'An eight-year-old girl is ruining my life right now...' UPDATED

"An eight-year-old girl is ruining my life right now..."

My sister, Kira, has two girls, Avery (8F) and Ellie (6F). I already have two children, Ashley (9) and Henry (10). One day, Kira came to my house and asked if she could drop the girls off for a couple of days. She brought all of their stuff, and I have now had them for a couple of months because she decided she did not want to take care of them anymore.

She let the girls do whatever they wanted. Avery is the most affected by it. Sometimes she is happy, playing with her dolls or her Littlest Pet Shops and being quiet. But most of the time, she will sit there and beat me up and make my life a living heck.

Every single time after she makes my life miserable, she will come cuddle with me, lie on me, kiss me, and tell me she is sorry. I just have to take it. I have to stay calm. I cannot yell back. I just have to let it happen and be nice to her.

Her hygiene is abysmal. She often goes to the bathroom in her pants and has accidents, then hides them from everyone. Of course, we can smell it. I try to get her cleaned up and get her into the bathroom, but she refuses. She starts screaming and crying, and she hits and slaps me during it. When I tell her it is not okay to hit people, she gets even more upset.

Every time I give her clean clothes and underwear so she can clean herself up, she refuses. She would rather sit in her own waste than get cleaned up. So I have to take her into the bathroom and clean her up myself. The whole time she is screaming that she hates me and wants me dead, or she will say nothing at all and pretend like it is not happening.

Then afterward, she will come cuddle with me and tell me she loves me. When it comes to showers, she will run the water and just stand outside the shower, refusing to take her clothes off. I have to go in there, undress her, and physically bathe her. She sits there screaming and crying, telling me how much she hates me and wants me dead. Otherwise, she just refuses to shower.

It is the same with changing clothes and brushing her hair. I have to do it, or she refuses, and the whole time I am doing it, she screams and cries. Brushing her teeth is a whole ordeal too. At school, they say she is the perfect little angel. She is very quiet, nice to everyone, and kind to her teachers.

But the second she gets home, not every day but on some days, it is the worst. She will come up to me, pull my hair, scratch me, bite me, hit me, and scream about how much she hates me and wants me dead. Normally, I grab her and hold her down to keep her from hurting me.

After about two minutes, she stops, starts cuddling me, hugging me, kissing me, and telling me how much she loves me. Then she cries and says how sorry she is. When it comes to cleaning up after herself, she actually does a really good job. Her toys are always put away when she is not playing with them.

But if I touch her toys, I will get hit or scratched unless it is Ellie or Ashley. They play with her toys all the time. Henry does not care about her toys, so he leaves them alone.

If we go somewhere as a family, she refuses to speak or participate. But the second we get home, she runs upstairs and starts crying. When I go to check on her, she starts screaming, crying, and hitting me again. Then she stops and starts hugging me, telling me she loves me.

If I ask her to do something like clean up after herself, she refuses and starts screaming, crying, and hitting me. But many times, she will also come cuddle with me, lay her head on my chest, let me rub her back, and let me kiss her and tell her how much I love her. She kisses me too, and she sleeps in my bed every night.

I do not know what to do. My life feels like a living hell. I have big scratch marks and bite marks all over my arms and body, and I do not know how to handle this. With the other kids, she barely talks. She mostly refuses to speak.

The only people she really talks to are Ellie and me, usually when she is screaming that she hates me. Sometimes she will talk to Ashley and Henry, but it is usually one word answers. At school, she refuses to talk at all. With my husband, she gives one word responses. I am trying to get her into therapy, but our insurance will not cover it.

Here's what people had to say to OP:

observefirst13 said:

She needs to learn that you don't get to hurt people and treat them like crap then get their love when you feel like you want to be nice now. Withholding cuddles is definitely the right move.

htdp0252 said:

This is not said with judgement, but genuine bewilderment- what shifted things from “oh I’ll take your kids for a few days” to “I now accept that I am primary caregiver of these kids forever?"

thumb_of_justice said:

You're saving Avery's life. If she hadn't been dropped off with you, she would not be getting these interventions that are going to make her capable of living a more normal and fulfilling life. I really hope things continue to improve and the toll isn't too much on the other kids and you and your husband. You are a patient and loving, strong person.

Aurora_96 said:

I'm happy these kids have you and that despite all the challenges you're doing everything you can to take good care of the kids. I applaud you. But your sister is just plain evil. She literally turned her back on her own kids.

That's one of the worst things you can do to your own children; having kids is a choice and not a choice you can just "undo" when you don't "like" it anymore. That's just plain evil. I have two girls (2 years and 6 months) and I cannot imagine having them for 6 and 8 years and then just be like "Yeah, no - I don't feel like taking care of you anymore."

UPDATE:

We got her tested for autism and she got diagnosed with level 3 autism. And regarded all of the heading and aggression towards me I made a "breakit basket" it's a bunch of just cheap things from the Dollar tree like all clips air-filled squishies cardboard boxes those little rubber bracelets that you get that shows and stuff and just stuff that won't be messy if it gets broken.

And every single time she feels like she has to get aggressive towards me and so doing it towards me and she does it towards the stuff I put in the basket. Also for punishment a lot of people are going to call me cruel but I do not care I will refuse to cuddle with her after she hits me and stuff for about 30 minutes...

...and it's like the most effective thing I've ever done. And we got all of the kids into play therapy and I got Avery into ABA therapy. And we're going to go to family therapy.