I’m at a loss of what to do with my 8 year old daughter. The household is so down with the behaviour and I don’t know how to make it any better.
It started at a young age 4/5. Every time we went away she would run off and find another family to sit with and say she prefers this mummy. She will never do as she is asked and every time she is asked it’s met with anger and refusal. She used to hurt the pets. She swung the gerbil round by its tail and laughed, its tail fell off. We gave her another chance but she did it again so the pets went.
It’s got to a point now where being around her is just so draining. Every morning for school she refuses to get ready and causes arguments. She won’t help pick toys up before dinner. When I speak to her she will often say “oi snap out of talking to me like this” or “you can’t talk to me like this” , “ I hate it here it’s the worse house”, “ I hate you” etc etc. The school have started giving her extra support as her behaviour was deteriorating. She distracts everyone. Her dance teacher has said she doesn’t want her attending anymore as she spends too much of the lesson stopping her from messing around.
The other day she cut her sisters birthday decorations up because she said she had too many. She steals from people and she lies. She cheats at games and she doesn’t have any friends. She will make one and then suddenly they are too rude to her or boss her around and they aren’t friends. She stole lots of girls things because she said she bossed her around….it wasn’t the case, she just messed around and they wanted her to focus.
I don’t know what to do anymore. This morning I asked her how would she like to be spoken to so that she will respond with respect. She just gave me a dirty look and said I just don’t like you.