Please Help.

[JessicaRabbit23]

Hello,

I have three children
my eldest, F, 10 in September is unbelievably emotional. To the point I actually roll my eyes when she starts to cry over the smallest of things. The school have noticed this and enrolled her into a mental health course at school after Easter half term. She has always been such a lovely girl, lots of friends, teachers pet kind of girl. At this age year 4 girls are becoming clicky and awful to one n other. I get this but she struggles to stick up for herself. I am the complete opposite and her two younger siblings are both diagnosed ASD and adhd and have no trouble sticking up for themselves and only cry after being defeated by each other. I’m at my wits end.

is it hormones? Has she just lacked attention because the other two have such high care needs? She hates herself, she’s getting little boobs, recently had some hair down below. Put in some weight so she hates herself. She did have so much confidence up until the end of summertime last year. She’s always been so good. Siblings are 6&7. Boy & girl.

any advice? Please no hate comments.

It sounds like she’s going through puberty, those hormones are intense and the emotions that come with that are huge. Could you carve out some time to spend with her one to one to chat about how she is feeling, no siblings no pressure?

Definitely agree this could be driven by hormones. When DD was at this stage, I bought her a book about growing up that had a big chapter on hormones. She was really relieved to read that it was completely normal and the book was a great way in for us to talk about everything. She still gets it out every now and then to read up on something .

I got a book a couple of months ago. I’m constantly reassuring her. It’s just the emotional outbursts I feel like this build up is absolutely awful if I’m honest. I’m not ready yet for the actual period.

I do this quite often. She hates going to school so I sometimes let her have the day off with me on my non working days.

Slippery slope allowing her to miss school. How about a late night on a Saturday to watch a film /bake cakes? She's 10. Imagine 5 years down the line her refusing school and you can't insist she goes when you've allowed her to skip it in the past.
A dc leaving school without qualifications is a lot more difficult to deal with.
Ime.

Don’t allow her days off, she will use this as leverage down the line.

ASD/ADHD is a possibility if siblings are diagnosed, worth investigating.

You just need to ride it out. Sometimes they just need a good cry. Any enquiring/trying to fix it , would upset DD even more , because she didn’t know WHY she was crying. So I’ve learned to let her be , while being there and offering reassurance, and have her little or big cry.

However if there are other issues like bullying and kids being mean, you can help with that and involve the school, expand her social circle , encourage friendships with the nicer kids, have her join clubs/activities for confidence building etc.

Any chance that she is also autistic and burnt out from masking?
Only a thought considering your other dc diagnosis and that ASD along with hormones can be incredibly hard.