remember you don't have to be a half brain dead crazy person to warrant trauma informed care but on the other hand, I'm done being treated like shit I'm not willing to be miserable AGAIN for the sake of indulging my own fears of confrontation One thing's for sure, you have to find a way to approach this that doesn't result in all your energy being sucked out. You have a life to live & a class to take & all kinds of awesome stuff to give energy to right now. This is no time to go back to letting someone steal all that from you, *no matter who they are.* And you sure as hell don't want to succumb to the sneaky temptation to let the other girls become drama-allies. Come on, you know they see how her little episodes affect you. You could "accidentally" favor them at those moments, fail to discourage them from starting to see her as the enemy or the bad one. **But you're not going to let that happen, because you know better.** Pretty sure a major part of it is **DON'T TAKE THE ACTUAL SHITTY UTTERANCES THAT COME OUT OF HER MOUTH SO FUCKING PERSONALLY.** Let her be a naive snotty headstrong wrongheaded snot right now if that's what she has to be right now. You can't micromanage every thought and moral and attitude that she is embodying and struggling with. Wait for the teachable moments. Be a little more cool, unperturbed. See what questions the others ask, and answer with level honesty. The moments of righteousness have a way of calmly, powerfully, quietly presenting themselves if you let them--**IF** you're not all geeked up on **I MUST FIX THIS BROKEN REPRESENTATION OF MYSELF AT ONCE BECAUSE SHE IS FAILING TO MEET MY EXPECTATIONS WHICH ARE REFLECTIONS OF THE HARSH EXPECTATIONS I HAVE OF MYSELF.** Well, anyway, you get the drift. Stand back a little, wait for the cat moment. This is way harder than it seems, but if you can kind of 3D-eye-squint your way into doing it accidentally on purpose, it actually can make a lot of stuff easier, because you're not as exhausted all the time because you're not having to commit a hundred and three percent to the panic of any given stupid moment. It's worth a try. And remember--never be stingy with the love. Some of it really is a need for attention, even sometimes a need for the exact attention that the behavior seems designed to drive away!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! #reflection Also, it might be good at least every now and then to think about what your actual motivations are. Say for instance she thinks you're just being mean and cruel and hypercritical, and you don't really *care*. Your stance is that if you didn't care, why would you be going to all this trouble? You think to yourself (and you imagine saying to her), if she really, genuinely, deep-down thinks I'm just an unreasonable, hearless jerk that just wants to blame her for everything, that's a genuine cause for concern! And it probably would be. But what *are* you really worried about? How much of the reluctance to let her "win" an argument, for instance, comes from sound pedagogy or a clearly defined threat to anyone's well-being, and how much of it comes from not wanting to be embarrassed, from wanting to have the right kind of child-as-product to show off? #here's the thing i'm still mainly worried about She's pretty much fine with me until I challenge her on something. Her mom was the same way. The way I dealt with that with her mom was fucked up. I have to find a different way to deal with it. And the thing with Millies bike? I mean if she REALLY believes the nonsense she was saying about that, that really does genuinely worry me. Because that shit is fucked up, like seriously sociopath level fucked up. And I already know I can't fix someone whose brain works like that It always comes back to these: - you're just going to blame me; you always blame me for everything - I'm sorry I'm not perfect - you always yell at me - you don't care about me It's so fucking infuriating and so unfair and I'm so fucking sick of it. Everything's peachy and fine and then she gets her little undies in a bunch, and suddenly I'm this horrible bastard--even if it's not even really about me. It's the Black and white, the demonizing. So familiar. Fuck. God mother fucking dammit.