Defiant 7 year old

[grumpyelf]

My DD is 7 (nearly 8) and is incredibly defiant. I'm really struggling to deal with her. Tonight, for example, she decided right at bedtime that she wanted to wrap her teachers' Christmas presents. I said that we would do it in the morning as it was bedtime. She was very angry and went and came back with some wrapping paper and scissors. I again said no, we'd do it tomorrow and she then just started cutting up the wrapping paper so it was all jagged and too small for the present so wasting the paper. She only stopped when I raised my voice and took the presents away.

I get totally stuck on how to stop her when she's like this. I struggle with consequences for example, as my parents only used smacking as their response to everything which I obviously don't do and so I am just lost with what to do.

She's my 4th so its not like I'm new to this but I don't remember my others being quite so bad. She does get lots of 1:1 time doing things that she has chosen.

Any ideas would be great!

If they refused to go to bed for any reason, one thing we did with ours at that age was to say ok, but bedtime will be 10 minutes earlier tomorrow and add another 10 minutes fir each time they argue.

You do have to carry it through though

Thanks for replying Jingle. What happens though if they don't go to bed the earlier time the next day?

We're having a bit of success with a set of rewards that she really wants and saying that we need X number of good bedtimes to get each one. We're now up to 5 good bedtimes to get her toy so fingers crossed it keeps working!

At that age their old enough to understand cause and effect. So I would say I told you no wrapping, put the things away or you lose something you really like.
So my DSS is that age so its warning that x behaviour stops or you get a 5 ( or 10) minute tech time penalty.
This weekend he lost all screen privileges for just generally not listening to us which he had to earn back. The child has been an angel.
Find something that motivates her such as a toy or game or privalige of some sort that you can take away for poor behaviour.

Dd of exactly the same age is exactly the same and it's infuriating. Im on zero tolerance now. If she argues it goes away/in the bin/she loses it. In this case like you did I'd have taken the presents away and said if she didn't stop then I'd give them to someone else (and follow through if necessary). Mine fights with her sister a lot so I confiscate whatever is being fought over and no one gets it.