Hi,i am having some severe problems with my 9 year old son, he has an 8 year old sister that he is so mean to, he calls her names and even hits her sometimes! I have taken care of the hitting , he doesnt do that anymore, but how do iget him to stop being so mean to her all of the time? it just breaks my heart sometimes because she loves him so much and will do anything for him, i cannot tell you the times she asks me "mama, why doesnt Dalton love me?"..it is tearing my heart out, do normal 9 yr olds act like this? In schoolhe makes straight A's , but he does seem to have some emotional and anger problems, my husband has anxiety disorder and we are both wondering if mybe our son is going to end up with this as well, i am thinking about taking him to a psychiatrist.....please help me!

Hi Angela,

Some of the stuff we deal with around parenting is taboo. You know, it's not to be mentioned. There is no doubt your son loves your daughter but he probably feels it is not a good thing. In earlier life was your son very close to you? As opposed to his dad? I do lots round this with parents and children so if you want to check out my approach email me or sign up for free reports at web site of same name. Your son loves his sister, it is completely okay but unless he gets over that, he will keep trying to make an enemy of her and become the family scapegoat. Obviously, if your husband has unresolved anxiety it is from his childhood, but if he faces the fears etc as best he can - that will make a difference. The family is a team, one emotional unit, it works together - everyone reflects everyone else
Best wishes
David

my son was most closest with me as a small child,i work at a daycare and he went to work with me when he was little.. my husband has an anxiety disorder, i dunno ifyou know whatthat is, but he takes medication for it and goes to therapy. it is a chemical disorder in his brain, not from something in his past, iknow my son loves my daughter, but like today for instance, it is her birthday and her dad who is at work, called to wish her a happy birthday and my son said while she was on the phone with her father, " i hate rebekah, she thinks she's all that" and i asked him why he would say such a thing and he told me he hated that she was getting a lot of attention.....i sent him to his room to write and essay of what happened and how he felt about the situation and he wrote me a 2 page essay of how much he was sorry for what he had said. So this time it is over, and i feel really good about the way it ended up, he apologized to his sister and they are currently playing together in her room. but he is always saying mean and hurtful things to her and NEVER apologizes to her......and when he was little he would bang his head on things when he got mad at me i took him to the DR and he told me that my son was a very emmotional child and that was how he took out his anger and frustration, well then he stopped doing that and started pulling out his hair when he was mad, then he stopped that and started scratching himmself all over his arms and then he would punch himself in the face and his latest thing is telling me that he wished he was dead......this hurts me sooooo much, i always tell him that i love him and when he does and says these things it hurts me so much and then we hug and things are fine, he is a normal child, he acts normal and has GREAT self-esteem, it just worries me that when he gets so upset he goes to such extremes as these........im so worried that when he grows up he is gonna be one of those people that cuts themselves to relieve anger.........i am going to make an appointment to see a psychiatrist tomorrow morning........thanks for your help

Hi Angela,

You want him to take responsibility for his behaviour. You want him to admit when he's wrong and apologise. When I read your answer to me I could not detect this very same attitude in your outlook - I mean your critical analysis was reserved for your son and not you or your partner, or your parents and you. What I am saying is children reflect their parents attitudes and approach to life. Your son is following in dads footsteps and, if the psychiatrist comes up with some medication - bingo - its happend again - your son is medicated for something that is not his responsibility. The source is psychological and emotional - I am pretty sure of that - anxiety is not a chemical - though I guess it turns into one. When mums and dads are willing to look at themselves, their children will reflect that maturity. So if your husband decided it was not only a chemical in his brain but something from his past too, he would have to face things. This facing things is the same thing you want from your son. It is a much less 'physical' way of thinking where we cannot make. Your husband is key I think.
Best wishes - thanks for replying to my relpy
David

David,
My husband has GAD or general anxiety disorder, which indeed is a chemical imbalance of the brain, due to the lack of serotonin......I have not taken my son to see a psychiatrist as of yet....he seems to be acting better. And as far as having him medicated, a friend of mine who has a son that she just took to see a psychaiatrist because he has GAD, told me that the Doctor suggested talk therapy since he is so young and she doesnt want him medicated or labeled, he flew right thru the therapy and is now doing so much better. I would never want my child to be medicated, i feel that there are too many children on medicine as it stands,so medicine for my child is incomprehensible to me at this point,ijust feel that he needs to learn some compassion for others (sister included) as well as some kind of anger management. That would really help him. I know some of his behavior is LEARNED behavior from my husband, he tends to blow things out of proportion quite a bit, that is why he is in therapy to learn to control that.
But he is in NO way a violent person, i dont want you to get the wrong idea, violence in my house will not be tolerated, he just gets upset easily which is what i think my son has learned from him.
Thank you for all of your responses.
Angela