Trouble With An Only Child

Articles

Trouble With An Only Child

By Brooke Hadley
May 28, 2005

Dear Brooke,

My husband and I have an eight-year-old daughter-- an only child. In the past few months, we are having trouble with her. When she does not get what she wants, she acts out by kicking me on the leg or tries to pull my shorts so I won't let go of her. Sometimes she slams doors, and sometimes she hurts her dad as well. She is doing great in school, and she is great with everyone else outside the home, but with us is a different story. What do you think is happening? We just don't know what to do. Please write to us soon.

Thanks, Jo

If your daughter’s not acting this way with anyone else, it sounds like there’s a communication problem in the home. Has there been any major changes recently such as fighting between you and your husband? A threat of divorce? Major rule changes for her?

In this situation, she’s acting out her emotions, and in order to solve the problem, she needs to open up to you about it. Obviously, she’s old enough to speak, but for some reason, she is choosing to react as opposed to discussing it. If she’s acting out in violence, she first needs to calm down. You can help her do this by getting down to her level, restraining her arms and asking her, politely, to calm down.

If she’s too upset to talk, take her for a walk and point out different things in the immediate vicinity. She needs to get her mind off of the intense issue before she can talk about it rationally. Point to the street, the signs, the birds and ask her to notice each one individually. This will bring her mind back to present time. Once she’s calm, you can sit down as a family and discuss the problem.

Ask her to verbalize what she’s feeling. Be sure to validate her concerns, even if it doesn’t seem important to you. You can talk about what’s going wrong in her life, and then work on a solution together.

For whatever reason, she’s fallen out of communication with you and your husband. She needs to feel like she can come to you to talk about anything and everything. It’s your job to get her to open up about the issue, and then work towards a solution that will help everyone to feel better.

Later you can point out to her that life goes much smoother when she talks about her worries rather than acting out. Let her know that violence is not a socially acceptable way to act.

I also recommend reading my article called, “How to Keep Your Children From Behaving Badly.” If you have anymore questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

------------

About the author: Brooke Hadley lives in Austin with her two sons, Skylar Austin and Andrew Ashton. She owns a freelance writing, editing, research and photography business, and her clients include Glamour Magazine, Austin Monthly Magazine and LifeTouch Photography.

http://www.ComposingMoments.com

Email: PersistentGerl@hotmail.com

Tell a friend about this site!

------------

All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com. Please link to this article rather than copying and pasting it onto your site (which would be unauthorized and illegal).