How to deal with teenage a-holery?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:We went through similar. I’m not sure anything worked perfectly. But we took away the phone, the weekend plans with friends, as consequences. Maybe go full silent treatment until she apologizes for her actions. Does she at least get good grades? If so hold onto that.

She gets excellent grades. I don't believe a silent treatment is the best way to handle. She will never give a sincere apology in her life, I'm pretty sure of that. She seems incapable of taking any responsibility for her actions.

I have occasionally given consequences to her. They are either ineffective, or they just exacerbate the issues. She doesn't seem to care about anything. She never spends time or talks with any friends. She could care less about a phone or friends, or weekend plans.

I would get her evaluated for depression. Sometimes it doesn't present as sadness, it presents as anger or irritability.

We have scheduled an appointment with a therapist for her. But until then, what can we do in the meantime?

A therapist won't be able to diagnose anything or prescribe medication. I would get a mental health screening from her pediatrician.

In the interim, you acknowledge that this is a problem that is beyond you, you hold your boundary and don't escalate. Protect your other kids from her nastiness. Try to make sure she is sleeping and eating enough and is well hydrated. Just try to get by until you can get some help.

Also, the other thing to try in the interim is exercise and more time out of the house and away from family. If you can arrange it, have her do some sort of sport or dance or volunteer work.

I totally agree with you. I have been trying to get her to exercise - even something as a simple as a walk, either on her own or with me, but she refuses. There is one exercise class we basically drag her to every week, kicking and screaming, but we refuse to let her give it up because otherwise she would do nothing and refuses to do any other physical activity. We have been unsuccessful with getting her to do other activities. Straight up refuses. As much as she says she hates us, she only wants to be at home only feels safe here. She hates school even more.

This is extreme behavior.
Has she always been like this?

Which part? To some extent she's been like this since she was born. Now that she's a teen, I think she realizes that there's really nothing we can absolutely force her to do and so she's digging her heels in.

Refusal to go outside, school, or leave the house. Refusing to eat, sleep, or talk when angry.

She hasn't refused school yet, but I'm really afraid that might be next. It's the first time she's refused to talk to us for days. She used to love the outside, so that is new too. I feel like we are at the very beginning cusp of refusing to eat and sleep, but she's always denied these are actual needs in her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We went through similar. I’m not sure anything worked perfectly. But we took away the phone, the weekend plans with friends, as consequences. Maybe go full silent treatment until she apologizes for her actions. Does she at least get good grades? If so hold onto that.

She gets excellent grades. I don't believe a silent treatment is the best way to handle. She will never give a sincere apology in her life, I'm pretty sure of that. She seems incapable of taking any responsibility for her actions.

I have occasionally given consequences to her. They are either ineffective, or they just exacerbate the issues. She doesn't seem to care about anything. She never spends time or talks with any friends. She could care less about a phone or friends, or weekend plans.

I would get her evaluated for depression. Sometimes it doesn't present as sadness, it presents as anger or irritability.

We have scheduled an appointment with a therapist for her. But until then, what can we do in the meantime?

A therapist won't be able to diagnose anything or prescribe medication. I would get a mental health screening from her pediatrician.

In the interim, you acknowledge that this is a problem that is beyond you, you hold your boundary and don't escalate. Protect your other kids from her nastiness. Try to make sure she is sleeping and eating enough and is well hydrated. Just try to get by until you can get some help.

Also, the other thing to try in the interim is exercise and more time out of the house and away from family. If you can arrange it, have her do some sort of sport or dance or volunteer work.

I totally agree with you. I have been trying to get her to exercise - even something as a simple as a walk, either on her own or with me, but she refuses. There is one exercise class we basically drag her to every week, kicking and screaming, but we refuse to let her give it up because otherwise she would do nothing and refuses to do any other physical activity. We have been unsuccessful with getting her to do other activities. Straight up refuses. As much as she says she hates us, she only wants to be at home only feels safe here. She hates school even more.

This is extreme behavior.
Has she always been like this?

Which part? To some extent she's been like this since she was born. Now that she's a teen, I think she realizes that there's really nothing we can absolutely force her to do and so she's digging her heels in.

Refusal to go outside, school, or leave the house. Refusing to eat, sleep, or talk when angry.

She hasn't refused school yet, but I'm really afraid that might be next. It's the first time she's refused to talk to us for days. She used to love the outside, so that is new too. I feel like we are at the very beginning cusp of refusing to eat and sleep, but she's always denied these are actual needs in her.

re: eating and sleeping - it's always been a struggle. but in the end, we've always been able to essentially make her eat and sleep even though she didn't want to. Now we are starting to see the very beginning of her using that as something she can control and we can do nothing about.

[Anonymous]

OP, please cross-post to the special needs board--I think you will get better suggestions there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP,

You MUST have this child evaluated. Her behavior is not normal. My kids and other relatives between themselves have bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression, autism and severe inattentive or hyperactive ADHD, but they are not intentionally and consistently cruel. Your child's behavior reads like oppositional defiance disorder, which occurs in some instances of autism spectrum disorder.

If you're in the DC area, I highly recommend the Stixrud Group in Silver Spring, MD. Their psychologists are very experienced. A full neuropsych will last 2 days and about 8 hours and cost you upwards of 5K, depending on the battery of tests they give her. The tests are not the same for each individual, some will be added specifically to address descriptions of the patient from parents/teachers. They will determine which tests to give her in a two hour long conversation with you, plus questionnaires filled out by you and two of her teachers. They will also explain her test results in a feedback session, and write a detailed formal report, with recommendations for future management of any diagnosis, including school services and accommodations, targeted therapies, and psychiatrist follow-up for meds, if applicable.

Please call a psychologist's practice ASAP because the best ones have a few months of back-up and you need to address this before it gets worse. It will take years to fully understand what you can do with her, and what resources are at your disposal, once you have a diagnosis.

Best of luck. It's very hard.

Me again. I posted before reading the other responses. "Therapist" is a vague term, and if you're talking about talk therapy, then it will be of no use whatsoever currently, because what she needs is an in-depth examination of how her brain works, if she's at all amenable to it. Therapists are not licensed to conduct neuropsychological examinations - only psychologists are, ones with PhDs. It's a completely different field of expertise. A therapist might be useful for the "victims", to seek ways to process their emotions And for your child, in the future, in a DBT/CBT setting (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy / Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), to learn ways to be more self-aware and less reactive to others, but only if she recognizes she has a problem and wants to do better...

I said above, but we are already in the process of having her evaluated.

She is in perfect 100 percent denial that there is any problem, and there is absolutely no acknowledgement of her own limitations or that outside guidance might help her in any way. It's really a personality mix that seems impossible to work with, so we are planning on getting some professional guidance on that.

PP you replied to. I'm very relieved to hear your child will be evaluated! That's the first step in the process. I hope it's a full neuropsych? With complex cases such as these, a shorter eval (some providers offer just a few hours worth of tests to diagnose ADHD, for example, or conduct testing for private school entrance requirements) won't cut it, and you're basically wasting your money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our oldest just turned 14 and it has been such a doozy. This is the child with which it seems every other standard parenting trick has zero effect. We have multiple, so the contrast is very noticeable. She has never been influenced by any external pressures (whether it's peer pressure or parental pressure) and is resistant to any guidance, advice, help, etc. Consequences never worked.

This was difficult in and of itself, but now at 14, the straight up meanness has gotten out of control. Very beyond the pale stuff. Calling us stupid, idiots, wishing us dead, telling us she hates us and wouldn't care about us at all at our funerals, and hoping we both burn in hell. And then the next second, she is completely normal, asking where me where the cookies are that I baked earlier.

She is pretty much also refusing to do basic chores or help out around the house, and basically saying that we can't make her do anything. We can't get into a power struggle, because it is such a trigger for her. Any slight inclination of control causes her to act out in extreme ways. It's causing negative ripple effects on our whole family, as her siblings witness her diabolical behavior.

How would you deal with this issue?

She has a terrible social life and she is lashing out at you because she can't be herself in public. She feels she has no control over life, and fears for her future, and she doesn't feel safe to tell anyone about it. She is treating herself even worse than she is treating you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP,

You MUST have this child evaluated. Her behavior is not normal. My kids and other relatives between themselves have bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression, autism and severe inattentive or hyperactive ADHD, but they are not intentionally and consistently cruel. Your child's behavior reads like oppositional defiance disorder, which occurs in some instances of autism spectrum disorder.

If you're in the DC area, I highly recommend the Stixrud Group in Silver Spring, MD. Their psychologists are very experienced. A full neuropsych will last 2 days and about 8 hours and cost you upwards of 5K, depending on the battery of tests they give her. The tests are not the same for each individual, some will be added specifically to address descriptions of the patient from parents/teachers. They will determine which tests to give her in a two hour long conversation with you, plus questionnaires filled out by you and two of her teachers. They will also explain her test results in a feedback session, and write a detailed formal report, with recommendations for future management of any diagnosis, including school services and accommodations, targeted therapies, and psychiatrist follow-up for meds, if applicable.

Please call a psychologist's practice ASAP because the best ones have a few months of back-up and you need to address this before it gets worse. It will take years to fully understand what you can do with her, and what resources are at your disposal, once you have a diagnosis.

Best of luck. It's very hard.

Me again. I posted before reading the other responses. "Therapist" is a vague term, and if you're talking about talk therapy, then it will be of no use whatsoever currently, because what she needs is an in-depth examination of how her brain works, if she's at all amenable to it. Therapists are not licensed to conduct neuropsychological examinations - only psychologists are, ones with PhDs. It's a completely different field of expertise. A therapist might be useful for the "victims", to seek ways to process their emotions And for your child, in the future, in a DBT/CBT setting (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy / Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), to learn ways to be more self-aware and less reactive to others, but only if she recognizes she has a problem and wants to do better...

I said above, but we are already in the process of having her evaluated.

She is in perfect 100 percent denial that there is any problem, and there is absolutely no acknowledgement of her own limitations or that outside guidance might help her in any way. It's really a personality mix that seems impossible to work with, so we are planning on getting some professional guidance on that.

PP you replied to. I'm very relieved to hear your child will be evaluated! That's the first step in the process. I hope it's a full neuropsych? With complex cases such as these, a shorter eval (some providers offer just a few hours worth of tests to diagnose ADHD, for example, or conduct testing for private school entrance requirements) won't cut it, and you're basically wasting your money.

We're starting with an evaluation through the school. First, we'll see if that is sufficient to work with - if not, we also have a private eval that is more comprehensive scheduled as well.

[Anonymous]

OP, I am very sorry for your family. It must be hell for her siblings.

This is not her "personality." She has something wrong in her brain. This is not typical or just a personality flaw.

[Anonymous]

I would encourage you to search PDA on the special needs board. There are some parent there that have recommended books related to how to best parent I those situation. That might give you at least a bit of a toolkit to get started.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our oldest just turned 14 and it has been such a doozy. This is the child with which it seems every other standard parenting trick has zero effect. We have multiple, so the contrast is very noticeable. She has never been influenced by any external pressures (whether it's peer pressure or parental pressure) and is resistant to any guidance, advice, help, etc. Consequences never worked.

This was difficult in and of itself, but now at 14, the straight up meanness has gotten out of control. Very beyond the pale stuff. Calling us stupid, idiots, wishing us dead, telling us she hates us and wouldn't care about us at all at our funerals, and hoping we both burn in hell. And then the next second, she is completely normal, asking where me where the cookies are that I baked earlier.

She is pretty much also refusing to do basic chores or help out around the house, and basically saying that we can't make her do anything. We can't get into a power struggle, because it is such a trigger for her. Any slight inclination of control causes her to act out in extreme ways. It's causing negative ripple effects on our whole family, as her siblings witness her diabolical behavior.

How would you deal with this issue?

She has a terrible social life and she is lashing out at you because she can't be herself in public. She feels she has no control over life, and fears for her future, and she doesn't feel safe to tell anyone about it. She is treating herself even worse than she is treating you.

That's what worries me the most. That saying those types of things to us must also make her feel like a terrible person - and she actually does say things like "I know I'm messed up. I hate everyone and wouldn't care if everyone died". The truth is, she'd care a lot. She's just so disconnected from her feelings.

I also noticed she has been voicing worries about her future as well. And keeps talking about wanting to go back to being 8, when everything was shut down during the pandemic.

[Anonymous]

OP, my kids are past this age, but whenever they were like those, they were terribly unhappy.

It sounds like your daughter is very, very unhappy. Which means this isn’t a discipline thing — or at least not exclusively that. It’s also very much a relationship thing — because she needs someone who can work through this moment with her…and you’re it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, my kids are past this age, but whenever they were like those, they were terribly unhappy.

It sounds like your daughter is very, very unhappy. Which means this isn’t a discipline thing — or at least not exclusively that. It’s also very much a relationship thing — because she needs someone who can work through this moment with her…and you’re it.

I suspect this also. And I'd much rather her be outwardly angry at us than to turn that in toward herself. I feel like that might be inevitable unless we address it.

[Anonymous]

I opened this thread and at first thought I was going to be able to commiserate. I have one kid who can be very tricky and spirals if given negative consequences. It makes her double, triple down. However she is very successful socially etc. And can be reasonable.

With her this whole authoritarian approach many on this site recommend just really does not work. She has to feel connected to us in order to de-escalate. My best approach is to walk away and then re-engage in a concerned way. What is going on. Why are you talking to us like this. Etc. People on DCUM would mock this approach and also what many suggest doesn’t work with some kids. I have another kid who responds very standard. Give the consequence, he stops. The end. Point is trust your own instincts and don’t let yourself be judged.

What you are describing seems way beyond this but I do want to strongly offer that I think a kid like this needs help not punishment. Good luck OP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Don't give her any money. Turn her out of the house at 18. Don't pay for her college. Let her fail and learn hard life lessons.

I can't do this. The thing is, she says she can't wait until she's 18 and can get away from us and never call or visit us ever again. But I'm honestly worried that her personality makes it so that she will never be able to be independent on her own or be able to thrive.

There are clearly things she can do to make her life work better, healthy habits and such, but she is 100 percent resistant to any guidance, and then she slips down a slippery slope very quickly. I want to give her the skills to be able to have a decent, balanced life.

As I read your posts, I agree that you should be worried that she will never be able to be on her own. Thriving sounds like an extremely lofty goal. Like a PP, I initially thought PDA (didn't jump to autism). But I also think that she is on the road to a personality disorder.

I would definitely seek an evaluation. I would consider parent training. And, I think you need to hang on to your hat. This could get so much worse given how young she is to be engaging in this level of behavior.

We went through some very serious mental health challenges with my middle child, who also didn't respond to consequences and, even more scary, didn't care if he lived or died or whether people physically hurt him. We were able to get through this and my son is independent now but it was neither easy nor inexpensive in both time and money. And, he's almost thriving with the potential to thrive. But, my goal was to get through it and get him independent. Thriving dropped off my list.

One last thing. We were told when my son was a couple of years older than your daughter that if we didn't intervene and really get things turned around, our son would be diagnosed with a personality disorder which is a permanent condition. I wasn't sure it was even possible to turn it around, but we followed the recommendations of the professionals (which often were tough love and that's really hard) and were able to turn it around. And, I know it sounds like we the parents put in the effort as opposed to our son. But in reality that is what happened because my son didn't care.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP,

You MUST have this child evaluated. Her behavior is not normal. My kids and other relatives between themselves have bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression, autism and severe inattentive or hyperactive ADHD, but they are not intentionally and consistently cruel. Your child's behavior reads like oppositional defiance disorder, which occurs in some instances of autism spectrum disorder.

If you're in the DC area, I highly recommend the Stixrud Group in Silver Spring, MD. Their psychologists are very experienced. A full neuropsych will last 2 days and about 8 hours and cost you upwards of 5K, depending on the battery of tests they give her. The tests are not the same for each individual, some will be added specifically to address descriptions of the patient from parents/teachers. They will determine which tests to give her in a two hour long conversation with you, plus questionnaires filled out by you and two of her teachers. They will also explain her test results in a feedback session, and write a detailed formal report, with recommendations for future management of any diagnosis, including school services and accommodations, targeted therapies, and psychiatrist follow-up for meds, if applicable.

Please call a psychologist's practice ASAP because the best ones have a few months of back-up and you need to address this before it gets worse. It will take years to fully understand what you can do with her, and what resources are at your disposal, once you have a diagnosis.

Best of luck. It's very hard.

I am the PP who mentioned personality disorder and shared a bit about my son. I have to say that the neuropsych was totally worthless from a mental health point of view. They wouldn't consider most diagnoses because of my son's age - he was 17 at the time of the last one. When I shared that after a recent inpatient hospitalization that the working diagnosis was bipolar, the evaluator admitted that they thought so but wouldn't have even mentioned it had the hospital psychiatrists (there was more than one hospitalization) had pretty much settled on the diagnosis. So, I got a sort of confirmation that the neuropsych was thinking bipolar as well.

My son has other disabilities so the eval was useful for other reasons. But it shed absolutely no light on the mental health aspect of his condition. His psychiatrist recommended it only because he felt that we needed an IEP related to disabilities and given all of the mental health issues, the neuropsych would provide the best information and recommendations for the least cost.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP,

You MUST have this child evaluated. Her behavior is not normal. My kids and other relatives between themselves have bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression, autism and severe inattentive or hyperactive ADHD, but they are not intentionally and consistently cruel. Your child's behavior reads like oppositional defiance disorder, which occurs in some instances of autism spectrum disorder.

If you're in the DC area, I highly recommend the Stixrud Group in Silver Spring, MD. Their psychologists are very experienced. A full neuropsych will last 2 days and about 8 hours and cost you upwards of 5K, depending on the battery of tests they give her. The tests are not the same for each individual, some will be added specifically to address descriptions of the patient from parents/teachers. They will determine which tests to give her in a two hour long conversation with you, plus questionnaires filled out by you and two of her teachers. They will also explain her test results in a feedback session, and write a detailed formal report, with recommendations for future management of any diagnosis, including school services and accommodations, targeted therapies, and psychiatrist follow-up for meds, if applicable.

Please call a psychologist's practice ASAP because the best ones have a few months of back-up and you need to address this before it gets worse. It will take years to fully understand what you can do with her, and what resources are at your disposal, once you have a diagnosis.

Best of luck. It's very hard.

Me again. I posted before reading the other responses. "Therapist" is a vague term, and if you're talking about talk therapy, then it will be of no use whatsoever currently, because what she needs is an in-depth examination of how her brain works, if she's at all amenable to it. Therapists are not licensed to conduct neuropsychological examinations - only psychologists are, ones with PhDs. It's a completely different field of expertise. A therapist might be useful for the "victims", to seek ways to process their emotions And for your child, in the future, in a DBT/CBT setting (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy / Cognitive Behavioral Therapy), to learn ways to be more self-aware and less reactive to others, but only if she recognizes she has a problem and wants to do better...

I said above, but we are already in the process of having her evaluated.

She is in perfect 100 percent denial that there is any problem, and there is absolutely no acknowledgement of her own limitations or that outside guidance might help her in any way. It's really a personality mix that seems impossible to work with, so we are planning on getting some professional guidance on that.

PP you replied to. I'm very relieved to hear your child will be evaluated! That's the first step in the process. I hope it's a full neuropsych? With complex cases such as these, a shorter eval (some providers offer just a few hours worth of tests to diagnose ADHD, for example, or conduct testing for private school entrance requirements) won't cut it, and you're basically wasting your money.

We're starting with an evaluation through the school. First, we'll see if that is sufficient to work with - if not, we also have a private eval that is more comprehensive scheduled as well.

PP you replied to. It's free, but it will not even begin to scratch the surface, OP. School psychologists are not PhDs, they are not trained in the same way as private practice psychologists, they have access to the same (very expensive) diagnostic manuals, and on top of all that, they simply do not have the time to work with a student - and take them out of class for the equivalent of 8 hours of testing! School evaluations are made to quickly check if a child has a severe learning disability, developmental issue or severe attention deficit such that they would need accommodations in school. They absolutely cannot diagnose complex psychological issues such as your child seems to have. If you understand this, then at least you won't be led down the garden path if the school eval comes back with a label of "attention issues" or "red flag for autism - please explore further" or whatever else - they might be true, but they will not give you the full picture.

You will need to do a full neuropsych in the future. In case your child rations her goodwill, please be mindful not to waste it on efforts that will not lead to thorough examination.