I am really fried. I found this site on Monday, and have been crying ever since. I believe it is because it is obvious that difficult child is not right, and the realization that there are others like her. Everyone suggested a 6 hour exam but at this point we can not afford that. I have went through bouts of guilt because of how angry she makes me. She again has been caught stealing things during the night from the kitchen. The lying is going to kill me. It is extremelly hard because it is my job to catch people lying, stealing, breaking the law...and I am good at it. However, her behavior is influencing my job. How can I keep society safe if I am unable to handle my own home. The most frightening thing is I am so angry, and hurt that I am unable to show her positive attention or love. I do love her, and have urges to hug her and never let go. However she is not a hug person, and she usually opens her mouth and ruins the moment. I can not get close to her, because I know she will lie to me in the next breath. I am terribly ashamed to admit these things, but I have no one to actually talk to. difficult child read what I wrote, as I bawl my eyes out..yet she feels nothing. I told husband today that I was leaving, and he could have the children. I can not take one more thing.
Does it EVER END!
- Thread starter Heartsick
- Start date
I can totally relate. I am very angry too. All the time, and I feel like it is a reflection on ME the way difficult child acts. I don't know what to tell you about the showing the love part. It's hard, especially when you don't feel it.
Are you really going to leave, or is that just your way of blowing off steam?
Are you really going to leave, or is that just your way of blowing off steam?
I am truely so broken, I am looking for somewhere for me to go, or for her to go. I do not have mental health issues, but right now, I just can not take anymore. I feel like I am on a tight tight rope. She just spent forever screaming at me, red faced, and making herself shake like a crazy person. I can not watch, can not hear, anymore.
DammitJanet
Well-Known Member
Hi....Welcome to the board. I am so sorry you had to find us.
I can understand your feelings of rage and helplessness with your daughter. I used to work in social services and I had a kid who was running me ragged...lol. Also as hard as it is to believe...I have one kid who is in law enforcement and one who has perfected breaking the law...sigh. Whats a mother to do?
You dont have to get the whole neuropsychologist exam done first. If that just isnt possible right now you can take other steps. Call your local county mental health and ask about getting her seen through them. That is usually a good first step if money is tight. Is she on insurance or state health insurance? Someone from mental health can probably help you with that.
I know what its like to not like your kid very much. It really hurts us inside to feel that way but you can learn ways to help her so it will reduce the stress on you.
Keep coming here and I hope we can help you!
I can understand your feelings of rage and helplessness with your daughter. I used to work in social services and I had a kid who was running me ragged...lol. Also as hard as it is to believe...I have one kid who is in law enforcement and one who has perfected breaking the law...sigh. Whats a mother to do?
You dont have to get the whole neuropsychologist exam done first. If that just isnt possible right now you can take other steps. Call your local county mental health and ask about getting her seen through them. That is usually a good first step if money is tight. Is she on insurance or state health insurance? Someone from mental health can probably help you with that.
I know what its like to not like your kid very much. It really hurts us inside to feel that way but you can learn ways to help her so it will reduce the stress on you.
Keep coming here and I hope we can help you!
KTMom91
Well-Known Member
Hi and welcome. I think we've all been in that place of not liking our kids. It's so hard to want to be around someone who keeps telling you how much they hate you. been there done that.
Are you able to get away, even for a weekend? Find a little bit of time just for you?
Are you able to get away, even for a weekend? Find a little bit of time just for you?
BusynMember
Well-Known Member
Hi there.
I could be wrong, because I certainly am not a neuropsychologist, but it sounds to me like she has some red flags for high functioning autism. Are you on Medicaid? If so, university hopsitals have NeuroPsychs and most of them take Medicaid.
If you don't somehow find a way to evaluate her, you will not be able to know what is wrong with her or to treat it with interventions. Please--try to find a way. She isn't a bad kid or a budding criminal (yet). She has some disorder and her brain is wired differently. You really do need to find out what's going on and how you (and maybe the school and community) can intervene and help her be the best she can be. in my opinion, a regular therapist won't be enough--they are not good diagnosticians anyway. Good luck!
I could be wrong, because I certainly am not a neuropsychologist, but it sounds to me like she has some red flags for high functioning autism. Are you on Medicaid? If so, university hopsitals have NeuroPsychs and most of them take Medicaid.
If you don't somehow find a way to evaluate her, you will not be able to know what is wrong with her or to treat it with interventions. Please--try to find a way. She isn't a bad kid or a budding criminal (yet). She has some disorder and her brain is wired differently. You really do need to find out what's going on and how you (and maybe the school and community) can intervene and help her be the best she can be. in my opinion, a regular therapist won't be enough--they are not good diagnosticians anyway. Good luck!
Marguerite
Active Member
Welcome.
While it is a good idea to get as comprehensive a test done as soon as you can, sometimes I do accept it's just out of reach. However, you do what you can when you can, make the best of what you can and in the meantime keep an open mind. Read up on everything, find out what resources you can plug into to make your life easier and give you answers.
I have a few thoughts and some questions for you.
First, you mention that in your job you have to keep society safe. This tells me that you are used to working in a controlling, authoritarian role (more so than most of us). I'm thinking that this could be a big part of the problem.
Not the cause, note. Certainly not that. There are undoubtedly many people with your job who have perfect children. But if you have a difficult child, especially one who has her own strong need to assert some control over her own environment, then what you get will be very much like what you describe. There can be many reasons why a child tries to control their environment. Often as parents, we react to this in achild by doing our utmost to prevent the child from having control - as if the child wanting control has to automatically be bad for them, as if it's the same as the child wanting free reign over the cookie jar.
But it's not the same thing. It's important to work out why this is happening, so your response can be more suited to the situation.
I'll give you some examples.
A child with poor impulse control is a kid who will chase a ball out into the street without even looking to see if there's a truck coming. Add to the mix a child who only sees the world from their point of view, who simply cannot recognise that other people may think differently, have different opinions or perhaps not be able to automatically know what the child wants, then add in a high level of frustration with everything that simply doesn't 'behave' as the child expects - you have a child who will feel much more comfortable if they can make teir world more predictable.
Next scenario - anxiety. When the child's mind is a constant stream of mental "what if's" of unpredictability, when meeting new people is a challenge because those people may do something or say something that could be upsetting or frightening, or make the child angry; when there are so many rules to follow that seem impossible, when keeping those rules is so difficult to keep track of and to remember, when they seem to get punished and can't remember why that the very fear of punishment makes them stumble even more over the right thing to do - then you have a child with a need to assert some control, in order to reduce the need for anxiety. Certainty becomes reliability, which becomes a reduction in anxiety.
There can be many reasons. But if we, as parents, approach this by clamping down on the child's freedom of choice where it probably really wouldn't matter to us, then we are going to have bigger fights in areas where it DOES matter to us.
That doesn't mean that the asnwer has to be anarchy - far from it. But there are ways of allowing the child to have control, while still holding the leash yourself.
Something I've found with difficult child 3 (and to acertain extent, his older sister) is a lack of 'relativity'. In his mind, everybody is equal. We might see this as a good thing in a world where discrimination is considered bad, but the down side of this is, he treats everybody the same - teachers, parents, babies, classmates, strangers, family. It's not a policy of his, it's simply how he thinks and how he beleives other people think. He sees other people thinking with the same thoughts and capabilities as he does. If he merely THINKS "I am thirsty," then in his mind, everyone around him should know this because HE knows it. Our failure to respond to tis is therefore, in his mind, our deliberate neglect of this need of his which MUST be met.
He treats other people as they treat him. This has meant that when an adult is kind and polite to him, he will be kind and polite back. If an adult is condescending to him, he will be condescending in return. And if (as happened frequently) a teacher shouts at him and is sarcastic, he will be sarcastic and shout at the teacher.
I remember when easy child 2/difficult child 2 was 3 years old, she was already badgering me to meet her every whim and I was exhausted. We also had a rule - drink a glass of water in between every glass of juice. She asked me for a second cup of juice, I poured her water (as per our house rule). She stood there, hands on hips, then shouted at me, "I said I wanted JUICE! Why don't you ever listen?" She didn't quite slam her fist onto the table. What she was doing was dishing back to me, what I had said/done to her in my method of discipline. Trying to explain that "Do as I say, not as I do," was how to behave just wasn't going to go down well, I felt. From then on I chose to moderate how I handled her.
Trying to change these patterns was not easy and we still struggle at times. husband can be (has been) a strict authoritarian, having been brought up with "Do not answer back to your parents," and suddenly finding he has fathered a Changeling who breaks all these rules. Because our intial approach was to try to control tightly, we had more problems. Because husband was the parent more absent (due to long working hours) his interactions with difficult child 3 have historically been more during difficult times of day, and at times when husband himself has been less tolerant of difficult child 3 because he himself was so tired. And now we've made changes, the wheels still fall off occasionally with difficult child 3 getting angry at his dad for "being unreasonable" when frankly, difficult child 3 has been really annoying.
But kids like this are not being annoying on purpose. We have to hold on to this. It does depend on what the problem is, sometimes a kid CAN choose to be a pain, but generally there are good reasons (food reasons to the kid) which, if we can work them out, give us a chink in the armour through which to aim our parental arrows.
A book which helps a lot of us, and certainly helped us find a better way to manage difficult child 3 with far fewer battles, is "The Explosive Child" by Ross Greene. There is some discussion of this in the Early Childhood forum, because the book seems to work better for older kids but some of us discussed how to modify it to the younger child. It can be done. It made our family's life MUCH easier!
Now some questions - you say your child lies a lot. How do you know your child is lying? What kind of lies does she tell? The answer can be very revealing.
One final point - ALL kids lie. All people lie. The main reason for lying, is to get out of trouble (if the person perceives that telling the truth will cause them trouble). There may not be a real need to lie, but it comes down to perception. These sort of lies, although still unacceptable, are understandable. Fairly normal. "The dog ate my homework."
The worrying lies are the ones where the person is trying to make themselves seem better, more important, more capable, to give them some advantage. "Yes, Mummy, I did my homework. I handed it in and the teacher gave me an A. Now can I have my treat that you promised?"
Another thing to describe about a lie - how complex is it? Is the child telling a whopper, an intricate alternative to the truth ("I didn't trip Johnny up, he was walking along all by himself and he fell over a tree root which happened to be in the path. My foot was nowhere nearly in his way, Jack said he saw me trip Johnny but Jack must be lying because he was still talking to Mr Brown in the school hall when Johnny fell"), or is the child simply saying, "I didn't do it?"
Something else to consider - if you know the child is lying, is there still a faint possibility than an intricate lie might just happen to be the truth?
An example back from my kids again - difficult child 3 was diangosed as autistic from the age of 3 (a bit younger). As we learned we were told that autistic kids can't tell lies. Then in 3rd grade difficult child 3's teacher said to me firmly, "He lied to me."
I was horrified, then disbelieving. But the story panned out. The teacher was determined to make me accept that autistic kids CAN lie and that we couldn't rely on this as a safeguard.
The story turned out to be more complex, however. difficult child 3, when questioned by the teacher, "Did you hit Justin?" had replied almost automatically, "No, I didn't."
Then the teacher said to difficult child 3, "But I saw you, I saw you hit Justin."
difficult child 3 persisted trying to deny it until he finally accepted the teacher wasn't bluffing, then finally said, "OK, I hit Justin."
The interesting thing, however - difficult child 3 was denying (which was alie) but was still not capable of inventing a complex alternative to the truth. He also wasn't very capable of even telling much detail of what WAS true. Complicating the picture at this time was the teacher himself, who would have his own preconceived idea of the event and who would then prejudice the question. "I saw you hit Justin, you had no reason to hit him, did you?" when in fact Justin had shoved difficult child 3 first and had been calling him names (as reported to us by another kid at a later time).
Some months later difficult child 3 came home with bloodied knees. "I got tripped up by Justin and his friends," difficult child 3 told me as I cleaned him up. difficult child 3's friend spoke to me quietly afterwards (when difficult child 3 was absent) and said, "Justin and his friends were calling difficult child 3 names again and chasing him, then Justin pushed him over on the big rock then they all ran away. The teachers didn't see andwouldn't believe us."
I wrote a note to the teacher.
Next day difficult child 3 came home with a sealed note form the teacher which said, "I've explained the situation to difficult child 3, that he was mistaken about other boys pushing him over; he just tripped over his own feet, a whole group of boys saw it and they all testified to the same thing."
difficult child 3 was puzzled. "I really thought Justin had tripped me, but Mr K explained that because of my autism, I sometimes misunderstand and my senses play tricks on me."
difficult child 3's friend just stood there and looked at me. When difficult child 3 was out of the room I said, "What happened?"
Friend said, "I don't want to talk about it. Every time I talk about it, I get into trouble and I'm told I must stop lying. I don't want trouble from Mr K or from Justin and his friends."
Lying is a complex business. Not everyone can do it well.
Similarly, truth is a tricky business and even when a person tells the truth, they can get disbelieved, or it may be an incomplete truth (for many reasons). And a child who wants to please a teacher can be confused and convinced to disbelieve the evidence of his own senses.
Heartsick, you sound like you're stressed incredibly. Is there any way you can get a break for a day or two? Someone you can go stay with? Even for an afternoon?
We do have techniques that many of us have developed to help us cope. Not just the ones I mentioned in the book, but other things like being super-organised in the evenings so you have a routine that is fairly easy for everyone to follow; being flexible with the child and allowing the child some time to transition from whatever they're doing to whatever you want them to do; having everything prepared ahead of time as much as possible (ie feeding tired kids early, get them to bed early). I used to find that tired, hungry kids were much more difficult to manage. And a tantrumming kid can often be soothed by putting them in a hot lavender-scented bubble bath. Even if you think "they don't deserve it," this isn't about what the kid deserves, it's about what will get the kid one step closer to bed PLUS calmed down.
Anyway, it's just a start. We pool ideas here, they can help. Somewhere on this site will be a parent of a child like yours. maybe many parents.
Marg
While it is a good idea to get as comprehensive a test done as soon as you can, sometimes I do accept it's just out of reach. However, you do what you can when you can, make the best of what you can and in the meantime keep an open mind. Read up on everything, find out what resources you can plug into to make your life easier and give you answers.
I have a few thoughts and some questions for you.
First, you mention that in your job you have to keep society safe. This tells me that you are used to working in a controlling, authoritarian role (more so than most of us). I'm thinking that this could be a big part of the problem.
Not the cause, note. Certainly not that. There are undoubtedly many people with your job who have perfect children. But if you have a difficult child, especially one who has her own strong need to assert some control over her own environment, then what you get will be very much like what you describe. There can be many reasons why a child tries to control their environment. Often as parents, we react to this in achild by doing our utmost to prevent the child from having control - as if the child wanting control has to automatically be bad for them, as if it's the same as the child wanting free reign over the cookie jar.
But it's not the same thing. It's important to work out why this is happening, so your response can be more suited to the situation.
I'll give you some examples.
A child with poor impulse control is a kid who will chase a ball out into the street without even looking to see if there's a truck coming. Add to the mix a child who only sees the world from their point of view, who simply cannot recognise that other people may think differently, have different opinions or perhaps not be able to automatically know what the child wants, then add in a high level of frustration with everything that simply doesn't 'behave' as the child expects - you have a child who will feel much more comfortable if they can make teir world more predictable.
Next scenario - anxiety. When the child's mind is a constant stream of mental "what if's" of unpredictability, when meeting new people is a challenge because those people may do something or say something that could be upsetting or frightening, or make the child angry; when there are so many rules to follow that seem impossible, when keeping those rules is so difficult to keep track of and to remember, when they seem to get punished and can't remember why that the very fear of punishment makes them stumble even more over the right thing to do - then you have a child with a need to assert some control, in order to reduce the need for anxiety. Certainty becomes reliability, which becomes a reduction in anxiety.
There can be many reasons. But if we, as parents, approach this by clamping down on the child's freedom of choice where it probably really wouldn't matter to us, then we are going to have bigger fights in areas where it DOES matter to us.
That doesn't mean that the asnwer has to be anarchy - far from it. But there are ways of allowing the child to have control, while still holding the leash yourself.
Something I've found with difficult child 3 (and to acertain extent, his older sister) is a lack of 'relativity'. In his mind, everybody is equal. We might see this as a good thing in a world where discrimination is considered bad, but the down side of this is, he treats everybody the same - teachers, parents, babies, classmates, strangers, family. It's not a policy of his, it's simply how he thinks and how he beleives other people think. He sees other people thinking with the same thoughts and capabilities as he does. If he merely THINKS "I am thirsty," then in his mind, everyone around him should know this because HE knows it. Our failure to respond to tis is therefore, in his mind, our deliberate neglect of this need of his which MUST be met.
He treats other people as they treat him. This has meant that when an adult is kind and polite to him, he will be kind and polite back. If an adult is condescending to him, he will be condescending in return. And if (as happened frequently) a teacher shouts at him and is sarcastic, he will be sarcastic and shout at the teacher.
I remember when easy child 2/difficult child 2 was 3 years old, she was already badgering me to meet her every whim and I was exhausted. We also had a rule - drink a glass of water in between every glass of juice. She asked me for a second cup of juice, I poured her water (as per our house rule). She stood there, hands on hips, then shouted at me, "I said I wanted JUICE! Why don't you ever listen?" She didn't quite slam her fist onto the table. What she was doing was dishing back to me, what I had said/done to her in my method of discipline. Trying to explain that "Do as I say, not as I do," was how to behave just wasn't going to go down well, I felt. From then on I chose to moderate how I handled her.
Trying to change these patterns was not easy and we still struggle at times. husband can be (has been) a strict authoritarian, having been brought up with "Do not answer back to your parents," and suddenly finding he has fathered a Changeling who breaks all these rules. Because our intial approach was to try to control tightly, we had more problems. Because husband was the parent more absent (due to long working hours) his interactions with difficult child 3 have historically been more during difficult times of day, and at times when husband himself has been less tolerant of difficult child 3 because he himself was so tired. And now we've made changes, the wheels still fall off occasionally with difficult child 3 getting angry at his dad for "being unreasonable" when frankly, difficult child 3 has been really annoying.
But kids like this are not being annoying on purpose. We have to hold on to this. It does depend on what the problem is, sometimes a kid CAN choose to be a pain, but generally there are good reasons (food reasons to the kid) which, if we can work them out, give us a chink in the armour through which to aim our parental arrows.
A book which helps a lot of us, and certainly helped us find a better way to manage difficult child 3 with far fewer battles, is "The Explosive Child" by Ross Greene. There is some discussion of this in the Early Childhood forum, because the book seems to work better for older kids but some of us discussed how to modify it to the younger child. It can be done. It made our family's life MUCH easier!
Now some questions - you say your child lies a lot. How do you know your child is lying? What kind of lies does she tell? The answer can be very revealing.
One final point - ALL kids lie. All people lie. The main reason for lying, is to get out of trouble (if the person perceives that telling the truth will cause them trouble). There may not be a real need to lie, but it comes down to perception. These sort of lies, although still unacceptable, are understandable. Fairly normal. "The dog ate my homework."
The worrying lies are the ones where the person is trying to make themselves seem better, more important, more capable, to give them some advantage. "Yes, Mummy, I did my homework. I handed it in and the teacher gave me an A. Now can I have my treat that you promised?"
Another thing to describe about a lie - how complex is it? Is the child telling a whopper, an intricate alternative to the truth ("I didn't trip Johnny up, he was walking along all by himself and he fell over a tree root which happened to be in the path. My foot was nowhere nearly in his way, Jack said he saw me trip Johnny but Jack must be lying because he was still talking to Mr Brown in the school hall when Johnny fell"), or is the child simply saying, "I didn't do it?"
Something else to consider - if you know the child is lying, is there still a faint possibility than an intricate lie might just happen to be the truth?
An example back from my kids again - difficult child 3 was diangosed as autistic from the age of 3 (a bit younger). As we learned we were told that autistic kids can't tell lies. Then in 3rd grade difficult child 3's teacher said to me firmly, "He lied to me."
I was horrified, then disbelieving. But the story panned out. The teacher was determined to make me accept that autistic kids CAN lie and that we couldn't rely on this as a safeguard.
The story turned out to be more complex, however. difficult child 3, when questioned by the teacher, "Did you hit Justin?" had replied almost automatically, "No, I didn't."
Then the teacher said to difficult child 3, "But I saw you, I saw you hit Justin."
difficult child 3 persisted trying to deny it until he finally accepted the teacher wasn't bluffing, then finally said, "OK, I hit Justin."
The interesting thing, however - difficult child 3 was denying (which was alie) but was still not capable of inventing a complex alternative to the truth. He also wasn't very capable of even telling much detail of what WAS true. Complicating the picture at this time was the teacher himself, who would have his own preconceived idea of the event and who would then prejudice the question. "I saw you hit Justin, you had no reason to hit him, did you?" when in fact Justin had shoved difficult child 3 first and had been calling him names (as reported to us by another kid at a later time).
Some months later difficult child 3 came home with bloodied knees. "I got tripped up by Justin and his friends," difficult child 3 told me as I cleaned him up. difficult child 3's friend spoke to me quietly afterwards (when difficult child 3 was absent) and said, "Justin and his friends were calling difficult child 3 names again and chasing him, then Justin pushed him over on the big rock then they all ran away. The teachers didn't see andwouldn't believe us."
I wrote a note to the teacher.
Next day difficult child 3 came home with a sealed note form the teacher which said, "I've explained the situation to difficult child 3, that he was mistaken about other boys pushing him over; he just tripped over his own feet, a whole group of boys saw it and they all testified to the same thing."
difficult child 3 was puzzled. "I really thought Justin had tripped me, but Mr K explained that because of my autism, I sometimes misunderstand and my senses play tricks on me."
difficult child 3's friend just stood there and looked at me. When difficult child 3 was out of the room I said, "What happened?"
Friend said, "I don't want to talk about it. Every time I talk about it, I get into trouble and I'm told I must stop lying. I don't want trouble from Mr K or from Justin and his friends."
Lying is a complex business. Not everyone can do it well.
Similarly, truth is a tricky business and even when a person tells the truth, they can get disbelieved, or it may be an incomplete truth (for many reasons). And a child who wants to please a teacher can be confused and convinced to disbelieve the evidence of his own senses.
Heartsick, you sound like you're stressed incredibly. Is there any way you can get a break for a day or two? Someone you can go stay with? Even for an afternoon?
We do have techniques that many of us have developed to help us cope. Not just the ones I mentioned in the book, but other things like being super-organised in the evenings so you have a routine that is fairly easy for everyone to follow; being flexible with the child and allowing the child some time to transition from whatever they're doing to whatever you want them to do; having everything prepared ahead of time as much as possible (ie feeding tired kids early, get them to bed early). I used to find that tired, hungry kids were much more difficult to manage. And a tantrumming kid can often be soothed by putting them in a hot lavender-scented bubble bath. Even if you think "they don't deserve it," this isn't about what the kid deserves, it's about what will get the kid one step closer to bed PLUS calmed down.
Anyway, it's just a start. We pool ideas here, they can help. Somewhere on this site will be a parent of a child like yours. maybe many parents.
Marg
WOW, thank you everyone. There were many comments, which i read. I need to print them so I can digest them. My job as an investigator for the state is stressfull, and I must maintain control of every thing, I am sure it leaks into my home life. I do have health insurance, but I am unsure what it covers. To be honest, I am not sure I can face what the mental health people say. But on the other side, when difficult child goes into freak out stage, it kills me to watch and not be able to "control" it. I am waiting for the book The explosive Child. As far as the lying, difficult child will reach out and shove easy child and deny ever touching her. She will load the dishwasher without rincing them, and swear up and down that she did rince them, and be completly baffled as to how the food reappeared on them. I will reread the previous post. It is my job to determine through observation, and questioning if a person is lying. With difficult child she is a dead give away. When she lies and I catch her, she instantly becomes angry, shrill yelling, explosive anger. I can lower my voice to a very not threatening tone, and she reacts wih an explosion. When I yell, I get the same reaction. I do need to get away, when I am not in the field, I work alot from home, when I need to be in the office, difficult child and easy child go with me. I am unable to separate work from home. Thanks I will read more.
nvts
Active Member
Heartsick! So sorry to hear what you're going through. If you work for the state, you most likely have coverage for a neuropsychologist.
Listen: guilt is a useless emotion unless you're using it on someone else to get what you want!
Everyone hates their kid every once and a while. Even "non-difficult child" parents. It's human nature if you think about it. Kids are a mish-mash of both sets of chromosomes - why wouldn't they also include some of the things about both parents that we hate? Relax! You're in VERY common company here. There are days I can't stand to hear them talk - other times I LOVE to have them around. Don't let society decide you're a mean mom!
For what it's worth - have her examined - I know in another post you said that you didn't think you could take it, but let me ask you this: Would you rather sit and wonder if you stink as a parent or would you rather find out that there's something chemically, developmentally or physical that could be causing this? If you choose #2, you can get help. If you choose #1, you're stuck in this circle of beating yourself up.
Please come often and post whenever you need! We're here for each other and no one defines you as an Ogre for feeling what you feel - they're just feelings - nothing more - nothing less!
Welcome to a great crowd! They helped me tremendously here!
Beth
Listen: guilt is a useless emotion unless you're using it on someone else to get what you want!
Everyone hates their kid every once and a while. Even "non-difficult child" parents. It's human nature if you think about it. Kids are a mish-mash of both sets of chromosomes - why wouldn't they also include some of the things about both parents that we hate? Relax! You're in VERY common company here. There are days I can't stand to hear them talk - other times I LOVE to have them around. Don't let society decide you're a mean mom!
For what it's worth - have her examined - I know in another post you said that you didn't think you could take it, but let me ask you this: Would you rather sit and wonder if you stink as a parent or would you rather find out that there's something chemically, developmentally or physical that could be causing this? If you choose #2, you can get help. If you choose #1, you're stuck in this circle of beating yourself up.
Please come often and post whenever you need! We're here for each other and no one defines you as an Ogre for feeling what you feel - they're just feelings - nothing more - nothing less!
Welcome to a great crowd! They helped me tremendously here!
Beth
BusynMember
Well-Known Member
If you have health insurance, you can probably get a neuropsychologist evaluation. In the opinions of many of us, that is the best evaluation process that exists, since there are no blood tests. The testing is quite intensive.
THe alternative to not "hearing it" is to have the child get progressively worse. NO, it is unlikely she will just "get with the program." Something is off with her and she needs evaluation, intervention and treatment. If you wait, you may be facing school failure, the police, drugs, and far worse things than a ten year old can think of to do. Lying is a symptom, not the problem. You don't want or need an out-of-control teen, and she's getting to that age.
It is hard to be objective about our own kids. I would still seek out that neuropsychologist. You may need to ask the pediatrician for a referral, but I'd do it.
THe alternative to not "hearing it" is to have the child get progressively worse. NO, it is unlikely she will just "get with the program." Something is off with her and she needs evaluation, intervention and treatment. If you wait, you may be facing school failure, the police, drugs, and far worse things than a ten year old can think of to do. Lying is a symptom, not the problem. You don't want or need an out-of-control teen, and she's getting to that age.
It is hard to be objective about our own kids. I would still seek out that neuropsychologist. You may need to ask the pediatrician for a referral, but I'd do it.
tiredmommy
Well-Known Member
{{{Heartsick}}} Sometimes, children will lie (some lie a lot). There are many reasons for this including needing to save face when caught doing something the know they shouldn't do but they can't control themselves.
I think I'm more concerned about your stress level. Does your work offer a confidential employee assistance program? I think you might benefit from talking face-to-face to someone that will help you work through all the emotions you are feeling.
Having kids like ours can bring you to your knees. Everything we've been taught about parenting doesn't apply to our kids and often our confidence is shot. It doesn't seem like it right now but virtually every member of this forum has felt like you do. The important thing to remember is that when you feel angry or frustrated is that your difficult child most likely can't control all her behaviors.
I know it seems hopeless right now but things can improve. {{{Hugs}}}
I think I'm more concerned about your stress level. Does your work offer a confidential employee assistance program? I think you might benefit from talking face-to-face to someone that will help you work through all the emotions you are feeling.
Having kids like ours can bring you to your knees. Everything we've been taught about parenting doesn't apply to our kids and often our confidence is shot. It doesn't seem like it right now but virtually every member of this forum has felt like you do. The important thing to remember is that when you feel angry or frustrated is that your difficult child most likely can't control all her behaviors.
I know it seems hopeless right now but things can improve. {{{Hugs}}}
Marguerite
Active Member
Thanks for the responses, Heartsick. It does fit with wat I thought - she IS bad at lying and the majority of her lies are "normal" ones, also simple ones. Nothing complex is invented (probably because hse is bad at lying and can't invent a really effective lie).
I hear you about not being able to separate work and home. The example I gave of easy child 2/difficult child 2 shouting at me with hands on hips - at the time I was working as a counsellor (over the phone fmor home) and one particular client rang me often several times a day and was VERY unstable; I would hear the same tone of voice from her and then get off the phone to hear it again from my baby; I had to finally hand off the client and tell her I couldn't take her calls any more. I finally began screening my calls and the organisation I worked for (which normally wouldn't allow this) fully endorsed these steps in my case. Not because easy child 2/difficult child 2 was a problem - at the time we hadn't recognised any difficult child-ness. But because the client was causing me so much stress.
So I'm wondering - your job sounds stressful, maybe more at some times than others, and this stress is coming home with you and hacing a negative impact on your relationships within the household.
That's not to say you haven't also got a difficult child - but it's an odd thing, if the parent is stressed then often an otherwise socially unresponsive difficult child will 'pick up' on parental stress because it makes the child MORE anxious and this in turn makes their behaviour worse. You then get a downward negative spiral, a vicious circle.
To break that circle, the first thing you need is space. Even if it's only for an hour or so. Learn to walk away, walk right out of the house if you need to and go outside for a breath of fresh air. Use this time to mentally assess your own stress levels and where that stress is coming from. It won't all be work; it won't all be home. KNowing yourself makes it easier to deal with what you DON'T know. (You do sound a lot like me, in how your mind works - I'm a very mentally organised, pragmatic person).
The next thing you need is to get inside your kid's head. Don't let the lies be your focus - as has been said, they are a symptom. Your child lies because she is afraid of the consequences, she did the wrong thing because she didn't think and now she fears punishment. She gets anxious when she lies because she knows she is bad at it and will get caught, so it doesn't matter how you deal with this, simply discovering she is lying causes her to get upset and angry. Please be aware - a lot of her anger, however it is expressed, is directed towards herself.
Which brings me to self-esteem. hers is probably rock-bottom. Yours isn't good right now, either, because you're used to coping. So you BOTH need to turn this around. The best thing I can suggest, is to find something she likes to do that you can join in with. Keep it to very short sessions to begin with because it MUST begin and end on a positive note. At first just do this for no reason, "just because". You both need to see each other in a favourable, happy light. This should reduce the hostility that is forming almost instantly when either one of you interacts with the other.
Similarly, if you can set up situations where the sisters can play together in the same way, that would be good.
But with your girls - make quality times with each, individually. Try to keep that child your whole focus for that time.
It need only be five minutes, ten minutes, even half an hour. But not so long that either of you finds it tedious.
The sort of things you can do - go for a walk together. Play a computer game together (difficult child 3 recommends "Mario Party" games. So do I). Read a book to them (difficult child 3 likes to read the dialogue, putting on different character voices - but only because that is what I used to do). Bake a cake together, or decorate cupcakes. Or if you haven't got time/energy/talent to bake, decorate marshmallows as if they're cupcakes!
Ask each girl what they would like to do, let them set the pace.
We cannot diagnose on this board. Even if I were a fully qualified neuropsychologist with decades of experience, I wouldn't be able to tell you what your daughter has. However, purely as a parent, I will say - nothing you have said so far leads me to rule out Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD). There are still other possibilities. But Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) in some form, possibly Asperger's Syndrome, would in my book be a fairly high priority for consideration. For more thoughts on this, and for you to do a bit of study on your own, go to www.childbrain.com and look for their online Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) questionnaire. It also cannot be used to diagnose, but you CAN print out the results (even if they score her as normal) and take them to an appointment for her, to let the doctor see where your concerns are running.
This possibility is not necessarily bad news, either. Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids tend to be highly intelligent. Also VERY law-abiding. The only problem here is that it tends to be the laws as THEY analyse them to be. For example, the school rule for difficult child 3 was "Do not hit other students."
But in his experience, other kids hit him all the time and the teachers did nothing. But if difficult child 3 hit back, he either was seen by a teacher or the other kids told the teacher and difficult child 3 got into trouble. yet if he told the teacher that another kid had hit him, the teachers did nothing.
So the rules, in difficult child 3's mind, became, "difficult child 3 may not hit other students because he will get into trouble. But other students may hit difficult child 3, unless there is a teacher actually watching."
The rule then morphed into "difficult child 3 gets hit because he is not a good person. Therefore difficult child 3 deserves to be hit and punished, purely because he is who he is. difficult child 3 has to just live with this, retaliation will be punished."
So you see that being law-abiding is still more complex. But once achild is into a routine and has taken the rules to heart, you will find a deeper honesty about that individual, despite an early history of the sort of lies you describe.
In our home - our kids finally stopped lying (so much) because they realised:
1) They are bad at lying, they WILL get caught out.
2) There is no problem about speaking the truth; if they did the wrong thing but are truthful about it, they will not be punished. However, they will have to help fix what they did wrong - but tat goes for all the time anyway, because if there is a mess someone always has to clean it up. Better it should be the person who made the mess.
3) It feels better to speak the truth. even a small lie makes the child feel really awful and the feeling is a natural deterrent. USe this, build on it. If you catch your child out lying and she rages, wait until she calms down then give her a hug (if you can) or in some way reassure her that you still love her (not easy right now!) and say, "You felt awful when you lied. You aren't good at lying, it makes you feel bad. I don't like it when you feel bad, it makes me sad for you. I do understand you forget to do the right thing sometimes - we all forget sometimes. It's OK to admit if you forgot to rinse the plates, or you lied about pushing your sister. Sisters (and brothers) do push and shove at times even though parents don't like it. But although it's the pushing I don't like, that doesn't mean I don't like YOU."
Keep reinforcing that you love her, that if she lies you WILL know but if she tells the truth you will just move on. She is lying because she is anxious and afraid, but it's a double-whammy because lying increases her anxiety. In time, with support (not easy) she should learn that telling the truth is the easiest path, that it feels better.
There is so much more, and a lot of it is good stuff. However, I don't wnat to overwhelm you right now.
Marg
I hear you about not being able to separate work and home. The example I gave of easy child 2/difficult child 2 shouting at me with hands on hips - at the time I was working as a counsellor (over the phone fmor home) and one particular client rang me often several times a day and was VERY unstable; I would hear the same tone of voice from her and then get off the phone to hear it again from my baby; I had to finally hand off the client and tell her I couldn't take her calls any more. I finally began screening my calls and the organisation I worked for (which normally wouldn't allow this) fully endorsed these steps in my case. Not because easy child 2/difficult child 2 was a problem - at the time we hadn't recognised any difficult child-ness. But because the client was causing me so much stress.
So I'm wondering - your job sounds stressful, maybe more at some times than others, and this stress is coming home with you and hacing a negative impact on your relationships within the household.
That's not to say you haven't also got a difficult child - but it's an odd thing, if the parent is stressed then often an otherwise socially unresponsive difficult child will 'pick up' on parental stress because it makes the child MORE anxious and this in turn makes their behaviour worse. You then get a downward negative spiral, a vicious circle.
To break that circle, the first thing you need is space. Even if it's only for an hour or so. Learn to walk away, walk right out of the house if you need to and go outside for a breath of fresh air. Use this time to mentally assess your own stress levels and where that stress is coming from. It won't all be work; it won't all be home. KNowing yourself makes it easier to deal with what you DON'T know. (You do sound a lot like me, in how your mind works - I'm a very mentally organised, pragmatic person).
The next thing you need is to get inside your kid's head. Don't let the lies be your focus - as has been said, they are a symptom. Your child lies because she is afraid of the consequences, she did the wrong thing because she didn't think and now she fears punishment. She gets anxious when she lies because she knows she is bad at it and will get caught, so it doesn't matter how you deal with this, simply discovering she is lying causes her to get upset and angry. Please be aware - a lot of her anger, however it is expressed, is directed towards herself.
Which brings me to self-esteem. hers is probably rock-bottom. Yours isn't good right now, either, because you're used to coping. So you BOTH need to turn this around. The best thing I can suggest, is to find something she likes to do that you can join in with. Keep it to very short sessions to begin with because it MUST begin and end on a positive note. At first just do this for no reason, "just because". You both need to see each other in a favourable, happy light. This should reduce the hostility that is forming almost instantly when either one of you interacts with the other.
Similarly, if you can set up situations where the sisters can play together in the same way, that would be good.
But with your girls - make quality times with each, individually. Try to keep that child your whole focus for that time.
It need only be five minutes, ten minutes, even half an hour. But not so long that either of you finds it tedious.
The sort of things you can do - go for a walk together. Play a computer game together (difficult child 3 recommends "Mario Party" games. So do I). Read a book to them (difficult child 3 likes to read the dialogue, putting on different character voices - but only because that is what I used to do). Bake a cake together, or decorate cupcakes. Or if you haven't got time/energy/talent to bake, decorate marshmallows as if they're cupcakes!
Ask each girl what they would like to do, let them set the pace.
We cannot diagnose on this board. Even if I were a fully qualified neuropsychologist with decades of experience, I wouldn't be able to tell you what your daughter has. However, purely as a parent, I will say - nothing you have said so far leads me to rule out Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD). There are still other possibilities. But Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) in some form, possibly Asperger's Syndrome, would in my book be a fairly high priority for consideration. For more thoughts on this, and for you to do a bit of study on your own, go to www.childbrain.com and look for their online Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) questionnaire. It also cannot be used to diagnose, but you CAN print out the results (even if they score her as normal) and take them to an appointment for her, to let the doctor see where your concerns are running.
This possibility is not necessarily bad news, either. Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) kids tend to be highly intelligent. Also VERY law-abiding. The only problem here is that it tends to be the laws as THEY analyse them to be. For example, the school rule for difficult child 3 was "Do not hit other students."
But in his experience, other kids hit him all the time and the teachers did nothing. But if difficult child 3 hit back, he either was seen by a teacher or the other kids told the teacher and difficult child 3 got into trouble. yet if he told the teacher that another kid had hit him, the teachers did nothing.
So the rules, in difficult child 3's mind, became, "difficult child 3 may not hit other students because he will get into trouble. But other students may hit difficult child 3, unless there is a teacher actually watching."
The rule then morphed into "difficult child 3 gets hit because he is not a good person. Therefore difficult child 3 deserves to be hit and punished, purely because he is who he is. difficult child 3 has to just live with this, retaliation will be punished."
So you see that being law-abiding is still more complex. But once achild is into a routine and has taken the rules to heart, you will find a deeper honesty about that individual, despite an early history of the sort of lies you describe.
In our home - our kids finally stopped lying (so much) because they realised:
1) They are bad at lying, they WILL get caught out.
2) There is no problem about speaking the truth; if they did the wrong thing but are truthful about it, they will not be punished. However, they will have to help fix what they did wrong - but tat goes for all the time anyway, because if there is a mess someone always has to clean it up. Better it should be the person who made the mess.
3) It feels better to speak the truth. even a small lie makes the child feel really awful and the feeling is a natural deterrent. USe this, build on it. If you catch your child out lying and she rages, wait until she calms down then give her a hug (if you can) or in some way reassure her that you still love her (not easy right now!) and say, "You felt awful when you lied. You aren't good at lying, it makes you feel bad. I don't like it when you feel bad, it makes me sad for you. I do understand you forget to do the right thing sometimes - we all forget sometimes. It's OK to admit if you forgot to rinse the plates, or you lied about pushing your sister. Sisters (and brothers) do push and shove at times even though parents don't like it. But although it's the pushing I don't like, that doesn't mean I don't like YOU."
Keep reinforcing that you love her, that if she lies you WILL know but if she tells the truth you will just move on. She is lying because she is anxious and afraid, but it's a double-whammy because lying increases her anxiety. In time, with support (not easy) she should learn that telling the truth is the easiest path, that it feels better.
There is so much more, and a lot of it is good stuff. However, I don't wnat to overwhelm you right now.
Marg
DazedandConfused
Well-Known Member
Hello Heartsick and welcome. I'm sorry for the "why" you are here, but very glad that you are here. This forum is the singlemost important thing that helps me maintain the sometimes few threads of sanity that I have left.
What jumped out at me is the lying when it is so OBVIOUS that it is lies.
Son came home yesterday with his clothes soaking wet. I really didn't have a problem with it (it was in the 100s here yesterday), I just didnt' want him to sit on the furniture. The conversation went like this:
Me: How did you get wet?
Son: I'm not wet.
Me: Yes, you are. Your shorts and your shirt from the waist down is wet. I can see it.
Son: I'm not wet.
Me: I can see you are wet. I'm not mad, I just want to know how you got wet.
Son: Only my shorts are wet. Not my shirt.
Me: Yes, your shirt is wet from the waist down. I can see the line. How did you get wet?
Son: Sigh! Grrrr! I got wet at the park! OKAY?! You're always yelling at me!!!
Son, of course, is the one that is yelling.
You might want to find out what your insurance does cover. Reading The Explosive Child is a good start.
I get what you mean about keeping control at home. I work in education and run a very tight ship with students. At home? Forget about it!
What jumped out at me is the lying when it is so OBVIOUS that it is lies.
Son came home yesterday with his clothes soaking wet. I really didn't have a problem with it (it was in the 100s here yesterday), I just didnt' want him to sit on the furniture. The conversation went like this:
Me: How did you get wet?
Son: I'm not wet.
Me: Yes, you are. Your shorts and your shirt from the waist down is wet. I can see it.
Son: I'm not wet.
Me: I can see you are wet. I'm not mad, I just want to know how you got wet.
Son: Only my shorts are wet. Not my shirt.
Me: Yes, your shirt is wet from the waist down. I can see the line. How did you get wet?
Son: Sigh! Grrrr! I got wet at the park! OKAY?! You're always yelling at me!!!
Son, of course, is the one that is yelling.
You might want to find out what your insurance does cover. Reading The Explosive Child is a good start.
I get what you mean about keeping control at home. I work in education and run a very tight ship with students. At home? Forget about it!
SRL
Active Member
Heartsick, if you have any health insurance coverage on her, most of the time with the help of your pediatrician you can find some sort of initial evaluation on her. Maybe it would be with a developmental pediatrician instead of a neuropsychologist or perhaps some other specialist, but if you have health insurance usually there is some kind of coverage available if you make the effort to go after it.
Also, if you live in the US, every student is entitled to free assessments through the public school system. Typically this isn't the only evaluation I would advise getting on a child, but if there truly are no alternatives it's best to take advantage of it. Schools can have some really insightful people on staff, plus they often know what's available in the community for families who don't have the financial means to do a full private medical and/or psychological evaluation.
Also, if you live in the US, every student is entitled to free assessments through the public school system. Typically this isn't the only evaluation I would advise getting on a child, but if there truly are no alternatives it's best to take advantage of it. Schools can have some really insightful people on staff, plus they often know what's available in the community for families who don't have the financial means to do a full private medical and/or psychological evaluation.
Hello Heartsick:
I too wanted to add my welcome. I too dislike my children at times. The thing I most often hear from my children these days is "Dont' Touch me" which believe it or not is an improvement.
This is hard for me to remember at times for myself. Especially after some recent evaluations for my older child. The child is the same child before and after diagnosis. Hearing it may be hard but hearing it doesn't make it happen. Eventually, reading the evaluation or reading the results is a tool to understand. Same kid just with more info. Trust me...it took me a week to truly read the recent evaluation from the school.
And then I came here..........
Hang in there. Come back often.
oh, this was told me when i arrived. No matter how awful the thing is you need to say, odds are very high someone here as felt that way.... or some difficult child has behaved that way.
(((((heartsick))))))
I too wanted to add my welcome. I too dislike my children at times. The thing I most often hear from my children these days is "Dont' Touch me" which believe it or not is an improvement.
This is hard for me to remember at times for myself. Especially after some recent evaluations for my older child. The child is the same child before and after diagnosis. Hearing it may be hard but hearing it doesn't make it happen. Eventually, reading the evaluation or reading the results is a tool to understand. Same kid just with more info. Trust me...it took me a week to truly read the recent evaluation from the school.
And then I came here..........
Hang in there. Come back often.
oh, this was told me when i arrived. No matter how awful the thing is you need to say, odds are very high someone here as felt that way.... or some difficult child has behaved that way.
(((((heartsick))))))
Heartsick--
Welcome to the group....
You are not alone. My husband has accused me of "not being loving enough" with our daughter, our difficult child. I just told him (in tears, of course)--that it's impossible to show affection or "be more loving" to someone who is kicking, hitting, and screaming about how much she hates you and wishes you would die. How I can possibly be expected to turn around with arms open wide....?
It's human nature to want to escape the things that torment us....
One of the things that keeps me going each day is the thought that the torment I am experiencing from my daughter on the outside must be nothing compared to the torment she is experiencing on the inside.
Hang in there!
--DaisyF
Welcome to the group....
You are not alone. My husband has accused me of "not being loving enough" with our daughter, our difficult child. I just told him (in tears, of course)--that it's impossible to show affection or "be more loving" to someone who is kicking, hitting, and screaming about how much she hates you and wishes you would die. How I can possibly be expected to turn around with arms open wide....?
It's human nature to want to escape the things that torment us....
One of the things that keeps me going each day is the thought that the torment I am experiencing from my daughter on the outside must be nothing compared to the torment she is experiencing on the inside.
Hang in there!
--DaisyF
I'm a newbie here too, and looking for support just like you.
I can only offer one some bit of advice...
My son (bipolar and ODD) gets really angry, really fast, especially when he doesn't get his way about something. One of his therapists told me that it is really important to walk away from a conversation with him before he begins to lose control. (Otherwise he just gets angrier and angrier...) Say you need to use the bathroom, etc. - anything to remove yourself from the situation, even if it's only for a few minutes. I tried it a few times and it seems to help. He doesn't drop the subject - he's still there waiting for me to come back - but while I was gone it gives him a little time to calm down a bit.
Hope this helps!
I can only offer one some bit of advice...
My son (bipolar and ODD) gets really angry, really fast, especially when he doesn't get his way about something. One of his therapists told me that it is really important to walk away from a conversation with him before he begins to lose control. (Otherwise he just gets angrier and angrier...) Say you need to use the bathroom, etc. - anything to remove yourself from the situation, even if it's only for a few minutes. I tried it a few times and it seems to help. He doesn't drop the subject - he's still there waiting for me to come back - but while I was gone it gives him a little time to calm down a bit.
Hope this helps!
daralex
Clinging onto my sanity
So sorry for what you're dealing with. There a a million times a day that I scream in my head (I work from home most days). There are many times I don't want to be anywhere near difficult child and do not like her much. I love her - but do not like her so mcuh. It is all so exhausting. It does sound like you could use a mini-break. Does difficult child have any friends she could spend a night with? Sometimes all we need is a little break to rejuvenate and allow ourselves to prepare to do ait all over again the next day.
(((HUGS)))
Dara
(((HUGS)))
Dara
I am back...I mentally checked out for a few days. I am to the point were I wonder where all the tears come from. They seem to come at the worst time EVER. We had a house full of company this weekend. difficult child was in prime form, punching a window, screaming, kicking...yeah it was beautiful. The scary thing is I found a pencil sharpener broken with the blade out. I know she is only 10 almost 11, but I fear her at times as much as the criminals I deal with. Her eyes turn strange and black, I feel the hatred radiat off of her. I have a coworker who has a child with multiple mental health issues, I finally talked to her today about difficult child. That was hard. I also made another app with her pediatrician, to get a referal for the neuro evaluation.
I am processing all of your information. The last comment was about difficult child getting angrier and angrier. That was so right on, I think it is a serious butting of the heads, because I want control of the situation. She flips in an instant when we are not doing something for her, or if I say no to something. {{Dazedandconfused}} your lying story sounded like a typical conversation in my home, only much quieter. {{Marguerite}} Your words of wisdom are pearls of sanity for me...they are also the ones to most invoke my tears. You are right, difficult child's self esteem is at an all time low, and I am sure I am not helping. I have said some awful things to her trying to make her see that her actions are grossly different than kids her age. I mean how many almost 11 year olds pee in their rooms? I have been thinking about her lying issue, and how she is bad at it. Everything in society says that lying is bad, you must be punished. It makes me cringe to think about embracing difficult child when she is openly disobidient, or lies. I know this is not about me, but about helping difficult child.
A common suggestion is that I get out, and do something for me. Get out and do something with her. I like to train for marathons/triathlons, and weight lift. I get up 2 hours early to train. difficult child likes to run with me, and I do try to allow her to go on the weekends. Problem is that is my only time where I do not have to hear anyone talking to me, I am responsible for myself. Next weekend I am going to women of Faith conference. The problem is this will be waiting for me when I get back.
Bottom line, is medication going to help, or is she going to be like this forever?
I am processing all of your information. The last comment was about difficult child getting angrier and angrier. That was so right on, I think it is a serious butting of the heads, because I want control of the situation. She flips in an instant when we are not doing something for her, or if I say no to something. {{Dazedandconfused}} your lying story sounded like a typical conversation in my home, only much quieter. {{Marguerite}} Your words of wisdom are pearls of sanity for me...they are also the ones to most invoke my tears. You are right, difficult child's self esteem is at an all time low, and I am sure I am not helping. I have said some awful things to her trying to make her see that her actions are grossly different than kids her age. I mean how many almost 11 year olds pee in their rooms? I have been thinking about her lying issue, and how she is bad at it. Everything in society says that lying is bad, you must be punished. It makes me cringe to think about embracing difficult child when she is openly disobidient, or lies. I know this is not about me, but about helping difficult child.
A common suggestion is that I get out, and do something for me. Get out and do something with her. I like to train for marathons/triathlons, and weight lift. I get up 2 hours early to train. difficult child likes to run with me, and I do try to allow her to go on the weekends. Problem is that is my only time where I do not have to hear anyone talking to me, I am responsible for myself. Next weekend I am going to women of Faith conference. The problem is this will be waiting for me when I get back.
Bottom line, is medication going to help, or is she going to be like this forever?
