DD abusing me - distressed

[Minifingers]

Have posted about dd on parenting teenagers board under a different user name. If you recognise me, please don't out me, as dd sometimes searches mn to see what I've said about her. I don't think she has ever looked at this board though. I lurk on this board a bit. I thought I'd post after realising that what I'm feeling at the moment is not a million miles away from what what I read here from women in abusive partnerships with adults. I really need to off-load.

There's a special kind of sadness and shame attached to being abused by your young teenage child because underneath you are constantly asking yourself the question - are they like this because of the way I've parented them? And fear for them - for their future and their well-being. I strongly believe that behaving in a violent and abusive way doesn't just harm the person who's being abused, but in a spiritual and emotional sense also the person who's behaving abusively. That's really hard when you are a parent on the receiving end of abuse from your child.

A bit of background: dd is going to be 14 in August. Up until the end of primary she was a very easy and happy little girl. Unusually happy, confident and high spirited I'd say. She had a massive sense of fun and loads of energy, to the point that she'd always be the last child standing at any party or sleep-over. She breezed through primary in top sets for everything, despite being one of the youngest in her year. Her teachers LOVED her. She was very, very pretty too, to the point that people would stop me in the street and say what an adorable little girl she was.

Fast forward to year 9 and she's unrecognisable as the happy, lovely little girl we knew before. She's still sociable and has a lot of friends, including a couple she's known since nursery. But that's all that's left of what she was before. On the days she's not actively refusing to go to school (about 2 or 3 out of every 5 days at the moment - she just won't get out of bed), she deliberately makes herself very, very late. She regularly argues with teachers - just point blank refuses to do things she doesn't feel like doing at school, whether it's an assessment for PE, moving desks because she's been talking, whatever. She walks out of detentions if she thinks they've kept her long enough, refuses to do any homework, is MASSIVELY disrespectful to the teachers she doesn't like.

Obviously I've tried to do something about her behaviour. I've moved her school (she asked me to and I was unhappy with her old school), I have kept in regular touch with her tutor and her head of year. We have tried to put sanctions in place for bad behaviour (ie grounding and losing her phone) and made our expectations clear but we aren't the most organised people and her behaviour has been so universally bloody awful that it has got to a point where sanctions become a bit meaningless. And in the meantime she has become so angry, and so resentful of me in particular, and it's got worse and worse to the point where I can't see how we can go on, despite the support we've had from the school and from other agencies (CAMHS) to get to the bottom of her behaviour.

If you've read on to this point you might be thinking - So far, so typical of some teenagers, but I'm posting specifically because of her behaviour towards me and how it's made me feel.

Over the last few months she has become more and more aggressive towards me. She

• daily tells me I'm pathetic and a failure as a parent because I have an autistic child (her youngest brother who is 7) and a daughter (her) who has been referred to CAMHS and who I can't control
• tells me I'm old and stupid. Tells me constantly to 'shut up' and if I don't do what she says, says 'Are you stupid? Did you hear me? SHUT UP'
• tells me I'm a failure because the house is messy and because I buy my clothes in charity shops
• says that DH should leave me and could do much better than me
• walks into the bathroom when I'm in the bath, even when I have the door locked and have said not to come in - she sticks a card through the gap in the door and unlatches it, pushes her way in and shoots disgusted looks at my body. Says she needs to wash her hands and won't go downstairs to do it because she can't be bothered
• walks into my bedroom and pulls things off my shelves when she wants something of mine, without asking me if she can have it. She walks past me into the room, ignores me when I say 'what do you want?', literally physically barges me out of the way and laughs at me, just takes what she wants and walks out.
• she has locked me out of the house when I've stepped outside to put something in the bin
• she has trashed my room
• she body-blocks me in the hallway of the house, sticks her face in mine and shouts at me that I'm pathetic and scared to make eye contact with her.
• she gas lights me
• she tells me I should just leave and why don't I give up and move out
• she constantly points out that DH earns more than me and that therefore he is 'in charge'. I have pointed to her that this is not how finances work in a marriage (at least not in ours thank god). She ignores me.

..... and then yesterday she snatched my mobile after I refused to allow her something she wanted. When I tried to get it back off her she hit me around the face, knocking my glasses to the floor, laughed at me when I cried, and shoved me out the front door of the house.

She weighs 10 and a half stone and is stronger than me. I'm frightened of her.

I found myself sitting crying in the car and too frightened to go back into my own home. I ended up going around to my SIL's house. She came back home with me and persuaded dd to be driven round to my mums, where she stayed last night.

I don't want her to come home. I feel completely traumatised by the last few months - I have this constant feeling of exhaustion and a weird sense of vigilance - like I am living under siege. I suspect a year or two more of this and I'd have a heart attack or something. The atmosphere in the house is often awful and it's affecting my ability to parent my other two children.

And although I'm the one who is the target of most of her spite and anger, DH is also very stressed by it. He's a 45 year old manager and someone who I would have said had 'cast iron' good mental health. Yet she managed to make him cry last week. First time I have seen him cry in the 20 years we've been together. He's a brilliant dad, very patient and caring. He's made loads of time for dd the past year, knowing that she's struggling with growing up, taken her shopping, to the theatre and out to lunch.

I keep asking myself what I've done to make her like this. DH and I have been together for 20 years, and we have always been loving and respectful to each other, in front of the children and at every other time. We NEVER speak to each other in a disrespectful way.

I have not been a perfect parent to dd - I have nagged her too much about her lack of effort at school (and when I say lack of effort I mean lack of ANY effort, not a failure to reach some impossible standard of perfection), I have lost the plot at times and shouted and pleaded with her about her truanting and lateness. On a couple of occasions I attempted to push her into her bedroom when she attacked me. I should have walked away and shut myself in my bedroom instead of engaging with her physically. DH has admitted he's made mistakes with her as well, and has apologised for telling her she was a 'waste of space' (in fairness, this was a comment on her absolute refusal to ever lift a finger to help at home, including refusing to do even such basic things such as remove her plate from the table after eating, put rubbish in a bin instead of just dropping it on the floor wherever in the house she happens to be standing, or flush the toilet after she's done a crap in it). Can her abusiveness be our fault? Is it always learned behaviour?

How do I survive the next few years being abused and disrespected in my own home until she grows up and either leaves or stops doing it? How do I keep myself intact and strong as a mother?

If you've got this far - thanks! I'm going out to walk the dog (stress relief). Will come back and respond later if anyone answers this.

Sorry my son clicked the button lol

Depression can present itself in many ways and she may be very good at hiding.the depression itself but not so good at hiding the feelings of anger that nobody has noticed or helping her (not your fault though obv. My mom didn't know I was depressed all she saw was an angry teenager)

Sorry for the epic post just thought I would share that as hopefully in the future you will have a wonderful relationship with your daughter as I would be very sorry to have missed out on what I have with my mom now!

(just read back the many spelling errors sorry typing on phone with a 5 month old is a recipe for disaster

You sound stronger already Minifingers, which I assume is because you've had a 24 hour break. I think you are wise to keep her at arms length until you feel stronger.

Perhaps you could use this time apart to formulate say a handful of basic rules + consequences that she has to sign up to in order to return home. The first one should be No hitting or violence to anyone especially my mum. Consequence= removed by police.

I hope your mother and sister are firmly on side with you and not tolerating any violence in their home.

Have a relaxing weekend OP.

Ok the identity element is key here (I am white, DH black, kids mixed race also in London).

I think you have it spot on that she is rejecting the white part of herself. Mixed race children often identify themselves as black, because wider society does. They are often more accepted by the black community (though not always), if a lot of her friends are black too then this will add to those feelings.

Very low self esteem linked with her identity and secondly her appearance are at the root of this IMO. Putting on weight is known for people with low self esteem, emotional eating. I think you need to find a counsellor that has experience supporting black and mixed race individuals and families.

Not sure where you are in London, but have found these organisations that may offer some support:

South London Family Centre

City and Hackney Mind Offer Black, Minority, Ethnic counselling services.

BME counselling services, look under London

Where is your husband's heritage from?

Is there any chance she could have PCOS? I think there's a few things going on with her, her identity, depression and hormones. I feel sorry for you and her tbh.

It's so good you have people who can take her. Is there any way you could go away just with her, perhaps wild camping? Leave dh with the other dcs? You can go for long walks and maybe bond?

Also try to get her to take some oils. I take starflower and it's helping my pmt. Plus a multivitamin.

It must be so stressful for all of you. I hope you can find a solution?

If you read this it seems PCOS is very closely linked to diabetes too.

With your more recent posts, she sounds incredibly depressed. It may be 'just' depression, or a feature of something else. I certainly used to tell my parents to leave me alone / that I didn't want to be anywhere near them - and it was because of my own pain, I was firstly pushing everyone away, and secondly 'testing' them, to see if they loved me enough. None of this was a conscious decision, by the way, it's only something I've realised recently.

Something else I didn't mention - dd has done EVERYTHING she can to be different from me. I am white and from a middle-class family. Privately educated. DD is mixed race, and we live in fairly down at heel part of London. She strongly identifies with black culture and often makes comments like 'that's so white', or 'that's so black'. She attends the sort of comprehensive you would typically find in a not very wealthy part of London and if you met dd on a bus you'd assume she came from one of the grimmer estates - her speech and her way of presenting herself

I don't think you can say she has chosen to be different from you. You have chosen these things for her, to marry someone from a different cultural background, where you live, not to educate her privately. She has had no choice over these things. Sounds like she is trying to fit in. It does sound desperately sad, as she sounds like she was a wonderful child.

Bluebell

homebird8 what?! I am not saying there is anything wrong with being mixed race, working class or state educated! The op wrote and I quoted a long list of how her dd has chosen to be different, not me. And I have just pointed out she couldn't have chosen any of those things. I do actually empathise with op. her dd's behaviour sounds horrendous. But she also sounds desperately unhappy, and trying to fit in. ( and working class, state educated here from a rough area, so no prejudice here! I'm told my comp now sometimes has police at the gates checking for knives)

Is there anyone else CAMHS can refer her to? You might have to fight for it but I did this with my daughter and received a completely unexpected diagnosis which is now treated by medication and has changed our lives. Things had descended badly with much of the behaviour you describe but now there is hope for the future of my family.

Also the other teenage girl I know with such behaviour also has a younger sibling with autism and there is a lot of anger and resentment surrounding the way he is treated compared to her.

Aside from everything else, eating shit will have a profound effect on her mood. No wonder she is a screeching banshee if she's filled to the brim with junk. If she could be persuaded to eat a healthy diet (h-o-l-l-o-w laugh) she would be transformed. And this is aside from the cultural identity problems that she is, apparently, struggling to assimilate.

...though I suspect she believes herself to be above the usual (potential) grind of being human. She was treated like a pop star from the off - nobody's fault, just how it went. Just to throw something into the mix (on top of the huge pile of difficulties): how have teachers been with her? Has she had an inappropriate relationship with a teacher? re special treatment, favouritism. Just wondering...

I had an appalling experience at CAMHS so couldn't recommend you try there - though I suspect it's a postcard lottery. If you can afford private therapy then I would recommend that's the way to go; though of course it's anyone's guess whether she'll turn up, highly likely she won't.

yy she's unhappy but, although she's only 14, she has to come to the realisation that her choices are making her unhappy. YOu're not doing her a favour to shield her from that essential reality, aside from any cultural, identity or body image difficulties she is struggling with, or anything else she may be struggling with. She may be 14 but she is probably an advanced 14. Kids these days are also sold the heinous idea that being famous is the only thing to aim for, the only thing of worth. She's already had the fame and sees no reason why she should lose it.

Another thing to consider is the evil weed. It's supposed to be innocuous but these days very strong. It accounts for at least one of my children's complete change of personality on every possible front. Almost all kids are on it now, particularly in big cities. I loathe the stuff, personally, because it has stolen at least one of my kids. (plus there's the longterm potential MH problems associated with it )

btw just to remind you that summer's coming and open windows would negate the need for a key..

Your last post make fill's in the gaps OP.
There a few cause's of your daughters behaviour that all together are pretty corrosive.

Hormones

Trying to fit in as a black/white mixed race child with her black friends.
Identifying more with her black side because of her environment.

Resentment that you had a private education where she's at an inner city comp.

Awful diet leading to nutrient deficiencies (particularly B vitamins and Vitamin D) these deficiencies along account for an increase in mental health problems.

"There are many symptoms and signs of a vitamin B complex deficiency including:

    emotional disturbances such as:
    mild to severe depression;
    vague fears, morbid thoughts, feeling that something dreadful     is   going to happen, uneasiness to panic, apprehension;
    mood swings, rage, hostility, suspicion, anxiety, nervousness,     inability to handle stress, insomnia or sleep disturbances;
mental disturbances, including:
    mental confusion,
    loss of ability to concentrate,
    impaired intellect,
    loss of memory, and
    headaches,
digestive disturbances including:
    digestive problems,
    hypochlorhydria (insufficient stomach acid production),
    constipation or diarrhea,
    stomach pains with decreased or increased appetite,
    craving for sweets,
    soreness of the mouth,
    sore throat,
    difficulty swallowing,
muscular and nervous disturbances including:
    weakness;
    fatigue;
    light headedness or dizziness;
    heart palpitations;
    chest pains;
    neuralgia to neuritis;
    muscular soreness;
    pain, tingling or ache;
    cold hands and feet; and
    heightened sensitivity to touch and/or pain;
skin disturbances including:
    dermatitis,
    acne,
    burning or itching eyes." 

Vitamin D deficiency is related to Obesity particularly in people with darker skin

Possible PCOS given her obesity and skin problems.
PCOS is exacerbated by poor diet high in sugar.

I think if you can change her diet or at least get her to take a high strength Vitamin B complex, Vitamin D and a multivitamin you could improve those mental health related deficiencies. Maybe then you would have a chance of working on the other problems.

CAHMS were a waste of time for my ds2 too. He was suspected of having Aspergers but they say not. They just seem to chuck you from one person to another and nothing helps? I'm sure others have had positive experiences of them though? He improved when he went to comp.

ER's right. Get good quality multi vit though. The cheap ones have shitty fillers in them.

Yes springykitsch it may be difficult to make her take them you're right?

Does your dd like to read OP? Maybe a book on teenage years may help? And some literature on vitamins and hormones?

Poor OP, all these suggestions of why her DD could be behaving how she is must be absolutely confounding

I'm with MaryZ here though: But I still think you need (just for a bit) to stop concentrating on her and concentrate on you.

OP is the victim of abuse and needs a rest and recharge before tackling any of this other stuff. You are no use to your DC if you cannot function effectively. Recharge first, then battle can recommence.

Where does she get the money to buy junk/possibly drugs?could u withdraw any pocket money till the situation improve?as well would you try stripping her room as someone else suggestested?would be easy now that she's away.

This is a nightmare for you and although we had alot of what you are describing it was not as concentrated. I believe that dd is sad, unhappy and lonely and really wants you to have said/done something that you haven't. Obviously the key to this is to find out what. Ideally you would tell her how much you love her seek out ways to show her your love, tell her you want to spend time with her and do things together etc. However I would say that you must take some time out for a bit to get youself to a place where you have the strentgh to do this,
I would think something would be causing her anger at you and although you have a mothers instinct it hasn't been abuse don't dismiss it. She has been bright and happy and now she isn't.She clearly doesn't like herself or you for some reason, hormones and diet do have amazing effect and would def recommend the supplements,whether you should have protected her from something that has happened to her or even shouldn't have made her mixed race it is something she is struggling with. I am not suggesting your failure just what he perceives!!!
At the moment though I think it would be best for you to try to build yourself up and restore your own strength. You are no good to any one in the state you are at the moment. I hope you get the support you all need.xx

Yes the detachment can feel like neglect or ignoring your DC.

But as long as you are taking the responsibility for your DC's aggression and bad behaviour (which you have no control over) then they are off the hook for taking responsibility for it. That is the transition to adulthood and if OP's DD is a precocious 13yrs (which she sounds like she is) then she may be going through this transition earlier than most teens.

Sometimes the best thing you can do is just let them take the consequences of their own behaviour. So she gets charged for violence and has a record that will be an obstacle for a career ambition? Well, that will really hurt (hopefully) and might be the point at which she sees why she can't carry on the way she has. A Hard Lesson. But, ultimately, the best for her and her family if she reevaluates the way she behaves.