Smart, kind, helpful 7 year old DESTROYING home

[cassielb]

Hi fellow mums. First time poster long time viewer needing desperate help or advice.

My 7 year old daughter has been displaying quite destructive habits the last 1-2 years.

Quick summary on her though she is extremely smart, well behaved in school, very helpful, kind, polite everything is great other than her constantly destroying her room.

She has picked up an attitude the last few months as expected but she quickly apologises when she knows she is wrong. Now with the destroying her room. She has drawn on walls, toys, furniture, carpet so we took her desk out and had a rule of only pens and crafts downstairs. Great! This continued as she would either sneak pens home from nana's/school/downstairs so we started doing bag checks and made her clean up what she had ruined. Great! Christmas goes by and she got some stocking crafts and completely destroyed her tonies she had just gotten by drawing colouring all over them. My fault for not checking what family members had given her when passing by at Xmas. So we got more strict with checking her room, basically compromised and said you prove you can be responsible for your room we will fix up (fix it meaning repaint what she had destroyed and change her room a little).

Our last straw was her drawing on her infant sisters toys while I was upstairs changing her. We cancelled her school holiday activities and she was not allowed to see her nana (who she loves) that week. My last straw and why I'm writing this post was I just went to tuck her in while she was asleep and noticed she has carved out chunks of her wall and carved numbers letters into the wall with a hair clip.

I woke her up asked why and it's the usual, I don't know, I don't remember, it was an accident, I'm sorry! I'm at my wits end, she is such a good child in every other aspect other than this. When I say she is so so so kind loving smart she is an angle but this we cannot seem to budge. We tried back checks, reward coins, reward charts, grounding, no activities, no tv, only books in her room, everything. I don't know what else to do, it's been 2 years of her ruining her room in our first home we have bought and it's only getting worse. Any advice is much appreciated

P.s : she went through a phase of taking things from nana's house, cousins house and had even taken things from shops. This went on for around a year but after letting her know if it happened again we would have to tell the police this has stopped. For good hopefully!

Pss: he dad has adhd, I don't know much about it but he seems to think she had it. She is a bit fidgety and her school report is great other than her getting distracted! This aside as I said she is an amazing child which is why I get so frustrated punishing her.

I need help

Doesn’t anyone ever get cross or upset with their children any more? There seems to be a lot of controlled withdrawal of activities/treats etc. I would be really upset, probably to the point of tears, if walls, furniture, toys were being defaced and destroyed on a regular basis. I think sometimes children need to see how much they’ve upset you. I’m not talking about physical punishment, obviously, but I really don’t think it does any harm to show that you’re unhappy and bewildered by your children’s aberrant behaviour, rather than staying completely calm and emotionless.

This has been happening for two years so I disagree. I stared with telling off, then removing pens from her room, then no chocolate for the weekend. Nothing worked.

No, you’ve misunderstood. My suggestion is that you offer her more opportunities and space for artistic expression. Think of it as something great and channel it in the right direction - rather than suppressing and punishing. Surely two years of a behaviour indicates that it isn’t naughtiness or whatever?

She is in swimming lessons, ballet, tennis, gymnastics and is part of a cycle club. All by choice. She has more than enough activities weekly, and I always am with my children

Again - you just don’t seem able to see it. She needs to be immersed in art. Maybe just for the short term, maybe this is who she is for life - but it requires nurturing right now. Wherever in the country you live, you must have art galleries somewhere near? In addition to the main galleries - which she should spend as much time in as possible, they may well have dedicated spaces and workshops for children - which will be free of charge. Sign her up to those so she can learn to harness her creative / communicative urges in a satisfying way.

Please, please stop trying to stamp it out - provide her with the means to do what she clearly needs to be doing.

Yea my daughter is like that with toys, she wants to see the inside ha ha. With the tonie we gave her vouchers for John Lewis and she chose to buy 3 new tonies then a day later had scribbled the faces off and broke raqpunzels arm (lol). Everyone parents different but in my house and family members houses we are not accepting vandalising any property whether it's hers or someone else's. She has a full play room of crafts and glitter and glue etc so has no reason to ruin items in her bedroom. It's just not something I'm willing to budge on letting her think it's acceptable behaviour

Is she getting lots of sensory type play (pairing/baking) and outdoor time (mud pies etc) Does she have ‘technical’ toys (I only ask as sadly lots of people don’t buy their girls certain toys as they still think they’re for boys )? I really doubt she’s doing to to be destructive. It’s obviously a need for her.

Thank you for the response! I thought I was going crazy with people telling me I was being over the top by removing pens from her room!

Lots of tears in private have been had not because I'm angry or upset but because I don't know what to do more frustration than anything.

She has a whole playroom do to her crafts so I'm not accepting or going to let her think it's ok behaviour to destroy things in her room

I'm gobsmacked at all the posters on here falling over themselves to find excuses for this behaviour and justification for not bothering to punish what is horrible, unacceptable behaviour. I'm glad OP punished her DD (not the stopping her from seeing a family member though, that's awful).

I have a DC with ADHD who categorically would never, ever behave like this as there is respect for our home! Respect that I have taught.

Yea my daughter is like that with toys, she wants to see the inside ha ha.

I would encourage this tbh. Sounds like you have a future engineer. Apparently my DC is very good at STEM I’m told, yea no shit . Lots of Lego and construction toys. There are toys you can get that screw apart with a little battery screwdriver that we have that are great.

Lol I heard you perfectly. I don't think you are understand. Nobody has stopped her creative freedom. She has a WHOLE playroom full of crafts pens paints whiteboards chalkboards etc she doing crafts constantly. Nobody has taken anything from her she just isn't allowed to do it in her room.

If she wants to go do pottery we'll go, if she wants to goto the craft house we do. Nobody is stopping anything. If she wants to goto an art gallery we will go. She isn't drawing pretty pictures on her bedroom wall she is scribbling and smearing pens, she draws and writes books with me in her playroom. It's two different thins. Going to an art gallery every week isn't going to fix anything

Removing pens from the room is absolutely fine and sensible. Punishments such as stopping activities or stopping her seeing a loved one for a normal child behaviour is massively OTT. But we all parent differently. I would class myself as a fairly strict parent by todays standards.

Yeah she has a sensory basket in her play room and a messy play basket. This is why we get so frustrated cause she has all the creative and sensory means in her playroom where me and her dad can see and play with her but she chooses to ruin her room. It's a hard one for sure

In years to come - in her autobiography or when she’s on Desert Island Discs or Private Passions or Netflix talking about her artistic practice - she’ll recall how her mother just didn’t understand her and how she felt like a freak because all she wanted to do was draw / paint everywhere, so she was constantly in trouble. And it was only when she encountered a gifted art teacher / got to Art School that she finally began to feel like herself and learn how to use her gifts …

My autistic DD used to do this and also cut holes in things with scissors, cut her own hair and stole food and money. She grew out of it by 9 or 10 as her impulse control improved. We tried to prevent it as much as possible like you have by keeping pens and scissors downstairs. I would definitely consider an ADHD assessment if there's family history.

Sounds to me like she is doing g it as a way of getting your attention

@cassielb we are not accepting vandalising any property whether it's hers or someone else's. She has a full play room of crafts and glitter and glue etc so has no reason to ruin items in her bedroom. It's just not something I'm willing to budge on letting her think it's acceptable behaviour

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 This! Exactly. She may have ADHD and as a sufferer of it myself, that would be a shame for her as it's not fun BUT that is not a free pass to do/destroy whatever she likes and be exempt from the rules of the house (or any other rules she dislikes) and having no respect for the home she lives in. There is a fine line.

Thank you for the response.

I agree with all this. She is very polite and smart like I said which is why it is hard punishing her or showing her consequences cause she is such a good little kid!

The whole nana thing she spends Fridays to Saturday at her nana's house since she was about 2. We found she had ruined her infant sisters Xmas presents and hidden them so i decided she would be staying home that weekend as my mum taking her out to soft play the next day we both agreed was rewarding baby behaviour. I didn't lock her away for two days with no contact to family ha ha

Ah I'll have to look into these! Thanks

Drawing on walls, other's toys is not acceptable, neither is damaging the house that you as a parent pay a lot of money for. There needs to be a serious punishment for this. Can't believe others are excusing this. no wonder the next generation are screwed, kids need boundaries.

So you're suggesting that just on the off chance that OP's DD is a budding artist, that OP allows her to completely and utterly destroy their home and everything within it? Potentially causing hundreds if not thousands of pounds worth of damage? Just to be a cool Mum? Just fucking wow I've heard everything there is to hear now. Every bloody thing

She spends Friday to Saturday at her nana's since she was 2. I cancelled two days worth of activities (the weekend) as this was after we decided to re-do her room only to find she has drawn and stamped all over her infant sisters new Christmas toys and hidden them. Instead of going to her nana's she stayed home that weekend as myself and my mum agreed her taking her out to soft play was rewarding her bad behaviour. She did her normal swimming lessons on the Sunday but that Saturday instead of going to soft play she helped me clean off what we could of her sisters toys and the rest of the day was spent as normal.

She definitely isn’t an angle!

Lol this is hilarious. She has a whole playroom, I encourage you to read before you respond. Her pens were removed from her bedroom where she was scribbling on the walls and carpet and anything else. She draws writes books colours paints does messy play everyday with us in her playroom or the living room.

If you are teaching your child that drawing and painting on furniture and personal belongings is okay then that's fine. But not in my house

Thank you!

We thought this too but I have alone time with my daughter without her baby sister most days. We have a girls day once a week or got to the point where she was asking for her baby sister to come with us ha ha: she has my undivided attention luckily my job allows me to stay home and finish just in time for the school run

Really not worth redecorating her room until this phase is over.

Also re the carpet - buy a cheap rug from the charity shop to go over the carpet. Easily replaceable.

No tips on white carpets sorry.

To me she is. She excels in everything. So kind and caring and helpful, just can't budge this little thing!