Issues with the Whole Family

I suggest your husband can stop the fights by refusing to fight. He should walk away when she pushes his buttons. You can only change her behavior by changing your (husbands) behavior. Walking away/refusing to fight is hard to do.

I've been taught to only work on one fix at a time. First stop the fights. Then work on school. I see eating healthy as the situation of the least important at this time. You can help by only having healthy foods in the house.

I've been a foster mother. It's hard work.You may need to stop fostering until you regain control of your daughter.

I suggest reading about the Love and Logic way of discipline by Foster Cline and others. They have web sites that can introduce you to the plan.

IMHO, she should be taken out of homeschool and put into public school. IMHO, she doesn't see homeschool as being "school." She will respond much better when it's someone other than her parents giving her her assignments and/or looking at her completed work.

As for refusing to eat healthy, to me that's a non-issue and not worth fighting over. I'm sure she's not eating poison and many of us who don't eat healthy are actually VERY healthy. That is a battle I would leave alone. And who knows, maybe once you back off of her and she sees you guys actually enjoying food that is healthy, she may decide to try some of it.

Again, I think you ought to put her in real school where she has peers and teacher to answer to. This is NOT something I would spend hard earned money paying a counselor to sort out. Waste of money IMHO.

Your husband needs to stop fighting and yelling! Not sure what he thinks he's accomplishing. Keep it calm, have quick and sure consequences, and have him model the behavior you both expect from her!

Don't buy junk food for any of the kids and it won't be such a huge issue. They can't eat what's not in the house. Now sure how old your daughter is but she can have some control by making her own lunches. Get all of the kids involved in shopping, meal prep and family meals -- if you are homeschooling everyone, recipes can be exercises in reading and math/fractions.

Not sure if you think it's essential to home school her, but she needs a social life, so she either needs to be enrolled in school or she needs some activities. If you can't control the home environment or the food, then she can't flourish as a student there.

If you are moving into a house, give her some control over her own room. Perhaps a budget for decorating, even if it's small, will let her create her own sanctuary.

You can get free or low-cost family counseling from the office of family/children's services in your town, through the school guidance department, or through a pastor of a church you may wish to join.

I guess my advice to you is, take a deep breath and treat these problems as separate problems. To be solved one at a time.

First, your husband has to stop the fighting. Period. He's the grownup, and grownups have no business fighting with kids. It's his job to quietly, gently lay down the law. If she sputters and protests, his response (in a quiet voice) is "I'm sorry you feel that way. But this is non-negotiable, hon. Now why don't you take a minute, pull yourself together, and come back and join us when you're calmer?" That's it. That's his line right there. No back-and-forth at all.

With the schooling, homeschooling is wonderful and fantastic WHEN it works. And when it doesn't, there's public school. Which is where your daughter needs to be enrolled. That's that.

Finally, the food thing is not an appropriate venue for stress and misery. It's more like, give yourself a year and solve the problem slowly. The best way to grow a healthy eater, honestly, is to train a young chef. Invite her to plan a menu. Take her to a farmer's market, and let her choose the food. If you can get her at all motivated, get her a fun, healthy cookbook. I learned how to cook as a teenager, thanks to Mollie Katzen's Moosewood Cookbook and Enchanted Broccoli Forest. Sadly, no one's ever taught me how to organize clutter, but that's a different story....

How to Talk so Kids will Listen, How to Listen so Kids will talk, is a good starter book.

Massive continuous fights = somebody's not listening and nobody is changing.

It sounds like everybody has gotten stuck. Everybody has issues that they think are in concrete. Yours is healthy eating. There are probably more issues between your daughter and hubby that seem insurmountable.
Find places to compromise, prioritize and settle. Start with a family meeting and Yelling is not allowed. Just find out the issues first. Then prioritize.
Everything can't be fixed this min.

My prioritized list would start:
Stop fighting first. its not giving in, its waiting. Sometimes little things fall off the radar if you just quit yelling.
Family meeting where "I feel" and "I need" statements are made. Including the Foster Kids. No fixing yet.
No fighting during this.
Move.
Get back into school stuff.

Healthy eating after you've gotten act together. This kind of stress is worse for your mind and body and bodes much more trouble than a cheeseburger and fries.

I'd stop trying to force her to do all this. It sounds like she has no say in anything, not even what she eats.

I have one that eats anything I put in front of him. The other one, if forced, will take a bite and gag then start puking. She WILL go days without eating and WILL NEVER eat something she truly does not want to try.

What would I have gained if I had kept being a DICTATOR to her about food? Nothing at all and I'd have ruined our relationship that much more.

You cannot cannot cannot force anyone to eat or drink anything by bullying them and trying to force them. They just dig their heels in more and more and more.

Let it go. Unless she's eating brownies and candy bars and drinking 2-3 liters of pop per day, then you need to stop buying it.

You really have to rethink the food thing. Having, cooking, and serving healthier food on hand is not a bad thing, not saying it is, BUT these kids are coming from homes that may have had nothing more then TV dinners in the freezer for months. They may have eaten mac and cheese every night for dinner, they may not have ever had an apple in their house and eaten one. Seriously! They may have never peeled a banana.

It's not healthy to change their diets drastically all at one. You have to have regular foods that these kids have been eating. Changing their diet overnight can cause them to have chronic diarrhea, vomiting, cramps, dizziness, rashes, and more.

We learned about this stuff in our foster parenting classes.

The foster kids are already mourning their loses, their toys, their clothes, their house, their schools, friends, family, pets, bedrooms, etc...and they are in distress.

When they come and you have completely different foods, such as tofu and salads for every meal instead of mac and cheese and ravioli's it can be rather shocking to their bodies.

What I'm trying to say it this, if you're eating drastically healthy and are not able to cook normal foods that these foster kids might have been eating then it might be a good idea to consider blending your menu's. Allow the kiddo's to have a more normal entree and then have a couple of healthier sides they can try. If there is NO pressure they might try it more. The less stress at the dinner table the more chance there is for adventure and trying some new foods they may love and want every night. Give their body's time to adjust with just one new food per night perhaps.

I'd also consider that your daughter needs time away from home. Others go off to work and maybe the foster kids get to go too. She may need a life outside those 4 walls that are called home. So if she wants to enroll in public school I'd let her.

Not sure, but wouldn't you be networked for free/ low cost support via the foster agency. It could help you with family issues such as the fighting and bickering, responsibility for schoolwork and good nutrition.

Best,
F. B.

There is so, so much that is going unsaid in your post.

Why did you move away from all her friends? You do know that she is grieving the loss of her friendships, right? Can you see that? Did you move because of HER issues, because one of you got a new job, to be closer to family -- why? Is it possible that stress from the move is behind both her and her dad's frustrations?

Why do you have foster children if your own nuclear family is having these issues? Did your husband and daughter have issues between them before the new kids joined the family? Is it possible at all-- though you will not want to see it, I think -- that the presence of the foster kids is changing the dynamic between your husband, your daughter and yourself? Does she feel that they get your attention while she is losing your attention? Please consult very seriously with the foster care program and get counseling through them to determine if your family right now is a family that should be fostering kids. You may need to be strong enough to question whether you should be foster parents while your daughter is still in your home. This may be a temporary blip that will work out, or it could be a problem deep enough to mean you need to stop fostering for a time--it sounds like you need the help of the fostering program and a counselor to find out.

You and your husband MUST get parenting counseling immediately. Please do not say "we can't afford any specialist"! Your city or county health department and/or social services department can link you to free, low-cost or sliding-scale family counseling. Also try your local "women's center" which are advice centers all over the place -- look them up for your area. And have you checked into what your health insurance will cover? You might be surprised, and you might find that many counselors or family therapists will work with you on sliding scale fees or payment plans. If your husband flat-out refuses to go, go by yourself and/or go with your daughter, whichever the counselor or therapist recommends at first. He needs to get out of a rut where his only way to relate to his child is to yell at her and she needs to be able to see him as something other than dad who yells at her. I'm not saying he's the only one at fault -- but he IS the only adult in that screaming match, and it's his role and responsibility to deal with things better if she cannot.

Someone else mentioned below that your family seems very controlling of your daughter and I agree. I would totally drop the food issue for now -- totally. Just keep decent food in the house and do not discuss it; it has become a power struggle because she KNOWS you cannot force her to eat or not eat anything, so simply drop the struggle for now. She may feel she has nothing at all that she gets a say about -- nothing she controls, but she can control this one thing, her eating habits. You have much bigger problems to deal with first -- can you recognize that? I am concerned that maybe you can't see the real issues because you are focused on smaller ones that are really symptoms (what she eats, her schooling) and not the actual problem (she feels she has no control over any aspect of her life; she is coping with sharing her whole world with not one but two foster siblings; she has had to move away from the support of her friends, and much more).

Please get outside help now, this week, today. He too sounds under a lot of stress -- did you move for his job? Does he possibly not like that job, it's not what he expected it to be, he is regretting the change and taking it out in yelling at everyone--? He needs help, you need help and most of all -- your child needs help. And what about the foster kids? Surely they hear all this? Even if dad is sweet with them -- they see that he is not sweet with his own child, and they are feeling all the tension in the household.

One last thing. I know you homeschool but be open to the idea that she might do better and be calmer if you can find a school or some kind of homeschooler co-operative where kids study in groups. That way she can meet other kids in this new area, join some healthy extracurricular activities for interest and fun, and have exposure to other adults (teachers, Girl Scout leaders, coaches, homeschooler parents in a co-op etc.) who are not you or your husband. It all sounds like there is too much togetherness right now and not enough outside activity, independent of the rest of the family, for her. I'd get her into some activities all her own as swiftly as you can--whatever interests her, arts groups, drama or music or a sport or dance lessons or computer programming classes, anything that interests her and that she helps choose, so she feels some control.

But whatever you do, you and your husband need to get third party help to cope with his anger (and the real reasons behind it) and your child's disaffection. He needs to ramp back and not engage and yell, and she possibly needs more to focus on that is not about the new house, the move, catching up on her schoolwork, or her foster siblings.

You don't say how old she is.

Are there any charter schools in your area? You might want to try her in a smaller, more intimate school setting.

And dad needs to stop yelling.

Don't buy any junk food, make food from scratch... as for the fighting... your husband can help your daughter change by example... your husband might begin to better curb his temper and not give in to his daughter's behavior..
additionally, consider those foster kids who have probably seen enough drama and trauma already in their lives, imagine how it must be for them to witness the fighting... it must be so unsettling..
via social services, they do offer FREE counseling for families who take in foster kids, I know I was a former foster kid.. maybe the entire family can get into some family counseling and learn new ways to cope.. in order to get the counseling services, not all members of the family need be foster... it's for the foster kids and all members living under the same roof..

good luck

The food is easy. If you don't buy junk she can't eat junk. Just keep healthy food in the house.
School? Does she NEED to be home schooled? Maybe she would be happier going to school and being around kids her own age.
Not sure about the fighting. If she went to school she could talk to a counselor. I hope you can figure something out :-(

Does your area offer any free or inexpensive therapy? We have family and child services here where you can go for very little money and talk to a therapist about just such issues.
Also, have you tried talking to each of your combatants when they are not mad and see if they are able to see sense then? Or better yet, have them sit down with some hard, fast rules about how the conversation is going to go (talking stick, no yelling, I sentences only ie "I feel.." and "I think..." and see if they can hash out a better solution when not in the thick of things. This means though that your husband also has to be prepared to make compromises. Good luck!