I have never posted to any forum before so I hope that this is going to the right spot.
I have a situation that I am trying to examin using polarity based problem solving.
Here is the situation. I married a woman about two years ago that had an 11 yo., now 13. The daughter never had any form of discipline growing up. Mother felt guilty about leaving dad and tried being buddies with her. The daughter never performed any chores, never had a set bedtime, never was held responsible for her actions, was allowed to talk-back and use abusive language towards mother, has been on and off behavior modifying drugs since she was six or seven, and has a real father that is 38 years old, has been in and out of jail and lives in his grandmothers basement with his own father.
She has always been an extreme challenge, even before I came into the picture. But, now that I am in the picture and she is living in my house I expect more from her. I do not tolerate her using abusive words towards her mother, I expect her to do a few simple chores around the house, I expect her to go to bed at a set time and expect her to respect property that doesn't belong to her.
We have tried reward programs to help her achieve these expectations. That backfired. She feels these reward ( i.e, money and a ride to the movies, permission to have a friend over, etc...) are her rights. She refused to do anything, she received nothing, but she became out of control. She followed her mother everywhere for hours (literally multiple hours) asking the same questions over and over trying to get her to submit to letting her do what she wants. Her requests became violent. I've taken her to counselors and nothing has helped.
We tried punishing. We made one rule to make things simple, "No talking back". We would ground her for one day for each time she broke this rule. She would rack up groundings of a half-year or more as she persisted and got more frustrated.
I've had it with her. I have a ten mo. old son that is wonderful. I want to raise him without fearing that her constant complaining, demanding, whining, fighting, abuse, etc... is going to effect his behavior. I don't want him being exposed to the hostility that she can bring out in us. I want him to see a loving and nurturing environment. I have done everything I could to ensure that mom can stay home with him during the day so that he doesn't get shoved off to an impersonal day care.
Now I am trying to decide how to proceed with her based on polarity. If I choose a love based polarity. I will forgive her of her transgressions, allow her to say what she wants and overlook her misbehavior in order to try to gain her love and hope that by these actions she would then respect us and desire to do better? I can't seem to buy this line of thought. If I were allow this, I am basically telling her she doesn't need to be responsible for her actions. I can't see how that will help her when she gets out into the real world.
If I go the other route and choose a fear-based approach I basically would walk into the room and say my house my rules. Either do as I say or get out. The problem is, she would have no where to go. Her dad, can't take her in. The basement he lives in is part of a 50 and over community that won't permit kids in the neighborhood. Her grandparents dealt with her before her mother and I married and don't want to deal with her. Even if I tried overwhelming force and took away every priveledge, forced her to work until she was too tired to argue, and basically punish her until she was ready to submit to behaving lest she suffer more punishment. I couldn't count that as success. First off, that would be a mighty battle and very stressful. Second, how would basically breaking the will of a child help that child once they go off into the real world?
I am trying to see a route based off of one of these polarities that might help her and us, but it seems that either extreme if carried out successfully would not produce a fully desired result.
Anyone see any other solutions?
Sorry this explanation is so long...
