[JDErickson]

I know there are some well respected people here in the psychology field. I'm hoping for some advice on my 12 year old daughter.

Basically she has been a handful from the minute she was born. Labor was long a nd tough for my wife. The first night we brought her home we almost took her back [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

She has always been defiant and required lots of punishments of varying levels to keep her in line.

She is very smart and has her own distinct ways she likes to do things. These ways are out of the norm for her age group and thus she doesn't have many friends and she struggles to keep the ones she has. She basically takes over any group she is in and trys to get them all to do things her way. Her way is a little strange to the other kids so they end up excluding her.

She is very smart but refuses to try and thus is now failing Science and Math. She has problems with math because she refuses to learn her basic facts in prior years. She doesn't do her homework and lies and tells us she has none.

She is a bit of a dreamer and has become immersed in the internet chat world. She can create her own world there. We try and limit her time but then she has meltdowns. She recently has been trying to blame her chat addiction on me since I play poker in the evenings some days.

Recently she has become very withdrawn and emotional. Her meltdowns have increased in frequency to almost daily. A few days ago she went into her room and wrote a depressing poem on her bedroom wall with permanent marker. She has started mantioning how she should just be dead and no one loves her, etc. One time she took a push pin and scratched up her arms.

She is not involved in any drugs.

We are attempting to find her some counseling now but I'm wondering if anyone has any specific advice that may help.

Thank you