Are these symptoms of autism?

It doesn’t sound like it will be a tolerable situation to have her live with you. Have you discussed with your family (the family that you live with now) what your concerns are? I’m sure they are aware of how difficult it will be for you and the whole family to tolerate her. Is it supposed to be for only a short term or indefinitely?

About a year. She decided she would save more money before buying another house. It would be extremely wrong in my parents eyes to express any concern. I was going to move out but bought a car and decided to save up to buy instead of rent…hopefully by March. This was before I knew they would be moving in and we would all be sharing a bathroom together.

My parents show my niece a lot of love because they know she is different and not many people like socializing with her. So they let her get away with a lot and they try to make me do things with her but it’s really hard with how she acts. Some days she will be fine and I can talk to her and whatnot but more often than most she will be acting up. I try not to get mad but it’s hard.

I am just wondering if with her aspergers is a good reason to have her act the way she does (laughing when we are mad and then say it’s because she has aspergers). Is this truly something that aspies don’t understand when we try to explain why it doesn’t make us happy? And then she gets confused why no one wants to play with her. It’s because she randomly says she needs to poop, will be in your face and keep sniffing you, and poke you, etc. and not stop when you say to stop.

That behavior would make me nuts. I couldn’t stand it.

Can you talk with your sister on this issue directly? Being open about your issues / concerns helps mostly rather than hiding them.

Does your niece behave the same way to everyone? Does she do that to her mother?

@chelle21689 Off the top of my head…...sell the car and move out to save your sanity!

Why doesn’t your sister move in with your parents? I could not live under those conditions with that little girl.

I know it’s hard for you to put up with behavior you don’t understand, especially if it’s in your home that’s supposed to be your place to relax.

To answer your question, most behaviors that aren’t considered productive have now been labeled a possible indicatory of autism. Here’s a list of indicators for teens.

But honestly that doesn’t matter at all for you, unless you’re interested in helping and understanding your niece.

I’d just ask you to consider a few things, maybe it will help:

- if it’s hard for you to deal with the stream of thoughts coming out of her mouth, imagine what it’s like having that in your head all the time… she can’t turn it off or hasn’t been taught to. Everything from her interactions with her peers to her dreams at night sound like those unfiltered moments you’re hearing. I’m sure it gets old.
– at 14, she is well aware that people find her annoying, she doesn’t know how to stop
– Raising kids is hard, raising kids who are vastly different than yourself is harder, it takes a ton of energy, empathy, and focus. Your sister has been living with your niece for 14 years, possibly while trying to maintain other relationships with people who don’t understand your niece either. Does she have a lot of help?
– If you still think it’s hard on you, think of it this way, would you ever consider switching places with your sister?

I’m not saying you’re wrong, I don’t think you are, I’m just giving a different perspective. It’s easy for us to get caught up in our lives and struggles, but your sister probably isn’t thrilled about moving back home at this point in her life. She probably needs help with all she has going and doesn’t have other options. It sounds like you may have other options that just aren’t ideal. That’s a big difference.

If it was me, or you were my friend, I’d ask if you could help your sister and niece without hurting yourself. That means not only tolerating them, but helping to teach your niece how to interact with the world. She’s going to be an adult soon. If you can’t help, then you need to move out. You’re an adult and your sister needs that support system you’re also relying on right now.

If it just feels like it all sucks, find someone to vent with if you need to, and then do what’s best for you.

@chyna it is my parent’s house she’s moving to.

@funkdaddy oh I see my sister needing breaks, I mean she is a single mother that raised her all by herself for 14 years and she’s not an easy child lol.

I think that’s why sometimes she drops her off with my parents or my other sister sometimes to take a break.

I am still considering moving out earlier now though. She knows I’ve been looking to move so it wouldn’t look like it’s because of them.

Thanks for he perspective though.

I deal with autism every day have have done for the last 14 years. One does NOT blame bad behaviour on autism. One corrects the child’s behaviour the best they can. Your niece sounds like she has never had any real boundaries put on her behaviour.

How was she raised? Was this the only way she could get any attention, even though it was negative attention? Were there any negative consequences to bad behavior, or especially positive consequences for good behavior? If she was never acknowledged when she did something kind or good or polite, and was only acknowledged when she did shitty, annoying, attention-getting things, then I’d say it was nurture, not nature, that is most responsible for her behavior.

Autism smautism, if that girl pulled that crap on me I’d slap her silly. Her mental health issues are not a get out of jail free card, there are and should be consequences to her actions. Maybe try completely ignoring her. Do not react, respond, speak and stick to your guns.

Tell her once and only once, that if she is going to behave badly you will not respond to her until her behavior changes and she conducts herself with consideration, courtesy and kindness. If you go for days without speaking a word to her or acknowledging her acting out behaviors maybe she will get the message. It’s going to be hard but if you can just go completely blank she will soon lose interest when she is not getting the payoff of your reaction. In the meanwhile yes, if you can move out that would be ideal.

You can be empathetic to peoples mental and emotional issues but that doesn’t mean you have to allow their issues to effect you.

To add to what @Coloma said, do acknowledge when she does well, though. Once you do that, be prepared to her to restart pushing in a negative way. Stick to your guns. It helps if you can send her to another room, or send yourself someplace else, like out on the deck or something. As long as she can see you she knows she has some sort of audience, even if it’s unresponsive.

@Dutchess_III Yes, I should have mentioned positive reward too, not just punishment for the bad, inappropriate behaviors.

@chelle21689 Sorry, I thought you were living with your boyfriend at his family home.

@chyna Ohhh nooo. I thought about maybe giving in and paying some money but I don’t think I want to be there also LOL. It’s like I’m stuck. I’ll see how I’ll adjust… but maybe move up the date on looking for a place. It is kinda hard when cold weather is coming up in the next few months O.O.

@Dutchess_III I think she was this way even as a baby. She was always “different” in the way she acted.

Must be a very depressed child who feels that nobody is on her side. Show her and keep telling her that you and the family are by her side, love her and want her. Keep drumming it into her every opportunity you get till she gets the message. As for shitty behavior, no matter how irritating, even if you want to strangle her, try to IGNORE her acting up and silliness. Be firm, simply ignore and if needed get up and leave the room telling her you have other things to do.

The main point is for her to know that she is loved and for you all to spend a bit of quality time with her. The rest will take tough discipline but do not tolerate it no matter what its called in the scientific field. Encourage her to express herself through art or music or sport. Be there on her side visibly but do not become her victims. I have a feeling that she may be testing you a bit. Good luck.

Find a bunch of room mates and get a place together, some place affordable. Get out now.

It sounds like your parents try to coddle this child, and don’t acknowledge that she’s got mental problems. Un-treated mental problems. Your sister, even though she might want to label this girl as having autism, and she might actually have autism, she is not helping this child by letting her act like this. Your sister is probably exhausted, but this is her child and the child needs some serious help from mental health professionals.

Do everything you can to research this condition, then do everything you can to find out if there is help available in your area, whether it’s day care for this girl, time out sessions for your sister, or possibly even a group home where the girl can live. Just because she’s a family member, doesn’t mean she should be able to wreak havoc with everyone’s lives.

One of my close friends just had a “final” incident with her adult brother, who probably also suffers from a mild form of autism. He is/was nowhere near as bad as what you are describing, but her brother created all sorts of problems for her parents during their lives (he always lived at home until last week) and her father passed away last year, and her mother passed away 10 years ago, so she moved back into the family home. This last year, living in her family home with 2 unrelated room mates, plus her 55 year old brother has been very difficult, because this fellow couldn’t hold a job, and refused to do any work around the house, and frequently “cried wolf” about being suicidal. This most recent time landed him in the county mental health center. My friend spoke with the doctors and they all agreed that it would be a much better, and healthier situation for all involved, if her brother moved into an assisted living, group home, where he can have freedom, but still have a structured lifestyle where he has to abide by a curfew and rules, but they also give them 2 meals a day and counseling. It sounds like this girl needs to be in some type of care facility like that, even though she is a minor. Unfortunately, it might be up to you to do all of the research to figure out what is available.

The biggest problem is that your sister and your parents don’t want to deal with it, so they are unlikely to go along with anything like this, which is a real shame, because the girl is just going to get worse, and eventually become an adult that no one wants to have around either.

Maybe it sounds harsh to some people, but this child is not your child. You shouldn’t have to put up with this. It will be detrimental to your own health if you stay there under this circumstance. Do the research, make suggestions, but be prepared to move out as soon as possible.

I’m with @Coloma I’m afraid I would end up smacking this kid. This is one of the reasons I don’t have children. I’m not particularly fond of them, but this kind of situation would be un-bearable to me.

I get that it must be un-bearable to be this kid, or the child’s mother, but this is NOT @chelle21689 ‘s child, nor should it be her problem. She’s a good person and will most likely do everything she can to help the situation, but being forced to put up with this kind of situation without any constructive changes is simply madness. No pun intended.

Here are some links to get you started. You can probably speak with people at some of these organizations to get some useful advice.

Autism Cares Foundation

Autism and Community Living

Easter Seals

Family Services

Monarch Boarding Facility for Autistic Children

Group Home Support

Residential Placement for Autistic Children

Pacific Autism Center for Education

Financial Assistance

Good luck @chelle21689 : )

@chelle21689: I was going to ask you if, when the girl acts up, screaming in your face or knocking on your door incessantly, does her mother give her any guidance? Does the mother tell her to stop or try to redirect her? If not, the mother is just as much at fault.

I would probably have a really hard time having someone screaming in my face without pushing them away or without going into another room and locking the door, and becoming really frustrated and upset with the whole situation. If she touched me in a bad way (pushed me or grabbed something from me), I’d probably have a hard time not hitting her.

I know @jca. Even if you know that’s exactly the kind of reaction she wants (that way she knows where one of your buttons are) it would be very hard not to act on it.

@jca yeah she does.

That’s another thing…hide your buttons. Don’t let her see you sweat. I have a grandson who was much the same way, but he’s 8 now, and started improving since my son came into his life, at age 3. Boy, it’s been a battle, though. He looks and looks and hunts and hunts for my buttons, but he can’t find them. Well, he knows of one, which he tries to push but it doesn’t get satisfactory results. He has this really annoying habit of ending the last word in his sentence with “uh.” Like, “I went to the house-uh.”
“I ate a hotdog-uh.” “We went to the park-uh.” At first I used to just look at him and say, “I have no idea what you just said because I don’t know what a “hot dog-uh” means.” And go on with what I was doing.
Now, though, I’ll just turn away. That’s enough for him to repeat the word correctly. I just won’t interact with him if he does it.
His folks don’t give him time out because “It just makes him even worse.”
I give him time out. The first time he said, “I’ll start yelling and screaming.”
I said, “I don’t care what you do, as long as you stay there. And you certainly won’t get out as long as you’re yelling and screaming. And you’ll go right back in if you keep acting up.” He tested a few times, major, but I didn’t budge. So, now, time out (or the threat of it) works.

Time outs didn’t work for my kid. I took his latest favourite toy and put it ‘in jail’ for a time. That started working. I suggest this system for any parent having trouble with their child. https://www.pmto.no/en

@Dutchess_III Taking your attention away is an excellent way of dealing with behaviour you want to discourage. Often, just engaging the child in a discussion or trying to verbally correct them is not helpful in any way because the child is doing it for a reaction or attention, ANY attention. I would physically remove myself from the room and hide in the bathroom (the only door that would lock).

@cazzie – So you wouldn’t recommend slapping a 14 year old silly?

Does the 14 year old see a therapist and/or psychiatrist, @chelle21689?

I haven’t read above answers.

Hasn’t she been tested? She’s in America right? Does she control herself in school? I would assume bad behavior would have her teachers recommending she be tested. If she is well behaved in school, then you would look at the family dynamic I would think. Either way a trip to a specialist sounds like a good idea.

Maybe she is ODD or ADHD? Or, something else.

@funkdaddy if you slap anyone silly here you will end up in the police station. The slapping and spanking remarks are dismissed out of hand by me. Always.

Spanking and slapping your child with an open hand as long as it doesn’t leave a mark is acceptable here in the state I live in. There may be less restrictions down South. Not that I do any type of physical punishment with my daughter.

As far as the circumstances described here, in the state this person lives in, I’m not sure what the laws are for them.

I wanted to add if she is ODD or ADHD there is medication that might help her. I’m never fast to recommend medicating a child, but sometimes it makes sense. Children who really need it typically take the meds without hesitation, because they themselves want to feel better.

I was being humorous in my remark, to an extent. I would not actually slap a kid silly but I also do not think that the occasional spanking by hand is abusive. I’m not talking belts and sticks.
Every animal on the planet uses some form of corporal punishment on their offspring.

A swat, a cuff, a nip, a bite ,a kick. Some kids need a couple of good old fashioned spankings to straighten them up. My daughter had maaaaybe 3 spankings between the ages of about 4 and 7, no harm, no foul. I was spanked a few times as well and am hardly damaged from my mother swatting me with her pink hairbrush.

If a 14 year old was in my face behaving aggressively I might very well slap her and I wouldn’t feel one bit guilty about it either. We have become a society of weaklings, afraid to discipline our children, more concerned with being their friends and peers than their parents and the lack of discipline is far more damaging than the occasional spanking IMO.

Corporal punishment is a short cut for spending the time and care it takes to raise a child.

@cazzie No, it is a disciplinary tool to be used very sparingly when all other methods of discipline have failed. Discussion, taking away a toy or privilege, time outs, etc.
My daughter is 28 now, has a great job, just bought a new car has about 20k saved and is in a loving relationship. I was a stay at home mom and there for her 24/7 until I went back to work part time when she was in 6th grade.

I was still home for her after school, was 100% involved in her life, activities, led a 4-H group, volunteered in her classrooms and raised her to be a lover of art, nature, animals and a kind and decent human being. The couple of swats on her butt as a young child had nothing to do with lack of spending time or caring for her. What a ridiculous and insulting thing to say. Pffft!

What do you think would have happened if you hadn’t hit her those times? You think she would have run off the rails and not be the pride of your eyes that she is now?

@cazzie No, I don’t think it would have mattered much either way, that’s the point, a couple of mild spankings is not damaging to a child and she has never accused my of being abusive because she received a couple of spankings as a child. I think I have been very clear that I do not advocate physical punishment as the main method of discipline but I also do not agree that a couple of spankings is abuse.

That’s exactly the point. You didn’t need to do it. Parents just shouldn’t do it. It is more about their anger than any ‘positive’ response in behaviour by their children and if that honesty can’t be realised, we aren’t going to get better at raising our kids, ie, our kids aren’t going to get better at raising their kids osv.

@cazzie I didn’t spank in a rage, I spanked calmly and sparingly, again, the rare spanking is not perpetuating abuse, just have to agree to disagree on this. There are many people who were spanked as children that did not turn into abusive parents. Parents that are verbally abusive, always screaming, no emotional control, insulting their children do far more damage than a couple swats on a clothed bottom.

@cazzie. Everyone has a right to their opinion but to keep acting like @Coloma abused her daughter is ridiculous. You asked, she answered. Over and over. I think swatting a kid when they are acting up and you need to get their attention is fine. But I don’t have kids so I never had to do this.

Sorry. I thought it was important to clarify since that answer has the most GAs on the question. It wasn’t dismissed.

Slapping a 14 year old (high school age) is a lot different than spanking a preschool/elementary age child on the bottom.

If you disagree, that’s fine. But I’d ask if it would be ok for me to slap a 14 year old girl? Is it only ok for ladies of a certain age? Is there a difference between that and hitting an 18 year old?

That was my point, it needed to be clarified.

@chyna Thank You for clarifying my intent.

@funkdaddy Ideally nobody would slap anybody but yes, if you were the childs father, uncle, family member and the kid was outta control in your face, I wouldn’t see that as completely out of bounds. A perfect stranger no, unless it was a matter of self defense. If some little 14 year old punk is trying to grab my purse you better believe I’m going to come up swinging.
In the case of some completely, out of control teenager behaving hysterically, well…again, it wouldn’t be out of line IMO if the kid was relentlessly dogging you, not allowing you to get away from their tantrum, screaming in your face, pounding on doors.

Infact, I’d also say call the police and have their outta control little ass hauled off to Juvenile Hall.

@Coloma – I honestly don’t want to argue, but I feel like maybe we’re missing each other and you’re not seeing why slapping someone you love and live with is hard to overcome. I think people should do what they feel is right for their families. So this isn’t an attack on you or your family.

But if I was growing up and it was ok for my uncle or my father to hit my adolescent sister, I would think it was ok for me to as well. What’s really different?

And if I can hit my sister, or daughter, why not my wife if she gets aggressive. After all, she’s relentlessly dogging me and in my face. What would the difference be? Do I love her more than I love my sister? More than my father loves his child? Would “she deserved it” fly with anyone?

To me that’s the problem with “if the kid deserves it”, and especially with a known behavior issue. You’re teaching what’s acceptable and at some point have to take violence off the table for that person to exist in society and maintain relationships. To me, high school is way past that point.

@funkdaddy I am talking about extreme circumstance not hitting someone because you have no self control or ability to find other, more effective coping tools. I am talking extreme, like someone in the movies slapping a hysterical person. So mild childhood spankings aside, I am not, in any way, advocating off the wall, abusive behaviors, only saying that in SOME, extreme circumstances I do not feel a slap is out of line, as a last resort. If a teenager, who is the size of an adult is being extremely aggressive and refusing all attempts to diffuse a situation by an adult, well then…yep, a slap might be in order as a last result.

14 year olds have killed people, raped people and should be tried as adults IMO. I’m not going to be concerned that I am slapping a minor if I feel threatened, nor should anyone else. From the way @chelle21689 described this girls outta control behavior I wouldn’t blame her for smacking that kid, not one little bit. That’s how I feel about it, I don’t coddle peoples bullshit behaviors.

@cazzie, Time out has always worked for me. I don’t know if it was the time out itself, or the aura of “OMG this is the worst thing that could happen to you! This is some serious shit now!!!” that I put around it (without the cuss words.) I mean, it works for me when it doesn’t “work” for the parents.
Here is One of the twins in time out. Here is the other. And here is adding insult to injury, thanks to sister.
But…on the other hand, here is sister saving him from time out (It was one of his first experiences with time out. Savannah had a LOT more experience with time-out than Kale, cuz she can be a bugger. I had Kale in time out. Timer went off and, from the living room, I told him he could get up. He just sat there and kept crying. I repeated “You can come out now!” and he just sat there, crying. Suddenly sister stomped into the kitchen and fixed it!)

I also believe in calm, rational, open hand on the butt spankings. Kids who recieve them, and other forms of serious, appropriate discipline when they’re little (<8) usually don’t need to be slapped silly when they’re 14 (with a couple of rare exceptions….like, “You don’t hang up on your mom because she will storm home from work and knock your block off! And you will not use the F word.)

I’m a very patient person and not into slapping people but a good shove to get this brat out of my face, especially if she’s been screaming, taunting, intimidating, banging shit, slamming doors, knocking incessantly on the door – the list goes on, it seems of the out of control behaviors of this girl. If she were in my face, screaming, you’re damn right she’s getting some kind of shove or something to get her the fuck away from me.

I still wonder what the discipline aspects were in her child hood. Inconsistent? Over reactive? Under reactive? So much of discipline is the attitude you surround it with. The authoritative tone of voice, even injecting a fear factor into it with your tone. The actual, physical discipline is only back up if the tone doesn’t work. The tone will work next time, though, because they know you’re serious.

@jca Yep, and if that makes us bad and abusive, so be it. lol

Yeah, I have good kids.

Here is a perfect example of how I worked:

Kale (2 years old) is so funny! So, he brought a really dirty soccer ball in from the yard. I told him to throw it back outside. He threw it in the kitchen! I sternly told him to pick it up and throw it OUT SIDE. He kicked it further into the kitchen! I was shocked! I really was! You just don’t disobey me! At that point I snapped out one word… ”KALE!!” In that one word was a universe of meaning… ’I cannot believe you just did that! Have you lost your mind? Do you know what’s about to happen to you?!’ It stopped him cold. And “what happened” was I snapped, “TIME OUT!” and in those two words were “Time out is a horrible, terrible thing! Yeah, you should be upset and crying! Don’t you ever disobey me again!””
2 minutes later he was free again, and he ran outside and I kind of forgot about it. Then I spied the ball on the chair in the living room. I picked it up and went to the back door and called for Kale to come to me.
He was uncertain of what to do. He saw me with the ball, and since he had just gotten into trouble over the ball, he knew it meant SOMETHING, but he wasn’t sure what. He was loath to come to me, but even more loath to disobey me (he had a suspicion that maybe even WORSE things than the dreaded time out could maybe happen…just a hunch…..)
Our deck has 2 levels. The bottom level isn’t very far above the ground, and comes about to the top of the twin’s legs.
So Kale made it as far as that deck, then leaned over from the hips down, which caused his upper body to splay on the deck.
“Fall down,” he said.
“Kale! Come here!”
He then brought his arms up from his sides, and spread them on the deck.
“Fall down.”
“Come here!”
So he slowly brought one knee up on the deck, then the other, crawled a couple of feet, and splatted on the deck again.
“Fall down.”
“Kale!”
It took forever, about 4 days, and he always kept moving toward me, inches at a time, so he was just short of actual disobedience, but he finally made it to me, falling down the whole way, and I’m gritting my teeth, trying not to laugh, trying to keep a serious, stern face. I was about cross eyed with my efforts.
I had backed into the house a bit so I could know my instructions would be clearly understood. I handed him the ball and said, “Throw this outside!”
Response was instantaneous! He spun around and threw it outside immediately!
I said, “Good job! Go play!”
I was rewarded with That Grin.

I have a story, a true story of a little kid that lived next door to me when my daughter was 1–3 years old.
“Kevin” was a little shithead, forgive the descriptor but if the little shithead fits..haha.
His parents were the most passive, mealy mouthed, wussy parents ever and little Kevin rode roughshod over them. All they ever said when the kid, who about 4, was acting up was ” Oh Kevin, Oh Kevin.”
This included the kid, running out of the house with a steak knife and running amok with other little neighborhood kids around in his ninja cape playing the knife wielding ninja.

Instead of immediately nabbing that kid and taking the knife out of his hand the parents just sat there calmly ASKING little Kevin the demon child to give them the knife. o-o
Once, evil Kevin pushed my, at the time, my 15 month old daughter down on the driveway resulting in her hitting her head, hard, on the concrete. I’d have liked to have picked that kid up by the scruff of his shirt and punted him into the next yard. Again, the parents did
nothing but say ” Now Kevin, that wasn’t very nice.”

A huge, tank of a 4–5 year boy pushing a 15 month old BABY down on the concrete, and zero discipline for doing so, I don’t think so, I’d have liked to beat the snot out of that kid.
Once, and this was a classic Kevin maneuver, the kid actually, because he was not getting his parents attention while they were talking to my ex husband and I in the yard one summer evening, took the garden hose and turned it on through the window of their brand new car and flooded the new cars interior. Again, nothing but ” Oh, Kevin!”
Oh Kevin my ass, had he been my child that kid would have been spanked soundly and put to bed for the rest of the night.

I have many more Kevin and “Oh Kevin” stories, I could write pages about this kid but, suffice it to say, due to the lack of any discipline Kevin and his parents were completely blacklisted in the neighborhood and nobody wanted their kids around Kevin or Kevin around their kids. A new family moved in next door to us and they had 3 sweet and well behaved kids, ages 3 ( my daughters new little best friend ) 7 and 9.
We became great friends and felt rather bad about excluding Kevin and his inept parents from the BBQs and other neighborhood fun but the kid was a fucking menace and the parents did nothing to manage his behavior. Seems to me they did poor little demon Kevin more of a disservice by allowing him to be completely taken off the neighborhood map for playmates rather than giving him a good spanking to straighten the kid up and teach him there were consequences for being a misbehaving little heathen.

Kevin is probably a 32 year old serial killer somewhere now. lol

I threw a tantrum about two months ago. I was out of control like I have never been in my life that I can remember. I really felt like I was going to go crazy. I felt abused. I wasn’t hit, there was no physical threat. I was screaming and begging and for the first time every I felt like I could throw myself into a wall. I wanted my way so badly, and I just wanted my father to stop what he was doing, what he kept trying to talk to me about and make me do.

Afterwards, I thought to myself, this is what three year olds go through. They are horribly uncomfortable, don’t feel in control, and no one cares.

I think you need to get to the bottom of why this girl is so miserable that she is always disobedient and throwing a fit. She must be in some discomfort.

Having my tantrum did help me purge a little. I went from crying to angry, and then I was able to pull my shit together. But, I’m an adult who rarely loses control anywhere close to that. I can say, slapping me would not have helped at all. Someone giving a shit about what I was saying is what I needed.

She isn’t three anymore. She can work on figuring out what is going on with a therapist, and get the right help.

Hopefully, a change in environment will be very positive.

@JLeslie I’m sorry, but…it sounds like you just exploded after years of pent up issues/feelings towards your dad. I think you’ve mentioned he is a difficult person before.
Responding to anothers abuse or mistreatment with a frustrated breakdown is something that could happen to anyone, but it seems to me this girl is more about lack of boundaries though she may still be miserable.

@Coloma I think it easily could be both for the girl. Focusing only on one thing isn’t enough.

In my situation sure my dad can push my buttons, but it wasn’t explained as simply as pent up emotions. I don’t sit around loathing my dad, and I don’t think of my childhood as a bad time. It was also the situation of that moment in time, and our typical interaction. Yes, he can be difficult. Why not assume the same about these parents.

My dad was not very strict, we rarely were given any sort of punishment, and yet he drove me to the brink sometimes. Why can’t that be true for this girl too? I wasn’t out of control behaviorally, I was mostly a well behaved, good girl, but maybe this girl has some brain wiring stuff going on that needs some attention. I was likely to be depressed, she might be more likely to express it as anger.

Jesus @Coloma. If the kid was 4 I can guarantee you the problem started 3 years and 6months earlier.

It’s a combination of both love & positive consequences as well as negative consequences @JLeslie. Emotional abuse is abuse too.

Oh, and consistency is super important. When my son was 4 I had a daycare. The kids were all out in the back yard playing. I came up from the basement where I was doing laundry to see my son sitting in the time out spot. I said, “What are you doing? I didn’t put you in time out!”
He said, “When you find out what I did you will so I thought I’d just get started.”
He knew, beyond a doubt, exactly what I would do.

@JLeslie Possibly, it seems though that it is not so much anger with that girl as just extremely, immature and inappropriate, obnoxiousness. Maybe she is acting out, maybe she is just grossly immature and attention seeking. No doubt the parents have played some hand in it all.

@Dutchess_III Yep, I agree and yep again, consistency is everything with children from bedtime to discipline.

@Dutchess_III I wasn’t trying to diminish emotional abuse, I was just clarifying that there wasn’t any physical abuse.

@Coloma Sure, it could be many things. To be fair to the child, I would want to rule out anything physical or organic. I’m just remembering a few days after my melt down I went for a blood test and my thyroid was a little revved up too. Maybe this girl has Graves disease or some other thing that is making it harder to control herself. Couple that with parents unable to really handle the parenting needs of the child and it’s more trouble.

A close friend of mine’s grandchild was whiny and obstenant and one big complaint she had was the seems in her socks bothering her. Her mom just thought she was complaining about everything and everything. My friend tells me this story and I cut her off and say, “go get the kid some new socks!” She comes right back with that she finally did. Things are much better, but there still already is a dynamic between parent child that the kid whines a lot for things. It’s their routine now. The thing is, it’s a real think that some kids can’t handle seems in clothing. If the mom had addressed it sooner things might be better. This child was extremely uncomfortable daily. She even voiced once she could talk that her socks hurt, and no one took her seriously or have a shit for years.

Or, the mom who used to think her baby was just being obstenant about going in the car. Screaming and crying when she buckled him in. After months she realized the cry was an in pain cry. She changed the seat to a different one so it didn’t press on the baby in the same way, and everything changed. The baby no longer cried in the car.

It’s not always the kid is just being a pain in the neck.

I know I’m jumping in late, but you can not smack a child that has autism. Watch what happens if you do. Additionally, hitting any child with severe behavioral problems will only exacerbate the problem. This is why most people can’t handle children that actually have behavioral problems, because they would do everything wrong.

Any attention – including negative attention (which would include smacking a kid) – is still attention, which is exactly what most of the kids want in the moment. You have to tell them, blatantly and calmly, why the behavior is not okay, and then you completely ignore it and give no BS consequences later. The moment they get a rise out of you is the moment the behavior will escalate. I know this firsthand because of years of fostering my niece who had severe behavioral issues.

@JLeslie I understand that. & @DrasticDreamer Very challenging I’m sure.

Brings to mind this little gem. haha

www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5aDiRmN1yg

@Coloma A little. Amp it up by about 100 and that’s closer to what I had to deal with. ;)

My daughter was at Little Ceasers getting a pizza. She had the twins with her. Savannah was being a buger. After the second time my daughter bent down and gave her a gentle whack on her hip. Savannah instantly started dragging her leg around, like she couldn’t walk and then fell on the floor yelling “YOU BROKE MY LET MOMMY!!! YOU BROKE MY LEG!!!” Her twin was going, “Stop it, Savanna! Stop it!”
My daughter was going, “Savannah! You can wait till we get home to break your leg! Get UP!” Sheesh.

When my oldest was 2, her, her dad and I were at the grocery store. She wanted something that we said she couldn’t have. She threw herself down on the floor screaming. My husband and I looked at each other, and without a word we both walked around the corner, where she couldn’t see us, then peeked back. We saw her open one eye…then the other..then she she looked around…and stopped. Just like that, she stopped. She got up, brushed her self off and had an expression on her face that was like, “Well, that was a waste of time!” She never did it again.

@DrasticDreamer Seriously? You must be a saint!
I can’t imagine, I’d probably have put a plastic bag over that kids head and gone to jail for the rest of my life. haha

But seriously @Coloma, you can’t whack a kid of that age, with those kinds of problems. They’ll most likely will whack you right back, or worse. Whacking should only be done prior to the age of 5 or 6. Unless they hang up on their mother, or use the F word.

@Dutchess_III I agree, I’m just enjoying vicariously beating the shit out the little brats. haha
Not just the F word or hanging up on you but also when they think cleaning their room means putting all their dirty laundry in YOUR room. That calls for throwing them down the basement stairs. lol

For each of my kid’s 13 birthday I taught them how to run the washer and dryer. For quite a while my kids tried that. I didn’t throw them down the stairs, but I just put the clothes back in their laundry basket and let them run out of clean clothes to wear. When they whined I just shrugged.

When I was a kid cleaning our room meant throwing everything ~ clothes, toys, books, down the main laundry chute. And dang if they didn’t come back nice and clean and put in their proper places in our room! And Mom was a martyr. Even at the time I thought she was ridiculous for doing that…but I took advantage of her.

@Coloma Yeah. Far worse, actually. She was sexually abused and there was very real worry from her psychologists and psychiatrists that she was well on her way to becoming a sociopath. :( I can’t remember which Jelly very recently posted a video about a little girl with very similar behaviors (the thread was about how much true dedication and love can turn things around) that my niece displayed, but in some ways my niece’s behavior was even worse, but absolutely identical in other areas. It really does take a lot of patience and understanding. Pretty much more than any human being possesses for the most part. You have to be willing to learn and relearn how to interact with a kid since it’s SO different than normal. My family and I had many breakdowns since it feels so impossible to actually help them. It’s genuinely one of the hardest experiences of my life for so many reasons. But! She has come so, so far – so much more than even the multiple professionals involved thought would be possible. She’s a different kid and it’s great to see actual happiness now – and empathy since that was completely missing. Anyway, sorry, but yes… It was very hard!

@DrasticDreamer Thanks for jumping in. Unless you’ve had to deal with children with special needs on a daily basis, I don’t think most people get it. I’m also a professional child care worker and have to deal with children of all stages of behaviour and help the Spec.Ped. folks pinpoint and work on any special needs we see.

@chyna accused me of saying @Coloma abused her daughter. AT NO POINT did I say that.

AGAIN, I’m going to post the website that outlines the course that was very helpful to me and my kids. If you can be bothered to read some of the material, you’ll see what I’ve been trying to talk about here, before this thread went walk-about. (it is pretty much what Dutchess was talking about with her grandson.) https://www.pmto.no/en
This isn’t just my opinion, as some here have barked at me. These techniques and the ‘no hitting’ rule is based in scientific studies. You can anecdote the hell out of your personal stories, but facts aren’t opinions and opinions aren’t facts.

I’m sure not hitting or shoving a special needs 14 year old that’s following me around and screaming in my face is not the best way to treat her problem. However, I would have a very hard time restraining myself, A little child is different. A 14 year old is probably physically my size. That’s just me. Again, I realize it may not be the therapeutic way.

Edit above: Double negative. Should read “I’m sure hitting or shoving her is not the best way to treat her problem.”

@jca, you’re right. It’s not the best way. It’s far too late by the age of 14. I think @Coloma and I just segued into our own experiences with young children.

Psychology is the only way to deal with it. I would suggest you take some counseling, like I did, trying to figure out how to deal with my middle, adult daughter.

@cazzie Thank you for that link. I’m picking out one suggestions here:

“Make sure you have the child’s attention before giving a direction…”
Nothing drives me crazier than hearing an adult yell out at a preoccupied child, in a room full of talking people, to do this or that, and then get angry when the child seems to ignore them. I learned early on, call the child to you, get down on their level, look them in the eye (not threatening) and explain exactly what you want them to do.

Parents who sit on their butts and yell instructions to their kids, like, “Don’t do that! Be nice!” bug the hell out of me too. Get your ass up, get over there, and do something.
We were at an acquaintance’s house a few weeks ago. There was a heavy metal bar, about the size of a baseball bat, in the yard, among all the clutter. One of the kids picked it up and used it as a bat. His parents ignored him. He wound up chunking a kid across the head. He claimed it was an accident. They were yelling at him. I whispered to his Gramma, “I think it’s time that bar just disappeared out of the yard.” The fucking thing should have never been there in the first place!!!

@Dutchess_III Yes, I hate parents that just sit there and yell too.
I also can’t stand parents that ask their toddlers and young pre-schoolers if they WANT to do something like put on their jacket. Of course they are going to say “No” or protest, you just, matter of factly, walk up to them and say ” We’re going to put on your jacket now and go outside.” or whatever. The ” Do you WANT to…fill in the blanks… put on your shoes, jacket, take a nap, go to bed, eat your broccoli is so annoying to me.

@Coloma the ‘asking’ problem is also in this programme. It is something we have had to address with parents at daycare, too. ‘Should we go home now?’ ‘No’, creates a lot of problems when it is time to pick up your child.

@cazzie Yes, I imagine it does.

When my kids were little I had a friend who was a counselor, and she gave me lots of free advice. One is, “Don’t ask, tell!” And don’t say, “OK?” at the end of a statement, because that turns it into an open ended question.

@Dutchess_III Exactly. Communication is hard at times, like asking someone to do something for you and saying “would” you do…x-y-z, instead of “could” you. “Could you” gives an out, “would you” is a direct request.

So today I saw my sister and my niece come in and she told her to get her butt upstairs and then they were in the room with the door shut. My niece started screaming as if she was being killed. I ran upstairs and my niece is having a meltdown screaming that she didn’t wanna live, she didn’t care about anything, she can’t stop acting how she is, etc.

She was also diagnosed with depression and has been seeing a doctor and been on medication. My sister apologized for me seeing the net down and said she just lost it and was angry how my niece was acting and being disrespectful. She said she was mentally exhausted.

So I have some sympathy for her. I thought I had it bad.

@chelle21689 can you suggest the website I referred to? Perhaps your sister could bring it up with the therapist and see if they are familiar with it.

@chelle21689 Maybe being away from her parents and living somewhere else will help. Or, are her parents going to be living there too? I might have missed something.

Being depressed at 14 is not uncommon. 14 is the bewitching age. I would say the biggest source of depression for teens is loneliness. They often have no idea their depression is caused by loneliness, if that is the case, it just feels from nowhere. If she has trouble behaviorally to begin with, she might very well have extreme feeling regarding not fitting in at school, and being on the outside. This is not to be taken lightly.

You’re young, maybe she will confide in you. She might relate to you better than her parents.

Loneliness and insecurity. There is so much peer pressure at that age. I never felt like I lived up.

You know, you can’t tell your sister how to act, but it sounds like she’s trying to confront the kid head on. I imagine that’s what she’s always done. I know some parents who think that if they just scream “Stop it!” the kid will magically stop. They won’t. They just get angry. She doesn’t realize she’s doing exactly what the kid wants her to do. LOTS of attention and fireworks to boot.

You’ll notice that in most of us suggested a much more oblique, less obvious technique. Seriously…talk to a counselor.

@Dutchess_III I’ve had to deal with teachers at my son’s school who think grabbing him and yelling at his face are ways to address his behaviour. It makes things much worse and the teachers end up angry and frustrated and my son comes home with marks on his back from being dragged out from under a stairwell or table. I want to just yell, ‘He’s hiding for a reason, you idiot. He’s scared and you are scaring him more.’

^^Exactly. There is usually a reason.

It blows my mind that teachers can act that way. I’ve listened to multiple teachers trying to give instructions to one kid at the same time, without ever making eye contact or getting his full atttention. It’s like, “WTF is wrong with you? You’re supposed to be professionals!”

If I got frustrated enough, and tempers were rising, I’d send the child to the office, where it was quiet, to give him a chance to calm down, and me a chance to regain control of the class room and get back on track of whatever subject we were trying to learn. I did that long before I got to the point I wanted to scream in his face (although I could feel it coming on.)

the two that yelled at him were men. He doesn’t react well to men confronting him like that due, in part, to what he went through with his father.

I will go slap them for you, and for your son, @cazzie.