Hi, advice on challenging behaviour in eight year old girl

[tryinghardmummy]

Hi, my friend - no, really, it is my friend, she's just not a member of Mumsnet (yet) - is in a bit of a pickle with her daughter who is absolutely lovely most of the time but has these strange episodes where she is really defiant, rude, physically and verbally aggressive and threatens to have her mother jailed in moments of high anger: but then, insists, absolutely INSISTS, when it is all over, that it wasn't her and that it was 'somebody else'. Indeed, "another me". Plus she says she "wasn't there", "didn't do that" and genuinely thinks that it was not her, dissolves into tears saying: 'it wasn't me, why won't you believe me?" It's really sad and strange. She's such a lovely little one, and the parents are baffled. Any ideas?

I would start with the gp. Maybe your friend can go and see the gp on her own first, explain what is happening and get some advice? It certainly sounds as if the girl needs psychological help.

Ouch. Schizoid split.

What lastingLight said.

Sorry.

Your friend's DD sounds like a bright little girl with a strong will and a hot temper which she doesn't yet have under full control, one who just can't resist the temptation to push her mother's buttons when she is angry, but is who also very perfectionist and believes that she should always be "lovely" and should never lose control. So when she does lose control to the point of hurting or upsetting her parents she goes in to denial afterwards. All pretty normal.

What to do? Well her parents shouldn't get into huge shocked arguments and discussions with her about what she said/did, whether she meant it, or why. There's no need to force admissions out of her, they all know what happened. They can remind her, each time it happens- "sometimes we all get very angry with the people we love and sometimes when we are angry we say things we don't mean / do things we really regret afterwards". Tears and denial can be calmly ignored. If she insists she didn't do it then her parents can say firmly "I am sure you wish you hadn't done it and now you feel very sorry" and ignore her protests. They can insist there are consequences for aggression (whether she accepts that she did the crime or not - that really doesn't matter!); and it's good to insist (calmly and boringly but persistently) that she says sorry but without having to spell out exactly what she did wrong - "I'm sorry I was rude / hurt you" will do. And when that's done, move on. If her parents can accept that her temper isn't something terrible and abnormal and scary but is something that she will learn to control and come to terms with in time, then so can she.

A good response to threats to send her mother to jail is simply "You're so angry about this you think I should go to prison?" If your friends don't already have How to Talk so Children Will Listen.... then that would be worth a read too.

If it's happening very often and there's a lot of physical aggression then it's worth a trip to the GP in case there's an underlying problem. But if all's well at school and at home she is mostly lovely and the temper outbursts are infrequent, then really it's not a worry.