How bad is this: anyone willing to compare?

[Screaminglikemunch]

Name changed but long-timer here…my life with my teen (various diagnoses) is absolutely hideous but I wanted to get a sense of whether I’m personally lacking in resilience and good parenting skills or if my DD (adopted so genetic inheritance and early trauma comes into play here) would have you on your knees too.

So, she steals anything and everything that is not locked down (money, chargers, tech, sugary foods, carbs). I have a combination safe under my bed but on the occasions I forget to transfer money/sweets/treats into the safe, they are gone within seconds. I cannot ever let my guard down; every pocket and handbag is frisked for money and loose change. My home is ransacked every single time I have to leave her (I have a much younger child who need to be transported to various extra-curricular activities) in an attempt to find the above. She binge-eats to a ridiculous degree hence the need to try to restrict access to unhealthy foods. The gaslighting is so extreme that I begin to doubt myself and worry about early-onset dementia.

She is violent towards me, verbally (extremely) abusive and threatening to the extent that her much younger sibling is terrified of her and we have a drill whereby the little one knows how to flee to a neighbour for safety when things kick off.

Her hygiene is appalling and I truly believe that she is waging psychological warfare on me when she leaves used period pads hidden under my microwave (yes, honestly).

My elder DD screams like she is being murdered whenever she does not get her own way or if I challenge her about her stealing, or just because etc, to the extent that an anonymous neighbour has reported ME to the NSPCC. I had a phone call from my LA MAST team and they shut the case down without visiting once they heard our history and spoke to the safeguarding leads at both of my children’s schools.

Genuinely, I have done my best as an adoptive parent and I have fought tooth and nail for every woeful bit of pathetic support we have received from social services. Genuinely, I believe my DD has psychological problems bigger than the current multiple diagnoses she has.

I am exhausted and drained and miserable and our home is toxic and I am craving peace and quiet. My DD would happily live with a robot provided she had three square meals a day and unlimited WiFi. She wouldn’t be able to threaten to stab a robot.

I have aged about 35 years in the last 10 and I have zero pleasure in my life. Every day I’m not stabbed in my bed feels like a bonus and like I’m winning at life currently. Fucked up, no? I’ve poured my heart and soul into this child for 13 years but I’m miserable, she’s miserable and her sibling is miserable.

Genuinely, is this just part of parenting a teen, albeit an unmanageable one, or am I allowed to believe that this is extreme behaviour and there is a good reason why I am so unhappy?

OP, there is a charity called Buttle which will pay boarding school fees for families in crisis, such as yours.

My personal opinion is that SS would fund a boarding school place if push came to shove to prevent an adoption from disruption. They have a shortage of foster carers for disturbed teenagers. I would hold out for this if I were you, but also contact Buttle.

Lots of luck. Things CAN improve - they did for me, against all the odds. You just have to stay strong.

@anonymousobserver , thank you SO much for that tip-off. I have researched the boarding school funding opportunity via the Buttle Trust and it looks like a lifeline for us as a family. I will raise this with the social workers who are now assessing us as I note that any application has to be completed by a front-line professional.

Any further on OP?

Just read all of your posts OP. I dont have adopted children but we do have a children with disabilities SW. I think if you told 1000 people what its like dealing with childrens socail care and SEN education 999 wouldnt believe how awful it is. Its fresh hell. I do hope you get the help you need. Its ironic that I was at point so desperate for help I told socail care that I couldnt cope and they threatened me with child protection. But when I said I will pick their bags they immediately retracted that they ever mentioned child protection.

As you sayit's ironic that if a sibling is abusing a child and even threatening life nothing happens. My 6 year old was punching my 4 year old on the head and strangled her multiple times. Our urgent help was a two year wait to be triaged by camhs. In that time I was told it would be a further two years to see a psychiatrist. So four years for help!

Luckily that behaviour stopped once ds matured and being told that he would kill his sister sunk in. By the time we saw camhs after two years the crisis was in the past.

You have all been failed by the people employed to help and that stings. I liken it to abuse in itself

I haven't read all but I've read enough I think to comment .
Dear op you have done enough to try and parent a very unhappy and disturbed young girl . It's time to tell services that she isn't coping , that you are concerned you can't keep her safe ( the notebook saying of her wishes to hurt others is a big concern ) that you believe SHE needs to be somewhere more suited to her needs ,
Then don't collect her from school ( do you do that ? ) let school know you will not be collecting her / not be at home for her . Because you are not prepared to watch her struggle anymore in a family that have repeatedly asked for support but cannot guarantee her safety or the safety of others in the family .

I worked in childrens services for 30 years including sitting on panel for children whose challenging behaviour meant they needed to be accommodated . I'm also parent to a young adopted child not yet a teenager .

I have also seen children removed into accommodation facilities where the contact with families has been successfully maintained and flourished once the child is in the right place and families arnt exhausted .

These places are v expensive and in short supply so you have to show that you are not willing to keep trying and failing .

Be strong , your love for her shines through and you want the best for her . Well done for getting this far now it's time to get her the help she needs for now and for the future x

When you say she doesn't have disability but is registered blind is that right ?

If she was affected in utro does that mean she may have Foetal Alcohol Syndrome ? That causes a lot of behaviour issues that are hard to resolve .

That doesn’t mean she’s not disabled, it just means your council are cunts!

What medication is she prescribed? Does she not like the pill? Is it swallowing it?

My ds has autism and adhd and has to take medications for his adhd, battle to get him to take it. He’s been on 3 different kinds.

Let me know what it is she takes, what the barrier to taking them is, and I’ll give some ideas!

Well, the ‘urgent’ assessment by the children’s team is proving to be anything but! I’ve heard absolutely nothing since the Good Cop/Bad Cop meeting. DD reckons she has a meeting with her head SENCO, school psychotherapist and the assessing social workers in school next week. Naturally, none of the professionals involved has bothered to contact me to update me. It’s like I have become a low-value person because I have indicated I wish to throw in the towel. I know what to expect; I know absolutely that the prevailing narrative will be that I’m the one to ‘blame’ as I have fellow adopter friends of tricksy teens who have trodden this path before me.

There is no way I’m waiting four years more for any help; I’m an older parent and I don’t know how many years I have left. I’m not seeing out my twilight years being fearful in my own home. It begs the question: how do we measure the success of a family that experiences unrelenting pressure day in and day out?

@twoblueskies , thank you, it’s good to have you here with your various adoption-related ‘hats’. You speak a lot of sense. My heart has not yet caught up with my head but I realise that a decision from me is imminent.

Funnily enough, the two front-line social workers weren’t remotely concerned about the ‘stabbing’ notebooks; they reckoned they were a ‘cry for help’. I shared with them that my DD’s birth father hanged himself in a high security prison while on remand for a serious crime and while suffering from diagnosed schizophrenia. Frankly, I’m terrified about my DD’s genetic inheritance.

Based on your experience, would a young person like my DD be accommodated in a residential unit or to a foster placement?

@danni0509 , I’m loving your incisive assessment of the crap-ness of my LA! She could fill an A-Z compendium of diagnoses and mental health- related issues. But, because she attends a selective grammar school, she is judged to have won one of Willy Wonka’s golden tickets.

She is on 72mg of Concerta XL daily which comprises of two caplets per day; one very small and one even smaller. Honestly, I have tried till I am blue in the face to get to the bottom of the resistance to taking the medication ( it’s not like they’re the size of horse tranquillisers) but the answer is always ‘I don’t know’. This is the universal answer in relation to my queries about the violence, the aggression, the anger, the stealing, the compulsive ransacking of my house, and the incessant binge eating.