We have estranged children, estranged parents and estranged grandparents all in one place

What is an EP please?

We had a neighbour with 2 sons and 2 daughters. She treated the older girl abysmally but was quite normal with the others. Told her she hated her in a room full of people. The little girl practically lived at our house. She would be chucked out of the house early in the morning regardless of the weather and without a coat or any breakfast. I tried to report it but emotional abuse wasn’t recognized at the time. A relative of the family said that the child was the image of her mother and had the same tendency to tell absolute whoppers that often caused trouble. Perhaps seeing herself reflected back through this little girl was part of the problem?

Children are often labeled and treated as difficult when in fact they are highly sensitive-

I know every case is different, I was always told I was difficult, and I possibly was, but I think I was only difficult for my mother, no one else seemed to find me unmanageable.

EP stands for estranged parent nonnie.

paddyann Sun 08-Sep-19 22:10:17 I wish people behaved like that nowadays instead of feeling they have to control everything. I bit of give and take goes a very long way and, if we think of all parties in a family instead of just ourselves, surely it is worth a bit of effort?

It is so easy to label children as the 'difficult one' the 'polite one' etc and these labels tend to stick and imo sometimes influence the behaviour of the child. I have seen teachers do this and the labels stick throughout the school life. I knew a boy who was labelled 'good at maths' because his brother was but he actually was not. Another said that the boy was kept up too late at night because he dozed off, in fact he was extremely intelligent and was simply bored! He won scholarships at secondary schools and got a first from Oxford. Same happens in families

You're right Nonnie when our youngest son went to secondary school he joined the football team and was also a member of the village team.

It was expected that he would play rugby because his dad
Mr. S., had played for the school and the town when he was older.

He was even told at one point that he couldn't be in the football team unless he joined the rugby. When I contacted the school about it, it had been a mistake and of course he could just play football.