New to the site, but am desperate for help

[kbayes]

I have a 6yr old, very clever, daughter. Her dad is not arround but I have a long term partner who does not live with us. My problem is my daughters behaviour at the moment. She has always been very strong willed, and has not liked being told no (does anyone?) but recently it has got so bad I am scared to even say no anymore. She has started really sulking, and stomping at the slightest thing, and it takes her ages to snap out of it. She is shouting 'no' at me when I ask her to do something, and I am constantly having to repeat myself to get her to do as she is told as she will just argue back every single time. I obviously love my daughter more than life itself, but at the moment I really do not like her and it is breaking my heart. I have tried naughty step, removing toys, cancelling treats, explaining and reasoning with her, and this evening I just broke down in tears in front of her, which she seemed to find funny! SOMEONE please help me as the situation I am in at the moment is really scaring me.

have no words of wisdom just empathy - sure someone of more use will be along in a minute. You sound distressed and didn't want you to have no response. Hope things improve

firstly, welcome to MN
I have a 3 year old who is like this (I dread to think what she will be like when shes older!) I have started to just totally ignore the bad behaviour and so far it seems to be paying off (last 2 weeks we have had far fewer tantrums), I know its hard though and I totally understand where your coming from when you say that you really don't like her at the moment, I feel awful when I feel like that about my DD, but I suppose it's quite normal to feel this way sometimes, I'm sure your DD knows you love her very much and thats why she knows she can see how far she can push you.

I also have a six year old who can throw a mean tantrum, it was particularly bad this year after she changed schools, with lots of face-pulling, sulkiness, paddies and so on.

I don't have a magic answer, but it is usually a phase, I found it just seemed to pass. I would stick with one or two discipline methods, like always losing computer time or whatever so it's pretty boring and predictable. The 'consequences' approach also works well at this age if they are clever (you see I think the naughty step is a bit young really, I just send her to her room or another room for a bit of quiet time, it's less a power struggle then and they still calm down). So, if she's not ready for the day, you can't go out and do that fun activity. If she's rude to you, you will be too upset to read the bedtime story. Stay firm, but I wouldn't crowd her or back her into a corner, let her have some time out, and come forward to you when she's prepared to be nice/not rude/eat whatever/be co-operative.

As for her laughing when you cried, she just didn't know what to do and so did something inappropriate. She's probably actually quite scared/confused by this response. I don't think it's a big deal, just tell her that even mummies cry and that although you do love her so much, her behaviour is not great.

Two other things that have helped us: ask her what's wrong at a quiet time. If she's clever then at 6 she can be starting to talk to you about her feelings. I found out my daughter was upset by a school situation with friends that I didn't know about and by other worries, some of which were quite absurd to me, but important to her. Then she'll feel like you listen (my daughter also wrote out sentences 'Today, I felt...because...) as she loved writing and found it easier than talking.

I also think it's easy to forget that at 6 they are still little, have emotional swings and still need lots of cuddles. I would do more cuddling, even if you feel a bit cross with her, I have noticed my six year old who seems to be so independent and mouthy is like a little baby if you stop and really give her a twenty minute cuddle on the sofa.

I do feel for you, I have so been there! Ignore any of my advice, it might or might not work for you, but you are certainly not on your own and your daughter won't be like this forever.

I don't have any magic answers, but do have some experience of a tantrumming DD, so a couple of thoughts:

Is your DD getting to bed early enough? The chances of my own DD having a tantrum are definitely much higher when she is tired.

What is your DD like at school? My DD has had innumerable tantrums with me, but never at school (or even pre-school). That tells me that actually she has quite finely tuned antennae for what she can get away with in the way of tantrums. That give me confidence to be more ruthless than I might otherwise be in the face of tantrum behaviour - although I admit I still don't do as much ignoring of tantrums as I probably should!

agree with onetoomanycornettos about talking to her.
talk to her when she is calm. there can be something making her angry.
and cuddles, praising are good.

I don't have DCs that age yet, but one of the best things I've ever read on MN was someone who said that the times when they most push you away are the times you need to hold them closer. I agree with cornetto that lots of cuddles is a good start.

I also find that changing focus when the DCs are stroppy is often a good tactic. ds1 (nearly 5) often just needs a bit of down time from his younger brother, who is a bit of a nutter, so he now takes himself off to their room, shuts the door and looks at a book or lies on his bed for a wee while, and comes out feeling much more chipper.

Do you have any other children?

I think lots of us go through this at that sort of age. When I went through it with my eldest DS I found the main thing to do was to be consistent. First of all I stopped giving second (and third, forth, fifth etc.) chances. He had to do as he was told first time or face the consequences. For us the punishment was the removal of a fairly small, everyday treat like not having pudding or not being allowed on the computer. It wasn't a quick fix, but gradually he realised that his behaviour only resulted in him loosing things and he improved. I found the removal of an everyday treat worked well because it was something that we could apply everyday, while the removal of a bigger treat, like a day out could not be applied regularly and would also mean the loss of some good quality time for us. Often the kids are just after attention. So I found that saying "That's it you've lost your computer time" and then ignoring him was far more effective than any longer telling off period. The naughty stair never seemed to work at all as he would just use it to further manipulate my attention by getting up or messing around. Good luck - my second son is 5 nearly 6 and I'm starting to see the signs that we're headed for Round Two!