I was asked to provide more background about our daughter. We have been taking her to professional help since she was around 4/5, when she bit and got angry very easily. Anger has been the underlying emotion that we have always been confronted with. She was diagnosed with anxiety by one psychologist when she was six - although that diagnosis was made without meeting our daughter, and just on our description of the behaviour we described. It seemed to tick a lot of boxes then but not any more. Our daughter is 'street smart' and a number of professionals can't see any problems because, I think, she knows what to say when she is in a 1:1 with them. We, the parents, appear to have problems, to such an extent that one psychologist two years ago said "she's fine", you (parents) need to see a family counsellor. The same psychologist did make one insightful comment: "She controls you (my wife and I) through her anger". And she's right. After 8 or 9 years of living with an angry child it takes a toil, and we probably have opted for the easy out when we should held our ground and implemented clearly defined and consistent boundaries. Until a couple of years ago, we had good periods (couple of weeks) and then some bad times. But now she is in a virtual permanent state of unpleasantness. We set rules around behaviour, including rewards, but she always wants to debate and argue when she's in a particularly bad mood. And now, as I mentioned in another post, she is refusing at times to hand over her electronics at the agreed time at night. She grabs her laptop and refuses to let it go. A couple of times I (the father) have wrestled the laptop from her grip - but this physical confrontation is deeply unsettling. Tonight we have friends coming for dinner and she was told she needed to have dinner with us, but she sent a text after school saying she was staying at a friend's. There are so many situations where we don't know what the right response is...
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