Anyone else get tired of loving a child who can be hard to love?

[Anonymous]

Hey immediate PP, you rock. Thank you for all the research

[Anonymous]

Try the mental health center at GWU, for you. It may be genetic.

[Anonymous]

OP, have you thought about checking out whether your child has a sensory processing disorder? An OT evaluation might reveal something that can be taken care of with therapy.

[Anonymous]

Where do you live? I live in Arlington. My son was (and can still be) difficult to manage, VERY hard to love (although I couldn't say it out loud or even to myself). his daycare providers said get him checked out by the county. He now has an IEP (Individual Education plan; something that has to occur through your county - a huge process) and is with people (therapists) in a special preschool who have heped guide him and have really made great strides in his behavior.

In my heart I believe he may just be growing out of it, but I do believe these early interventions helped immensely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:what?
you want to say what?
she looks at me and says YOU CAME FROM THE JUNGLE RIGHT?
she introduces me to her frieds like this THIS IS MY SLAVE, MY MOTHER BOUGHT HER FROM SOUTH AMERICA FOR VERY CHEAP...
you want me to say she's pleasant?
SHE SUCKS but I love her and I'm still with this family because they don't agree with her behavior and we all want her to be a pleasant and succesfull individual.

Look. I would not blame your kid for saying this, I would blame yourself. The second she said this you should have said bye to her friends, grabbed her hand, sent her to her room, and come down so hard on her that speaking to you the way she does becomes an unpleasant experience. Call your child out on her bluff. She is not nervous about talking down to you. That is not her fault, it is yours. Stand up, be a mom, and let her know things are going to change, or being a kid will not be as much fun for her.

[Anonymous]

Kids are only going to keep doing what we put up with. Set the tone early. It's not just, we get what we get. There is alot we have to do with, as far as how easy or hard parenting is.

[Anonymous]

To the 8:58 poster - First of all, the woman you are responding to is the child's nanny not her mother so "be a mom" is not the right answer. Second, I don't think you are taking to heart what the people with these problems are saying in this thread. The discipline you describe would be useful and successful for a child with a more ordinary temperment, it would have little impact on a child with the more extreme sort of personality that is being described by those seeking advice here. While I don't agree with some of what this nanny has said about the child - for instance I most certainly do not agree with this nanny that the child is not suffering or that the child takes real pleasure in causing others pain - the child is most certainly suffering and needs help and the fact that she laughs at certain things does not in any way mean she is experiencing real pleasure. However, I sympathize b/c one of my three children is difficult to parent (I would not personally say "difficult to love" b/c for whatever reason my attachment to my difficult child is, if anything, stronger then to my other children - and I would not ever say that out loud (or as a prior poster noted, even probably to myself)) and I know what challenges everyone here who has described their problems here is facing. Providing the ordinary discipline and consistency advice to people with this sort of issue is not going to solve their problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To the 8:58 poster - First of all, the woman you are responding to is the child's nanny not her mother so "be a mom" is not the right answer. Second, I don't think you are taking to heart what the people with these problems are saying in this thread. The discipline you describe would be useful and successful for a child with a more ordinary temperment, it would have little impact on a child with the more extreme sort of personality that is being described by those seeking advice here. While I don't agree with some of what this nanny has said about the child - for instance I most certainly do not agree with this nanny that the child is not suffering or that the child takes real pleasure in causing others pain - the child is most certainly suffering and needs help and the fact that she laughs at certain things does not in any way mean she is experiencing real pleasure. However, I sympathize b/c one of my three children is difficult to parent (I would not personally say "difficult to love" b/c for whatever reason my attachment to my difficult child is, if anything, stronger then to my other children - and I would not ever say that out loud (or as a prior poster noted, even probably to myself)) and I know what challenges everyone here who has described their problems here is facing. Providing the ordinary discipline and consistency advice to people with this sort of issue is not going to solve their problem.

Then the nanny should have said bye to the friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:what?
you want to say what?
she looks at me and says YOU CAME FROM THE JUNGLE RIGHT?
she introduces me to her frieds like this THIS IS MY SLAVE, MY MOTHER BOUGHT HER FROM SOUTH AMERICA FOR VERY CHEAP...
you want me to say she's pleasant?
SHE SUCKS but I love her and I'm still with this family because they don't agree with her behavior and we all want her to be a pleasant and succesfull individual.

Look. I would not blame your kid for saying this, I would blame yourself. The second she said this you should have said bye to her friends, grabbed her hand, sent her to her room, and come down so hard on her that speaking to you the way she does becomes an unpleasant experience. Call your child out on her bluff. She is not nervous about talking down to you. That is not her fault, it is yours. Stand up, be a mom, and let her know things are going to change, or being a kid will not be as much fun for her.

The nanny wrote this post about her charge, not the Mom . Read the whole thread before you launch into someone people...

[Anonymous]

I really get this. I practically yelled at my son this morning (ok , I yelled) from a distance of 25 yards--He's severe ADD--IEP whole 9 yards--I know the neighbors had to be giving me the big eye roll (there she goes again)as they loaded their quiet little soldiers into their cars. My son seriously pays a attention to about 10% of what i say to him--it gotten so bad that I'm avoiding interactions with him and he's 9. He is sweet as pie though. He literally will do the opposite of what I ask him to do almost reflexively 90% of the time. By the time people hear me speaking harshly it is because I have gone through so many hoops with this kid just to get him out the door to walk to school it's like fight a war. He just stares at me blinking with his sweet face completely oblivious to how much frustration he's causing--or unable to adapt. We have two other kids who are really suffering from all the strife.
I feel so depressed about this morning's send off, I just want to walk away and never look back. He does not deserve to have have me as his mother--I'm not tempermentally able to handle him--I never have been. I've tried and I've wrecked him and myself in the process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To the 8:58 poster - First of all, the woman you are responding to is the child's nanny not her mother so "be a mom" is not the right answer. Second, I don't think you are taking to heart what the people with these problems are saying in this thread. The discipline you describe would be useful and successful for a child with a more ordinary temperment, it would have little impact on a child with the more extreme sort of personality that is being described by those seeking advice here. While I don't agree with some of what this nanny has said about the child - for instance I most certainly do not agree with this nanny that the child is not suffering or that the child takes real pleasure in causing others pain - the child is most certainly suffering and needs help and the fact that she laughs at certain things does not in any way mean she is experiencing real pleasure. However, I sympathize b/c one of my three children is difficult to parent (I would not personally say "difficult to love" b/c for whatever reason my attachment to my difficult child is, if anything, stronger then to my other children - and I would not ever say that out loud (or as a prior poster noted, even probably to myself)) and I know what challenges everyone here who has described their problems here is facing. Providing the ordinary discipline and consistency advice to people with this sort of issue is not going to solve their problem.

Then the nanny should have said bye to the friends.

PP, you are making an assumption about the child in question, let's call her "Laura". In your view, the assumption goes like this.

"Laura" is saying nasty things about me in front of her friends. "Laura" has control over what she says, and she is capable of not saying nasty things, if she wants to. She is also capable of learning cause and effect -- that if she says nasty things about me in front of her friends, she no longer gets to play with her friends.

Therefore, all I have to do is, with consistency, teach her a lesson. I need to "nip this behavior in the bud" and teach her that saying nasty things gets her nowhere. Then she will learn.

So, if I consistently remove access to her friends every time she says nasty things then she will learn that she must control what she says around her friends.

The type of "natural consequences" outlined above DOES work for many children.

However, it does NOT work for SOME children. Some children:

1) do not have control over whether they say thing or stay quiet;
2) are not able to stop saying nasty things if they open their mouths;
3) are not able to remember the consequences from last time, in order to influence what they do in the future.

Since you, PP, are on the outside, you really don't know what the deal is, with this child "Laura". You don't know what is causing ths behavior.

It is very nice of you to offer your opinion as to what will work for"Laura's" nanny, to get her to stop saying nasty things about her in front of her friends. But be aware that your opinion may be, pretty much, worthless to the person who posted about the child, since you do not have all the facts.

What is true for YOUR child, may very well not be true for another person's child.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I feel so depressed about this morning's send off, I just want to walk away and never look back. He does not deserve to have have me as his mother--I'm not tempermentally able to handle him--I never have been. I've tried and I've wrecked him and myself in the process.

Just wanted to say -- hang in there! I really feel for you (and today, feel the same way as you do.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To the 8:58 poster - First of all, the woman you are responding to is the child's nanny not her mother so "be a mom" is not the right answer. Second, I don't think you are taking to heart what the people with these problems are saying in this thread. The discipline you describe would be useful and successful for a child with a more ordinary temperment, it would have little impact on a child with the more extreme sort of personality that is being described by those seeking advice here. While I don't agree with some of what this nanny has said about the child - for instance I most certainly do not agree with this nanny that the child is not suffering or that the child takes real pleasure in causing others pain - the child is most certainly suffering and needs help and the fact that she laughs at certain things does not in any way mean she is experiencing real pleasure. However, I sympathize b/c one of my three children is difficult to parent (I would not personally say "difficult to love" b/c for whatever reason my attachment to my difficult child is, if anything, stronger then to my other children - and I would not ever say that out loud (or as a prior poster noted, even probably to myself)) and I know what challenges everyone here who has described their problems here is facing. Providing the ordinary discipline and consistency advice to people with this sort of issue is not going to solve their problem.

Then the nanny should have said bye to the friends.

PP, you are making an assumption about the child in question, let's call her "Laura". In your view, the assumption goes like this.

"Laura" is saying nasty things about me in front of her friends. "Laura" has control over what she says, and she is capable of not saying nasty things, if she wants to. She is also capable of learning cause and effect -- that if she says nasty things about me in front of her friends, she no longer gets to play with her friends.

Therefore, all I have to do is, with consistency, teach her a lesson. I need to "nip this behavior in the bud" and teach her that saying nasty things gets her nowhere. Then she will learn.

So, if I consistently remove access to her friends every time she says nasty things then she will learn that she must control what she says around her friends.

The type of "natural consequences" outlined above DOES work for many children.

However, it does NOT work for SOME children. Some children:

1) do not have control over whether they say thing or stay quiet;
2) are not able to stop saying nasty things if they open their mouths;
3) are not able to remember the consequences from last time, in order to influence what they do in the future.

Since you, PP, are on the outside, you really don't know what the deal is, with this child "Laura". You don't know what is causing ths behavior.

It is very nice of you to offer your opinion as to what will work for"Laura's" nanny, to get her to stop saying nasty things about her in front of her friends. But be aware that your opinion may be, pretty much, worthless to the person who posted about the child, since you do not have all the facts.

What is true for YOUR child, may very well not be true for another person's child.

Why does is always have to turn into this "oh no, we are controlling our children to much". We aren't giving them free reign to express their feelings. Come on, it's not ok, for a child to refer to her nanny as a slave, and continue to have that conversation with her friends. Call it controlling then, but we do teach our kids that somethings are acceptable in the way we speak to people and about people. They can express themselves all they want, but if they cross the line, it's not being a martyr to real them back in and say, "I don't think so. I have a more laid back household because of it, and so do my friends.

[Anonymous]

op: i am in your exact same shoes. i would pursue more therapies, like OT or even private play-based therapy, but i cannot afford it. i make do with what i've learned from several parenting books. and i just try to survive it. it's an awful thing to say about a child's life, or, actually, both of our lives, but it's true. i am pretty unhappy most of the time when i am with my child.

other parents, one thing that really helps is to not be judgmental about the difficult child's behavior or the parenting. it may seem to you like it's the parenting, but PLEASE believe me when i say that it is not.

other parents can really make or break my day sometimes. i know some people feel uncomfortable saying something "negative" about a child, but i actually usually feel relieved and supported when another mom says "wow, your daughter can be really challenging." yes, she can. it's true!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:op: i am in your exact same shoes. i would pursue more therapies, like OT or even private play-based therapy, but i cannot afford it. i make do with what i've learned from several parenting books. and i just try to survive it. it's an awful thing to say about a child's life, or, actually, both of our lives, but it's true. i am pretty unhappy most of the time when i am with my child.

other parents, one thing that really helps is to not be judgmental about the difficult child's behavior or the parenting. it may seem to you like it's the parenting, but PLEASE believe me when i say that it is not.

other parents can really make or break my day sometimes. i know some people feel uncomfortable saying something "negative" about a child, but i actually usually feel relieved and supported when another mom says "wow, your daughter can be really challenging." yes, she can. it's true!

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