Help! My 11 year old dd is a thief and a liar!

[atmywitsend]

How do I deal with my aggressive 11 year old dd1 who is a liar and a thief?

My 11 year old dd1 (dd2 is 9) has been pre-adolescent all her life. Now it's getting serious. Her attitude, aggressiveness and resentment towards my husband & me (mostly me), rudeness and totally selfish & amoral outlook makes my blood boil. Now I have found cosmetics which she has stolen from a drawer in my bedroom. She lied & said she'd bought them. I gave her 3 chances to tell the truth, but she still went on with the lies, even when we proved she couldn't have bought them (one had a label that must have been 15 years old!) - she just didn't have the sense to say sorry & cool the situation down. She never has. Similar situations have happened in the past - I now have doubts about a watch she 'found' at school - she didn't even think to hand it in to lost property and didn't seem to have any empathy for the person who lost it, even though she herself has had a purse stolen out of her bag at school. She never seems to learn from her mistakes either, although she is, on the surface a bright, outgoing child. At home she is totally aggressive and I am at my wits end. She has never been a child whom you could send to a 'naughty spot' or even out of the room - she would always stay 'in your face' and provoke further reaction.

I am not a calm mother, I have to admit. I know that I ?blow? and end up shouting at her and I have tried to smack her in the past. Then if I try to get anywhere near her she goes into a violent rage where I get kicked, scratched, bitten and it usually ends up with my husband having to hold her back from hitting me. She is strong and getting taller by the day and I?m getting scared. I know that I would never ever use real force against her (and have told her this) but I believe that she would against me. We saw a family counsellor about 18 months ago who tried to talk through her anger management problems, with little improvement, as she said that my dd1 did not yet have the maturity to want to improve. We have tried a range of punishments, from grounding to loss of privileges (TV & PC etc), loss of monthly allowance etc but nothing seems to have any effect on her behaviour. What is most galling is that she will never say sorry and, once she has calmed down, acts as if nothing has happened and seems to expect us to do the same. There is no remorse, no regret (except for getting caught perhaps) and nothing to show she has learnt the error of her ways. She seems to be on a path of self-destruction. I know all teenagers kick at the traces but I can honestly see her doing things that are going to harm herself and her future (sex, drugs, failing at school) just (it sometime feels) to spite us. She also bemoans how ?deprived? she is, conveniently ignoring what a privileged child she actually is: trips, holidays, sports, music, ballet, clubs, swimming, few money worries and, above all, a stable, loving family with both mother and father present.

I?m sorry that this is a very long rant but I?ve needed to get it off my chest for years!

[soapbox]

Oh my! What a nightmare!

It is very very difficult for me to offer any advice as my DCs are much younger and I have no idea how I would react in this situation.

The one thing I do wonder though is that in trying lots of different ways of controlling her you have lost the consistency of constantly reinforced boundaries???

Also I suppose if she sees you angry and out of control, it gives her the message that she too can be angry and out of control!

Anyway - good luck I hope you find some answers soon

[hatsoff]

i cant offer real advice either - sorry. but i wondered if it might be a crumb of comfort that i have heard it said that there is something about the way in which our brains develop that means we really dont have the capacity to empathise properly until much later than age 11. i'm not saying that your dds behaviour is acceptable - rather that you should try not to take it personally - easier said than done i know. i hope someone else can give you more practical advice.good luck

[joash]

Your DD sound identical to how ours was. This is not gonna help at this stage - but DD1 was the same way at the same age, it didn't improve no matter what we did. We had years and years of hateful, aggressive behaviour (sometimes escalating into violence as she got older). We got to the point where she absolutely hated me and I definately hated her. All I can say is that she's 24 now and one of the most loving young women I've ever met. We have a great, very loving, very close relationship and we even look back at her horrid timies and can laugh about them now. She has no idea why she was like she was and has apologised.

[joash]

timies - should be times

[atmywitsend]

Joash - thank you so much for your post. It's given me some hope. I know how hard it is to admit that you hate your child, but that's how I feel most of the time. I know that you are suppose to hate the behaviour whilst still loving the child but it's very hard when you have a child who so obviously hates you. I know it is genuine hate because I've been there - it's how I felt about my own mother (history repeating itself - I always vowed I would be nothing like my own mother yet here I am in the same situation!). Unfortunately, unlike your daughter, I never did reconcile with my mother and disliked her to her dying day. This is what I fear will happen with my own dd.

[happymerryberries]

Sympathies, my kids are younger and it must be so hard for you.

How is her behaviour in school? I know that you have mentioned that she 'found' a watch, but other than that how is she? If she is acting out then you may well find that the school can help by refering her to the EBSS . This is the emotional /behavioural social services and they can help your child, posiibly by looking at councelling. I may be that you wil have a long wait , so in some ways the sooner you ask about this sort of help the better.

The other possible route is via your GP. Have a chat with her form tutor. he/she will have coped with things like this many times before and maty well be able to put you through to the right help that you need.

[edam]

To add to Joash's post, my younger sister was like this. Nightmare teenager. But has grown up into a caring, kind, funny, competent and confident adult and a generally all-round fab human being. Hope that gives you some hope, even if it's not much help right now.
Is there any way you could manage to stay calm yourself, consistently, when you deal with her? If you are a shouty and angry family when the going gets tough (not having a go, it's just a personality type) then she's learnt shouty angry ways of expressing herself. It would take time to get the message across that you aren't going to rise to the bait anymore but may be worth a try? I haven't had the pleasure of parenting teenagers yet so may be talking out of my behind, but my very youngest sister was a teenager when I was an adult and the ONLY way to manage her when she got into a strop was to stay very, very calm and do the broken record assertiveness technique where you just keep repeating yourself eg. 'No, you can't go halfway across London all by yourself...'.

HTH

[colditz]

Oh, God, I was this child.

I did it because I craved to be close to my mother. I stole out of her drawers to have something of hers, I needed something that spoke of her as a person, because she never had the time to talk about herself to me, and I was an emotionally needy child. I used to scream at my mother out of anger at my life. I felt deprived of something but I didn't have the eloquance to say what. So I accused my mum of neglect, abuse, and of not loving me as much as my brother, but what was really causing the horrendous behavior was pure neediness.

I haed no reason to be unhappy with my life, I had a lovely childhood in comparison to some, but there was always a gap that needed filling, and at 10 years o9ld I couldn't say what I needed, and as a result my mother and I abused each other for years.

What I am trying to say is that it might be neediness, and that it probably isn't your fault, because I was needy for no reason at all.

[Sponge]

There's little I can say either to give comfort for the present as obviously you daughter is difficult and will probably remain so for a while. But my brother was very similar at that age and up to about 15 - angry, aggressive, secretive lying etc and actually punched my mother once. But he is an intelligent, sensitive and loviong adult now and we are a very close family so there is hope?
How is she with your other dd? I ask becasue however difficult my bro was with my parents he was aleays OK with me and would talk to me so you might be able to get some insights form dd2.
FWIW I used to steal stuff quite a lot at that age and would always lie if caught. Once you've lied you've dug a hole and you just keep digging deeper. I would never have owned up or aplogised, however much evidence there was. But for me the act of stealing was not directed against my parents. I just wanted the stuff. I don't do it now by the way.

[docket]

Poor you atmywitsend.

Your daughter sounds a lot like me at her age. I used to steal and lie and had absolutely no respect whatsoever, despite having a very nice life. I was horrible to both of my parents, especially my mother. She recently told me that she spent my early teenage years terrified I would end up on the street, selling myself, on drugs and in all sorts of trouble.

I did grow out of it and (I think!) became a decent person and I now have a fantastic relationship with my mother.

I can't really offer much advice other than that I think situations were best diffused when my parents ignored me / my behaviour. I think I got a bit of a kick out of the fighting .

Anyway, I do hope things improve for you.

[SoBlue]

She sounds like a normal teen to me iv had 2. Mostly just a phase they go through but will grow out of. Her stealing your makeup suggests she might have image/growing up issues so maybe a chat about that might help her. Try and spend sometime doing fun stuff together (cinema, girly shopping)so its not all negative stuff you do.This will make her feel warmer towards you and want to behave a bit better. With the lying if its not too big sometimes saying i know you did it and leaving it there can diffuse it as they know you know, so there isn't the need to go ott denying it. Hope that makes sense.

[ionesmum]

Is there any chance she is being bullied? A relative of mine stole and lied, and was really agressive at this age. Later on she told me that she's started stealing to pay off the bullies at her school, and then got into the habit of stealing for herself, and the agression was sheer unhappiness because no-one saw what was going on.

[fostermum]

she wil come through it,you say you hate her, well i felt like this at times with mine but you hate what she does but not her,dont get these confused!

[hopelesscase]

atmywitsend - when I went to joint this Forum, I tried to use the name 'Witsend', because that's where I am a lot of the time.

My dd1 sounds just like your dd - mine is 15. I've begun to hate Sundays, because I can't go to work (and I don't exactly love my job!), and seem to spend a lot of Sundays crying in my room. I'm beginning to feel like a bloody teenager myself! DD does all the things your dd does, seems to be deliberately trying to fail her exams, and treats her family like poo - and, perhaps predictably, her worst venom is reserved for me.

Thanks to those who have said that they were nightmare teenagers - it gives me hope.

[hopelesscase]

I didn't try to 'joint' the Forum... but join it.
Sorry!

[maltesers]

mu advice is to try really hard to be calm. I know its hard when they can be so rude and insulting. I have a ds of 17 and a dd of 14 and a 4 yr old ds. My dd can be very hard work and very rude and disrespectful. Stick to the boundaries and dont let them wind you up, stay calm but stick to your guns. Dont be afraid to carry out and enforse a punishment. Dont get into arguments, just walk away and say you will not talk to them whilst thay are screaming at you. Give time to them. Encourage and praise, know it so hard when they are so awful. Show you care and are always there for them at the end of the day.

[allyco]

haven't read all this thread but do sympathise. my eldest DD was just obnoxious from a similar age and got worse and worse.

She's now gone to university and thank God its far enough away for her not to come home every night (does that make me sound terrible?!) I used to blame myself and I often thought my DH would leave us. Many's the time he had to leave the house to stop himself hitting her. That does sound bad I know but if you've been in the situation you'll understand.

Can't believe I'm on this thread tonight AND on one bemoaning the fact that nine-month-old DD4 won't sleep!! Just goes to show that they never stop being a problem...

Thank God for Mumsnet.

[tinkabell]

COLDITZ & DOCKET admit to acting just like your teenager & as you can tell they are nice adults now...My son is now 18 we went through hell for over 2+ years with him eventually he calmed down, gave up all tha bad stuff he is becoming a nicer person...at long last....x