I hope the therapist is good.

I did deal with this once, and I'm just barely over my PTSD from that experience. Mom was in denial, aided and abetted by her pedi, who said dcg was a "normal" five year old. I assure you that if her behavior was normal, nobody would ever have more than one child, if that.

What worked for her was that her misbehavior scored her chores, per my normal for four/five year olds. She disliked chores (at home and here) and passively fought back by being loud and obnoxious instead of getting along with the chore--attention seeking behavior, or just sitting in place, not doing the chore.

Then I said that she'd have to finish her chore before she could be included in the group activity, and I made the group activity the most irresistable thing in the world to her: Dance party with streamers etc. She couldn't bear being left out of a dance party, so she got her chore done fast.

After that, her disobediance went way, way, way down. At least to me. She still gave her mom total garbage, but for me that kid went down to the kinda bearable range after that.

But seriously, it was years before I could look at a photo of her without feeling serious chills. I felt like I was looking at the cover of a Stephen King novel whenever I saw a pic of her, even years after they'd left.

As younger sister was getting old, she began acting the same. And then for some reason, completely incomprehensible to me, mom decided to reproduce again. I did NOT offer a spot to them for the Fall.

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