House of Tiny Tearaways - Anyone?

[Toothyboy]

Lazy old git, wasn't he?!!

didn't see it last night

what happened with Jesse's sleeping? has Harry's mum managed a smile?

I felt sorry for Amelia actually. OK, so she gets her own way, but I don't think her life is fun or particularly happy. Her parents send out really conflicting messages & are not consistent at all.

The more I watch this programme, the more convinced I am that we create our own monsters.

FIS, Jesse's sleeping is getting there, but it is still a real struggle & the dad still hasn't quite got to grips with what he should be doing. Can't work out whether the Dad is a bit thick or just doesn't really care or want to be there.
Henry's mum finally cracked a smile about the family day out to Brighton. That whole family seem so much happier. They are definitely the success story of this week!

For the first time I think Tanya is getting it wrong re Amelia. It doesn't seem to me that her mum is too lax with her, rather that she is so angry and unloving. I was surprised at Tanya giving them carte blanche to be so firm with her - what about the positive praise side of things too? A lot of the time when her mum gets cross with her she seems really control freaky - I mean, why shouldn't Amelia choose to wear socks if she wants to?

I watched this a couple of nights ago. I can't believe how vitriolic people have been on this thread and the other one about a four year old. And a very unhappy four year old at that.

I agree, elliott - whatever happened to "pick your battles"?

thanks bugsy

I do feel sorry for Amelia (and always have done). The mum really is neurotic - she seems obsessed with having the perfect child which in her eyes seems to mean that Amelia does exactly what the mother wants her to do.

But why has the saintly Tanya failed to see this? all those awful negative comments ('you're such a strange girl' repeated yesterday; and 'you've ruined everything'(!)). Come on, there's only today to get it right!
And, personally, if baby brother was messing up the game and bigger sister was getting upset, I'd probably find something else for the baby to play with...

I agre Elliott - in the one I saw there seems to be so little warmth from either of the parents. The mother was talking about constantly challenging herself and always 'setting the bar higher' - I just felt desperately sorry for her daughter who seemed to be some sort of project that had gone terribly wrong and was now very public proof that she wasn't good at everything.

Yes, I agree, the mother went on and on at her about how she always had to ruin everything, and I was muttering at the TV screen "Just stop talking at her". The mother never looks at all happy - I don't think either of them smile. And she just seems to look at Amelia with distaste.

Actually (preparing to be flamed here) I find watching this programme a really good warning to me about all sorts of bad parenting behaviour. Watching Amelia's mum's vitriolic attack made me realise how sometimes I say dreadful things to my boys when I'm angry [shamed emoticon]. HOTT always strengthens my resolve to enjoy my lovely boys more; every week there are parents who come out genuinely having fun with their children again.

missed liast nights ep... how did it all end with amelia then???

i too thought that the mum was all about 'what does it look like to other people....'... i mean who cares if the socks go with croppped trousers or not?...

tanya definitely right when she spoke about what the hell will she be like when she's a teenager of they (parents) didn't smarten up their act!... felt mother needed to relax a bit and stop nit picking and start to ignore amelia when playing up...

was dipping in and out but Amelia's mum was upset as she realised they were leaving with more problems - well more that they were aware that the eating issue was only part of the problem.

They ended with a sort of fun meal all together in the house - Amelia was almost taunting her mum with the not eating (a babybel) and at first the mother was responding to her taunts (eat the cheese, you'll normally eat cheese etc. etc.) and then the mother just stopped the comments and gave up and lo and behold, Amelia ate the cheese (while her mum and dad looked completely bemused, stressed and exhausted!).

that's a shame foxinsocks... could we say that tanya was beaten by amelia?

I thought so

It seemed to me that Tanya was actually a bit frightened of telling the parents the truth - she's normally so upfront with parents about what the problems are but with Amelia, it was almost as thought she was worried what their reaction would be.

Not sure it was Amelia who defeated Tanya as her parents. They just didn't or couldn't seem to grasp the enormity of the issues beyond the eating and how to tackle them together. Her mother's almost resentment of her daughter just set up the atmosphere for the conflict and Tanya never really got her through that.

Agree, Tanya never commented about the extreme negativity of the mother's dealings with Amelia, and she never made the parents have a real humdinger of a conversation about why the father treats Amelia like his little princess and is unable to stand together with her mum....that poor girl is going to be one of those princess-y girls who are a real pain to be with even when she is grown up....

think she took her eye off the ball with this family, our Tan....

have it waitnng on sky plus
ccatnwait

I didn't watch it all but it was quite a disappointing episode - loads of flashbacks (though you can forward through those). Although it has to be said, all the Amelia stuff is worth watching!

I wonder what happened when Amelia was told the Fairy Castle didn't come home too.Or maybe it did and we didn't get to see it.
I think she will probably have a castle full of princesses,fairies and whatever else her heart desires within a week or two anyway.Dad'll cave.

oh yes, what a shame we didn't see that - in fact, I think we saw a lot less of Amelia than we normally would have in the last episode (with any other 'problem' child) because nothing had worked

Oh I'm bereft without HoTT! When's the next series?

Think the Amelia saga was the most interesting case all series as there were so many sides to it. Too much to address in one week and especially to get through to 2 parents who just aren't used to being / admitting they're wrong.
Thought the parents were very emotionally closed as well - only saw mum cry once and she brushed hubby off when he tried to comfort her.

Fair play to Dr T though - tho she didn't target Mum's over critical style directly she told them to leave Amelia alone in general i.e. no more nagging at the table or anywhere for that matter. Very tactful and hopefully it will sink in for the parents.

I read some posts criticising HoTT the other day for just being part of the usual reality TV thing which can tend to make a mockery of the people on it. I really don't think that HoTT fits in to that category though. The families get followed up after the show, they are not made fools of during the show and the families and the viewers learn loads about effective parenting from someone who's advice is grounded in proper qualified clinical experience. That's my two pennys worth!

I don't know if Amelia's mum will be able to bear the shame of having such a brat and the whole world seeing and blaming her though. And actually I felt dreadfully sorry for her- think the negative "strange child" type comments were an end of the tether thing mostly. I think Tanya only partially got the story right this time. The heart of this one is skewed power within the family fueled by relationship problems, imo. The dad supports Amelia over the mum and the mum resents and feels heartbroken about that and fights against it, understandably, which lends vitriol and desperation to her tone when she disciplines Amelia, which causes Amelia to behave ever more appallingly only for Dad to take her part and the cycle to continue ever onwards. If the parents were able to strengthen their relationship the cycle would be broken, imo. Hope they can but I reckon this one might end in the divorce courts. Felt bad for the child because she was EXTREMELY difficult to like.

I agree that poor Amelia is messed up because of her parents. She is just four yrs old and admittedly not likeable but it has obviously all gone wrong from the start for her. Her parents have so many of their own issues which they are not willing to delve into and I think they need to explore their own reactions to her.

In most cases the truth has been that problem behaviour from kids is entirely down to the parents and this case is no different.

Good point SM. However I think the fact that we're talking about the Amelia family so much is because it was the most unresolved case. At the end of each week most families come out of it looking good - they've seen where they've been going wrong and want to fix it and power to them - no need for them to be emabarassed at all by being on TV.

The Amelia family did not see to want to face up to their problems, as Saadia said.
They must have known what they were letting themselves in for and that Dr T always goes for the family 'story' behind the kids problem.

I think that the problem lies in that Mum was Dad's princess until Amelia came along and Mum resents being usurped. There were examples of this on the show, as SM says. But Mum is the adult in this situation and Amelia is the child so Mum's comments to Amelia were still out of order I think, despite her understandable desperation.

I've been thinking about this and I believe that when Tanya advised them to "leave Amelia alone" it was actually a way of saying that they are not yet able to deal with it and anything they do could make things worse.

Also, while I think the father is at fault for pandering to her, that in itself is not enough to make a child so obnoxious (for want of a better word). IMO the real problem is the lack of a strong mother/child bond.