Worried about my 4yo DD

[RubaDubMum89]

This is going to be a long one, so I'll summarise here:
DD 4, 5 at the end of the year, has been hurting the animals. Last week she cut both the cats ears with scissors. Today she's pulled loads of feathers out of the chickens. I'm at my wits end. Would you start proceedings with a Dr for her to see someone or am I over reacting?

Long version:

We had some problems with DD when she was younger - 2.5ish - smacking the cats and throwing stones at them etc. We spent a long time explaining to her how the cats have feelings, when she was hurt it's not nice and that's how the cats feel etc and the behaviour stopped. We've not thought anything of it since then. Now it's resurfaced.

To give you an idea of DDs personality - she loves animals, she's generally a kind and loving child, she's even had a couple of certificates from nursery for always being super kind to everyone. The cat she hurt is like her best friend, they've grown up together, play together, sleep together, when she's hurt and she crys he comes running from where ever he is to snuggle her, it's is (was?) a really beautiful relationship.

Then, last week, I saw the cat walking around with two bloody ears. I knew straight away what had happened - when I'd been cleaning upstairs I'd come down to find DD chopping paper up with the nail scissors we'd forgotten to put away - I knew she'd cut his ears and my heart sank. I felt sick. I asked her about it, I couldn't shout at her because I knew I'd go too far, and she denied it, then after asking a few more times she told me, she'd been making paper dinosaurs and the cat was in the way so she cut him. I asked if she knew what she was doing and she said she knew it would bleed and it would hurt him. She couldn't tell me why she would want to hurt him.

After I'd cleaned the cat up I took away all of her toys. They're all in the loft and she's earning them back day by day. All treats were cancelled, no puddings, no chocolate or treat food and no TV at all until she's shown us she can be nice again.

We debated at the time taking her to see someone, the Dr probably and hoping they could refer her on, but after a good 5 hour discussion and tears we decided we'd wait and see, as the behaviour is so very out of character we wanted to believe it was a stupid thing done by a 4yo who lacks comprehension.

Everything has been going great. The first incident with the cat was exactly a week ago today, she's earned a few toys back, she got to watch TV for 30 mins after tea last night and she's been her usual loving self with the cats. Then this morning, I was in the bathroom with the door closed and she pushed a chicken feather under the door. Then another. Then another. Until there was 10/11 of them.

I asked her if she'd pulled them from the chickens and she said no, to which I said in all the time we've had them, we've not had but 3 feathers fall out and she said I was right, she'd pulled them from the chickens. Again we've had the same conversations (me and her) she's promised not to do it again and I've taken a couple of her toys she'd earned back away. She's also no longer allowed to go near the chickens, which she was upset about.

Honestly, I don't know what to do. Do I take her to see someone? Do I seriously consider rehoming the animals now? I'd like this to be a VERY last resort as I adore all my animals and many of them predate DD but I'm worried what the next incident will be now. I don't know, my mind is all over the place. I'm worried about her, to say the very least and I'm devastated this is happening.

We're quite strict with DD and hold her to a high standard with behaviours and manners. We won't tolerate rudeness or back chat. She's never physically punished, we operate on a 3 warning system then she's sent to her bedroom. Maybe we're too strict? Is this a power play? But then it feels ridiculous to react to bad behaviour by being less strict?

Before I ramble anymore - AIBU to be so worried? Or am I totally over reacting?

Please start with
www.worldofbooks.com/en-gb/books/adele-faber/how-to-talk-so-kids-will-listen-and-listen-so-kids-will-talk/9781853407055?gclid=Cj0KCQjw7pKFBhDUARIsAFUoMDaJYcCJ_vuoZ7WRz4-SFUDNpkXb-GMUrCzo5tsq5X8BtQOCfSppDlAaAuKmEALw_wcB

Lots of good strategies

As said above the grandad example is not the right approach
She is four
And yes the year spent fixing your relationship may hzve impacted...but speak to a family therapist

Less punishment
more empathy

@SnappyMcSnapface

OP, mumsnet is not a place to come for any kind of nuance or common sense. The replies on this thread aren’t helpful to you.

I totally understand why you’re so concerned about this behaviour, but you don’t need to brand your daughter a sociopath. 4/5 is when children are developing empathy, not when they’re masters in it. It’s actually developmentally normal for children to have huge empathy blind spots which they eventually overcome, and they grow into perfectly normal children.

There is lots you can do to work on a child’s empathy skills. A child psychologist can help you with this if you can afford to, but if not there are books, websites and online courses which can assist you. This isn’t a sign that you’re a bad parent or that your daughter is an irredeemable animal torturer. She just needs help with the development of this specific skill, and that’s ok.

As for rehoming your animals - you can decide for yourself if that’s actually necessary. If you can e sure your daughter isn’t left alone with them and that they are therefore safe, there’s no reason not to keep them. I expect you can find practical solutions to ensure their safety without rehoming them.

Please ignore the nastiness and hysteria of other posters. This is a very upsetting and distressing situation, but there is so much you can do to help your daughter and no reason to believe she can’t be taught to treat animals properly.

Agree. In the absence of any other worrying behaviour it could just be that she made a mistake which needs correcting. Some sort of power play could well be a contributing factor.

Two things:

1. Any siblings in the house?

1. She'll be happy if you get rid of the animals. It's clear from your posts you love them. She sees them as competition, she's jealous. She realises this and knows how to get your attention.... Yes, it's in an odd way, but she's only 4. Don't project adult values onto the immature actions of a 4 year old.

Just mulling things over and I think the grandad example I am not sure I would have counted my 4yo. I would have counted my 6yo. My 4yo I would have distracted instead.

@SmidgenofaPigeon

I’m sure the cat would rather not have his ears mutilated than have the child write a card to say sorry! What on earth is the point of that. I can understand why you’d do that if you’d hurt another child, but a cat?! ‘Here cat, sorry I snipped your ears and made you bleed, and that in the past I’ve loved stones at you, but here’s a nice card!’

The point of the card would be to help her to think about it from the cat’s perspective, and support her in developing empathy and perspective-taking. It’s a really helpful suggestion.

It made me think of my DS, who is 4 and was so excited when his grandparents came to visit (first time we'd seen them in ages, due to Covid) - he just wanted some attention from his grandad, to talk/play with him, and his grandad wasn't interested. I was pretty heartbroken for him tbh. In the end he went off to play by himself. But if his grandad had started to play with him and something hadn't worked out (like the wrong song in the OP's example), I can imagine DS having a tantrum about it, because of the pent-up disappointment and frustration about being repeatedly ignored and told to wait. I would have shown him some compassion and not punished him.

If we want our children to be empathetic to other people (and animals), we have to show them empathy ourselves.

Punishing a child in that scenario is not showing empathy.

I can understand why you are upset OP. But I do also find your reactions a tad over the top and punishments far too harsh. She is still very young to understand fully. Especially pulling feathers from a chicken. I can imagine in the mind of a child that is no different to having your hair or nails cut.

Has your DC ever been violent towards another child? By that I mean hitting or bitting which is common? Would you react in a similar way if your DC hit another child? Because I think it would be far too harsh.

That example of grandpa visiting.. that punishment was quite harsh and heavy handed imo. Your DD is still very small and on that occasion I feel like she was punished just for acting her age.

I agree with the PP above who says she may be jealous of the animals. A bit like when older siblings do (to us) awful things to their new baby sibling - because they are jealous and because it gets them attention albeit negative. In those cases we recognise it’s jealousy and normal behaviour even though it may be something potentially quite harmful to the new baby. It may be exactly the same thing here and yet is getting a completely different response.

@Orangeinmybluelightcup

Just mulling things over and I think the grandad example I am not sure I would have counted my 4yo. I would have counted my 6yo. My 4yo I would have distracted instead.

DD is a headstrong child and ever since she was young she's not been able to be distracted or appeased by alternatives. If she wants to do something she wants to do it, we've tried every trick in the book to distract her - why don't we play with this, why don't we do this, let's wait a few minuits then we can do this etc. We have always explained why behaviours are undesirable too, it's not like we've just punished her outright for something she doesn't understand. We rarely shout and nearly always talk rationally to her. She's a very intelligent child. She's always been emotionally intelligent - in my opinion and has been articulate and switched on from an early age and we've tailored our approach to this.

I agree though, we need to alter our approach. I'll be looking up some of the suggestions made up thread and am greatful for all the advice

There seems to be a degree of hysteria going on here. Yes, what happened is awful and I’m not surprised OP feels mortified. Yes you should definitely get the animals checked by a vet. But to draw inference that DD is a sociopath and should never again be left alone with animals/children is ludicrous.

I’ll probably be flamed for being too permissive here, but I think the main thing you need to do is connect with her more. Sending her to her room for tantruming (how small children express themselves), removing all her toys, punishing her with food, lots of warnings and time outs...she sounds like a 4 year old who desperately needs loving adults to help her process and express her emotions, not squash them with this idea of ‘holding her to high standards’. I can’t recommend the books ‘how to talk so children will listen’ and ‘the whole brain child’ enough if you think changing your parenting approach might be the simplest first step before going down the route of psychiatric care. Good luck with everything x

@Susannahmoody

Two things:

1. Any siblings in the house?

1. She'll be happy if you get rid of the animals. It's clear from your posts you love them. She sees them as competition, she's jealous. She realises this and knows how to get your attention.... Yes, it's in an odd way, but she's only 4. Don't project adult values onto the immature actions of a 4 year old.

No siblings. She has two cousins she sees a couple of times a week.

I'm not ruling out the possibility of getting rid of the animals, but, I would like that to be an absolute last resort.

@OodieWoodie

I can understand why you are upset OP. But I do also find your reactions a tad over the top and punishments far too harsh. She is still very young to understand fully. Especially pulling feathers from a chicken. I can imagine in the mind of a child that is no different to having your hair or nails cut.

Has your DC ever been violent towards another child? By that I mean hitting or bitting which is common? Would you react in a similar way if your DC hit another child? Because I think it would be far too harsh.

She's never hurt another child, that I know of. I am really starting to think I've been coming at the whole parenting thing wrong. My worst nightmare is having an entitled, rude, demanding and spoilt brat for a child. I know people with young kids that have never said please in their life and speak to their parents like dirt and get exactly what they want by stamping their feet.

I think I've gone way too far in the other direction. Her dad has always agreed with my parenting style as he wants the same outcome in the long term for DD as I do but I don't think we're going about it the right way now. I actually feel really awful, like I've been inadvertently abusing DD.

Please don't think though folks that DD lives in a loveless, dickensian home. She's well loved, we start everyday with a cuddle and a conversation in bed, we laugh hard and often and we play endlessly. She has never gone without love and she is rarely naughty enough to warrant being sent to her room. The grandad example was a couple of weeks ago and the most recent occasion I could bring to mind - barring the animals incident.

Someone mentioned punishment with food, it's not as severe as that, like "go to bed without tea" I just don't think bad behaviour warrants treats like a chocolate bar. She still has her snack after nursery, it's just fruit or toast. Nothing special.

It sounds like I'm trying to justify myself but I'm not, not really, I just don't want to be seen as some complete ogre because I don't think I am (I really hope I'm not!)

WildStallions I'm mulling over what you said about leading questions - and I'm not being goady here, I want to adapt my own behaviour - so, taking the cat example, if I said to her "what happened to the cats ears?" and she said "I don't know" what then? Or in any other scenario. If she doesn't tell me what happened, regardless if I know or can, beyond reasonable doubt, assume, what happened, what then?

I'm guessing the answer surely isn't to just ignore it, but I genuinely can't think of how I'd proceed without saying something like "I think this happened, did it?"

Have you had any therapy to discuss your own abusive upbringing in relation to your experience of parenting? Becoming a parent can stir up childhood trauma. It can be so difficult to navigate when you don't have a positive experience to build on

I haven't. I can't face it. I don't think I'll ever be ready to face it. I don't want to go into detail as I don't think it's that relevant, what happened to me has left permanent emotional and physical scars but it's all very well suppressed and I'm at a stage, in my 30s where I no longer think of it everyday or month even. I know, wholeheartedly, that DD is not being brought up in that kind of environment and I'm happy to learn and adapt my approach and that's good enough for me, rightly or wrongly.

@RubaDubMum89 I agree let's go do some colouring book while grandad gathers his wits wouldn't cut it, but if 4yo wouldn't leave them alone I would take 4yo out the back or something well away until grandad ready to interact. I think that's what I mean. I don't think I would view pestering a grandparent who they're excited to see as something to count and give a timeouts for. Although the meltdown at the end I would say they need to go for a calm down. Maybe at 6yo when they can understand more that its not polite I would give a count. However I think 20m waiting to play is a tall order!

I'm just trying to help I don't mean it as a criticism. You've got my full sympathy. And you sound like a caring and considered parent.

I’m also a bit sceptical as to what happened between your DD and the cat. I’ve had cats all my life and I have three now. I can’t imagine any of them sitting quietly while a 4 year old girl cut first into one ear with scissors and then the other. Any cat I’ve ever owned would have shot off, probably after scratching the little girl.

Then there’s the fact that the cat still comes to your DD for attention. That isn’t something cats do when they’ve been hurt by a person or animal. They stay right away as a rule.

I’m speaking from the experience of seeing my DD1 (now 12) sometimes being rough with our cats. She hasn’t ever actually hurt them but I’m always very watchful when she chooses to stroke one of them, as she’s been known to suddenly grab it, even when it’s comfortably asleep. I keep telling her that this isn’t the way to treat a cat, and have shown her how to pet a cat but she doesn’t get it, even now.

But none of my cats would wait around to have their ears cut with scissors. They’re wary of DD1 and generally move away when she approaches them.

DD2 is very good with them by contrast and they’re much more relaxed when she strokes them.

My DDs are both adopted, so there are obviously attachment issues at play with regard to DD1’s apparent lack of empathy. And possibly jealousy plays a part too.

She’s better with the cats than she used to be, thankfully, especially since having therapy.

Whatever happened with your DD and the cat, clearly you’ll need to supervise her closely and never leave them alone in the same room. And I also think you should take the cat to the vet to make sure all is well.

@RubaDubMum89

Have you had any therapy to discuss your own abusive upbringing in relation to your experience of parenting? Becoming a parent can stir up childhood trauma. It can be so difficult to navigate when you don't have a positive experience to build on

I haven't. I can't face it. I don't think I'll ever be ready to face it. I don't want to go into detail as I don't think it's that relevant, what happened to me has left permanent emotional and physical scars but it's all very well suppressed and I'm at a stage, in my 30s where I no longer think of it everyday or month even. I know, wholeheartedly, that DD is not being brought up in that kind of environment and I'm happy to learn and adapt my approach and that's good enough for me, rightly or wrongly.

I gently urge you to reconsider. It is so important for your DD and for yourself that you confront those demons - at your own pace, perhaps a tiny step at a time with long breaks in between, but you must.

A good place to start is the book "Toxic Parents" by Susan Forward. There is also Napac, they have a support line and lots of resources on their website.

I also think you did very well, telling your DD that if she hurts any of the cats again, they will need to be rehomed. The fact that she was sad about that is hopeful, it could be that she really has learned from what this. She clearly has affection for the cat.

@Orangeinmybluelightcup

I'm just trying to help I don't mean it as a criticism. You've got my full sympathy. And you sound like a caring and considered parent.

I really appreciate all the input from everyone, critical or not. Sometimes you get so far into your head about a situation you become blinkered and can't see the wood for the trees!

FWIW, I also agree with @NameChange30. I also suffered abuse as a child and suffer from PTSD. But therapy has really helped me. It can make your life so much better, and that will also benefit your DD.

lizziew1969

I've been rehashing the whole cat thing over the past week and the only conclusion I can come to is he didn't feel the first snip as its in the tip of his ear so he didn't run away until the second snip. I don't think DD would have the strength to pin him down if he didn't want to be there.

They've grown up together and have a lovely relationship, up until now, he never minded the prodding and poking when she was small and used to lay next to her and purr. He let's her push him around in her dolls pram and cover him with blankets and again, lays there and purrs and rubs against her. He never tries to run. He really is a special cat. The older cat is gone after a couple of strokes of her back, she won't entertain DD at all.

The injured cat is placid to the extent I can quite happily give him a sink bath with no resistance when he's caught a rat and rolled around with it. I've never known another cat like him.

It makes the incident that much more upsetting. If DD hurts herself and crys, he comes running to rub on her and see if she's OK. I've seen him throw himself over the garden fence to get back to her before when she's fallen off her swing.

I'm really hoping that PPs are right and she doesn't fully comprehend the extent of the issue and, with a change in tactic and very careful monitoring we can return to a happy household and maybe in a few months, if nothing else happens and we continue drilling into her about animals having feelings etc and praising her for positive interactions with the animals, then she can resume her relationship with the cat.

I know she misses him already. She was sad at bedtime because I shut her bedroom door so he couldn't be in there with her whilst she falls asleep. O ly time will tell.

I wonder if she doesn’t feel allowed to express any anger or negative emotions because that leads to punishments so she’s taking those feelings out on the animals? I do think the punishments sound too harsh and controlling and maybe a lighter touch towards behaviour would help.

Completely understand that you don’t want to raise a rude, badly behaved child but sometimes overly worrying about that outcome can lead to a very authoritarian parenting style.

Have to say the grandad/Alexa incident doesn’t seem like something that would warrant a punishment. Just a very young child getting a bit over excited and frustrated in the heat of the moment.