Urgent advise. Agressive eightyear old step son.

Hi all.

I need urgent adivise on the following:

My BF has two children, a six year old daughter and an eight year old son that are currently visiting us.

His son is really aggressive when he does not get his way and has started scratching his father, telling him he hates him, that he will kill him one day etc. He also refuses to do what he is asked to do constantly.

He also bullies and hits his sister while she is doing everything to please him.

I am at my wits end, since there seems nothing helps, he wont comply to punishment and even if you take his toys away he laughs and calls his father stupid and idiot.

I have myself a seven year old son that lives with us and I am tired of having this kind of incidents constantly at home and in my son''s presence.

I do have my own thoughts and solutions for this but I would like to hear also from you guys. Does anyone have a similar experience?

What would you do if your son was acting like that?

Thanks in advance.

Hi chained

Yes very tiring I know. Has your ptns son alway been like this? How was he when he was younger? How is he with mum, is he the same?

It may be acting out because of the separation, or may be an anger management issue - (have gone through both so can empathise truly).

I can only advise on what worked for mine, the ''you will do as your told'' forcing stance didn''t work (mum says only because I was too soft but no matter)! When younger I would isolate said child (in a safe room, believe me when I say safe I mean it - no chords etc). I would be stood at the other side of the door (holding handle) until said child had calmed down (hope no one is going to slate me over this - it was advised by a specialist at the time & did work without injury to any party). So when said child had calmed down (the question ''have you calmed down yet'' would be asked) then we would sit down & talk about it. How I don''t expect behaviour like that & why, how would you feel etc etc. several times over but the point does eventually get through.

As an older child & in terms of problems due to anger & separation - I recommend relate counselling on anger management issues & indeed family matters as this did solve issues (although there are blips).

However, all depends on this can be dealt with, with you both or would be the rp role / decision which may be different from your own.

Sorry I''m not more help

Stay strong JJx

My sister has similar issues with her son, parents still together so no divorce issues, I hope someone comes up with suggestions because she at the end of her tether and doesn''t know what to do.

At the moment she cuddles him until he is calm but that means sometimes she gets hurt and its not making the incidents stop.

I dont have experience of the situation but just wanted to second what JJ said. Having seen the same done on supernanny numerous times and used such techniques when safe to do so in the school evironment i find it has been helpful for me.

Thank you all for your answers.

To answer some questions that might give you a clearer idea of the situation:

The divorce is three years old now.
The mother has a new BF and they moved in with him last year. They relocated to France to do so.

The boy has always been like this. He got worse after his sister was born.

We found out recently that his behavior is the same towards his mother and her BF, too. So, it is not something personal towards my BF or his sister.

At school he has no friends, neither does he socialize with children outside the home.
There have been instances that he has been a bit rude to my son, too but this took an end when I intervened and set my foot down.

As I have understood it, the only strategy his parents have is to try to avoid situations that will fire him up. I can tell you though from experience that this does not help at all. On the contrary, on top of him having daily outbursts, we are all held captive to his whims.

Last night he decided he wont drink water from the tap because it is dirty (!!). He refused to drink milk or anything else and he didnt go to sleep before 01.30 whining all the way.

I am seriously fed up having to deal with this all the time and my parnter refusing to listen. He has the impression that since he is not the RP, he cannot fix things and he would do ANYTHING to let the time he visits go smoothly, by letting him get away with everything under the sun.

Last night I counted: He told him he hated him 5 times, that he will kill him one day 2, that he is stupid and idiot 6, that he is not listening 216455432 times and that he does not care another 38576784.

All this got not attention what so ever. On the contrary, my BF was all the time trying to explain himself and talk himself out of the situation! It seems like his parents all the time feel the need to appease him and are afraid to put their foot down and say enough is enough! I dont care if you hate me or not, you wont: Hit your sister, destroy games, toys etc or throw things around!

I am sorry I seem frustrated but I am as we just went though another of his outbursts that resulted in scratching his father again!

If you ask me what was the re-precautions? None at all. No consequences, no punishment, not even a go to your room!

I dont know what to do...

Have you considered medical channels? Perhaps he has needs that havent been recognised and arent being met that result in these outbursts.

Pandering to him & trying to avoid things will defo not work, heck you will end up having your life ruled.

Although your partner is not the RP there should be rules at your house similar to ''this is not the way we do it here'' or ''we don''t accept this behaviour here'' by avoiding you are perhaps only making it worst for the future & a teenagers.

Jslgb yes I too went through the controlled hug period - well started of with the ignore tactics when a toddler, (HV said just walk over him & ignore it until child''s finished). Then the controlled hug (on a train once - not nice!) & after a while you get past the point when being hurt during the controlled hugging period is too much & holding onto a 10 yo who''s nearly as big as you is too difficult - this all when still together so no separation issues.

The controlled room is really really hard I admit & we use to have to make sure the room was filled with safe stuff which if broken wouldn''t be dangerous or cause too much upset! Sounds terrible I know but what I would say is that when the ''child'' is in that period of temper - they don''t actually have 100% control of themselves, often my child was really upset afterwards when he saw what they had done - holes in wall, broken door etc.

Hence all this followed by anger management counselling - (after split & split did make it worse I have to be honest & anger started to show at school too so needed to stop). Now it is a lot better & occasions are rare very rare & teenager can control them in the main.

I found when I tried to ignore / avoid when an older child 6 onwards it actually made things worse as child would store up the angst & blow whereas hitting it head on although hard I found it shortened the actual event & helped all round.

Never seen it on the nanny progs tbh, remember the naughty step - toddler use to wee on step - so didn''t use that one for long lol (well I laugh now ).

Chained you & your ptn need to take a breather - trying to reason with his son when all this is going I found didn''t work but made both my child & me more angry / upset. The controlled room period - you don''t talk aside to say ''once you have calmed down we will sit & talk about this" once & then intermittently ''have you calmed down now''. Didn''t alway feel like it worked & sometimes we''d blow against each other but in the main it worked & we could talk & cuddle & solve the problems together once we had all calmed down.

Good luck - when I look back now I wonder how we/I got through it - but we did.

Stay strong (you''ll need to) JJx