I came home the other day to find out that I have two, unexpected temporary, live-ins. My wife’s best friends teenage girls. Why you ask, do I have theses girls living with us? Because one of them had their mother thrown in jail.
Hold on to your hats, you’re not going to believe this one.
First, some back story. For the last year or so my wife has been confiding in me about her friend and her daughter’s stormy relationship. The girl -a teenager - has been smoking pot, getting into fistfights at school, terrorizing her sister and with alpha female male tendencies dominating the house.
A couple of months ago my wife was running back and forth to her friend’s house late one night because there was a fistfight between her friend and her daughter. When I spoke to my wife about it, it became clear that the daughter was allowed to grow up in a classic environment for “Ugly Child” behavior.
(For more on the “Ugly Child Syndrome “ refer to my book: DAGPAW Means Success A Parent’s Guide to Instilling Martial Arts Success Skills Into Their Child At Home. Now on sale on AMAZON.com)
The girl from a very young age was allowed to conduct herself like an adult: she stayed up late, decided when she was going to eat, what she was going to wear, was allowed to curse in the presence of her mother, and I believe that at one point she even was allowed to conspire with her mother against her father when they were separating.
What happens when a child is allowed to grow up like this is that they believe that they have the same rights as an adult and inevitably outgrow the demand for respect of the one responsible for allowing them to get that way.
“Ugly Child Syndrome” (my definition of obnoxious, defiant behavior) occurs mainly in single-parent households where a parent partners with a child mentally and emotionally in order to feel better about bad things that they are experiencing in their life: separations, divorce, legal hassles, etc..
The child becomes the sounding board or counselor to the parent. Over a period of time, they slowly become a person who the aggrieved parent can vent to.
As the years go by the child gets tired of giving the adult mental and emotional support and begins to take over the house dominating, rooms, television, when the house will shut down for the evening, when everyone in the house will wake on weekends and holidays, and in some cases go as far as to send their parents to their room when they want to have company.
This happens because the child views the aggrieved parent as emotionally weak and dependent. They have watched for, probably, years how the aggrieved parent has built a dependency on them, and even rewards them for being strong and supportive by giving them independent lifestyle decision-making ability.
The famous American film actor Mickey Rooney was an American actor, vaudevillian, comedian, producer, and radio personality. In a career spanning nine decades and continuing until shortly before his death, he appeared in more than 300 films and was one of the last surviving stars of the silent film era was a battered parent of a child infected with the “Ugly Child Syndrome”.
It can happen to any unsuspecting parent willing to shield their child from themselves or are too embarrassed by their situation to tell others. He took years of beatings from his child because he thought the police would jail his son for his abuse. Thankfully he found the strength to get help from the authorities before his child killed him.)
This is the stage my wife’s friend’s daughter is at. She not only has made her mother and sister bunk together, because she has taken the master bedroom, but she is also attempting to make her mom comply with curfew hours, etc.
I encouraged my wife to get her friend to read a copy of my book DAGPAW Means Success A Parents Guide to Instilling Martial Arts success Skills Into Their Child at Home ( now on sale from AMAZON. Com) when she completed it was like a light went off and she could clearly see her predicament.
She quick, fast, and in a hurry put together a plan to seize control back from her daughter but it might be too late. In an effort to wrench control back from her daughter she put her foot down and created rules of the house that had to be abided by in order for her daughter not to be shipped away to New York to live with her father. Her daughter bristled at this idea of living with her father, someone who could control her and became more defiant by the day.
Determined to keep control, her daughter became physically and verbally abusive, indulgent in sex and alcohol, and dismissive of her sister and mother.
A couple of weekends ago my wife’s friend took her girls to New York to visit their father. While she was there her daughter found an ally in her mother’s estranged sister (her aunt) who from what I can tell had been waiting for an opportunity to settle an old score with her sister. One of the ways that the sister devised to get even with her sister was to talk about allowing her daughter to come and live with her and her family in New York (something my wife’s friend is dead set against because her sister is more rules relaxed that she is). After speaking with her Aunt, and before she divulged private family matters, the daughter asked her mother if she could stay in New York and live with her Aunt. Her mother said no!
Upon hearing an answer that she didn’t like the daughter told her aunt how her mother went away for a few days, a common event for them by this time, to visit a friend.
While she was gone the daughter and mother got into another throw down over the phone about her wanted to stay in New York. The daughter complained to her Aunt about not being able to move to New York and embellished facts about being left alone: not being able to eat for days, unclean house, etc. Her Aunt jumped on the idea that the girls had been left alone, called child services, and made a complaint.
The police interviewed my wife’s friend and daughter and gave her a stern warning when they were unable to corroborate the story by the second daughter.
That not being good enough the daughter went to school and complained to a counselor (remember leaving her children alone overnight had become a normal occurrence because the mother was her children’s confidant and friend). My wife’s friend was arrested and is now in jail being held without bond. While in jail, my wife’s friend contacted the father of the girls and ask if he could watch over his children until she got out, he declined. My wife begrudgingly agreed to watch over one of the girls but declined to look after the one who was drinking, having sex, fist fighting, etc.
Yesterday, Nov 6th my wife’s friend's sister came down from New York and took the unruly daughter to live with her. In the end, she got what she wanted.
“Ugly Child” behavior, like racism, is not something that children are born with. It is infused into a child because an adult, who will benefit immediately from it, somehow feels that their child is better off with it.
Most “Ugly Children “ are resentful of the authorities, conspiratorial, and have defiant, obnoxious behavior because the parent who allowed them to get that way has weaponized them to fight their battles against the system or an estranged husband or other family members.
“Ugly Child” behavior is not always taught as a weapon though, sometimes it is allowed to develop because of neglect or because an adult thinks it is in a child’s best interest to be able to speak out and speak up for themselves which is true, but “Ugly Child” behavior allows them to go too far.
While “Ugly Child” behavior is not new (when I was a kid I had culturally different friends that were allowed to curse at their parents) it is growing. Here is what I think is happening: When I grew up I was in the “spare the rod, spoil the child” generation. Children were to be seen and not heard. I believe that the generation of children that went through that period hated it so much that they went completely to the other side and now give their children entirely too much decision making liberty which causes “The Ugly Child Syndrome”. Parents have to find a middle ground.