddaughter (now-5) was similar (as was her mother). Hard hard work. I care for her and her brothers a lot. But, she’s independent and a go-getter. She’s developed so many more skills than her brothers. Her brothers will be advantaged in the world simply because they are male. Her whining/tamtrums (because ‘I do’ and she couldn’t yet), her annoyance at having to take direction was major. I found it helpful to reframe my thinking into ‘what type of adult do I want her to be?’ And a lot of the attributes were really similar to her 3yo attributes. But, to survive, I give her a lot more choice. She responds well, and life is a lot easier. She’s going to be a strong, independent woman.

Sounds off and no one seems to be helpful, but my question is what have you tried to help with the whining- helpful suggestions:

-diet change
-vitamins (especially magnesium i use mighty kids)
-regulation activites (movement etc) even better co regulation together
-chiropractor

also what does she whine about? Maybe you need to address things for her like transitions (prep her) etc. is she actually just overly vocal about her needs? Are they being met or can jt be explained?

sounds like she has complete nervous system dysregulation- if you regulate her the whining may reduce to what is considered a normal level for a child her age, and it wouldnt help to do the same for yourself- both regulated=happier life

Are you able to take a break for 24 hours? Would your DH cover to let you have one night off to mentally reset? If so, get to a hotel and some peace. Exchange the favour every month or so. Parenting toddlers is bloody hard, I can’t imagine it’s easier with adopted toddlers. It doesn’t solve the long term issue, but maybe short term will give you a chance to recover.

what do you know about attachment?

I have a 3 year old son and I can relate 100% - some days are better than others!
I appreciate that you may know more than me in terms of SEN etc but actually you may be describing a totally normal 3 year old - controlling, awkward, tantrums etc.
I love mine to bits but find him tiring and draining.
Not sure I have any answers for you - but you are not alone.
I find hunger/tiredness affects mine so plenty of snacks and strategic naps/altering bedtime (I use chat gpt quite a lot).
We spend quite a large amount of time outdoors, I limit any time in cafes as he can’t sit still, I limit TV particularly Youtube as I found that affected behaviour.

In terms of defiance - I try and be as strict as possible (I’m not saying that’s the only answer), bribery/explanation of consequences. You mention defiance with putting on a shoe - mine never wants to get dressed or brush teeth, takes us ages to leave the house (I give myself a 30m margin whenever we leave the house). All threats I proceed with - going home early from places/no pudding etc.
With the whining - again I am quite defiant - ‘stroppy kids don’t get pudding etc’ - I find mine worse when he’s tired/hungry.
Routine routine routine

As for myself I try and have some time away every so often - a coffee with a friend/walk/pilates. In turn I will so solo childcare so that DH has time he can spend alone also. Nothing wrong with heading to a different room for a coffee/bit of doom scrolling either.

It sounds like you are doing a great job and providing a stable loving home for these kids - be kind to yourself and hopefully this too shall pass.