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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To wonder why parents don’t take responsibility for their children’s behaviour?

77 replies

PPAPPINE · 03/09/2026 01:48

I have noticed that particularly with older children/ teens with behavioural issues, parents and adults in general seem to think the child is solely to blame and take very little responsibility of their own.
I don’t believe children become violent, aggressive or incredibly reckless for no reason. I believe it is usually due to trauma or neglect/ lack of positive attention even (or especially) in ND children.
It seems like most people genuinely believe that a child or young adult with behavioural issues like aggression/ defiance/ criminal or reckless behaviour has just become that way either of their own accord or due to outside influences or neurodiversity. When it’s often down to neglect and lack of support and love at home.

Arguably, lack of education around attachment and parenting is not always the fault of parents and I’m not sure why it’s not encouraged.
Of Course there are exceptions and other factors that play a part but it’s hard not to notice that it’s often the children who have unstable home lives, multiple younger siblings and no boundaries or routine.
This all seems so obvious to me. AIBU?

OP posts:
T3Tim3 · Yesterday 07:19

MageKing · 03/09/2026 09:52

I'm someone who believes strongly in parental influence on their children but I still think this is a bit simplistic.

Yes, ND children often get parented in a way that is less effective. Because the parents don't know any better, are overwhelmed as often as becuse they think children should just behave differently. Ditto, good kids can go bad with poor parental decisions which may be made for any number of reasons. But at the same time, there are other factors - outside influence, natural personality of the child, school, friends, abuse etc.

we have a chld in our broader family. There is no question that he is very difficutl to parent. It's also an unfortunate truth that his parents are both fairly ineffective and both are constantly bemused by the fact that he doesn't behave the way they think he should. He's ND but it has taken until he's almost a teen for that to be confirmed because his parents were first in denial and then when they decided they did need support, they're overwhelmed and stressed and it took them 4 years to get any sort of diagnosis. The relationship between his parents is also poor and his father in particular has a lot of issues which have impacted him including regularly disappearing for months at a time. Plus Covid was bad for veryone, but I suspect his experience was worse. His parents weren't great about getting him out and about pre-Covid, needless to say, during Covid he was just at home, all day, every day.

His mum wants the best for him and is doing her best, but she doesn't have the support of a decent partner and her own issues mean she hasnt listened to school or other professionals. Any feedback given to or about him she pushes back on aggressively, I suspect becaus she felt as a child that her parents NEVER supported he (from what I can tell, that's not untrue).

It's not as simple as, "parents don't care or put the effort in". Even when parents are makign the mistakes, it's not a simple, "they're not trying hard enough".

“Yes, ND children often get parented in a way that is less effective.“

Your evidence for this? Because it’s not what I see. Parents of ND children are often the most skilled at parenting in very difficult circumstances . I’m often left in awe. Who are you to say how parents of ND children should parent?

HalzTangz · Yesterday 07:36

PPAPPINE · 03/09/2026 01:48

I have noticed that particularly with older children/ teens with behavioural issues, parents and adults in general seem to think the child is solely to blame and take very little responsibility of their own.
I don’t believe children become violent, aggressive or incredibly reckless for no reason. I believe it is usually due to trauma or neglect/ lack of positive attention even (or especially) in ND children.
It seems like most people genuinely believe that a child or young adult with behavioural issues like aggression/ defiance/ criminal or reckless behaviour has just become that way either of their own accord or due to outside influences or neurodiversity. When it’s often down to neglect and lack of support and love at home.

Arguably, lack of education around attachment and parenting is not always the fault of parents and I’m not sure why it’s not encouraged.
Of Course there are exceptions and other factors that play a part but it’s hard not to notice that it’s often the children who have unstable home lives, multiple younger siblings and no boundaries or routine.
This all seems so obvious to me. AIBU?

I don't know where you are getting data from to say it's usually down to trauma, but my thoughts are it usually down to peer pressure

newseries · Yesterday 07:36

@Factcheckingwhilstbored i do get that, I think the hardest thing about ds is the judgement or the fear of judgement. I really, really want others to think he’s a lovely little boy, as stupid as that sounds. And he can be but also he has done some things that are, well, pretty awful to be honest, and I am mortified and so upset.

I remember in the early days of meeting DH he had a bit of an upset stomach and kept going to the toilet and confessed he’d been feeling a bit off all day but hadn’t wanted to let me down in case it scuppered his chances (bless him.) We had a weird conversation where we agreed that bodies react differently to ‘under the weather’ syndrome. If I’m in the slightest bit off I feel sick or am sick; I get car sick, I was sick when pregnant, I feel sick when very nervous. With DH if was bowels but some people get headaches or rashes or faint.

I think emotional stresses are similar and some children become very clingy, some cry, some won’t join in, some start refusing to do anything (‘would you like some chocolate, a new toy and a cold drink?’ ‘NO!’ sort of responses) and other children get aggressive. Unfortunately that is my ds: emotional turmoil of any sort can tip into physical stuff. It’s got better and I thought it had stopped altogether at one point but it seems not: we’ve had a few incidents this summer.

He has had a lot to process and deal with of late and I am understanding of that but I still need him to understand that aggression just isn’t acceptable. However, as much as that sounds both compassionate and firm, in practice it’s a lot harder. I am a bit limited in what meaningful consequences I can actually give for one (on both occasions we left immediately but it was edging towards the end of our session anyway when the incidents happened so he only actually missed about ten / fifteen minutes) and lost TV for the rest of the day. But how meaningful is this? It feels like a very weak response in all honesty! And he’s five: pray to god he grows out of it as I’ll be struggling if he’s doing it at fifteen.

It’s the worst feeling when you love your child so much but have these horrible thoughts of ‘are they just not a nice child; are they a bully; are they mean? Are they going to have no friends? Will they be ostracised from parties? Will they end up in prison?’ (yes I know … I do catastrophise a bit!) Then because I am a nice person I feel so upset another child’s been hurt but I also love my son and have that instinct to want to protect him and understand and you’re asking ‘what happened, please tell me!’ and get these nonsensical answers and rambles that are clearly lies!

I wish I had the answers here but I don’t. I desperately want to believe he’s not a bad child and I’m not a bad parent and I’m holding onto that as a way of trying to keep my sanity!

Elvisrockstar · Yesterday 07:48

OP, this is a very black and white view. Many, many factors contribute including parenting but also neurodiversity, trauma, poverty, unsupportive school environment etc.

Some parents are undoubtedly in denial about their parenting because it is very raw to look inwards and realise that you are the - or at least a major cause - of your child’s issues. I have had to do exactly that myself. I was the parent who only served organic food, limited screen time, imposed consequences etc but my traditional parenting approach which had worked so well with my older NT child wasn’t what my ND child needed - they required a different and much more attuned type of parenting.

I was extremely fortunate that we had the financial means to obtain external professional support and outsource domestic duties. Without the resources and support we accessed, I believe our ND teenager would currently be on a path to jail and/or addiction now.

Please be mindful that many parents will be suffering with very poor mental health themselves (as I was) but don’t have the resources or emotional capacity to address this.

Also unless you have parented a challenging ND child (teenagers in particular), it is impossible to describe how difficult it is compared with an NT child/teen. I can only describe it as akin to living in a war zone with a nervous system on constant high alert.

CaptainMyCaptain · Yesterday 08:16

As a teacher of 30 years I'd say some parents just don't know how to parent, some find themselves living in circumstances anyone would struggle with, drugs, alcohol and neurodivergence themselves or in the child are just some of the reasons. If you read the school related threads on MN there are also parents who seem to think teachers should let their children chat in class, bother other students and generally do what they like for fear of upsetting them and I suspect this is increasingly a reason although I have retired now and am well out of it.

CaptainMyCaptain · Yesterday 08:20

T3Tim3 · Yesterday 07:19

“Yes, ND children often get parented in a way that is less effective.“

Your evidence for this? Because it’s not what I see. Parents of ND children are often the most skilled at parenting in very difficult circumstances . I’m often left in awe. Who are you to say how parents of ND children should parent?

As a teacher in Early Years have met parents of ND children who are in complete denial about their problems and refuse all help until much further down the line. I have also, sadly, met parents who are keen to get their child a label and then think this absolves them of any responsibility e.g. 'he can't help it he's ADHD'.

I'm sure these are a tiny minority but I can tell you they do exist.

BertieBotts · Yesterday 10:00

I don’t believe children become violent, aggressive or incredibly reckless for no reason. I believe it is usually due to trauma or neglect/ lack of positive attention even (or especially) in ND children.

...often down to neglect and lack of support and love at home.

it’s hard not to notice that it’s often the children who have unstable home lives, multiple younger siblings and no boundaries or routine.

I think you're conflating several things here.

Unstable home life, multiple (half) siblings, no boundaries/routine is a common pattern where parents are struggling, likely due to a combination of (at least 2 of) poor executive functioning (ie, difficulty considering future effects of current actions), and/or other physical or mental health difficulties, and/or their own trauma, and/or lack of good modelling from their own parents. It is very difficult to offer support to these families, I've talked to people on here about this before. You occasionally see someone in one of these holes posting desparately but it is very difficult to get them to actually make any changes, because when someone is living in this kind of chaos, the effects of all the difficulties sort of "lean on" each other and make everything else heavy and even if you make progress in one area it tends to collapse very shortly under the weight of the others, unless there is sustained and robust support AND the root cause of the executive functioning/other health issues are identified and addressed. This is generally not how any outside support actually works, support organisations are set up to come in, offer advice/structural support for a short time and then take the support away, and it doesn't work or the effects are only very temporary. The effects of this kind of chaotic lifestyle ripple outwards and are very damaging.

But in any case adults being stuck in this kind of cycle doesn't mean they don't love or care for their children. Often they do but they are overwhelmed.

I've been there, in my case the chaotic parts of my home life with DS1 were caused by undiagnosed/unmanaged ADHD, and generational trauma - this is a weird one because my own childhood was happy. I would not describe it as traumatic, my parents did split up, I was bullied at school, and my mum has told me of some parenting that my dad did which upset her but overall I don't consider that I have childhood trauma. Maybe some "little t trauma" (which I think everyone has to some extent and is not really what I'm talking about). But my mum has significant trauma and so does my dad. I didn't even know this until I was much older but I do think that the ways their trauma affected them affected me in turn and not even in ways I could put my finger on. It's not their fault, and I don't blame them for it but I'm (still!) frequently surprised when I realise the differences between my own upbringing and what to me feels like a more "normal" upbringing. But I assumed my own life was normal as I was going through it - everyone does, I think.

Yes I can see the link between the difficulties I had maintaining structure and calmness at home and my eldest's difficult behaviour (though he's not that extreme now) and I can see how having my own ADHD better managed, and having more structure day to day leads to much better and more manageable behaviour in my younger two DC, and YY particularly in DS2 who also has ADHD and possibly ASD. I do think this is really important, I want to write something about it esp the things which have worked for me, as a lot of "standard" advice, as written, missed the mark.

But some other things I think also play in.

I notice at least on MN/other forums there is a widespread belief that violence/aggression are unnatural behaviours, and so if children are using them, they must have seen them somewhere to copy them. I do not think this is the case. It can be true for certain kinds of behaviour, for example vocabulary is not innate, it is learnt although it can be picked up anywhere at all and once DC have learnt that a word has more power they will store that knowledge, whether it means that they feel afraid of it, or it comes out in moments that they feel under threat. But violence and aggression in general are instinctive defensive behaviours in humans, just as they are in animals. If you've ever seen a tiny kitten or small dog square up and hiss/growl/yap at something much bigger, you've seen this in action. Those are aggressive behaviours, but they are primarily a fear/stress response, part of the fight/flight/freeze pathway.

Violence is also one of the the most primitive communication methods that we have, and aggressive body language or verbal aggression is universally understood as a precursor to violence. It is so primitive that it works across species. We understand signs of aggression in animals and they in us. Even when humans lose other brain functions (such as in dementia, TBI or intellectual disability) violence/aggression remains, sometimes without the safeguards that people with full brain function have.

When people of any age do not have access to sufficient language or other social skills, either because they have not developed them for whatever reason or they are temporarily unable to access them due to something like a strong emotion, or they have tried using these ineffectively, they may fall back on violence because the intent of communication is usually pretty clear (often: back off, or leave me alone, stop that/do not do that again, or give me that thing that you have) and it tends to work, even if you experience consequences as a result. (The other fallback is avoidance).

Most children over time develop sufficient communication and social skills and emotional regulation and impulse control that they are able to successfully access a number of other ways to handle almost any situation, and can run through several in turn and not get down to the lowest form of communication which is violence (preceded by verbal/physical aggression). This combined with the fact that violence/aggression carries a fairly clear social penalty discourages the use of violence and aggression except in extremis. But some children either grow up in an environment where the use of violence and aggression is normalised and modelled by adults, or is inadvertantly rewarded (e.g. by parents giving in to tantrums), and/or, they do not for whatever reason develop alternative skills for communication/conflict resolution/acceptance of difficult situations and emotions.

The lack of development could be related to environmental factors such as lack of appropriate adult attention or opportunity to practice said skills, e.g. when child has excessive screen time. But these can also be related to a ND or other difficulty. Hearing difficulties can affect speech, for example. Sensory processing differences or learning difficulties can massively increase a child's cognitive load. And very often you find there is a cyclical effect, where children struggle to communicate with peers or adults outside the family or manage a certain situation, so they stop trying, or fall back on strategies which are at least effective (aggression/avoidance). Or adults become stressed and do not know how to handle their child's behaviour and start to avoid things like playdates and/or fall back on more screen time, perhaps not even consciously!

Support in the UK for this kind of early difficulty BTW is shit. Truly truly inadequate. Most often to start out with, you get completely inappropriate advice based on consequences, which will do fuck all if the child doesn't actually have access to other options to run through. It's like the first assumption is that the parents have encouraged the behaviour by giving in to tantrums, but even if this is the case, children benefit much more from support with communication/social/emotional skills than they do from being punished for falling back on something which generally works anyway. And being punished for something you don't actually have the skills to manage another way increases stress and damages the parent-child relationship, which will increase stress behaviours.

Secondly you're told to hang on because the child will grow out of it. Which they might. Many do. But if they don't then again usually the first thing you're told is consequences. Which, again, does not help if they don't have anything else to fall back on. Or sometimes, often alternative parenting advice reverts to lowering/reducing demands, which can be useful as a temporary stress reduction overall to allow children space to develop skills - but avoiding everything means children have less opportunity to practice more adaptive skills, so "low demand" or "they are only little" can backfire as well.

Or sometimes a child is not violent/aggressive when they are younger because they do have just enough of the helpful skills or can use avoidance instead and it's only when they are older and expectations of them increase past what they actually can manage to compensate for, that you find aggressive or defiant type behaviours show their face. But again, first port of call = consequences. And with older children, it's often assumed that if consequences don't work then increasing the consequence will, which is not evidence based at all, in fact the evidence shows that mild consequences are just as effective as severe ones, and the overall effectiveness of consequences is "not very, and only in conjunction with rewarding/development of positive replacement behaviours".

And if parents need to take responsibility I think we also need to be looking at schools taking responsibility - why are schools so stressful and difficult for many ND children to manage? What about the health system and social services - why is it so difficult for parents to access good quality advice and support with DC's development and behaviour, early and consistently?

We need to look at corporations taking responsibility - why are screens so much more addictive and prevalent these days with little to no attempt to protect DC from these effects? UPFs marketed directly to children? Relentless pursual of profit by companies/work culture/cost of living taking parents away from DC at home?

I could go on but we are still on summer holidays so I need to take my DC out and spend time with them Smile

But in short, it is much more complicated. It is not as simple as "parents need to take responsibility" often they are already doing the best they can with the knowledge and resources (emotional, practical) they have access to and anyway how does pointing the finger even help? Whatever happened in the past is already done.

And a final thought:
I think a lot of parents would LIKE to take responsibility in terms of being able to access resources (information, assessments, therapy, advice, courses, appropriate schools) which would actually help their DC, but do not find these kinds of things available.

IabsolutelyhateteachingEnglish · Yesterday 10:05

@CaptainMyCaptain oh FFS. I'm a parent who was keen to get my child, now 9, help from the first time I suspected ASD and ADHD when he was 18 months old. I don't think it absolves him of bad behaviour, I constantly tell him that he's got to be 100 times as good as everyone else if he wants to be given a chance given how much neurotypicals hate people like him. I make no excuses for his behaviour and constantly try to get him to behave.

This doesn't stop him - ASD, PDA and ADHD - from being massively perfectionistic and sensitive to rejection and inclined to present a brittle, chippy, antagonistic front when he's feeling anxious or rejected. People who dislike him see him as a disruptive, antagonistic little shit because all they get is the brittle version. People who build a relationship with him see him as an open, confiding, sunny little kid who is emotionally intelligent and desperate to please others.

Every single parent I've met with "difficult" kids like this has tried - while dealing with the negative - to focus on positive aspects. I'm sure there are people out there who think I'm avoiding dealing with my son's shitty behavioural issues by focusing too hard on what he's good at. What I'm trying to do is give him opportunities to excel and feel confident and happy, since he has basically had zero success in the context of school or age peers.

I don't know, maybe I should just send him to reform school instead?

newseries · Yesterday 10:36

@BertieBotts i am tremendously grateful for your post, it does leave with the question of what can you do, what do you do?

Elvisrockstar · Yesterday 11:16

@BertieBotts
This was such an excellent and informative post. It should be read by everyone questioning why children are not behaving in the developmentally expected way for their age.

It also resonated with my own experience as an adult with undiagnosed ADHD who felt utterly overwhelmed by chaos despite on the surface appearing to hold it together.

plasticplate · Yesterday 11:46

I know several parents who are good parents with other children with no issues but have one child with poor or antisocial behaviour. Those parents are continually fighting for help for their child.

CaptainMyCaptain · Yesterday 11:56

IabsolutelyhateteachingEnglish · Yesterday 10:05

@CaptainMyCaptain oh FFS. I'm a parent who was keen to get my child, now 9, help from the first time I suspected ASD and ADHD when he was 18 months old. I don't think it absolves him of bad behaviour, I constantly tell him that he's got to be 100 times as good as everyone else if he wants to be given a chance given how much neurotypicals hate people like him. I make no excuses for his behaviour and constantly try to get him to behave.

This doesn't stop him - ASD, PDA and ADHD - from being massively perfectionistic and sensitive to rejection and inclined to present a brittle, chippy, antagonistic front when he's feeling anxious or rejected. People who dislike him see him as a disruptive, antagonistic little shit because all they get is the brittle version. People who build a relationship with him see him as an open, confiding, sunny little kid who is emotionally intelligent and desperate to please others.

Every single parent I've met with "difficult" kids like this has tried - while dealing with the negative - to focus on positive aspects. I'm sure there are people out there who think I'm avoiding dealing with my son's shitty behavioural issues by focusing too hard on what he's good at. What I'm trying to do is give him opportunities to excel and feel confident and happy, since he has basically had zero success in the context of school or age peers.

I don't know, maybe I should just send him to reform school instead?

I made a point of saying the people I mentioned were a minority but they do exist. Not you, obviously, or the many parents who try their hardest and battle to get the right support when the support available is inadequate. I'm sure nobody hates you or your child.

I'm thinking of the parent who gave their child Monster drink before an ADHD assessment so he could get a diagnosis at which point anything he did was 'not his fault'. I do know how he has ended up in his late teens unfortunately.

CaptainMyCaptain · Yesterday 11:58

IabsolutelyhateteachingEnglish · Yesterday 10:05

@CaptainMyCaptain oh FFS. I'm a parent who was keen to get my child, now 9, help from the first time I suspected ASD and ADHD when he was 18 months old. I don't think it absolves him of bad behaviour, I constantly tell him that he's got to be 100 times as good as everyone else if he wants to be given a chance given how much neurotypicals hate people like him. I make no excuses for his behaviour and constantly try to get him to behave.

This doesn't stop him - ASD, PDA and ADHD - from being massively perfectionistic and sensitive to rejection and inclined to present a brittle, chippy, antagonistic front when he's feeling anxious or rejected. People who dislike him see him as a disruptive, antagonistic little shit because all they get is the brittle version. People who build a relationship with him see him as an open, confiding, sunny little kid who is emotionally intelligent and desperate to please others.

Every single parent I've met with "difficult" kids like this has tried - while dealing with the negative - to focus on positive aspects. I'm sure there are people out there who think I'm avoiding dealing with my son's shitty behavioural issues by focusing too hard on what he's good at. What I'm trying to do is give him opportunities to excel and feel confident and happy, since he has basically had zero success in the context of school or age peers.

I don't know, maybe I should just send him to reform school instead?

I really don't know how you got any of that from my post.

Cantstopitscreamingout · Yesterday 12:04

It isn't clear what behaviour we are discussing in your OP. Are we talking about anti social behaviour outside of schools or dysregulation within schools? I think in many schools these days there is an expectation that children should behave in 'x' way, regardless of the quality of care, teaching, understanding, difficulty of the curriculum and safeguarding in school due to very limited resources. I don't think parents can be blamed for many children struggling to cope in a poor quality setting. If other childcare settings were of poor quality we wouldn't blame the children for their reaction to it.

BertieBotts · Yesterday 21:05

newseries · Yesterday 10:36

@BertieBotts i am tremendously grateful for your post, it does leave with the question of what can you do, what do you do?

I will come back probably tomorrow with some resources.

Thepeopleversuswork · Yesterday 21:21

5128gap · 03/09/2026 08:36

Parenting is important. However so is peer group and natural strength of character. Once a child starts operating in the world without you by their side, your influence shrinks and other types crowd it out. I think teen behaviour is part parenting, part personality and part keeping your fingers crossed they get in with a good crowd.

I agree. Parenting is important, obviously. A child without a stable home, without boundaries or love and guidance, or one with undiagnosed ND obviously has cards stacked against them. At the margins parenting can make a big difference.

But I firmly believe excluding outliers genes, personality and peer group are ultimately more important.

My sister and I were parented identically and went to the same school. I went fairly off the rails for about 6-7 years. Not to the point of addiction or criminality but enough for my parents to be really scared for some time. My sister was meek, obedient, extremely risk averse, extremely focused on academics.

I’m completely normal now so our lives have equalised but for a good 20 years we were incredibly different in every aspect of our lives.

I just can’t identify anything in our upbringing or social environment that could explain why we had such different experiences of adolescence.

TheGrimSmile · Yesterday 21:30

I might have said the same as you years ago. Now I know it's just not as simple as that. You're naive if you think it is.

Thepeopleversuswork · Yesterday 21:39

@BertieBotts that was one of the most insightful and thought provoking posts I have read in a long time.

And a great corrective to the screeds of kneejerking about “boundaries” and “consequences”. Most of this is pulled out of people’s arses.

seahorsessky · Yesterday 21:39

DarkFate · 03/09/2026 06:10

10 years ago I would have agreed with you. Since having an autistic child that lacks empathy, no amount of punishments, explaining why his bluntness and lack of consideration for people’s feeling does, he will never understand, except it… some children are just easier than others!!!

That is true. But the environment is relevant too. If your child gets in with a "bad crowd", even if you're a very involved, committed parent, it's hard.

BertieBotts · Yesterday 23:23

T3Tim3 · Yesterday 07:19

“Yes, ND children often get parented in a way that is less effective.“

Your evidence for this? Because it’s not what I see. Parents of ND children are often the most skilled at parenting in very difficult circumstances . I’m often left in awe. Who are you to say how parents of ND children should parent?

I wonder if what the original post is trying to say is that actually, the majority of parents do not parent in a gold standard way. Most people are winging it. Most people fudge concepts and do a bit of a mishmash of whatever was good from their own childhood + what seems logical + things they have read / seen / heard from experts, books, TV, (etc) or other parents.

For NT children this doesn't tend to matter very much, ie it works, because getting it roughly right is absolutely enough. For the majority of children, developing better skills and behaviour happens naturally as a combination of natural development + opportunity to practice skills + life experience (both direct, ie the direct outcomes of their own decisions/behaviour, but also indirect ie seeing the outcomes of what happens to others around them, hearing stories from trusted people, hearing repeated stories from acquaintances/strangers/fiction and observing cultural narratives/norms) and they also tend to have a strong drive to fit in with socially compliant behaviour ie mimicking what they see modelled and accepted. (And accordingly, behaviour/healthy coping and communication skills can become skewed if the social norms around the child are skewed or if opportunities for practice and gaining experience are curtailed).

The role of parenting is essentially a fairly concentrated flavour of social approval/disapproval. It plays a not insignificant, but overall small role in how NT children grow up because the most important factor is the set of social norms that the child grows up within, which is partly set by their parents' own behaviour, a small amount by how their parents react to their behaviour and largely the ways that the majority of people around them (which are mostly selected, not necessarily consciously, by their own parents - this is the "Parents are gardeners not carpenters" theory). In that parents tend to socialise with other adults whose value systems they broadly share and tend to seek out environments for their children (e.g. schools, neighbourhoods, social clubs) where the value system is broadly shared. But this is also how, for example, children of immigrants tend to absorb more of the culture of their adopted country than their parents' culture of origin even if the parents are very keen to bring the children up with an understanding of their home culture.

With ND children the problem is partially that the natural development piece is not happening on time and/or the ability to pick up on cues for social norms or be influenced according to social norms is less proficient. And so parenting or other influences have to fill in a lot of gaps and this means that frequently, "winging it" or adhering roughly to common parenting principles isn't enough, because the child can't necessarily fill in the gaps with all this other information because they are not necessarily able to access it.

So it's not really that ND children are receiving worse parenting, most children receive parenting which is adequate but imperfect. But ND children might need closer to perfect parenting (which doesn't exist) to get the same effect.

Although there is a whole other factor about how ND child behaviour can actually influence parent response as well and factor in to ND children (the research centres on ADHD and I can try to find this) receiving more in the way of counterproductive parenting, to be blunt, because their behaviour is more irritating. It is difficult to talk about because you don't want to blame the child. And I don't think the research is blaming the child, but recognising that it can be extremely difficult to maintain consistency and calmness in the face of challenging behaviour.

piscofrisco · Today 00:32

Zippidydoodah · 03/09/2026 07:22

This is us, too. 😢

Please tell me your son got through it and came out the other side? 💐

It was me with dd2. I honestly thought she would end up dead the way she was carrying on. She spent her 15th birthday in a psychiatric ward due to a suicide attempt and her 16th on her own as she had been asked not to come back to school except for her exams, as they had found her with a water bottle full of wine.
She is now 19 and about to go off for her second year at a top uni and, touch wood, is flying. She can’t believe the way she used to behave and we can’t believe how she has managed to turn it around. She has done amazingly. The stress of it all still lives in me though. My hair started to fall out at one point and I lived with a constant feeling of dread at what would happen next. I’ve had to work hard to stop being hyper vigilant about her.

But there is hope-in our case it took a new school for a levels, new friends, strict boundaries, an inattentive ADD diagnosis, counselling and her own strength of character.

Timeforachange26 · Today 00:47

PPAPPINE · 03/09/2026 10:46

I agree but isn’t it your job as a parent to know about your child’s friends and know where they are at all times and if you suspect anything you take action?

How do you enforce that in a non compliant 14 or 15 year old

StrugglingTeenager · Today 03:40

How can you take responsibility for something that's not necessarily your fault?

Research I've seen suggests that a teen's peer group has a much bigger influence on their behaviour than their family's values or parenting.

In my case, I have a professional qualification and experience related to parenting, a brilliant support network and several hundred hours of formal and informal education & training on my DC's specific needs. I've sacrificed my career to help them. In groups for parents with mostly NT children I am honestly amazed at how little thought appears to go into many people's parenting approaches, how little they've thought about what they do and why, and how little reflection on what works. I've been forced to construct all this from the ground up to deal with our specific DC's situation. We were told at a social work assessment that the SW had never met parents who were more in tune with their DC than us and that she wished we could teach other parents of ND kids how to do it. But from the outside my parenting looks like a disaster - weve dealt with violence, aggression, physical destruction, burnout, meltdowns, police involvement etc. Not every child or teen who looks like their parents have done a bad job actually has parents who do a bad job.

Cooshawn · Today 05:36

I'm absolutely no expert here.

But more importantly, neither are you. And you thinking something doesn't make it true.

PassTheCranberrySauce · Today 06:12

newseries · Yesterday 07:36

@Factcheckingwhilstbored i do get that, I think the hardest thing about ds is the judgement or the fear of judgement. I really, really want others to think he’s a lovely little boy, as stupid as that sounds. And he can be but also he has done some things that are, well, pretty awful to be honest, and I am mortified and so upset.

I remember in the early days of meeting DH he had a bit of an upset stomach and kept going to the toilet and confessed he’d been feeling a bit off all day but hadn’t wanted to let me down in case it scuppered his chances (bless him.) We had a weird conversation where we agreed that bodies react differently to ‘under the weather’ syndrome. If I’m in the slightest bit off I feel sick or am sick; I get car sick, I was sick when pregnant, I feel sick when very nervous. With DH if was bowels but some people get headaches or rashes or faint.

I think emotional stresses are similar and some children become very clingy, some cry, some won’t join in, some start refusing to do anything (‘would you like some chocolate, a new toy and a cold drink?’ ‘NO!’ sort of responses) and other children get aggressive. Unfortunately that is my ds: emotional turmoil of any sort can tip into physical stuff. It’s got better and I thought it had stopped altogether at one point but it seems not: we’ve had a few incidents this summer.

He has had a lot to process and deal with of late and I am understanding of that but I still need him to understand that aggression just isn’t acceptable. However, as much as that sounds both compassionate and firm, in practice it’s a lot harder. I am a bit limited in what meaningful consequences I can actually give for one (on both occasions we left immediately but it was edging towards the end of our session anyway when the incidents happened so he only actually missed about ten / fifteen minutes) and lost TV for the rest of the day. But how meaningful is this? It feels like a very weak response in all honesty! And he’s five: pray to god he grows out of it as I’ll be struggling if he’s doing it at fifteen.

It’s the worst feeling when you love your child so much but have these horrible thoughts of ‘are they just not a nice child; are they a bully; are they mean? Are they going to have no friends? Will they be ostracised from parties? Will they end up in prison?’ (yes I know … I do catastrophise a bit!) Then because I am a nice person I feel so upset another child’s been hurt but I also love my son and have that instinct to want to protect him and understand and you’re asking ‘what happened, please tell me!’ and get these nonsensical answers and rambles that are clearly lies!

I wish I had the answers here but I don’t. I desperately want to believe he’s not a bad child and I’m not a bad parent and I’m holding onto that as a way of trying to keep my sanity!

If your child has ADHD (he might be a bit young to have a diagnosis), then first line treatment is ADHD meds.

I spent the first few years of primary wondering what was ‘wrong’ with DS1 - when he started ADHD meds everything fell into place. The advantage of early-ish treatment is that they get used to being emotionally regulated and their behaviour improves beyond recognition even when they’re not taking medication (DS1 only takes it in school).