My 11 year old keeps stealing from the family and I've tried everything??

Nicki

I don't know the answer to pigpen's daughter but to tell a 10 year old child that you cannot bear to have her around and that all her siblings hate her is one of the saddest things I've ever heard. That would have broken my heart and my spirit at that age, and probably still now, and certainly wouldn't have helped solve the original problem. After all, if you are living in a house where everyone hates you, why would you care whether your behaviour affected them negatively?

I don't know how you row back from this position, but I bet that child will remember that statement for the whole of her life, and that it will affect her relationship with her whole family, and how she forms relationships with others. It's the kind of comment you might expect to get from the class bully in the playground, not from a parent who is supposed to love you irrespective of what you do.

Sid_Wolf

pigpen wrote: »

How many times do you slap them before deciding it isn't working?

A slap isn't always the cure.

I only needed one for each thing I did wrong, swore in front of my parents, SLAP, never again. Stole from mums purse, que mum crying when she found our and a slap from dad, never done it again.

Plus a few more things, but my mum has always said i was a very good kid

pigpen

Nicki wrote: »

I don't know the answer to pigpen's daughter but to tell a 10 year old child that you cannot bear to have her around and that all her siblings hate her is one of the saddest things I've ever heard. That would have broken my heart and my spirit at that age, and probably still now, and certainly wouldn't have helped solve the original problem. After all, if you are living in a house where everyone hates you, why would you care whether your behaviour affected them negatively?

I don't know how you row back from this position, but I bet that child will remember that statement for the whole of her life, and that it will affect her relationship with her whole family, and how she forms relationships with others. It's the kind of comment you might expect to get from the class bully in the playground, not from a parent who is supposed to love you irrespective of what you do.

She hasn't been told that but that is how she makes us feel.. as in sad,betrayed, disappointed .. It would be cruel to actually say that we hate her to her.. even I'm not that mean.. I don't hate her, but I do hate this behaviour.. and I hate feeling this way about my own daughter..

pigpen

Sid_Wolf wrote: »

I only needed one for each thing I did wrong, swore in front of my parents, SLAP, never again. Stole from mums purse, que mum crying when she found our and a slap from dad, never done it again.

Plus a few more things, but my mum has always said i was a very good kid

But what if it didn't work.. would you have been slapped more?

If I slapped my 10 year old every time she did something wrong she would be black and blue and I'd never stop! Or at least some days it would be that way.

Nicki

pigpen wrote: »

it frustrates me to the point that I honestly cannot bear to have her near me.. I have sat her down and said this is what your behaviour makes me feel like, and the other children hate her for it.. and she sits there blankly looking at us with a sullen face and doesn't care one jot.

OK, but you can understand my confusion!

duchy

Don't really want to go OT but slapping kids on a regular basis doesn't work. It's the shock value (like most other punishments) any punishment that is over-used soon stops been effective. However don't really want this to divert into a smack/don't smack debate as it'll just get off the topic in hand

vroombroom

omg OP, grow a backbone!! Take the xbox off him, take his other prized toys off him and get locks on the cupboards if you need to!

pigpen

Nicki wrote: »

OK, but you can understand my confusion!

yes.. but it was not meant quite like that..

I'm not an ogre

I have firm boundaries and rigid routines.. I have 2 with ASD so I know you understand the need for that.. but I am not really totally heartless. I feel I have tried every avenue to get help for her and noone seems to think their is aan issue.. apparently this is normal behaviour!

I don't want to dislike my daughter and I don't want her siblings to dislike her but she just won't learn.. it is a horrible way to live.

She sneaks through cupboards to find stuff and everyones bedrooms.. she stole £7 from DD1's room not long ago.. it is an awful way to live.

jinky67

pigpen wrote: »

She hasn't been told that but that is how she makes us feel.. as in sad,betrayed, disappointed .. It would be cruel to actually say that we hate her to her.. even I'm not that mean.. I don't hate her, but I do hate this behaviour.. and I hate feeling this way about my own daughter..

My DS didnt steal stuff, but like your DD and OP's DS he just wouldnt take a telling about anything. I too tried everything to get through to him and nothing made the slightest difference either. It honestly was horrible to live with

Nicki

It does sound grim. I have no answers for you. Just wondered whether maybe you had tried giving her a taste of her own medicine? So rather than telling her you are removing something as a punishment, the item just disappears and no one owns up to taking it? You could then when she has the inevitable meltdown have the conversation about how horrid it feels when that happens without owning up to where it has gone.

Another thought is that my older child who is definitely not ASD sometimes nonetheless shows some very ASD thinking . I do think there is a tiny strain of it in all of us, which sometimes peeks out. Perhaps her empathy levels aren't well developed yet, so she actually has no idea why people are getting so upset by this, and doesn't see it as any worse naughtiness than for example not putting her clothes in the laundry bin, or doing her homework when she should?