My wife died about a year ago. She had breast cancer for five years. We had been married for almost 10 years.
We have two girls, one is now seven, the other nine.
The seven year old is very loving, very demonstrative with her feelings, very sensitive. She talks freely about her feelings. She is a pleasure to be around, and easy to raise.
My nine year old is very talkative, very smart, very pragmatic, and is just the opposite of the seven year old, emotionally speaking. She does not like to share her feelings, and is not much of a huger or kisser. She loves to sing, and is very creative in a artistic way, Just about anything she puts her mind to, be it cooking, or sewing, or physical activity, she picks up fairly quickly, and does it well. I wish I had half her talents.
The relationship between my wife and I was rocky for many years, and we argued a lot. My mother-in-law lived with us for about 7 of those 10 years.
My wife often argued, yelled at me, and often put me down in front of the girls. My mother-in-law would straight out tell my now nine year old not to listen to me, and what a bad guy I was, etc.Not to mention she would tell her whole side of the family what a rotten guy I was, usually when she was on the phone, while my daughter was present.
My daughter would openly punch and hit me for years, on a regular basis, besides being rude, not listening much to me, and really just staying away from me. My wife and mother-in-law, while telling her not to do it, would not usually go much beyond a light verbal reprimand.
She has not skipped a beat in school, despite her moms death, and is generally very pragmatic, and responsible, and goes about her daily routines the same now as she did before her mom died. I keep her busy with after school gymnastics, and guitar lessons, things she likes to, and wants to, do. She is a ravenous reader, reading about two 150 to 200 page books a month.
So now here we are, my nine year old, while she has stopped hitting me, and listens to me a lot more then she previously did, still challenges me at a verbal level on a consistent basis. She also has told me that I treated her mom meanly, that she thinks my younger daughter gets to much attention, and that we need a woman in the house. She has told me she does not like males. My older son, 31 years old, from my first marriage has been living with us for about 4 months, and she has made it clear she does not want him there. My mother, and my friends have sometimes been over to visit, and she tells me, and sometimes them, she does not want them there. She antagonizes my son, hits him, and generally is insulting and rude to him. She is sometimes rude to my friends, when they come over, which is actually not that often.
She keeps things bottled up, rarely, if ever mentions her mom, and is a bit high strung.
Just last night she was so rude to a friend of mine, that he actually told my daughter, straight to her face, not with raising his voice, but firmly, told her she was rude, and don't dare talk to him like that.
Last week, I had a major argument with another friend, and indeed our friendship may be over, because, in part, of my daughters behavior. My friend does not think I am tough enough, and I said I am continually correcting her, I sometimes put her in her room, I sometimes deny privilege's, she is seeing two different therapists for about 5 months now, one provided by the school, the other on the outside. My daughter was rude to my friend, and I told my daughter to apologize, and she did, but with a grudging attitude. So I sent her to her room, and she went in a fit. My friend then told me that my daughter is a brat, that she is very disrespectful and rude to just about everyone, and that I don't do enough. That my daughter does not appreciate all the sacrifices I make and all I do for her.
I told my friend that I generally don't believe in hitting them, and that I also do not want to discipline for every time she acts up, because, to be blunt, then she would be in a almost continual state of being disciplined. I told my friend that I don't want to break her spirit, that my daughter is stubborn and strong willed by just her innate nature, and that I doubt I can change that, and neither do I want to, that I just a loving, civil, functional working relationship in our home. I said that my daughters high intelligence level, she is in the high 140 IQ range, seems to make it tougher, not easier, for me. And obviously, her mom died only 13 months ago, so that is a factor.
So my friend, who was visiting from another state, cut the visit short, and instead of staying 5 days, left after 3 days, the next morning. And my daughter told me she was happy my friend was going, and smiled when she left.
I am at the point, where really, to be transparent, I often do not enjoy her company. I love her of course, but she wearies me with her constant questions that many times are just often designed to get attention, or annoy me. and if this continues as the years roll on, I am expecting a full blown rebellion from my daughter. If she can be insubordinate now, what does the teenage years look like? And I am also concerned that she may one day hurt herself.
I pray for my children, I am raising my daughters as Christians, I read the bible to them almost every day, I am trying to be a good example for them in my life, I take them to church with me every Sunday.
I am really at a loss. I feel like I am just constantly putting out bush fires with my daughter. She can be so very mature at times, but then can often act well below her age level and can over respond to some simple situations just so inappropriately. Yelling and and having fits and blaming me for things that I sometimes have no control over. It has come to the point where I do not even want to have friends over, as I hold my breath thinking what will she do to make them feel unwanted.
