Advice please! how do I help my teenager?

[Irishtimer]

14 year old daughter- past year nightmare to live with…

rude, aggressive, mean to siblings, swears, lazy, disrespectful, only interested if talking about herself- body shames others…. Everything I’ve tried hard to guide her not to be but also aware everything a typical teenager is.

her older sister was nothing like this- her teenage years were a bliss - so this has got us hard. Is this just normal teenage behaviour? How do u deal with it?

have tried soft approach- understanding, guiding, listening- have also tried removing phone/ grounded at weekend etc.

I understand she’s going through big changes in her body but feel I need to do more to protect her siblings who r often at the other end of her rage.

she’s in the popular group at sch- but the friendship group seems completely toxic- they all seem to treat each other appallingly. Very small school and no way of changing groups.

she’s just so angry and never reflective.

any ideas as to how to get through it?

I"m sorry no advice but watching with interest as my 10 year old sadly has started doing this.

rude, aggressive, mean to siblings, swears, lazy, disrespectful

Having occasions where a teen behaves in one if these ways is not uncommon. It shouldn't be frequent enough to describe the child themself as these things tho, just discrete instances of behaviour.

The exception being that teens are inherently self absorbed. I think that's something to do with brain development.

How do u deal with it?

Model what you expect to see

Having really firm boundaries and clear lines on what's unacceptable, pulling up on those things every time. It's never going to be acceptable to be disrespectful in my house, for example. I will pull up on it every time and model, comment on and praise respectful behaviour.

But, if it's minor annoying stuff that's not important enough to breech a boundary, then I just let it slide. Don't sweat the small stuff.

The behaviour is constant- we ignored small issues initially- ‘choose your battles’ but it didn’t work. Get regularly called the c word, told to F off. We have kept it within the family for as long as poss but the behaviour is now being seen by extended family who she has also told to F off. All she says is we don’t understand her life and we prefer our other daughters. We have showered her with time and affection but she’s always a victim.

we are taking her phone from her every time she swears at us or is violent towards her siblings but it’s getting to the stage where we never seem to give it back.

this behaviour has only been the past year- of course we ignore a lot of what she says and love her regardless but it does make me sad.

All she says is we don’t understand her life and we prefer our other daughters.

Probably worth scratching under the surface of preferring her siblings - which will likely be a process that makes you feel uncomfortable as parents.

Id probably ignore any swearing as long as they aren't said to my face as direct disrespect. In other situations its just deflection or chasing the shock value.

Careful with taking the phone away for protracted time. As well as punishment losing meaning/value if overused, you will also be significantly affecting her social life. I'd be more inclined to use scales of no phone until tomorrow, rather than weeks at a time without it.

Is she regularly good, well-behaved, hard working does kind things etc? It's cheesy, but the saying "catch them being good" is important in teens. It serves to regularly remind the teen that you love and cherish the person they are underneath all the crap.