DD13 called us f****g idiots. I'm fuming

[BrieFree]

I have nc'd for this.
DD13 and I have a complicated relationship. I have always struggled to show her affection and the love she deserves. DH fortunately is a great dad.

We have a severely disabled child too for whom we have to really fight for so that she gets support with therapies etc.

Anyway we were trying to get DD13 a smart phone- her first one. DH had chosen a few in our budget but she absolutely hit the roof, saying how ugly and awful they are. We are talking about pretty good Samsung phones.

She started hitting DH, then hitting her own head, then called us twats, told us to f off and said we are f*g idiots.
I told her to get out of the room and she told me to shut up .
I told DH that we are no way getting her a phone for a long time.
I want to give her a screen ban (she has an iPad and a laptop) and ground her for a week.

But tbh, I don't know if that's right. I feel such a rage and yet I blame ourselves for raising dd to be so entitled.

I do struggle in my relationship with her and counselling points to my own difficult relationship with my mum. In fact, this goes back to my grandmother and great grandmother - all had difficult relationships with their mothers.

I hate that I am perpetually angry with her. I don't feel like this towards younger dd. I want to show her love.
What is right to do in this situation?
Only helpful answers please. I don't need criticism as I get how upset dd must be. DH says she picks up on my irritation.

And buy her an iphone.

Some kids end up in horrible cliques where a phone is a huge status symbol.

My nephew and niece were. My DC went to the same school, different groups and no one batted an eyelid at samsungs.

Sounds like your daughter is validating herself via outward appearences.

Sounds like there is alot going on at home.

Make her weekend, buy her the phone.

Social services said no to what exactly?

YANBU. She needs to understand that money doesn't grow on trees. (Unless it's a J or A series, then YABU😂)

Jokes aside, I agree with your DH, after she speaks to you like that, she gets nothing. She can have one when she's 16 and has a job to pay for it. It'll do her entitled attitude the world of good.

Cringing at the “mother of 5”
advocating harsher discipline to a troubled upset 13 year old in this situation 🙈🙈. Just goes to show having numerous children does not necessarily make you any sort of expert.

@BrieFree
When you see 2 kids drowning, save the one who is making less noise first.

You need to prioritise this daughter, over your disabled child, till she is well enough for you to step back. She needs more than a half hearted effort now, she needs the family to focus on her and help her get well.

The phone issue is just a tiny thing, no even worth bothering with. Get her the one she wants. There are so many things going on here.

I think with this, she may well say she doesn't want to do anything or doesn't know what she wants to do. If that's the case, I'd try saying that you really want to spend time with her and you'd like to go for a walk/pottery painting/shopping/whatever it is you actually like and could she come too. That way it's less of an obvious "mum feels like she has to do something I like" and more of a "mum's doing it anyway and wants me to come too"

All of this. Her childhood sounds a lot like mine and I absolutely feel for her. I desperately wanted to be like everyone else at school. I was horribly bullied at secondary school because of my haircut and clothes and shoes ( oh God the things my mother made me wear). I used to bite my arm in a rage because I was so unbelievably frustrated that everyone else's mum seemed to actually like them and to want them to fit in, to look attractive, to have choices and mine seened to go out of her way to keep me as the frumpiest, most unattractive child she possibly could. My middle brother became ill at 14. He's still alive at 60 ,married and working but he became the focus and, if you didn't accept all the restrictions that brought, you were just a selfish bitch. My wedding day, pregnancy announcements, bloody everything were always hijacked, sabotaged or adapted around my brother. I was never ,and am still at 61, never, ever the child that matters. Thankfully I have a wonderful life with my second husband,my children, DILs and grandchildren so my mother's power is gone. She always looked down on her mother. I was far more like my grandmother than my mother. Maybe that's why she was so repulsed by me.

When I read the first sentence or two I thought what a brat. But she is dealing with difficult circumstances at home and is obviously very angry and unhappy. Of course she can't get away with behaving like that.

No matter how many children you've had, this isn't a 'tantrum about ban stage' issue. Violent outbursts come from somewhere and it's not screens in this case. I don't know what you're reading, but if you think the OP is capable of advising on how emotions needed to be handled, it's a different thread to the one I've read. The mother herself has no idea how to handle her own fury at her DD.

Get back into therapy for yourself but don’t focus on your own difficulties, focus on how you become the mum your eldest daughter needs.

OP’s difficulties are the problem. How does she become the mum she needs to be without working through the reasons she hasn’t been that mum for so long ? If she’s ever going to find a proper, loving connection with her DD this is the starting point. Her own mother was emotionally detached - seemingly a multi generational issue - and her father was abusive. OP has clearly never had help to process that before becoming a parent herself, so the current situation is hardly surprising, and the window of opportunity is closing for both OP and her DD.

She feels unloved by you and will be very aware of how much easier you find it to love her sister. She’s lashing out in the only way she knows how.

That.
Your posts are such a hard read @BrieFree . You seen to think that her dad's love can somehow make up for your lack of it. It doesn't.

Likewise you seen to think that a fortnightly outing makes up for the lack of warmth, love and attention for the other thirteen days. It doesn't.

I'm not underestimating how difficult it is to have a severely disabled non-verbal child, but somehow you have to make emotional space for your 13 year old.

I don't think your counselling is what's needed here. That's just introspective stuff. You need parenting advice. Advice that looks beyond you, and to the needs of your DD. You need to carve out time and attention for her.
Is your DH daily taking his share of care for your other child, to free you up to give DD some attention?

That sounds like a good plan. On the phone, can you tell her she can have a phone of her choice up to £X? If she's rejecting the latest Samsungs, then your budget can't be that small so she should be able to find one that's acceptable to her within budget. Also consider second hand, eg from Back Market, as they're refurbished and come with a warranty.

Moneysaving Expert has good advice on getting good phones for less money.

Compare Cheap Mobile Phones Contracts - MoneySavingExpert

The impact of your difficulty bonding with her is likely to be an underlying sense of low self esteem and unworthiness.

I think you have to see some of her difficult behaviours as symptoms of a situation she didn't choose. If she hasn't been able to build a sense of herself as unconditionally loved, what phone she's given becomes less about a phone and more about looking out for evidence of where she is in your affection.

I think you need to focus more on your relationship and her internal world, and less on strict boundaries right now.

How do you prioritise a physically able bodied child over a physically disabled one ? I get what you’re saying and l agree that in an ideal world this is what should happen, but in the real world it’s nigh on impossible. I think what’s needed is for the family to come together and fight for both kids equally, because it sounds as though eldest DD has some element of disability herself and is struggling with it on top of everything else.

She’s the glass child. Her tics, outbursts, and ‘jokes’ about suicide are seriously concerning; she needs to be genuinely listened to, not brushed aside and reduced to being a “moody teen”. It’s not just a case of a teenager not getting their own way in regards to the phone.

I could’ve been the glass child, but my parents did everything in their power to ensure that wasn’t the case. I’m not saying it would’ve been easy for them at all, but they never made me feel like parenting me on top of my autistic sister was a chore.

They would do little things that made me feel listened to.
My sister didn’t like us eating together as a family because she didn’t like looking at my ‘disgusting food’. She wasn’t bothered about my parents food which was the same as mine, it was just me she had a problem with! Most nights she’d eat on the sofa with one of my parents, and I’d be at the table with the other one. When I was in year 8 (I think, I would’ve been about 12/13?) Thursdays were my least favourite day of my timetable at school, I’d come home in a foul mood, and my parents would make my favourite dinner and we’d eat at the table together while my sister was at a sports club.

When I started to get into hair, makeup, and fashion my mum would leave little hand-me-downs from her wardrobe and bits and bobs from her makeup bag in my room, and before her “big” shower on a Sunday night, she’d come in to my room and let me practice hairstyles and makeup looks on her.

My dad knew I was really into Blur, they were playing in our city and I wanted to see them in concert but I couldn’t go because my sister had an appointment that day and my parents weren’t sure what time they’d be back. One of his workmates went, recorded parts of it on his camcorder, and I came home from school a few days later to a “private concert” set up on the video player.

This sounds horrible but sometimes my sister would object to something like me getting to open a present first on Christmas Day, and my parents would make eye contact with me then roll their eyes and point at her. Feel bad for my sister about this one, but it was nice to see that my annoyance was shared.

Again, they’re quite small things but they really made me feel better about the situation. My parents also had regular therapy sessions, which I would strongly recommend.

You’ve had some amazing advice on here and I will echo the fact that you need to fake it until you make it. Spend quality time together, no punishments, family therapy.
My DD told me, age about 18, that she kept a lot of her emotions in because her younger brother was so outward with his issues she didn’t want to give us more issues. I had no idea. You just don’t know what goes on in your DCs’ heads.

This all day long.

13 is where it all goes incredibly tits up for autistic girls. She won’t be able to understand what’s happening to her.

Please please take the pressure off, hang out with her in low key ways, and just listen.

I agree with this. Yes your daughter behaved in a spoilt way but she is no doubt surrounded by far more spoilt kids - who have had expensive smart phones for the past two years - and she is clearly very distressed or she wouldn’t be hitting her own head, would she?
She has genuine problems: you struggle to show her love and she has a disabled sibling. Have some compassion.

Sounds like you’re directing the anger you feel for your own parents onto your child. That’s a lot for a child to endure. Unfortunately rather than breaking the cycle you’ve continued it. It’s great her dad shows her love as that will hopefully help her in the future. You feel anger but won’t allow your child to feel anger?

You need to stop being angry at your daughter. She is struggling because of you and you clearly do not like her. That poor child.

You need to get her to GP and look at her mental health more seriously as she is clearly struggling.

It sounds like she's hiding behind her mask of false eye lashes,lots of makeup etc.From experience it also sounds like she doesn't like herself very much so can mask.

What phone does she want? She clearly needs to apologise and explain herself.
She is clearly a very mixed up child and having a mother who struggles to show her affection is having a massive impact on her.

Hi, no judgement here but I’d suggest acting towards her out of anger is not the most effective way. It will further damage your relationship and all you are modelling to her is a repeat of her behaviour- get dysregulated/lash out. Can you think of ways to put your anger to one side and decide how you would approach this without the emotion? Perhaps instead of focusing on what punishment she deserves, think about what needs she is trying to express. Maybe some curiosity about why the phone is such a huge thing- does it represent your love or care? Trying to gently explore this with her, as well as holding up boundaries and asking her to think about the impact of her behaviour, might be something different you can do to stop the same cycle repeating over and over. Believe me, you will come back to this scenario in slightly different ways, many more times as she goes through her teens.

hitting DH, then hitting her own head? She is sick in the head. You need to tell her that the money you were going to spend on the phone is now going to be spent on a psychiatric assessment, and do it. She needs treatment.

It sounds a hard situation all around.
At a basic level surely it’s about fitting in. I’d say the vast majority of kids have iPhones where we live - obviously not the latest models but hand me downs. Is it down to wanting to fit in?

That aside it sounds as though communication is very challenging in your home for various reasons and the swearing whilst not ideal is not the biggest issue. Teens swear, it’s disrespectful but at times I think they need to be able to vent in their own home. As long as she’s not being like this to others outside. Hopefully therapy will help you all.