Need someone to talk to about this..hand hold

[Catwoman76]

Last night and this morning things kicked off again. Dw took dd6 to bed last night. I could hear dw asking dd sternly to brush her teeth. Clearly dd wasn't doing as she was told. Again could hear dw sternly asking '..get in there now and brush your teeth..' again dd wouldn't do as she was told.
I feel like it was the tone of voice dw was using that just made the situation escalate. Dd starting messing about. I went upstairs and I asking dw to calm her voice down. Dd messing about again dw tried to put her in her room whilst dd resisted and started screaming. Our technique with dd as she has always lashed out as us, is to put her in her room and we count to 100. One of us stands outside door and counts with her.
Dw shoves dd into her bedroom whilst dd was fighting to get out. Dw was holding door handle whilst she counted. Dd was going mental in her bedroom.
Dw was shouting at me saying I don't support her and I was telling her off!!!??? All I said was she needed to calm down.
I came downstairs and dw finished counting and dd had calmed down. Dw wife went into bedroom and tried to explain to dd why she had been put in her room.. dw was again talking sternly to dw. Her tone was harsh with dd. Dd reacts back when she is spoken to in a stern voice. If you speak calmly to her it normally helps.
I again went upstairs but didn't say anything and dd messed about and dw had a go at me asking why I had come upstairs and how I had made things worse by going up. Basically she said I should've stayed downstairs.
Basically dd messed about again didn't do as she was told so I out her in her room. Dd was screaming so I opened door and explained I was doing the counting with door open. If she is going to mess about I would close the door.
In the background dw was shouting at me saying I didn't support her and I wasn't doing the discipline the right way as I had opened door.
Eventually things calmed down and I managed to brush her teeth and in bed.
Dw went to bed and we didn't discuss anything..
This morning we all got up and dw hardly spoke to dd when dd tried to engage in conversation. Instead dw continued again in a stern harsh voice with dd about how if parents ask her to brush her teeth she needs to go an do it. Again her tone was harsh and stern. Dd always reacts when she is spoken to like that. I went upstairs and again dw was continuing to talk sternly. Dw said to me she must listen to us and again I asked dw to try and keep calm.
Well, she went berserk with me and dd. She went on to kick our bedroom door in. Dd obviously got scared.
Dw said some awful things to me and said it wasn't working.
All I was trying to do was to try and calm her down.
Thing is, we have had issues where she always undermines me in front of dd and shouts at me if I merely speak out of tone with dd.
I've been waiting to discuss the above with dw but never found the right moment.
Wife stormed out and said she was going to move into one of our rental properties as things aren't working out.
In the past she's done this before..walking out and staying in hotels and not communicating when dd is upset wanting to ring her.
All of this just because dd didn't want to brush her teeth.

That’s hard to read -
End point is your DD witnesses domestic violence
Emotional abuse between parents and damage to property
It will be disturbing to her
It will show her how to badly regulate emotions
It sounded liked you are tuned into DD and attempt to diffuse and help her regulate but your DW isn’t on the same page as she can’t regulate herself very well
I think you and DD are better off without DW
An adopted child needs a particularly secure and emotionally containing environment as pp suggested

Catwoman
Fair comment, although I still believe that if one person is doing the bulk of childcare, that can cause stress. It doesn’t negate how wrong shouting etc is, just another thing to consider.
I still think writing her a letter without using inflammatory language is a good way to get her to see where you’re coming from, if talking about it directly causes problems.

Buy this book and read it. It is particularly brilliant for use with strong willed and defiant children. It transformed our family pretty much overnight. If your wife is genuinely interested in having a calm, loving, co-operative home life, she will adopt its methods. Ime some people don't because they enjoy fighting and want to be top dog. If she is like that the problem won't go away. But if she's just exhausted and frazzled and having a bad night, be sympathetic - happens to us all.

You guys really need to at least do a parenting course together or if possible see (together) a psyc who specialises in parenting/attachment. None of this is any good for a child, especially a child who's adopted.

You completely undermined your wife last night. Going to tell her to calm down was highly confrontational - something you say you don't like!

Frankly, if your DD isn't doing what she's told, then I can understand why your wife would be talking sternly to her.

You need to apologise to your DW and to back right off when she's in charge of the parenting at that point in time.

(Mind you, I also think you need to find another way to deal with bedtime/tooth brushing if it's causing this amount of upset)

This is a frequent thing, isn’t it.
You need to be on the same page as to what is an acceptable way of dealing with your daughter’s behaviour. Obviously your wife shouting and kicking the door in is totally unacceptable, and you appear to be very soft on her! but you need to find a way of working together and presenting a united front as this will help your daughter best in the long run.
There’s no point attempting to fix it while you’re both wound up from this huge row, but when things are calm you should both look into family counselling, parenting classes etc. It’s not that you’re necessarily doing a ‘bad’ job, but you need to do the same job.

Dd had a hospital appointment today as she had a bad wee infection with blood in it on Sunday.
Just come back from hospital appointment and wife not even bothered to text to ask how it went.
Think if it didn't kick off last night about what I said it would've kicked off another day

Wife has done this before where she just leaves. Ignores dd after naughty behaviour.
Ignores phone calls and texts asking her to ring to dd as she is upset etc

You need couples counselling and your wife needs a neutral third party to help her learn better techniques for dealing with challenging behaviour. Scolding does not work, but clearly you telling her that sets her off, because I suspect she knows you are right.

So do you support DW? With both my DS and SS if something starts to escalate me and DH will recognise and take over from one another. DH will say “you go sit down” or similar and manage from there. It’s not clear whether you take a back seat and then wade in when tensions are already too high with bright ideas or if your DW is overreacting to you trying to help.

Either way, you need an adult conversation about how you should parent and discipline DD and how you can support each other.

@DinoHat

So do you support DW? With both my DS and SS if something starts to escalate me and DH will recognise and take over from one another. DH will say “you go sit down” or similar and manage from there. It’s not clear whether you take a back seat and then wade in when tensions are already too high with bright ideas or if your DW is overreacting to you trying to help.

Either way, you need an adult conversation about how you should parent and discipline DD and how you can support each other.

Yes I 100% support. I went upstairs and said I will do bedtime (this was to help her defuse).

She continued harshly telling dd to ..better get her teeth brushed...'

So you stayed downstairs listening to your wife upstairs struggling with the bed them routine?

You then came up and told her to adjusts her tone of voice

Then went back down stairs?

Quite frankly I would have been pissed off too.

You are a team. Maybe the evenings are important to your wife to unwind and getting all these bits done signals the end of a hard day.

Maybe you could do the bedtime routine if this is the particular time of day she struggles with?

Your marriage and family are in a very bad way. I don’t know the back story but have you had counselling before? Are you considering it now?

Shutting your 6 year old in her room isn’t working. I doubt it would help you either calm down or comply if someone did it to you. It’s not working so scrap it.

You urgently need to start being consistent in how you parent your child. All she sees is you undermining and tearing strips off each other. She needs calm clear boundaries and the way the two of you are carrying on must be very unsettling and destabilising. No wonder she’s acting out.

You don’t have many options. Get some therapy. On your own and together. She sounds like she needs anger management. You need a parenting course. And you need to consider a divorce. Your child needs a happy harmonious home far more than she needs married parents. You chose to have her, you owe it to her to sort yourselves out and stop living in a war zone.

@indecisivewoman81

So you stayed downstairs listening to your wife upstairs struggling with the bed them routine?

You then came up and told her to adjusts her tone of voice

Then went back down stairs?

Quite frankly I would have been pissed off too.

You are a team. Maybe the evenings are important to your wife to unwind and getting all these bits done signals the end of a hard day.

Maybe you could do the bedtime routine if this is the particular time of day she struggles with?

I was busy tidying up and doing dishes. I had been to work that day from 8am to 6pm. This was at 730pm. Wife is happy to do bedtime

But she’s not happy, she was struggling. Sometimes you need a helping hand. Would she not have done in the dishes? My husband and I would have just swapped.

You need to sort this with your wife away from your DD and go in as a United front.

Lots of issues here but you need to start to work as a team

You both need to stop undermining each other in front of dd
You really shouldn't tell a parent to calm down when you can hear she's struggling with dc, it's going to exacerbate the situation
Your dw needs to sort her anger issues out
You both need to put a plan in place on how to parent and maybe a parent course for you both is needed

Someone uothread said your dd is adopted, if this is the case, speak to your support after adoption worker and see if there are any courses available to you both. Parenting an adopted child can be very different to north children

Firstly, I don’t pretend for a minute to be an expert on raising an adopted child. My career was with very young children, however. In my (limited) experience of adopted children and their families, including two sets of close friends who have adopted, attachment issues seem to underpin this kind of behaviour. It’s as if they really are pushing the limits to say, “If I’m this bad will you still love me? How about now? Will you hang around even when I’m at my very worst?”
One or other parent disappearing/ reappearing in tough times will make a child with attachment issues much more insecure. I can understand the need to get out of a challenging situation, lockdown must be adding massively to this kind of pressure, but whilst it can be understood by an adult as a temporary release valve, it is an insecure child’s worse nightmare. They need to feel unconditionally loved. I do, however, also know how easy all this is to say when I’m not at the sharp end of this every day as you are.
I really do feel for you as it sounds as if all three of you really do need some help here from experts. Mumsnet is not always the place to find it. Labelling children as a ‘naughty child’ is not really helpful. It is far better to label the behaviour and not the child. This leaves the child with a chance to turn things around. Children hear their labels said in the heat of the moment eg “You’re so naughty!” and learn to live up to them. “If I’m a naughty child, there’s no hope for me.” It suggests a permanent state. Whereas “I’ve been naughty/ done something naughty” separates the child from their (temporary) behaviour. It allows the chance to learn about and take personal responsibility for wrongdoing, but also see that it can be changed and therefore also learn how to put things right.
Possibly as this seems to be an ongoing situation, praise has taken second place to censure here? It can be very, very difficult in stressful times with a child who has behaviour issues to find something to praise, (I know, I’ve known a few! 😂) but if every positive thing she does also gets noticed and commented on, it might help? (Apologies if you are already doing this, no idea of your full situation obviously).
Please start reaching out to the relevant agencies for help. Not as easy in lockdown, obviously, but in the meantime Google forums for adoptive parents and I’m certain you won’t be alone and might find some useful tips. It’s easy to get locked into destructive cycles. You need someone who knows their stuff snd is experienced to show you how to break out of this loop, which is so sad to read about and so painful for all of you. I sincerely hope you find the help you need.

@Catwoman76

Wife has done this before where she just leaves. Ignores dd after naughty behaviour. Ignores phone calls and texts asking her to ring to dd as she is upset etc

To me, this is the biggest problem. Carrying on in anger the next morning, ignoring the child who is trying to engage with her is a continuation of punishment.

There are ways to discipline a child without that shite.

You undermined your dw but that is neither here or there at this point given the extreme violent reaction from her and her reaction proceeding it. You have a vulnerable child that by the sounds of her behaviour has attachment issues due to adoption/events before adoption and she is being witness to violent outbursts in the home that should be safe and not at all like what she may have been removed from. Witnessing domestic violence is considered child abuse. If the police had been called to your home last night for your wife kicking the bedroom door in, you would be having a referral put in to social services. Your focus should be protecting the child you adopted. Please do not let this vulnerable little one go through anymore of this, as a child who was in care if I had left my unsafe and abusive home thinking I was going to one where I would be safe and loved to have what you described I hate to think how damaging it would have been to me. If this cycle continues she will be removed from another family which will also be damaging to her. I feel so sorry for the poor little thing. Please do not let your wife back in until she has undergone anger management and parenting courses, if ever. Please also report this to social services and get support.

OP you need proper specialist support to deal with this - I (and many others have said) that your daughter came to you when she was 2 and there will have been some huge repercussions of that, these are manifesting now and neither you and particularly your wife have the skill set to manage it without proper help.

You need to go to social services and get the help for your daughter she needs and how to manage it.

It is your only move now OP and has been from the start. Why would you try and access the help you all need?

I think you might be better posting in the adoption part of the forum as posters on here may not be aware of the levels of trauma adopted children have experienced and they gentle ways this needs to be managed.
Are you and DW both in agreement on how to parent most of the times? If I were you I would be concerned that your DW volatile behaviour may make any attachment issues worse?
I hope you can resolve things. Have an i mumsnetty hug

@singlemummanurse

You undermined your dw but that is neither here or there at this point given the extreme violent reaction from her and her reaction proceeding it. You have a vulnerable child that by the sounds of her behaviour has attachment issues due to adoption/events before adoption and she is being witness to violent outbursts in the home that should be safe and not at all like what she may have been removed from. Witnessing domestic violence is considered child abuse. If the police had been called to your home last night for your wife kicking the bedroom door in, you would be having a referral put in to social services. Your focus should be protecting the child you adopted. Please do not let this vulnerable little one go through anymore of this, as a child who was in care if I had left my unsafe and abusive home thinking I was going to one where I would be safe and loved to have what you described I hate to think how damaging it would have been to me. If this cycle continues she will be removed from another family which will also be damaging to her. I feel so sorry for the poor little thing. Please do not let your wife back in until she has undergone anger management and parenting courses, if ever. Please also report this to social services and get support.

This is spot on. This is a safeguarding issue for this vulnerable girl.

Dw kicked off with me when I went upstairs the 2nd time to help out. She started shouting at me asking me why I had gone upstairs and that I had made the situation worse.

Thing is dd has been as good as gold this lockdown. Yes, we've had the odd day where she's been a little naughty, but nothing excessive or out of the norm. I don't know why everyone are saying challenging issues with adopted dd. She isn't that naughty

@Catwoman76

Dw kicked off with me when I went upstairs the 2nd time to help out. She started shouting at me asking me why I had gone upstairs and that I had made the situation worse.

Thing is dd has been as good as gold this lockdown. Yes, we've had the odd day where she's been a little naughty, but nothing excessive or out of the norm. I don't know why everyone are saying challenging issues with adopted dd. She isn't that naughty

You are seemingly getting distracted by the replies concerning your dds behaviour. You need to concentrate on how witnessing what she did will affect her and how you are going to make sure she is not caught up in this behaviour from the people she looks to to be her safe people. I don't know her background or circumstances surrounding her adoption but I was in care for 4 years and am aware of what children who have been adopted can experience before being removed and put up for adoption. Even if she had the most loving home before but then for whatever reason ended up being adopted, that would also have had an effect. Even if she wasn't adopted, no child should have to be caught up in this toxicity, its damaging. There are enough threads on this and other sites that have grown adults in toxic and abusive relationships and a reasonable amount of these people witnessed this type of behaviour so that is their normal. This is what you are both teaching her is acceptable in relationships. I think the spotlight needs to be moved from your dds behaviour (although imo holding a door shut while she is in her room is not OK, imagine yourself feeling big emotions and having someone forcibly hold you in a room) most parents have had this issue with refusing to brush teeth, stay in bed, all other normal child behaviour. You need to address how you are going to protect your dd from your wife and make sure she is not witnessing their parent kicking a door in and stonewalling them. It is normal for kids to push boundaries and occasionally for parents to disagree and not handle it the way they should and some may either purposely or inadvertently undermine the other parent but the reaction by your wife is not acceptable and needs to be addressed as a priority. Yes, you going upstairs the 2nd time may have felt undermining but it does not excuse her behaviour.