Attention seeking dd. I don’t know how to deal with it

[Purplecookie]

My dd 13 has always been attention seeking. So much so that a number of teachers in separate schools have pointed it out to me. In primary school it was usually ‘I hurt myself look at my knee owwwww’ and she hadn’t actually hurt herself, but she’d cry about it until she gained the attention of everyone, people would roll their eyes and walk away but she kept these things up.

now we’ve entered the teen years and I’m fed up of it all. The most recent phenomenon is to stare into space and pretend she doesn’t realise she’s doing it then say ‘oh I’m sorry I didn’t realise’ in a really annoying cutesy voice. It’s clearly fake, her eyes move to see if I’m watching.

ahh I feel like an awful mum but I snapped this morning and said if you carry that on no one is going to have time for you.

this is the third time she’s done it to me since yesterday and on the way home from school she told me a story about how at school she dazed out and didn’t realise, so she’s also doing it at school I don’t know if she has done it to teachers and I’m sure I’ll find out, but it’s just annoying me so much regardless.
am I being ridiculous?

I know there are worse things in life but it feels like it’s constant ridiculous things like this that I haven’t got time for and she’s been attention seeking for so many years I had hoped she’d grow out of it. Am I doing something wrong. Can anyone advise if it’s possible to stop this behaviour?! I make efforts to talk to her every day, include her in me and dh conversations, listen to her, spend time with her and cuddle her and tell I love her everyday so I don’t know where it’s coming from.

Yanbu. She needs to be bluntly told to pack this in otherwise nobody will bother with her as an adult. I take it she doesn’t have many friends?

My DGD did the same at a similar age. We all studiously ignored it. She grew out of it.

If it helps my 13 year old niece is loving doing this stare into space thing at the minute … it’s infuriating and I’ve snapped at her! Hoping it’s a phase.
she also sometimes listens and responds then 2 secs in says she forget what we were talking about laughing. I barely speak to her at the moment!

You should take her to the GP so that they can refer for an eeg to rule out focal seizures. It's not unusual for puberty to bring on epilepsy.

I'd do one of two things, neither of which is probably in line with gentle parenting guidelines:

1. Completely ignore. If possible, walk straight out of the room immediately. If you have to be in the room, act as if you have neither noticed her staring nor heard her cutesy "apology".
2. Make out like you think it's extremely serious. Suggest calling an ambulance. Make up a terrible story about a disease that started with this and resulted in awful consequences. Put her on a strict no UPF diet, saying that you've heard that it's the UPFs causing her to "daze" out. Or no dairy, no meat- whatever her favourite food is, she can't eat it. If she says it happened at school, ask for every detail, exactly what time it started, how long it lasted, who was there. Bore her friends by asking more about what they saw. Make her keep a diary. Cancel social events and say that you had no choice as she clearly needs rest. Turn it into the biggest deal and most inconvenient thing ever.

Is it possible she might need a little bit of attention?

Pretend you are worried she’s having seizures and muse whether you should take away all devices and no TV in case they’re what’s triggering the “attacks”

Are you actually giving her any attention, as this often happens with children who don’t and negative attention is better than none.
Plan things to do with her, and if the attention seeking continues cancel the plans.

How did she react when you said no one would have time for her? That would be pretty telling.

You should take her to the GP to rule out focal / absence seizures first. When I have them, I can look at people, often even talk, but it's like there's two layers to my brain and one will be functioning while the other is not - I won't remember conversations etc.

Take her seriously; rule them out - and not in the sense of "I'm going to prove there's nothing wrong with you", build trust with her by saying "I'm worried about these episodes so you need to be checked".

If she's faking, it may be enough of a scare for her to admit it. If there's something underlying making her feel she has to act this way, it may build trust and let her open up to you about what's really causing it. If it's real, she'll remember who supported her and who didn't.

Seems like she has too much access to screens. Take away her phone / devices until her behaviour improves

Following

I'd want to be really sure she was doing this on purpose before I had a go at her. Epilepsy, ASD, probably other things can cause this staring/absence. I do it myself and it's not intentional just overwhelm. I'd rather nobody noticed than doing it for attention.

However if you're really sure, it's not wrong to be irritated by it - my teenagers irritate me every day - but I'm a firm believer that if you're going to tell her to stop an attention seeking behaviour you need to give her attention in some other way. Plus, to be blunt, saying people won't have time for her is pretty mean. In my experience teenage girls don't need another criticism to focus on and when your mum says it it really hurts! And you don't even know it's true either. Maybe ask her friends are doing it, annoying as it is. Or maybe they find it endearing.

Have you ever leaned in and given her the attention she obviously craves? If she's not getting that love and attention at home she's going to end up looking for it in all sorts of wrong places. How is she at school with friendships? Does she struggle?

I'd be really, really concerned about absence seizures. I'm amazed you're not tbh. I'd also be seriously wondering if she's ND particularly autistic, it would completely explain her behaviour and absence seizures are more common in autistic children.

It's really disturbing that everyone has just written her off as annoying and attention seeking including her own mum and not for one minute considered why she has been behaving in these way for all these years.

I really think she needs a lot of help and support tbh. I feel terrible for her.

I'd ignore the nonsense behaviour and find ways to give her attention for positive things.

Thanks. I didn’t realise it could be a real thing but I’m 99% sure it’s not, mainly because she has been attention seeking since 3yo or so and also because she watches to see if it’s working then magic’s back into her ‘trance’. I think I will mention a concerned trip to the doctors anyway to see if I can stop it that way.

Honestly I feel for anyone else going through this but I’m grateful I’m not alone. I am not one for sympathy and immediately nip this sort of thing in the bud but she carries on. I wonder if it because I have little time for it sometimes that she does it. She does it with everyone by the sounds of it though.

im really hoping she grows out of it. I thought she would have by now.

Gosh this is tough, because she's asking for love/attention and just pushing everyone away.

I've had this with my teen DDs when they were in need of more love/security, picking up the latest thing from social media, e.g. tics, stimming, gender dysphoria - all entirely conscious or sub-conscious rather than actually unconscious/real, IYSWIM.

I'd try 'love bombing' for a while and see if that helps. It's sort of the opposite of what you want to do, so you have to dig very deep.

@Goldfsh maybe. She is an only dc and me and dh spend every living minute doing something for her.
We cuddle her every day say we love her at least every hour of when we’re with her, we tell her we’re always there for her and if she doesn’t trust one of us she can always go to the other etc. that’s what’s surprising to us. I might understand if we weren’t there or not affectionate but we are.

If she's been doing it for the best part of a decade then perhaps she actually does need some more attention op, every child is different and behavioir is communication, I would be trying to find ways to make her feel more secure and seen.... did anything happen at 3yrs old that may have kicked this behaviour off?

Funny I actually think the opposite (especially from reading the OPs latest post).

😂😂😂😂😂 re 2. Like your style.

I'd resoundingly ignore the behaviour, and only give her attention (slightly more than usual) when she's not doing it.

Take it seriously - and not so you can scare her or take away things she enjoys, as someone suggested.

As a child I used to have absence seizures where my face would go slack. For years my mother yelled at me for 'pulling faces' and then denying it - I was bewildered and completely unaware of what was happening. I ended up apologising when she shouted because I concluded that my resting face must just look horrible sometimes.

If you rule out medical causes and she is just doing it for no discernible reason (to you) then just ignore it. If it's for attention she'll stop when she isn't getting it. If it's because she needs time to think or process then just let her have that. She wouldn't be apologising if you hadn't made her think it was wrong.

Well, that’s feeding the attention completely

It does sound annoying and I think I’d just try to be honest about it - that when she does it it’s grating for others and what else could she do / say to engage. Often it’s a way of not being sure where you are in the world.

It's a lot to be telling her you love her every hour of the day! I don't even do that with my baby grandchildren and they're so cute I could eat them all up!

Does she have things that actually boost her self esteem?

What doesn’t work: DD you are AMAZING and WONDERFUL and we love you so much you beautiful human.

What does work: I see you worked hard at that one thing. That aspect was difficult and I saw you try hard.

She needs difficult tasks with achievable goals and praise based on her work and commitment. What hobbies does she have? What interests? She’s missing something and you need to work out what that is. Does she have chores? Does she have meaningful relationships with other people who aren’t entirely focused on her wellbeing?