difficult child thrives on chaos - and the more trouble she can cause and the more blame she can place on us...the happier she seems to be.
So, our therapist has advised husband and I to disengage from difficult child as much as possible. If we don't fight with her, we don't give her advice, we don't give her direction of any kind...it will take some of difficult child's ammunition away from her. (And hopefully, eventually inspire difficult child to take some responsibility for herself)
So far - we have seen a definite improvement in the amount of stress, anger and general chaos in our home. So that's good.
But - difficult child still lives here. So we are acting like we are "detached" and don't care what difficult child does...BUT since she still lives here and her behaviors affect us - we are still "attached" to her...and her behaviors are still making me crazy!
STILL not showering! I'm supposed to be "detached" so I don't care - but I still have to live with the stench! difficult child stinks. Her clothing stinks. Her bedroom stinks. Her breath is enough to make a maggot pass out...BUT fiddle-dee-dee!
STILL can't do any chores around here. I asked her to get the food out of her bedroom and you'd have thought I asked her to remove a kidney. So she does nothing....so she gets no favors from me- but geezz! I'm still stuck picking up after her because all her garbage and such gets in MY way.
STILL can't do any homework (evidently she still hasn't gotten any...what an amazing school she attends!)...BUT manages to put in all kinds of time planning what she is going to wear to school. Cut up a shirt so she could look like a zombie today. Great! Good effort! Too bad a cool outfit over your filthy body STILL does not make you "cool".
--sigh--
Thank you for letting me vent. I'm not supposed to care, I guess, but it would be so much easier to be "detached" if I didn't have to look, smell and live with the issues day after day after day...
So, our therapist has advised husband and I to disengage from difficult child as much as possible. If we don't fight with her, we don't give her advice, we don't give her direction of any kind...it will take some of difficult child's ammunition away from her. (And hopefully, eventually inspire difficult child to take some responsibility for herself)
So far - we have seen a definite improvement in the amount of stress, anger and general chaos in our home. So that's good.
But - difficult child still lives here. So we are acting like we are "detached" and don't care what difficult child does...BUT since she still lives here and her behaviors affect us - we are still "attached" to her...and her behaviors are still making me crazy!
STILL not showering! I'm supposed to be "detached" so I don't care - but I still have to live with the stench! difficult child stinks. Her clothing stinks. Her bedroom stinks. Her breath is enough to make a maggot pass out...BUT fiddle-dee-dee!
STILL can't do any chores around here. I asked her to get the food out of her bedroom and you'd have thought I asked her to remove a kidney. So she does nothing....so she gets no favors from me- but geezz! I'm still stuck picking up after her because all her garbage and such gets in MY way.
STILL can't do any homework (evidently she still hasn't gotten any...what an amazing school she attends!)...BUT manages to put in all kinds of time planning what she is going to wear to school. Cut up a shirt so she could look like a zombie today. Great! Good effort! Too bad a cool outfit over your filthy body STILL does not make you "cool".
--sigh--
Thank you for letting me vent. I'm not supposed to care, I guess, but it would be so much easier to be "detached" if I didn't have to look, smell and live with the issues day after day after day...