I have 3 dd's (11, nearly 3 and 5 weeks old) and 1 dsd (nearly 10), I've been with dp for 8 years and living together for 6.
I'm really struggling with my 11 year olds behaviour, she is rude and argumentative about everything, which I'm sure at her age is normal to some extent but she does it constantly, we can't talk about anything when dd is about or she will try to insist on knowing exactly what we are talking about and will question us in what we are doing or where we have been that day while she is at school. If we say we have been to the shops she starts looking about for bags or whatever and insist we tell her every little detail, if we refuse to tell her all the details she will tell us she has a right to know what we have been doing. If we say we haven't been anywhere but she notices I have make up on or hair different she will tell us we are lying and question us some more. It is exhausting.
She also gets involved if we are telling the other kids if for anything eg with dsd she will have to involve herself by saying things like well I wasn't doing anything I was just reading my book, playing on my tablet or whatever when again we weren't actually talking to her and never suggested she was doing anything or with the 3 year tells us we shouldn't be telling her off shes not even 3 yet and only playing, even if that's playing on the stairs or in the kitchen near the oven at dinner time and we are trying to keep her safe. The toddler is going through "the terrible 2s" atm so any kind of no results crying and she will then shout the toddler over for a cuddle and say stuff like aw its ok you were only playing and it's not fair you've been told off. Its ridiculous she seems to think she is the parent and has an equal say in how we parent the others.
As for behaviour she never sits still, she is constantly dancing or jumping about the living room including on the furniture, she lies upside down on the couch (as in feet up the back of it on the wall and head off the bit you sit on).
Despite being told repeatedly not to she will pick the toddler up and throw her (playfully) onto the couch or spin her around. When shes told not to do this she then argues back that we do it (spin her around) so why can't she? The difference is dd has very little special awareness and has on numerous occasions bumped toddler off the door or wall or almost dropped her.
She still draws on her books, furniture, her walls she can't be trusted with makeup sets or nail polishes as she pours it on her carpet or uses lip gloss to stick stuff to her walls despite having blue tack to put up posters. She is not allowed slime stuff in the house, partly because I hate it but mostly because she then uses that to mix with water and shampoo/shower gel type stuff to "make potions" that end up all over the bathroom or her room that she shares with the younger one.
Every time she goes for a bath she floods the floor and not just a little bit it took 4 towels to dry the floor last week, so last night I specifically set out what not to do in the bath so instead she used slime that her dad gave her to bring home and also all of everyone's bath stuff to make a potion which has stained the floor bath and her room carpet. I'm sure the marks will come out the bath with a good scrub but it's not the point she knows not to do that. She then lied about what it was and tried to hide the slime, when she finally gave me the slime she then said she doesn't know why she isnt allowed to have slime in the house anyway??
She ruins everything we buy her and sometimes what we buy the others, dvds get scratched or sprayed with perfume, toys get sprayed with perfume or broken, games get opened and bits left everywhere so can't be played with jewellery gets lost or broken, I bought her a nice locket with her birthstone and a pic of me and her inside for her birthday and she had snapped the chain on it and has now lost the locket part. It wants really expensive but it was a lot of money for us and the kind of thing I would have treasured at that age.
There is so much more but I'm just rambling on now, I know some of that might seem silly but this is constant, every day is like that and I don't know what to do. She gets sent to her room when she doesn't do as shes told but just ends up wrecking something up there and banging about, she has broken all her drawers as she goes up and opens and slams them when shes been told off or breaks something just to prove shes mad at being given a row. We've took her tablet and tv stick off her, she gets grounded, though never really goes out much so not really much of a punishment anyway. I don't know what else we can do, I've tried talking to her, spending more time with her, shouting at her nothing works the behaviour and attitude is just constant. I don't even think it's to do with having either of the younger 2 as she has always been like this although admittedly getting worse or maybe just because she is the age she is it's more annoying as she surely should have grown out if most of this by now, it's like she has never grown out of the toddler stage, it's that bad that sometimes even the toddler is telling her no when she does things.
Anyway does anyone have any suggestions on how I can make her see this behaviour and attitude isnt acceptable anymore? Its causing arguments between me and dp now, I feel that he feels I should be doing more to stop it but I don't know what else I can do, we are just so exhausted with it all plus the wee ones, he jumps on her for every little thing she does now which annoys me as sometimes I just think he should let some things slide but then from his point of view we let too much slide and maybe if we tackle the little things the big things will stop too but that causes arguments cause then she feels like she can't do anything without being told off, though it doesnt stop her from doing it anyway.
Sometimes I think we should just split up because honestly if it was his dd behaving like this I wouldn't have stuck around this long, it's different as obviously I love my dd unconditionally I carried her and have been there every day of her life and I nearly lost her when she was born so I obviously have that attachment to her but he doesnt he can walk away at anytime and I can honestly see that day coming as the stress is really getting to us so part of me wants to walk away while it's my decision and I'm prepared for it but then that wouldn't stop dds behaviour I would just be dealing with it on my own with no one to moan to at the end of the day and why should the wee ones have to be split between 2 homes just because their sister can't behave.