My ex (39F) and I had 3 kids together before we divorced about 7 years ago. My daughter is 13. I’ll call her Lacey.
Lacey is now 13 years old. She appears to be behind developmentally in a few ways. She has almost no understanding of abstract subjects, no social skills, and no emotional intelligence. Both her younger and older brother far exceed her in these areas. She has been held back twice in school. She is currently getting good grades, but it isn’t really that she understands the material. She just obsessively spends hours on her homework or studying something that doesn’t take that long to do.
My daughter talks to herself A LOT. When she was little, I was told it’s cute and she will grow out of it. She hasn’t. She has full blown conversations with herself. When we go out in public and she does this, people look at her likes she’s crazy. No matter how many times I’ve talked to her about it, she continues to do it. She hasn’t developed empathy like other kids her age have. She doesn’t care how other people think or feel and would never consider other people’s feelings. She has serious hygiene problems. I have to force her to shower and brush her teeth and hair. She gets very angry with me, but I have to stand in the bathroom door and watch her brush or else she won’t do it. If I don’t, she will go so far as to go in the bathroom for a few minutes pretending to brush and then say she has. It’s gross. I only have her half time. Her mother doesn’t enforce any cleanliness standards, and so half the time, my daughter goes out stinking with matted, greasy hair and teeth with slime on them. Lacey just doesn’t have any understanding of why it’s important to be clean although it’s been explained countless times.
A good part of the time, Lacey just seems like a zombie. She will be almost nonverbal. You can talk to her, try to play games, tell her jokes, and she will just sit there pretty much ignoring, only shrugging or making some kind of disapproving sound. Other times, she will do pretty well (for her), but she still has these weird tics. She is obsessive about certain things and insists she has to check and organize her backpack for about 20-30 minutes before bedtime.
She has no friends. Just a couple weeks ago, we were at a friend’s house. Two girls a little younger than her that she’s known casually for a while sat next to her and tried to chat. My daughter decided she wouldn’t stop the book she was reading, so she literally sat there staring at the book, ignoring these two girls. I saw and told her she’s read a lot and shouldn’t hurt her eyes and took the book. So she decided to pull half her hair over her face and sit there looking like Cousin It. Those girls tried talking to her for a while and eventually gave up. It was so bizarre. This is not an isolated incident. This is pretty much the norm for her in any kind of social situation.
She also has no understanding of consequences. Her entire life, she has not once understood that she has done something wrong. If she is disciplined and everything is explained, she still comes away thinking she is being wrongfully persecuted. She honestly talks about how she never does anything bad, ever.
Lacey is addicted to electronic devices. My ex let’s her play on her tablet for 10+ hours a day (I’m not exaggerating). So when she’s there, Lacey will watch music video for ten or so hours, only rolling out of bed to eat pizza or go to the bathroom. She won’t shower, change her clothes, brush her hair, nothing. I know this is bad and doesn’t help her at all, but I can’t do anything about it. My ex refuses to change her parenting style, and the legal system has no problems with it either.
I’ve wanted my daughter in therapy for a while, but my ex refuses and we both have to agree to anything like that. She always just says there’s nothing wrong with Lacey. And maybe she will just grow out of this stuff? She’s been this way her whole life, and I’m concerned she’s going to fail in adulthood. I don’t really know what to do about it, but I thought maybe people who have had similar problems with their kids could offer some insight. Sorry this is so long.
TLDR: My teen daughter acts strangely and I don’t know what to do about it.
Submitted February 24, 2019 at 02:27PM by Worriedaboutmykid https://ift.tt/2U11cUF
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