dirtmover12
New member
Child psychologists of reddit, please help.
I know the answer I want may not be the right answer, I figured I’d ask anyway and hope I’m in a place to listen.
I am the step-dad of a 9 year old girl. She was diagnosed with ADHD ~3 years ago. Her biological dad was also diagnosed with ADHD as a child (makes sense since generally accepted to be inherited). Her bio parents split when she was 2 1/2 for a multitude of reasons, some of them being his narcissistic and mentally abusive behaviour. While I’ve really only heard one side of the story (my parter’s, the child’s mother’s), from what I’ve seen from his behaviour over the 5 years I’ve been in the picture, his reported traits seem to match up.
Over the last ~6 years, his presence in Miss 9’s life has been sporadic, and spread across numerous homes. Up until recently (the last 6-9 months), he had been completely out of the picture for the prior ~2 years. (There’s a bit more nuance to this, but that’s the high level summary).
Over this time where her father was absent, her mother and I have created a stable home life understanding the importance of this for ADHD brains.
Last year, her biological parents attended mediation with a child psychologist who had already met with Miss 9. They agreed that the biological mother (along with myself) would have day-to-day care, while the biological father (along with his partner and her two children, one of whom had been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder) would have her every other weekend. This arrangement resembled their previous agreement, but with the adjustment of three nights instead of two, which was influenced by financially driven by the bio fathers hope to pay less child support, as revealed during the mediation.
There have been multiple instances where Miss 9 has come home from her father’s speaking with the attitude of a teenager, and generally just exhausted, so more moody. The behaviour exhibited is out of character for her and “resets” after a few good sleeps and finding her routine again. She has been whiteness to multiple arguments while at her father’s, including one where the couple broke up, and he had promised the child that he was moving out and finding a new house, only to get back together with the excuse of “everyone fights, it’s normal”.
With all this preamble, my question is:
Is this environment a healthy environment for her and since the shared custody situation won’t change anytime soon, is there anything we can do to help grow her emotional intelligence and keep her safe?
I know the answer I want may not be the right answer, I figured I’d ask anyway and hope I’m in a place to listen.
I am the step-dad of a 9 year old girl. She was diagnosed with ADHD ~3 years ago. Her biological dad was also diagnosed with ADHD as a child (makes sense since generally accepted to be inherited). Her bio parents split when she was 2 1/2 for a multitude of reasons, some of them being his narcissistic and mentally abusive behaviour. While I’ve really only heard one side of the story (my parter’s, the child’s mother’s), from what I’ve seen from his behaviour over the 5 years I’ve been in the picture, his reported traits seem to match up.
Over the last ~6 years, his presence in Miss 9’s life has been sporadic, and spread across numerous homes. Up until recently (the last 6-9 months), he had been completely out of the picture for the prior ~2 years. (There’s a bit more nuance to this, but that’s the high level summary).
Over this time where her father was absent, her mother and I have created a stable home life understanding the importance of this for ADHD brains.
Last year, her biological parents attended mediation with a child psychologist who had already met with Miss 9. They agreed that the biological mother (along with myself) would have day-to-day care, while the biological father (along with his partner and her two children, one of whom had been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder) would have her every other weekend. This arrangement resembled their previous agreement, but with the adjustment of three nights instead of two, which was influenced by financially driven by the bio fathers hope to pay less child support, as revealed during the mediation.
There have been multiple instances where Miss 9 has come home from her father’s speaking with the attitude of a teenager, and generally just exhausted, so more moody. The behaviour exhibited is out of character for her and “resets” after a few good sleeps and finding her routine again. She has been whiteness to multiple arguments while at her father’s, including one where the couple broke up, and he had promised the child that he was moving out and finding a new house, only to get back together with the excuse of “everyone fights, it’s normal”.
With all this preamble, my question is:
Is this environment a healthy environment for her and since the shared custody situation won’t change anytime soon, is there anything we can do to help grow her emotional intelligence and keep her safe?