I am worried about my daughter Jessica she is at her wits end with my grandson Leo, she feels like she has failed him as a mother and is often very stressed and upset not knowing what to do. When she gets upset I get upset as there is nothing I can do to help her and when I do try to speak to her she gets angry with me and yells.
Leo started school this year and after his second day they reduced his hours to only 2hrs of a morning and even since doing that he has been sent home a couple of times for not liseten or throwing funiture or as happened one morning for kicking a teacher. That was when they reduced his hours.
Jessica feels like he never listens, never does what he is told, never eats anything she prepares for him unless she yells and screams and goes off her head at him. She feels like he doesn’t try or try to try he just says I can’t or I don’t want to and then tunes out until she yells at him.
She feels like no one wants to be around him except his grandparents and her and there are times she doesn’t want to be around him. Her sisters always say he is to hard to handle and don’t want to watch him for her not even for a short period of time.
She is convinced the school have given up on him and just send him home because it is the easy option and he will never attent school for more then a couple of hours. When she gets in these moods nothing I say helps she just gets angry with with me.
I have tried telling her that yelling will not help in the long run but she just gets angry with me and says nothing else works…………….I have tried to tell her there are no quick fixes it will all take time but as I said she just gets angry with me. I know she doesn’t mean to be angry with me she is just frustrated and at her wits end. I have also tried to tell her that I think getting angry and yelling is teaching him to get angry and yell but she says nothing else works and I don’t know what to say to her…………
She is convinced that I allow him to get away with everything and give him everything he wants and never get mad with him but that is not the case. I do get mad in fact while there were here yesterday I had to go mad at him for going and gettting a small bottle of Coke without asking, I am tying to get him to ask first but there are times when he doesn’t. Anyway what did Jessica say…………..”see he does whatever he wants” and yes he does but even though I was mad with him I didn’t yell I spoke firmly and told him he knows he has to ask. His logic is that if he had asked the answer would be NO so he didn’t ask…………
She is often saying to me that she can’t do it anymore and that it is too hard and she has failed and I said yes I know that feeling and then you go to bed get up in the morning and do it all again because you have to………….there is no other option. This of course made her mad with me and she yelled at me. “I wake up not feeling like I can do it”
She has been prescribed anti depression medication but she will not take it and since she doesn’t live with me I can’t give it to her I said to her that if she wanted me to I could ring or text her each day to remind her but she got all pissy with me so I haven’t done that. To me it is like she just isn’t giving it all her best. When I talked to her about her depression medication she said to me that it didn’t work so there was no point in taking it, I said it doesn’t always work straight away and if she really felt it wasn’t working then she has to go back to the doctors and have another chat with them. I also said counselling may help but she was like I don’t want to go to counselling so I am also at my wits end about my daughter I just don’t know what to do to help her.
joannerambling 
I am sorry for your situation. My grandson has behavioral issues as well. He doesn’t listen and does a lot of yelling. The problem came about because of a custody issue, which I don’t want to delve into too much here, but my son and his wife found a wonderful counselor who they take him to. The counselor works to show both my grandson techniques for dealing with his problems and anger. Like taking deep breaths first and blowing them out like he was blowing up a balloon. He also has meetings with my son and his wife to go over things he wants them to incorporate. It has been a positive experience for all. I agree with you that your daughter’s way of handling the situation is only going to make things worse. There could be many reasons for his behavior, her depression may be a part of it as well. Children don’t know how to express their fears, or as my grandson said one day he felt bad but “didn’t know the words” to express himself. Yelling back won’t help either. I hope your daughter seeks the help they both need to start building a good relationship with her son and to help him work out what it is that’s bothering him. My thoughts are with you as I know from experience how hard it is to watch the pain they both must be going through. One other suggestion I would like to offer, I hope I don’t offend you, but talking about him in front of him which it appears your daughter did from the way you spoke about the instance of the soda will only reinforce his behavior. One other thing I tried to remember when raising my children was that children who don’t feel they are getting what they need will act out to get the attention because they don’t understand negative versus positive attention, they just want the attention any way they can get it.
Yes I agree I feel that although we are seeing people over at an organisation called Kalidoscope I feel there is a too long a gap between appointments. The schoo have arranged a meeting with Jes tomorrow but only after I sent the prinicpal an email outlining my concerns. I am not offened by your comment at all I also agree that Jes should stop and not talk about him in front of him, although she does he best not to there are times when she does. We need a diagnosis so the school can apply for extra funding to help him. At least when we do have appointments with the specialists they are always with the same people.
I’m glad I didn’t offend you. It is so hard watching our children and their children struggle isn’t it?
Aww Joanne, so sorry to hear this. Is there someone that your daughter respects who might be able to talk to her? Often parents or those who are the closest can’t be the ones to do this, because our kids feel the freest to get angry with us…I feel for you. You’re a good mom and a good person.
Thank you and you are right she needs to find someone she can talk to
I feel for you though, it’s hard a mother to stand by and not be able to help…
xo
What a dilemma! I’m wondering if your grandson has a form of ADD – has your daughter sought some professional help?
We have been told that he may have ADHD & ODD but have not got anything in writing as they don’t want to label him which is of no help to us or Leo…………..