Epic failure as a parent

[Anonymous]

As a parent with an Asperger's non-conforming child, my advice is to stop feeling "shame" and do something already.

There is clearly something going on with your child and you have to get to the bottom of it without coming from a place of anger or shame. Rope in the ped, who can recommend a psychologist. Call the school counseling office if you want them to get involved. Help your child instead of castigating her.

[Anonymous]

All of this advice is all well and good.

But some kids are just bad asses who have poor and/or dismissive parents. Absent issues like Aspbergers, autism, etc the issue is usually behavioral problems which are the result of poor parenting. And usually in cases with those social issues, students are not suspended over and over.

I'm just glad OP is willing to take a look at herself as the cause of her child's problems as well as the solution.

Her kid sounds like the type I'd HATE for my child to have to be in a class with. You know that kid, the one the teacher has to constantly stop teaching for in order to address. That kid who has to mouth off and completely disrupt learning for everybody before she storms out. What a nightmare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a parent with an Asperger's non-conforming child, my advice is to stop feeling "shame" and do something already.

There is clearly something going on with your child and you have to get to the bottom of it without coming from a place of anger or shame. Rope in the ped, who can recommend a psychologist. Call the school counseling office if you want them to get involved. Help your child instead of castigating her.

+1

OP, I totally get your feelings as a parent, but you are making your kid's behavior into a big pity party for yourself. Stop internalizing your dd's actions. Parenting is not about controlling our kids, it is about guiding and helping them become healthy confident adults. You can't force her to be 'good', but you can support her and enforce consequences and help her through whatever difficulties she is having right now. It may be hard, but you have to stop thinking of this in terms of how it defines *you* as a parent. It is just MS, hopefully you can help her before there are permanent effects.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent with an Asperger's non-conforming child, my advice is to stop feeling "shame" and do something already.

There is clearly something going on with your child and you have to get to the bottom of it without coming from a place of anger or shame. Rope in the ped, who can recommend a psychologist. Call the school counseling office if you want them to get involved. Help your child instead of castigating her.

+1

OP, I totally get your feelings as a parent, but you are making your kid's behavior into a big pity party for yourself. Stop internalizing your dd's actions. Parenting is not about controlling our kids, it is about guiding and helping them become healthy confident adults. You can't force her to be 'good', but you can support her and enforce consequences and help her through whatever difficulties she is having right now. It may be hard, but you have to stop thinking of this in terms of how it defines *you* as a parent. It is just MS, hopefully you can help her before there are permanent effects.

+2. Was going to write my thoughts but these PPs summed it up perfectly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent with an Asperger's non-conforming child, my advice is to stop feeling "shame" and do something already.

There is clearly something going on with your child and you have to get to the bottom of it without coming from a place of anger or shame. Rope in the ped, who can recommend a psychologist. Call the school counseling office if you want them to get involved. Help your child instead of castigating her.

+1

OP, I totally get your feelings as a parent, but you are making your kid's behavior into a big pity party for yourself. Stop internalizing your dd's actions. Parenting is not about controlling our kids, it is about guiding and helping them become healthy confident adults. You can't force her to be 'good', but you can support her and enforce consequences and help her through whatever difficulties she is having right now. It may be hard, but you have to stop thinking of this in terms of how it defines *you* as a parent. It is just MS, hopefully you can help her before there are permanent effects.

I'd give OP a break here. She is going through one of the stages of grief when one has a child with problems. I just made up these special stages but surely shame is one of them, precisely because people have a tendency to zero right in on the parents and blame them for whatever their child is or does. A parent in this position engages in many questions about what one might have done wrong, second guesses many past decisions, and in general tortures him or herself. It is not the bad parents who feel shame; it more often is the good ones.

I'd also encourage a good nonjudgmental talk with the daughter, leaving all of OP's feelings out of it as I agree this conversation has to be about the daughter, not the parents. Try to pinpoint what is going on--bullying, teachers, academic boredom, mental distress, possible drugs, some trauma the parent is unaware of. It's hard to throw a professional into the mix when you really don't have the first clue as to what might be going wrong. I'd definitely avoid at this point any authoritarian, tough love approach.

Trauma can be a very, very big issue with girls. I have a daughter myself with what all the mental health professionals think is something rooted in trauma. She won't talk to me about it. Her psychiatrist just sent me a note saying she strongly suspects this, but can't get her to open up at all. It is a large cause of mental health and drug abuse problems.

[Anonymous]

I'd forgo the yelling and have a short conversation such as this, "tad, your father and I are extremely disappointed in you. We both know you know what you did was just stupid and what's worse is that you are not a stupid person. Beyond that and perhaps the most difficult part for us is the disapointment your father and I have in ourselfs and our parenting. We cannot believe that you would begin to think that this type of behavior would be acceptable in our house and clearly you think just that. As a result, we have to reevaluate our approach to parenting and until we have come to a resolution on how best to communicate our expectations of you and what toucan expect from us you will no longer be allowed.....". He will go nuts but hold your ground and dont fight back. Just let him rant/yell whatev. He was skipping class ultimately not the worse that he could have done but he was dumb getting caught and you can presume he's done it before.

[Anonymous]

Why are you ashamed of her behavior? Out of all the potential reactions you could have, that's not the obvious one. Think about it from her perspective - she is stuck in a boring classroom and not allowed to even move from the room without prior permission. She broke a rule and you can be mad about that, but why "ashamed"? Unless you can empathize a bit I don't see how you are going to get anywhere. You need to figure out what is going on without projecting or internalizing. Save the shame for something truly shameful, like bullying or stealing or beating someone up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why are you ashamed of her behavior? Out of all the potential reactions you could have, that's not the obvious one. Think about it from her perspective - she is stuck in a boring classroom and not allowed to even move from the room without prior permission. She broke a rule and you can be mad about that, but why "ashamed"? Unless you can empathize a bit I don't see how you are going to get anywhere. You need to figure out what is going on without projecting or internalizing. Save the shame for something truly shameful, like bullying or stealing or beating someone up.

I think the shame comes from the fact that this is DD's THIRD suspension this year. She's obviously been acting out all year. However, not all infractions result in suspension.

DD realizes she and DH should've done something differently along the way.

I suspect she's tried having talks with DD before--only to end up where she's at now.

And we can all poo-poo OP's feelings, but the truth is that we'd feel embarrassed by our children's behavior as well.

[Anonymous]

When my son(s) performs poorly in school, I break out the cleaning supplies and tell him, "This isn't punishment, it's job training."

My first son graduated from college and has a very good job. One in 9th grade, and the youngest is in 6th.

we'll see how it works with them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I just got word that my MS kid has been suspended from school for wandering the halls without a pass: the third suspension in less than a year. I am really at a loss, since neither I nor my husband was ever suspended for anything. Heck, I never even saw the inside of the VP's office! My spouse's father would have beaten him within an inch of his life if he had been suspended, and mine would have grounded me for months. But the authoritarian approach just doesn't work with this kid: the last time we tried, she ran away, during a major snowstorm, no less.

I don't really want any suggestions. This was a school offense, and the school is right to impose its consequences. But I am angry and deeply, deeply ashamed of her behavior. Just need to put that out there.

She needs consequences at home. Getting suspended three times before spring break is not ok. Stop making excuses, stop letting the school handle it, stop whining and step up and be her parent.
Take her phone, limit her weekend fun, make her do some real chores, step up. You need to lay down some real rules for her.
Explain to her what you expect of her in school or any other time.

[Anonymous]

But the authoritarian approach just doesn't work with this kid: the last time we tried, she ran away, during a major snowstorm, no less.

I don't really want any suggestions. This was a school offense, and the school is right to impose its consequences. But I am angry and deeply, deeply ashamed of her behavior. Just need to put that out there.

Why did you post if you didn't want suggestions? The shame was killing you? You should be ashamed - ashamed of yourself that you haven't found a discipline system that works. 'Authoritative' isn't the only model. PPs have it right that this isn't about you, it's about finding out what works for your DC so she makes better choices.

[Anonymous]

OP, I did stuff like that when I was a kid. I wish I could go back and talk to my teenage self, and tell myself that those stupid things were a mistake!

[Anonymous]

No suggestions, but a big virtual hug for you. Parenting is tough! I've been there.

[Anonymous]

I heard this guy speak recently (http://www.bradsachs.com) and I thought he had a lot of good ideas about how to have a conversation with your teenager in a way that will actually be productive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All of this advice is all well and good.

But some kids are just bad asses who have poor and/or dismissive parents. Absent issues like Aspbergers, autism, etc the issue is usually behavioral problems which are the result of poor parenting. And usually in cases with those social issues, students are not suspended over and over.

I'm just glad OP is willing to take a look at herself as the cause of her child's problems as well as the solution.

Her kid sounds like the type I'd HATE for my child to have to be in a class with. You know that kid, the one the teacher has to constantly stop teaching for in order to address. That kid who has to mouth off and completely disrupt learning for everybody before she storms out. What a nightmare.

I am convinced that this poster is the same one who has been posting frequently on several threads ranting about bad parenting and how every problem is because of the parents. Over and over again the same themes and then she sock puppets herself. She's got some kind of issue. I just point this out with the gentle suggestion that you not engage.