Fresh Niece

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Well, my sister is living her last days due to being terminally ill. I'm caring full-time for her daughter who is 15. My son avoids her. I asked him why and he said that she gives him the creeps. He is on the spectrum. She has no diagnosis but tends to stim once in a while. The other day we were watching a sitcom and there was a bit of sexual openness that made me uncomfortable. I said that she shouldn't watch it. It was inappropriate and bold. She started to stim and then yelled at me that at least she wasn't an old fart. My immediate feeling was three more years and you're out of here. I don't feel anything for her because this is not the first time this kid disrespected me. I'm keeping my promise to my sister to care for her but I think I want out of this. I got a gut feeling that this kid is a sociopath - there is a coldness about her that I can't pinpoint but I see my son's point. My husband and elder son who is 26 won't say anything negative about her but they keep on hinting that she should go and live my brother. She isn't nice to him because he's gay. He's willing to take her with open arms regardless. I want this kid out of my house but my brother is often blind to things that can hurt him. I don't know what to do? My older brother warned me not to take this kid because he feels our niece is a bad apple just like her father who left my sister a long time ago with no information or cash to raise the daughter. He's planning to go through the court systems to hunt this guy down.

I'm not sure it's a good idea to lable a 15 year old kid a "bad apple" already. She's only 15, has no dad and now her mother is dying too, and since you said she was stimming she might have some undiagnosed condition on top of that. I don't have any advice but that she'll be a bit of a difficult kid the coming years is pretty much to be expected. She didn't ask for all this either. She may be acting like an ass but I can't imagine she is happy about all this.

I feel very sorry for the girl. She's 15, her mother is dying, her father is nowhere to be found, her aunt , who she is now living with, has decided she's a psychopath and wishes she could get rid of her, her uncle has decided she's just like her father...poor kid. Maybe try to have some compassion? That might help get you through the next 3 years that you're stuck with her. But to be honest, by kicking her out, you might be doing her a favour if your other brother doesn't assume she's a psychopath for being "cold" while her mother is dying...

Did you consider that A) her mother is dying which might just be effecting her emotionally and that B) she is a teenager in the midst of a storm of hormones and that basically all teens can be rude or bitchy at times.

Labeling a 15 year old a "sociopath" is a bit absurd, especially given the very weak example you gave of behavior which just sounds like normal teenage angst apart from the possible stimming. And you know, I wouldn't be a ray of sunshine if my mother was terminally ill and dying.

My advice is to cut her some slack and get her (and the whole family) the counseling to get through what is going to be a very hard transition for her.

It sounds like you need more support than you have right now. Can you contact a local social service agency? There are lots of supports for parents with children with disabilities, and also for kids going through struggles like your niece.

I second the "you need more support."

You do, and she does. Because this is an incredibly difficult time for both of you.

"Bad apples" set stray dogs on fire and bury kittens up to the heads in the yard so they can chop their heads off with a lawn mower (yes, I've known people who did those things-- there is generally a large supply of kittens on a farm-- and those kids are now adults in jail on charges of things like child molestation).

Rebellious teenagers, who have suffered from a lack of attention because the family is busy with the business of their mother's dying, tend to be smart-mouthed and disrespectful. I shudder to remember myself at 15. Sometimes I'm glad Saint Alan was pretty democratic and tolerant and let me read/watch whatever I wanted as long as I knew when to keep my mouth shut...

...and sometimes I think I would be more socially acceptable today if he'd set a few more, and tighter, limits.

I'm not going to tell you where to set your limits. Personally, I permit the viewing of those things as long as a parent is present and we can discuss why they're not necessarily a good idea...

...but I realize that I am, like my father, pretty permissive and not running a real tight ship. Your limits within your own home are yours to decide; the kids in your home have to live with them.

I would definitely suggest some grief counseling and possibly some behavior management classes (never been to one, but they seem to have worked wonders for my cousin and her adopted daughter). I would also suggest several thousand deep breaths (and possibly a strong cup of coffee or a good stiff drink, according to your bent) and some tolerance for the fallout from the mess you and the kid are going through right now.

It's about more than the grief from "My mommy/sister is effing DYING!! !" That's a huge thing, but there's a lot more to it than that. When the household is absorbed in the business of someone dying, things that aren't absolutely essential (food, sanitation, basic safety, some degree of affection and teaching in basic human decency if they're batting 1000 in the Hospice League) tend to fall by the wayside. Discipline over things that are, in the grand scheme, pretty small (and sexualized sitcoms and fresh-mouthed teenagers are pretty small) tends to get let to slide in favor of having some joy, skipping the fight, and making some good memories.

My folks had a fair bit of support, and they were socially very rigidly upright (at least on my mom's side, which is where the dying was going down). My grandfather was so rigidly upright (autistically rigidly upright, in fact-- a textbook case of autistic rigidity in moral reasoning) that he would have been a deacon in the Baptist Church if his history of mental illness hadn't been common knowledge. Kids I went to school with called him "Old Stick-In-The-Mud," and it was the understatement of the decade.

And they still let a lot of stuff like that slide. I threw a lot of fits that were basically ignored. I skipped a lot of school that was basically overlooked as long as I got my makeup work and kept my grades up. I left the house a lot of mornings, and other than one famous incident of deciding that I was going to walk to a friend's house in the next town over, nobody really gave a crap as long as I didn't break any laws and materialized again by dark.

It took a couple of years for Saint Alan to iron out the "I'll go where-ever I want and do whatever I want, and as long as I'm home by dark you can't do anything about it." He didn't bother ironing out the "I'll read/watch whatever I want," even when he got calls from the school about an eighth-grader asking for books about Auschwitz and reading Stephen King. I don't know if that was because he had a philosophical objection to sheltering a teenager, or if he just deemed it "Not worth the fight."

Obviously, you're raising your own kid(s), and this young lady does not get to be accorded the right to play hob with your system of parenting (or expose your ASD kid to a whole lot of horrible imitable behaviors through the media). But-- there have been lapses in her discipline, and they are (based on the information I have now) completely understandable and acceptable under the circumstances. This is a pain in the ass that is going to take time and mental/emotional energy to iron out...

...but it's not a reason to condemn the kid.

Hang in there.

Since I have a teenage daughter, I will start by saying that teenage daughters are naturally difficult. And self-absorbed. I really would not read so much into her behavior; this is a girl who has had it pretty rough all her life, and maybe could really use someone to kill her with kindness, so to speak, and not question her every move.

How would she feel about living with your brother? In difficult times most kids seem to respond well to feeling they have some choices and control over their lives, even when none of the choices are good ones. You might consider presenting her with a list of options, along the lines of, "you can live here, but these are my rules;" or "you could live with your uncle, and I know he will be good to you, but you are going to have to push aside the negative feelings you have about him being gay, because if you choose that option and give him a hard time, we will make you live with XXX, instead."

I would also consider getting to know the parents of her friends, to find out if there are any families among them that might understand your niece better and either serve as a bridge or be willing to take her in.

Which brings up another question: has she been able to continue in the same school and with the same friends through all of this? Or has all that been uprooted? My daughter, I know, would be so very lost without her friends; they are everything to her, and that is also common with teenage girls.

^^^^^

She's really smart. Definitely stamped with the Princess BeeBee, Royal PITA Seal of Approval

Abuse of aniimals is a REAL red flag.

It really is.