I don't like my six year old

[DownByTheMeadow]

I feel awful even typing this, but I don’t like my six year old, and I feel like our bond is hanging by a thread.

His behaviour at the minute is SO testing. He is rude, back chats, argumentative, defiant, nasty to siblings, self absorbed, snarls, grits his teeth when talking, constantly negative, just an all round pain in the arse.

The problem though, is me. When he behaves like this I find it really triggering. I end up being nasty to him, and my mouth spouts before my brain has engaged. I tell him I don’t like being in his company, he’s naughty, I end up almost growl shouting back at him through my own gritted teeth (telling him off for behaviours I’m then displaying!), even when I’m telling him off, he continues to argue back at me and must always get the last word, then it escalates, and the cycle just continues.

On the flip side, he can suffocate with kindness. He’s always been a tactile person, he wants kisses, cuddles, climbs on us, strokes our faces, rubs his face up and down ours like a dog… and I find it so annoying! What breaks my heart though is when his siblings are affectionate, I welcome it, but when he does it, I find myself bristle at his touch. I’m not a tactile person, so I don’t know if it’s just the intensity of how he goes about it, or if it’s because our bond is so damaged.

I really need some help. I just don’t know how to stop myself becoming so reactive to these behaviours, how I can parent him in a way that benefits him, how I can turn this around, how I can make this just a ‘phase’ and not create some horrible childhood memory of what a horrible mum I am. He already has self esteem issues and I know I’m just making this worse.

I know anyone who sees this post will think this poor little boy deserves better from his parent that this, and I wholeheartedly agree, but please know regardless, he is so loved, and I would move mountains for him, which is why I’m so desperate to get this resolved

I’ve been here. it’s very hard.
You are entering into the argument and not behaving as the adult. If you meet him with child ego then he isn’t learning how to regulate and behave. You have to model it.
it’s not easy. I recommend looking up emotion coaching and try your very best to remember that it isn’t about you, I mean that nicely! It helped me to think of my DC as separate Tom me and try to be dispassionate.
finally don’t give yourself a hard time or stew over past behaviour. Each day is a new day and he loves you really. And of course you love him. Parenting is hard.
I have ADHD and it’s very common for parents with adhd to become overwhelmed like this :) even if you don’t it might be worth looking at strategies for adhd parents as they really helped me.

Tom = to

Sounds like your son needs to be seen and heard by you and his feelings accepted by you. I would look up connective or positive parenting and start the work needed to self regulate , connection before correction.
It's really hard work and not a quick fix, but It does really help when you can pause and soften yourself before speaking. Think of your child as having a hard time and need your help rather than him misbehaving. Changing your mindset towards his behaviour is key but takes practice. He will notice you trying, though, which is good.

Thank you so much for your responses, I have made a note of your suggestions and will get researching straight away. I'm really determined to turn this around

Are there any parenting courses locally that you could attend to give you some more tools to deal with his behaviour? Poor boy but also poor you because if you are aware you aren't parenting perfectly then you're doing better than you think. How about love bombing him one day next weekend and spending some fun time together? It will make a difference for both of you.

I think you are so brave in being honest with how you are feeling...I feel a similar way about my 6 year old DD. She is so intense in the way you describe and pushes all the buttons/boundaries. I feel like she senses how I feel, which causes her to up the ante even more and it becomes a viscious circle. With that in mind I have tried to model good behaviour...being super calm and keeping my voice very calm and level (this is a real effort!). I have also been quite open with my DD with what I am trying to achieve and what I expect from her. I think my DD also has some anxieties and has struggled with some big transitions recently...so I am also looking into some private counselling/psychotherapy for her, or perhaps for both of us. I wish you the best of luck and you are a fantastic mum for acknowledging and acting on this x

I'd really recommend the Philippa Perry parenting book- it's great on why some of our children's behaviour really presses our buttons and elicits such a strong response- all to do with how we were parented ourselves, generally, and how to work through it.

You are brave to be posting so honestly, but if you do this I find it really triggering. I end up being nasty to him, and my mouth spouts before my brain has engaged. I tell him I don’t like being in his company, he’s naughty, I end up almost growl shouting back at him through my own gritted teeth (telling him off for behaviours I’m then displaying!) I think you are being abusive, I would define this as toxic parenting.

What was your own parenting like, do you perhaps need counselling?

Sounds really hard OP. It’s probably a bit of a vicious circle. Maybe some counselling for you and a chat with someone objective like his teachers about his behaviour - perhaps this is a case of needing to meet in the middle.

Sounds like mine! Was just thinking today that 7 years old is the worst. I honestly can’t see my other 2 delights going the same way at that age but im sure they probably will.

Resources I’ve found good:
Between by Sarah Ockwell Smith (for the coming years mainly)
Family Links’ book
How to have incredible conversations with your children book (will try and come back with a link!)

I try and remain calm but sometimes they need tough love. They are looking to you for a boundary so you need to hold firmer than ever - to make them feel safe.

In a calm moment today I ended up saying ‘you hurt my feelings every day!’ think he was really shocked and I said ‘well, I still love you millions’ etc and went about our day. I think focus on the calm moments and a lot of work you do in those times will help in the fraught times.

to Have Incredible Conversations with your Child: A book for parents, carers and children to use together. A place to make conversation. A way to build your relationship amzn.eu/d/h0p3Wvq conversations book

Parenting Puzzle: Your Guide to Transforming Family Life amzn.eu/d/2eOKdAk Family Links book and they also do a parenting course as well

Thanks for your responses. Tonight I put some time aside and did some baking just us, and it was lovely and he was great, but the second it finished, the behaviour returned.

His behaviour at school is of no concern, however in the playground, he saw his 14 year old female cousin, started punching and kicking her, in a playful way, but he just doesn’t seem to understand boundaries. She asked him to stop, I asked him to stop, and he was just laughing over and over and continuing. I tried to explain that she was clearly expressing she didn’t want to play fight yet he didn’t stop, and that isn’t okay. But it doesn’t sink in for some reason, this same situation has happened numerous times.

I agree about the comment of it being toxic, and it’s my behaviour that makes me so keen to change what’s happening. I had a pretty idilic childhood to be honest. Parents were open, understanding, calm and fair in their approach. There were loggerheads when I was a teen occasionally, but I suspect I was the course there. But I will add I only say things like that when I’m at my limit, after hours and hours of reminders, prompts, calmness etc.

Tonight for example, baby is learning to walk, I asked the two older siblings to step back a little to give the baby some space, 6 year old decided to kick and shove three year old out the way and hurting them. And tried to justify it with ‘well you wanted them to move, so I was making it happen’.

Thank you for both kind words and honesty, it’s what I’m seeking, I just need a solution. I have written down all the suggestions and I’m going to get the books, do the research, do everything I need to. I just want our (mostly) happy and serene family time back.

I always ask these question and parents usually ignore them because it requires them to self reflect, but here we go:

What does he watch on tv?
What computer games does he play?
What films does he watch?
Are they all age appropriate?
What time does he go to bed and get up?
Does he eat loads of sugary junk?

All of the things above contribute to children's behaviour.

How are you developing his empathy?

I really sympathise with you OP, I found my now 7 year old DS so so challenging during the summer last year, when he was 6.5. He did get much better when he went back to school in September, so hopefully it'll be a passing phase for your DS too.

I also ended up going back onto a low dose of anti depressants, which I had been on previously in 2019 for PND and had come off. I recognised the returning signs of anger, mega irritability, losing my temper. Once I felt better, I was able to deal with DS better, and I'm sure that's helped his behaviour. Not suggesting you start ADs obviously but perhaps look at how you are feeling as well.

I had a period of feeling like this when my youngest was smaller about my older son. My older boy is just so full on and my youngest was so little and vulnerable it took all my patience not to shout at him to get away from the baby.
Feeling SO irritated at him, waiting on edge for him to do the next annoying thing.
What really helped me was looking at photos and videos of when he was little.
It helped to soften my heart and remind me that he is my baby, too.
I also go out of my way to give him loving attention. I make sure my eyes light up when he comes into the room. I think it helps because he doesn't act up as badly for attention.
He doesn't need to get in my face, because he knows I SEE him.
Lots of praise for lovely behaviour too.

Push for an assessment for him to see if anything comes up. Maybe private if you can afford it? I struggled soooo much with DS1 for years, and because there were "no problems at school" assumed there was nowhere to go, but he has ADHD, which is behind all of the intensity and impulsivity and frustrating behaviours. If I'd known this at 6 it would have changed so much. We got through it anyway and it's OK now he's a teenager, but I do feel guilt if I look back at the most strained years and ultimately it has created a distance between us which I've never quite managed to close again.

Since you know that you don't want to react the way you have described in the OP, obviously it's not great parenting, but it's not as though you've chosen this approach deliberately. That to me says that you've tried more of a "normal" approach and it hasn't worked and this is what you are left with. I always had these grand ideas of how I wanted to parent and when I found myself shouting and being horrible instead I assumed that I was the driver in a cycle whereby I would not cope with his behaviour, would react negatively, which would escalate his feelings which would create more behaviour - and yes, in a sense, that was true. But I thought if I could just cope better and apply the tools perfectly, it would work and therefore the part making everything wrong was me. But I no longer believe that to be the case. The reality is that there is no such thing as a magic parenting style which will prevent all behaviour and most parents do not parent perfectly all the time, most children can manage that and their behaviour does not become overwhelming. So while I definitely wasn't helping, I was not the sole cause. Something else was feeding in and causing his behaviour to be extreme which made it not manageable for me, no matter what tools I was using.

For example: What kind of thing do you do to manage behaviour with your younger two? Do you recognise a difference in their responses compared to DS1 at younger ages? I didn't have a second until DS1 was 10, but when I did it was astonishing because DS2 was SO different (even though he has what can apparently be considered to be challenging behaviour!) And you mention that you welcome their affectionate approaches whereas you struggle with DS1's, which makes me think that you're experiencing something different there too.

I said earlier about a standard parenting approach not working and being left with this approach that you recognise is inappropriate but is basically you in "survival mode". You might think that the answer to this is to learn more or different behaviour management tools, but I think actually what was helpful for me was to learn a whole new way to look at behaviour, from the bottom up as opposed to top down. When we look at behaviour in a top-down way we tend to assume that it is a deliberate choice that the child is making, and we invent all kinds of imaginary reasons such as "he wants to get at me" "it's easier for him" "it's getting him what he wants" etc. Or sometimes simply leaves us baffled because we can't understand WHY they are acting like this or it seems totally and utterly counterproductive (like when you say they can have X after they clean up, and they spend 45 minutes bitching and whining and complaining when they could have just spent 2 minutes cleaning up and got what they wanted). So look back to what you said in the OP, "I'm telling him off for behaviours I’m then displaying!" - well, why are you displaying those behaviours? Not because you think they are a good idea but because you are overwhelmed and out of useful productive options.

It's likely that he is overwhelmed and out of useful productive options too.

So when you can see behaviour, not always all behaviour, but certainly the kind of behaviour that is immune to normal parenting responses, the kind of behaviour that triggers parental overwhelm and fallback on inappropriate parenting responses, (especially if that parent is perfectly able to react appropriately with other children), try seeing that as a lack of appropriate skills and/or as a stress response. It changes everything because you start to see patterns that didn't make sense before, such as why he does much better when he has your one on one very focused attention, and (perhaps) why he is worse after a full day at school where he is managing to hold things together but perhaps using up his capacity for stress management while doing so.

If this is ringing any bells I would strongly suggest to look at Mona Delahooke and Dr. Ross Greene. For example this playlist (you will need to look for part 2 and so on yourself because MN's youtube linking is a bit broken) by Ross Greene is an excellent primer:

Good luck!

Oh and for me I liked a book called When Your Kids Push Your Buttons by Bonnie Harris.

OP my son was like this and it was only when he was 13 yo did we learn he had ASD so social cues were very hard for him to understand.

Consider getting your son assessed for ADHD and ASD and yes go on parenting classes and see a child and adult therapist together. Art therapy works wonders. It is incredibly tough parenting. People telling you that are abusive are not helpful.

fb.watch/jd1NfG0V5A/.
Do the free master class. It really helps

6yo was the hardest age for me. They all turned into lovely 12yos and as for teens... actually I quite like teens. But 6, yeah, very hard work.

So he's 6 and you've got a 3 yo and a baby? Is he just missing you and needing affection from you? 6 is still so little... when my DC2 was born my DM kept saying how much attention I'd need to give DC1 so they felt secure and not alienated and to reduce scope for jealousy of the new baby.
This did really help in hindsight so maybe it's as simple as that with him - esp as it's the second child he's been sidelined for (in his mind obvs!).
I always imagine how would I feel if my DH came home with a new wife and I was expected to carry on as normal.
Esp given he was so good - calm, secure, loved, receiving undivided attention - when you were baking.
Also though just really watch your behaviour and the words you say to him as some children/people remember things forever.
I have a real memory for words said and of all my childhood memories the mean stuff from my parents - who were mostly calm and lovely - really stick in my head even now, more so than the happy memories sadly.

Also forgot to say like PPs have said ADHD/ASD might be worth considering but also check if you're being clear in your boundary setting?
Eg the playground incident with you and 14yo cousin "asking" him to stop hitting her - once its clearly not a light fun wrestle then he needs a brief sharp "stop it DS!" so he knows that's it, end of debate or he'll be in big trouble. Then when he learns to stop straightaway give him a cuddle for good listening etc.
If he doesn't get clear boundaries he might not actually realise when he's behaving badly - you need to make that clear to him - but without being mean or frightening (no more gritted teeth or growling!!).

This is a really wise post.

@DownByTheMeadow I know this is an old thread but I can relate so much to what you are saying, did this pass for you?