DD's insults | Imamother

amother

Pink

Wed, Nov 15 2017, 5:20 pm

I'm not sure what to do here. My DD, age 13, has nothing but disdain for her two younger siblings. It's a rare moment that she can possibly exist in the same room and breath the same air as her little brother or sister. She often will make disparaging remarks toward them. The behavior is unacceptable but I can't get her to stop doing it. I would be happy to ignore the comments because the more attention she gets, the more it seems she does it. But the comments, I feel, will cause low self esteem, and other things. Not to mention, family needs to love each other and be there for one another. I'm not expecting that, realistically. My DS has a thicker skin but my little DD, I feel, is internalizing these comments more. It's really unpleasant. DD is mouthy with us too but she takes the majority of her angst out on her siblings.

amother

Wine

Wed, Nov 15 2017, 5:29 pm

Been there... hugs to you! It’s so hard!! Just want to give you chizuk that it really does get better! My dd became the same way around 13. Now a year and half later, can’t say she’s back to normal but she’s so much more tolerant and much less insulting. The way I handled the younger siblings is I explained to them that she is going through a hard time and they should not take what she says seriously. I worked on pumping up their self esteem and making her comments seem silly to them. It really helped. As far as my dd, I ignored whatever wasn’t really bad, so that we didn’t have too much negativity going on. But when she straight out said something very mean or insulting I explained nicely that even though she may be angry or upset about things, she has no right to take it out on her family and she needs to be more careful with the way she speaks to them.

Hugs again. This too shall pass!