Nine year old daughters behaviour breaking me and the family apart?

[Alotofpink]

I don’t know how to start really but I’m really struggling at the moment and don’t know how to make it better.

Basically daughter is at the beginning of a SEND referral. She can’t take being told to do anything, from turning the light off to getting ready for school, reading etc etc. Complains every time we go out of the house because she wants to be in control of where we go, if it’s not somewhere she wants to go then she will play up. She gives me terrible looks and tells me I’m a terrible mum, Im nothing like all the other mums. Her dad literally can’t take it anymore as she has placed him into an enemy position so literally snarls and eye rolls him. I’m also an enemy and she looks at me with such hate at times but I have to get her ready.

If I’m honest I’m starting to dread our days, dread having to ask her to do anything and often find ways of letting her get her way. I try so hard to feel love and understand that she doesn’t do this on purpose but I’m really struggling with this now. My little girl just has such hate towards me most of the time. The school are trying to work with her around feelings of others etc etc. She just simply says she doesn’t care, I want my way, I don’t see why I can’t have my way when I want.

Anyone have any advice please?

As a parent of a very similar child, I would say this type of thinking is at the root of most of our worst fallouts.
We've had to change our mindset completely and slowly reconnect with the lovely person under the mess of hormones and PDA. Trying to bring them into line ended in a really traumatic mental health crisis it's taken ages to unravel. It really wasn't worth it.
Our problems really accelerated at age 9 too. Looking back, I can see that age was similar to perimenopause - a massive influx of hormones far earlier than you'd expect. We're now properly in the teen years and, although far from perfect, much easier to understand.

She will cry and feel very sorry for herself. She will have absolutely no idea the part she has played in the situation.

Oh she is a really lovely, artistic and empathetic person underneath it all. She has voiced many times I can’t stop it I can’t control it.

When she tells you you're a rubbish mum, in my experience the only thing to do is calmly tell her it's not ok to speak to you that way. If you do this every time, she'll eventually get the message. Taking the emotion and punishments out of the equation really helps both of you feel more in control.

I just wanted to send a handhold OP. I heard about PDA about a year ago and immediately eye rolled thinking it’s just a label for bad behaviour. Then I felt ashamed and did quite a lot of research, watched YouTube articles and tried to understand the psychology and physiology behind how the child was feeling and how an adult should cope. A lot of the advice seemed to be based on giving choices and options rather than instructions/consequences. It made a lot of sense. BUT… I still struggle to understand it, and I imagine that’s where you are with friends and family at the moment. It sounds very isolating.

It just seems like life becomes a battle that you are never allowed to ‘win’, that the person you are supposed to love the most is deliberately making your life unbearable, that all societal expectations about behaviour, boundaries and consequences have to be abandoned (but only for one child, your other child should still adhere to these expectations?). It must be like walking against a gale force wind all the time?

Of course you know all of this and I’m not saying it to be mean, I think your family need much more support than you are getting and from someone who knows what they’re talking about and can help you and I hope you get some really helpful pointers from here.

One last thought, maybe try and reframe your daughter’s needs into something your mind can comprehend a little better. If she was deaf for example you wouldn’t expect her to learn to hear, or for there to be consequences, you would find a different way to communicate.

I hope you and your family find a way to feel joy and good about yourselves. Xxx

My usual response is that is not nice that has hurt mummies feelings. Which I suppose doesn’t help

But do you think you are a rubbish mum for not getting lip balm, or do you think this child is trying to be unkind to me because she didn’t get what she wanted?

I would assume the latter and say, “I’m sorry you think I’m a bad mum, I try very hard to be the best mum I can be. I’d like you to try and be a good daughter, because I love you and it hurts my feeling that you think I’m rubbish. You can have but some lipbalm with your pocket money, shall we go to the shop after we’ve done your reading?”

Has anyone been kind to you today? Make yourself a cup of tea and give yourself a little break. It really can get better you know.

That is what I need. I need support. Currently I have family telling me that I have no control and I’ve let it get to this by not being hard enough. I’m only human and I’m finding it hard not having anyone.

When my AuDHD (PDA) child is like this it means she's anxious and/or disregulated.

When she says she hates me I say I LOVE you.

Learnt that on here!

"10 Days to a Less Defiant Child" (Bernstein) is a good book.

So how I would deal with that in relation to my DC would be to say breezily "Oh dear, well you can't expect people to like you if you're violent and nasty towards them, can you? You could try being nice and see where that gets you." And then just shut it down - "I don't want to hear anymore about it, you have only your own poor behaviour to blame. If you want people to like you and want to play with you, you need to think about your behaviour."

My DC doesn't have your DD's challenges so it's obviously an entirely different and much more stressful situation for you. But I do sometimes have to do "social stories" with him, in the sense of thinking about how his behaviour impacts others and their reactions to him. One thing it struck me, reading some of your posts, is that your DD seems to have trouble linking cause and effect. "I behave like this, people react like this".

Would it be useful to put together some sort of visual chart and help her link behaviour (both hers and others) with reactions? So, "I hit others" and the consequences are "Others are sad" and "I have to sit by myself to keep others safe". "I say nasty things" leads to "people feel sad" and "people don't want to be around me". And then do the same with good behaviour as well - "I share with others", and then this good thing happens.

What is the background to all of this?

She didn't just go from a "normal" child to this overnight.

I hear you OP.
In a similar situation here.
It probably doesn’t help, but you are not alone 💐

Usually children are born like this. Neurodivergent.

(Typical is usually the term used rather than normal. I’m not being critical, just figured you put it in inverted commas because you didn’t quite know the term to use.)

Just wanted to say I hear you, OP. My 9-year-old DS has suspected PDA ASD and ADHD, awaiting assessment.

He has found KS2 increasingly hard and school avoidance has become a big problem in Year 4. I think he’s in autistic burnout.

Meanwhile, I’m a lone parent - he hasn’t seen his Dad for over 6 months and his violent and challenging behaviour is causing massive problems with his NT teenage sister. And I supposedly work full-time! Which is impossible with all the calls, meetings and forms I have to fill in currently.

We’re drowning here, so I don’t have any advice. I have sought support from school, early help, CAMHS, SENDIASS and a local charity that offers counselling for SEND parents - anywhere I can. I don’t see a light at the end of tunnel at the moment, but I know I am doing all I can and I’m sure it will come.

Asking for help from friends and family and getting myself counselling is what is helping us all to get through this crisis period. Sending hugs, OP. 💐

She has always been like this in one way or another and the behaviour has just escalated. As NT children are learning and adapting my daughter isn’t really.

With the poster who said that they just discuss the behaviour and say if you want friends you have to think about your behaviour and adjust my daughter can’t. Her response is always, I don’t want friends I don’t care. I know she does want friends.

We had what I believe was burn out last year when she repeatedly kept hiding in lockers, under tables etc. The school has had a massive overhaul in staff since and she has improved remarkably, no more hiding. I think it is me currently who is in burnout which means I’m not censoring by behaviour enough and I’m probably triggering her.

Could you rephrase it so it's not targeted at her/a demand on her?

"These are things we can do which make people happy and want to be friends with us".

"These are things we do which make people sad and they don't want to be around us".

"If you did decide that you wanted friends, it might help if you gave some of the things in the first group a go".

Yes, I agree that the suggestion of discussing the behaviour perhaps comes from a place of not quite understanding how things are for children like this.

I usually tried to give my son the chance to talk things through after big confrontations, but It seemed hard for him to even be fully aware that he had had some strong feelings, let alone to name them. He was truly empathic and could understand that his behaviour generated very difficult feelings for me and others around him. But his ability to process and reflect on those feelings was definitely blocked in some way. Probably his awareness of others' feelings generated some anxiety which in turn partially shut down his processing.

I think that mentioning to your DD how the behaviour makes you feel (and other family members feel) is a worthwhile strategy. But only if it is done in a very low key and minimal way. Not the sort of warm conversation where you aim to 'come together' with a mutual understanding of one another's feelings. Just a very brief report of very clear emotions - "I was angry when you hit your sibling". I think that can sometimes help the child to become more aware of feelings without being completely overwhelmed by them

I have tried so many ways of talking to her, so many ways of re-phrasing and I always get the same response…”oh here we go again, it’s always moan moan moan at me, just shut up, eye roll and walk off”. I sometimes think he needs to come from someone else. Someone she perhaps respects or likes it feels??

I’m absolutely not an expert in any of this, but it sounds like your daughter has a lot of anxiety. Being aware she’s not like everyone else, wanting things that others have got (so that she is the same). Would a child psychologist/therapist be an option?

Yes there is never a conclusion or an apparent understanding of views. When I talk about my emotions then it almost seems to back up a feeling that she has that I’m somehow stupid that she hurt my feelings. I’m probably projecting massively but she has said well if you sad then you stupid. I have cried in her presence and she laughed at me. I don’t really know how to piece this together in a way where I understand where it’s coming from if that makes sense?

Would visual aids/pictures help? Something very simple and, like you say, maybe someone else discussing it with her rather than you?
It's not my area of expertise (I work with young people but doing something quite different), but I'm somewhat intrigued by your description of the difficulty she has linking her own actions and behaviour with what happens next. From your description, it's not just that she loses control and therefore forgets about or does things regardless of the consequences. It's also that she genuinely can't see the link - that life is a series of interactions and the response we will get from others is dependent on our own input.

It has been requested from the school and myself. I try and talk to her that it’s ok to be different, I am different myself. But I understand the pressure of wanting to be like the others at this age. It must be so hard for her to understand all of this.

That is exactly how I described it to the school. She has no idea how to behave to get a certain response, or want to even do that behaviour because then she won’t feel in control. It’s like she is trying to control an outcome without doing the bit in the middle.

The cruelty may be part of her very desperate need to feel a sense of control in the situation. My son sometimes said some cruel things. It felt like he was trying to frighten me away, because any slight possibility of a moment of closeness felt very threatening to him.
Also, he was very perceptive of the fact that I was 'using strategies', trying to find solutions. And he fought that very fiercely. I suppose it felt like a threat to whatever small fragile sense of control he was trying to protect.