Absolutely mortified....how could she do this and why?*update*

Welshwoofs

Op - you said your daughter doesn't understand emotion. I'd say she clearly does because from what you've said, she actively enjoys creating negative emotion in those around her.

I don't know, it seems to me that you're placing quite a lot of your hopes on 'attachment disorder' but it honestly seems to me that's a bit of a crock when we're talking about a short separation from a parent at an age where the child can't even remember it.

I agree with the poster who said to write a letter addressed to all the professionals she's seen at once. But I also think that you've got to have a small part of yourself prepared incase the answer is that there's nothing wrong and she's just, for one reason or another, a not particularly pleasant child. Ultimately, you've got other children to think about and it's not fair on them for her to continue as she is....it already sounds as though she's set her brother up for a childhood full of being bullied and that's not an act that's unthinking of not ignorant of emotions - that's an act of pure malice.

Hanging_by_a_thread

Has you daughter been made aware that had her lies been believed, she and your other children could have been removed from you and put into care? Also that you could have been facing being investigated and possibly prosecuted. If she is old enough to put you and her siblings in this awful position, then she is old enough to have it spelt out to her the full ramifications of her actions.

Having read this thread all the way through I cant help but think the daughter will just be given a nice horse riding lesson, new bag and clothes. All the while the other children will be left worrying what humiliation awaits the family next and wondering when social services and the police will be knocking on the door again.

You say that you cant bare the thought of putting your daughter into care, of not being there for her. In time your other children are going to realise how unbalanced their childhoods have been, because of your daughter. If things continue as they are I see you being left to cope alone with your daughter, who will be unable to function in the adult world. You run the risk of your other children growing more and more resentful and walking away.

pepper18

hi teabag,as a mother of a 14 yr old boy,who is on the autistic spectrum.i can idendify with a lot of your dd behaviour,my son displayed a lot of the same ,he was distressed in his school environment,i took him out of school and home schooled him,not by choice as it provided a much needed break,its amazing the resourc es we find for our children with differences,your daughter is hitting out and hurting others as she can not explain how overwhelming school is, i totally understand every aspect of your post,beleive me only we would know what we have been through/are still going through,i take it a day at a time ,hour by hour if necessary,my son is asleep now as despite being brought to bed at 3.am. went down to play in the snow bare feet and pyjamas and all at 5.am,there is much more to my story as only you would know,but its personal and still hurts a lot,take care

Ames

Wow, she sounds like my sister. There's nothing wrong with her, she's just a very calculating and manipulative person. Especially what you said about your dd smirking - my sister gets this look in her eye when she thinks you're not looking, which shows she knows what she's doing, knows how much she's hurting you, and is happy about it. I can't describe the look, but it's chilling.

You have my sympathy about being pushed from pillar to post - I have that with my own health, each department says that my problems are another department's speciality and so they (ie, their budget) should be responsible for me. It's so frustrating, so I understand your despair about that.

londonsurrey

Ames wrote: »

Wow, she sounds like my sister. There's nothing wrong with her, she's just a very calculating and manipulative person. Especially what you said about your dd smirking - my sister gets this look in her eye when she thinks you're not looking, which shows she knows what she's doing, knows how much she's hurting you, and is happy about it. I can't describe the look, but it's chilling.

My mother is like that. A psychopath bricks your windows, but a sociopath bricks your mind.

Symptoms : http://www.mcafee.cc/Bin/sb.html

Hanging_by_a_thread

I think the daughter shows signs of being narcissistic to be honest. It must be horrendous for the mum and other siblings.

Blackpool_Saver

Mad, bad or damaged, she needs help

carefullycautious

Its a shame you cant capture some of this behaviour on some type of surveillance camera. At least you would have some hard evidence as to what is going on in your home.

I also think you should not be trying to diagnose the problem as it only distracts from what is happening.

Maybe change tack and ask for family therapy so that you are all included.

teabag29

Thanks for all your advice guys. Just to update, I have spoken to dd today after she had another outburst for no apparent reason. She then calmed down and spoke to me properly. I asked her what she had said to the school police lady (community support officer).... I cannot believe some of the things she said.

She told them I treat her differently and she got nothing for xmas.....omg she had £800 spent on her! She said I hit her with a belt, held her and asked my other dd to get the belt then hit her with it.....even the way she re-laid what she said back to me sounded so convincing, like she was remembering back to an incident, but there has been no such incident. She told them I dont feed her (she steals food and has a food obsession so I can imagine they prob now think this is why she does that), she told them before we have a meeting with a professional or a caf meeting I tell her what she must say in the meeting, there is a slight bit of truth in that but not in the sense shes made out, I remind her to tell them what games and learning things we've done since the last caf (her memory is very poor at age 5 so she does need things refreshing). The way she has portrayed it is that I fill her head with things to say before the caf that arent true to make me look a better parent. She also told the cso that I dont help her at home educationally like I claim to.....and according to her the response from the cso was "well we both know if she did do the things with you she claims to you'd be in the top groups by now"..... although I know dd lies through her teeth I can quite believe this was said becuase the cso has made a very similar comment to me herself before now. The thing is I genuinly do help dd as much as I can, I have taught her the alphabet and half of her months (may seem nothing at age of 13 but as I say she has poor memory and ive been trying for years....more than school have managed to get her to learn), I have taught her the colours of the spectrum, helped with homework and projects which is a battle because she refuses to do it and it takes hours, I do 1:1 reading with her and also family reading where they all stand up and read a page out loud then swap over till the book is finished. On top of that we also play lots of games and alot of these are team building and trust games which the psychologist has given us to try, also memory games and things like monopoly, wii, ludo that sort of thing.

I'm really angry at what the cso said because a) shes been at that school 18mths and getting extra help and since she started shes gone down atleast 1 level in every subject so how dare she say I cant be helping her otherwise she'd have moved up in her levels and b) by saying that to her she has played right into dd's hands that she has been believed and all she has to do is come up with a story for professionals to believe her and that will give her attention and get her out of lessons for the afternoon.

I just dont know what to do. Dont know if i'm clutching at straws now but somebody sent me a link (thankyou) about a disorder ive never heard of called pda (Pathological Demand Avoidance Syndrome) http://www.pdacontact.org.uk/noframes/whatispda.shtml

Reading this is like reading about dd. She has 80% of the symptoms for aspergers and attachment but not enough to fulfill a diagnosis, but this disorder is realted to aspergers and it says parents of children with this often think their child has aspergers. The key symptoms are manipulation (which dd deffo has) and these children like to be in control and often bossy, their favourite game is teachers.....this is dd to the letter to the point that school reports even say she forgets who is the teacher and who is the pupil.

My concern now is this. The place that diagnoses this disorder (and others) is in nottingham and costs £2600. Who would I go to about getting funding for this as its not nhs? they accept parent referals or if I can raise the money do you think its worth a shot?

teabag29

carefullycautious wrote: »

Its a shame you cant capture some of this behaviour on some type of surveillance camera. At least you would have some hard evidence as to what is going on in your home.

I also think you should not be trying to diagnose the problem as it only distracts from what is happening.

Maybe change tack and ask for family therapy so that you are all included.

I understand what u say about diagnosing the problem but if I knew for sure what was wrong and could put a name to it then I would get advice on the best way to parent her and what support is available. Also a diagnosis would go a long way in getting school to help her more and perhaps a statement. It may also prove to people that no actually its not a case of bad parenting this child actually has a disorder