7 (nearly 8) yo dd behaviour/ATTITUDE/attention seeking/lack of remorse.... AAAARGHH!! Long sorry

[jellybelly25]

All of the above.

On the whole she is pretty good but I have always had to really keep on top of it as she is naturally quite naughty... Mostly blatant disobedience and laziness (all the time), and big teenage strops when she gets told off (as if it is a big shock to her?!!).

Every morning is a nightmare she will hang around and stare at me until I yell at her to get on with whatever it is that she needs to do... I have tried numerous times to do it without shouting and I will have asked anything up to twelve times in a normal tone of voice, she ONLY does what she's asked if I shout.

Every night at the moment she manages to piss us off enough to snap at her before bed which both of us hate as nobody likes to go to sleep on a bad note. But she just pushes and pushes....

I have a 4mo dd which I am sure is a big part of the problem but I can't exactly give her back... Am organising alone time for me and her, dp and her etc, but am worried that she may see this as a reward for her bad behaviour - she is very perceptive, often coolly suggests reasonable punishments to me in the midst of rows... infuriating!!

She lies a lot (I have been told that they all go through phases of this), is secretive and devious (new worrying traits) and says sorry but OBVIOUSLY doesn't mean it.

And she talks almost continuously and I have experimented with whether or not she will stop unless I intervene but she doesn't. EVER. I have to interrupt her to tell her to stop so I can think, at which point she goes off in a huff, or stays quiet for 10 seconds then starts again.

It is rather exhausting, but I think I maybe expecting a lot of her. Anyone I tell goes 'but she's such a good girl?!' and looks at me in disbelief.

this is soooo typical. My dd (now 9yo) went through a stroppy phase at this age. Another mum of a teenager, a 7 year old and a toddler said that the 'stroppy sevens' were as difficult as the terrible twos and the teens! Hang on in there - she is testing the boundaries and needs to know that they are in place - it will make her feel secure. Has she got a favourite 'toy' i.e. Nintendo, computer,playstation type thing? If so you could withdraw her right to use it every time she has a strop. Far more scary for the child than shouting imho! hth

You could be describing my DD,7

We've found that removing her favourite things as punishment ie hifi,gameboy etc for ,few days,as cruisemum1 suggests,really does work.

I think it must be a hard age to be,not little like a 4-5 year old but not bigger like 9-10,if you get what I mean,they can't be totally independent and grown up children but want to be.
I heard somewhere that this is the age when all their hormones start to surge towards the climax of puberty,so think this may be why they start getting some of the adolesant traits,ie strops
as for the devious thing...calling their bluff or bribery is the only thing that works in this house.

Ok thanks am feeling a bit better now... I was thinking I had destroyed her character by having dd2!

In the past no TV/movies has had the most effect, although she has this irritating habit of then following me around muttering 'ho hum, what shall I do....' Which is ridiculous as she is completely happy with any of the billions of toys she has in her room once she gets going with them!

Thanks guys anyway. I hate the feeling of having been angry/shouting for days on end...

Stroppy Sevens

Oh, god it's all soooooooooooooooooo familiar. I've an 8 year gap between my 2 daughters. The good news is that now she's 10....it's still the same but you've had a good few years to get used to it

Tinker - I have an eight year gap between lo's too! DD is 9 and ds turned 1 on Friday .

Last night she was really good. Ithink combination of doing stuff together (cooked tea etc) and the fact that I lost my rag and threw away the lip glosses she was busy fiddling with for ages in the morning when she should gave been getting dressed has got through to her (temporarily anyway).

She later came by asking if I would like to throw away some different lip glosses instead because she had 'just remembered' it was actually those she had been fiddling with and not the ones I did throw away... And which bin did I throw them in...

There is a ten year age gap between me and my sister and we get on so well, she is my best friend by a mile... But I am the younger one so I can't remember how much I must have p*ssed her off when I was litytle!

jelllybelly - the one on one thing really does pay dividends. Well done for finding time/patience. It means so much to the older child imo.

Sounds like my dd6 at the start of the summer hoildays stroopy/moody/lippy/arrogant By the end of the day I was only to happy to put her to bed to have a break from it.
The one strange thing was for the first time she was helping with jobs in the house with out any fuss.
I cracked down on the bad behaviour and prasied the good. I started a reward chart using merit (simaliar to school) and for every five merit we did something together of her choice. ie: went to the hairdresser (a friend alwayes cuts her hair), swimming then mcdonalds, bike ride.
It did take a few weeks to start working but now I have my old dd back. Except for the small slip that i'm try hard to be firm about.
Reading all the messages I really hope the behaviour don't turn again when she's seven.

lexcat that all sounds good, I might start something like that (again). I hope she stays cool for you too!

Thanks cruisemum I think my girls are both sensitive souls.... Is hard work to fit in extra one on one when basic stuff is difficult to begin with! But got to be done...

Yesterday was chaos, builders next door have concrete machine draped across front steps so can't get past, look at me like I am mad as I come bumping down with buggy and dd1 in tow, they take ages to move it, late for school. Tyres on buggy go flat halfway to school. Have appointment in a.m. car nearly doesn't start... Get back from appointment to pick up dd2 from moms, she screamed whole time I was away (lovely but v clingy baby), car dies in middle of road at my moms house when we leave to fetch dd1 from school. Have to call another parent to take her home. dd1 has no clue what is going on as message was not relayed to her so is acting funny when we fetch her. also did not hand in letters/homework/all the other random sh*t schools send home that has been in her bag since Monday. I am cross (feel bad as I know she is feeling funny b4 anyone points this out). dd2 screams all the way back to my moms house. We are all fraught, car eventually starts and we get home v late. dd1 gets in bath after dd2, washes her hair with my shampoo and in the process pours most of it over the sides of the bath! She gets told off and then cries uncontrollably for an hour during which we have to feed and put dd2 to bed. In the end we have cuddles and a good chat and she said she can't stop herself doing silly things...

So I said it would be much better for everyone if she tries really hard not to do the silly things, then we can still have cuddles but they would be happy cuddles not sad ones because of her being naughty, and it would make everybody's evenings much better. This is the first time she has really seemed to be genuinely sorry for a long time.

Today I am totally drained. Poor dp had to catch a train at silly o clock for a meeting so he's knackered too. At least we got to watch heroes tho .

Not sure what I am expecting anyone to say I just felt like sounding off!!

I have ds6 and dd aged 11 mths,ds has been a nightmare ecently with rages,mood swings etc THey come out of nowhere & he says awful things to me like Im the worst mum in the world & he wishes he wasnt born etc
Was wondering if it was all normal or if I was putting too much pressure on him.I am strict but he is spoilt in lots of other ways.Was really woondering if a bad case of sib rivalry.Anyway good to hear your comments.

Jellybelly, reading your op makes me think your dd and my ds must be long lost twins or something. I'm afraid I haven't got any advice at all, as I'm having my own struggles. I have 2 other boys - 2.6 and 2 wks. And I think being pregnant (was quite ill too) and having ds3 has been a trigger in his change in behaviour. Theimpsmum mentioned the surge of hormones at this age, and I have to say I have wondered if his moods were hormone driven. I noticed he gets a bit whiffy sometimes, which I think adds to that arguement.

But its so hard isn't it? I'm going to try to do the one-to-one thing with him. And I'm going to keep reminding myself that under the surface he is a very kind-hearted little boy. And that this fiestiness is all character building. I suppose the key to it all is being consistant with boundaries by calmly reinforcing them. And not doing as I do, getting all emotional and shouty about it all. Easier said than done though. It does get easier doesn't it? I hope so.

Congrats on yr ds3 kinki! 2 weeks, are you still pretty bleary eyed? It is hard. Especially when you get used to them being able to occupy themselves without too much fuss, then as soon as you are less available they want you every waking second!

One on one helps, and I reckon she is much better when I give her something to do than when I just let her do what she wants (thinking she will jump at the chance to go watch movies in her room or paint her nails etc..) even baby stuff or house chores or whatever. Often easier said than done tho.

Its definitely a sibling rivalry thing, she has been pretty good previously at saying 'everyone is cooing over the baby and nobody is talking to me' which is great cos I can reassure her and remind people to include her etc (that's another thing, people can be so insensitive to older siblings I think), but lately she seems to have lost that ability to articulate her feelings.

Hormone changes also makes a lot of sense.

This morning it was SEVERE stomach cramps (rolling around on bed, limping about the house doubled over), which subsided very quickly as she realised she still had to go to school

If your dd is generally well-behaved with other people, that's a good sign. SOunds like she's just testing lots of boundaries with you, and testing your love.

I am SO happy to have found this thread - I came on today to post for some advice about my DS (7) who is driving me bananas with his miniature teenager behaviour (strops, sulks, shouting, telling me he wants a new mummy, picking on his brother (5) etc, and it is a blessed relief to know that I am not alone. I had suspected hormones, so its interesting to see other people have the same theory

I have started reverse psychology of putting his pocket money for the following week into a jar in 10p's. When the behaviour is bad, he gets a warning and if he carries on, one coin is taken out of the jar, so how much pocket money he has at the end of the week is up to him - do you think this is too harsh? (I am of course also praising positive behaviour).

He's such a bright, lovely, kind-hearted boy, but I just want him to understand where the boundaries are now, rather than trying to deal with it when he is bigger.

It is veyr reassuring isn't it...

I think that sounds like a really good plan re pocket money!! I might do that, how much doeshe get? I am a bit haphazard with pocket money, i.e. I have phases of giving her a pound per week, then I forget, and when I buy her a load of stuff anyway I think what's the point... But this would definitely be a good motivator for her. She has a collection of treats that I give to her when she's been especially helpful or well behaved too.

The hormones theory is gaining weight.. She's had one or two spots recently, very strange.

hi jelly

Same problem, when my last ds3 was born, my ds2 did pretty much the same sort of thing.

Apart from stating the obvious, try to give her more attention, i used a chart to try and bring a bit of normality back and stop me losing my rag over everyday stuff.

I worked out what were 'rights' and what were 'privelleges' ie computer, ps2, sleep overs, having friends round, sweets, etc, etc and started a point chart.

So stuff like getting dressed 3 points, tidying your room 3 points, doing homework 4 points. so i my ds did it first time when i asked he would get the points. The first reward was easy to get, the second a bit harder, the third a bit harder. for example 3 points - a nice desert, 6 points an hour on the computer etc, etc. If he didnt have enough points, he didnt get.

If at the end of the week if had managed to get a high amount of points, he could have a friend round, sleepover, cinema, whatever.

Gosh, law, that is a very organised system! I am not very good at being organised but I get the gist, and I think that sort of thing helps. I like the idea of graduating the treats according to how good the deed is....

You're definitely right about not losing your rag, dp and I made a pact to just not shout anymore unless something really warranted it, because she takes very little notice and we end up feeling awful.

Jelly - im far from organised, i had to write it down and stick it on the front door, so it hit me in face on my way out!!!.

I didnt use it for long, just broke the battle of the wills cycle!!

I have a pile of stuff at the door every morning lol