...but if I draw some lines that are reasonable for me, she could end up with a lot of unnecessary pain and suffering, for years to come...
I'm curious about this piece. I don't want to ask you to share details you don't want to (so I won't). But I want to say that generally, when we set reasonable boundaries, a number of counterintuitive things happen:
1. The child (first has a fit then) feels calmer and safer.
2. The child gets more of what she needs (e.g., sleep, nutrition).
3. The child's long term ends up better, because she learned with her parent how to notice and respect boundaries. This means much better relationships overall, short term and long term.
4. The child learns some critical self-reliance. i.e., Starts practicing things like self-soothing instead of a fight response to stress.
So much this!!milliemchi, I so know what you are going through -- my DD was sort of ridiculously similar, and at 11.5, there were days I wondered whether she'd live to 12, because I was so ready to throttle her. It was just exhausting, when every. little. thing. is a battle.
First, you are doing the right thing with the assessment and the doctors. Hormones at that age are outrageous, especially when you have a kid who tends toward the dramatic, and undiagnosed ADHD basically multiplies those effects. Getting professional help is the first place to start.
Second, I can tell you from experience that jooniFLORisploo is 100% correct. When you have one of those sensitive/emotional kids, they feed off the engagement. You cannot talk to them or reason with them in an argument, because their emotions literally won't let them process and understand (and the fact that part of them knows you're right just pisses them off more).
I was always an explainer -- I have a knee-jerk hatred of stupid rules, so it was really important for me to make sure my kids understood why the rules were what they are. But the thing is, in the heat of the moment, all of that talking and negotiating actually makes them feel
less secure. Kids this age are starting to separate themselves from their family, but to do that successfully, they need to know with 100% certainty that home is still there and as solid as ever -- so when they push and test their boundaries, they actually
need you to hold firm to make them feel safe. It's sort of like they are a big rubber band, and you are the post it is attached to -- the more they push away, the more firmly they need you anchored in the ground. This is where I recommend 1-2-3 Magic, both for that explanation and for the calm, unemotional reaction needed.
So I know it sounds completely counterintuitive, but engaging when they are in that mood is actually worse for the kid than simply enforcing the line and sending her to her room -- when you get emotional, she reads that and it ramps up the intensity; when you engage and don't enforce the boundary, then she feels forced to keep pushing until she finds out where the line really is, and keep pushing and keep pushing until you finally lose it and yell or whatever, and then everything blows up and you both feel stressed and miserable.
What we did was have a talk in a quiet time, where we laid out the rules, the privileges, and the consequences, based around the things our DD valued. For ours, it was independence -- she wanted to be recognized as a competent adult more than anything in the world. So our talk was along the lines of: you are growing up, and so you deserve more independence. But with greater freedom comes greater responsibility -- you want to be treated like an adult, you have to act like an adult and do what you need to do without me nagging. That means managing your homework and keeping your grades up (and for your DD, getting herself in bed at the proper time). You do that, you can do it your way; but if you miss assignments or the grades drop, then you do it our way.
And
of course the grades dropped -- funny, it is hard to study effectively while listening to music, watching TV, AND texting friends all at the same time. :-) So then we just calmly said, ok, you know the deal: now you can sit at the kitchen table, and we will check your work, and check online to make sure you have submitted everything, etc. Note: none of that was angry on our part* -- that was absolutely key. It was just, well, you had two paths, you chose path B, so I will implement path B. She, of course, had huge fits over it, but we just ignored all the drama and implemented our rules until the grades went back up -- at which point, she earned the right to do it herself again. Rinse, repeat, for 3-4 years.
Obviously, yours would be different -- the key is to find whatever matters to her the most, and use that as both a carrot and a stick. I won't say it was remotely easy -- every year, we'd drop back into the failure cycle, and the arguments, and all that, and I'd think two steps forward, three steps back, will we ever get out of this?? You just have to expect her to cross the lines periodically -- really, that's her job! But I realized that if I looked over the longer term, every year the crash got a little bit later -- from December, to February, to March, to April, to May, and then finally this past year, no crash at all! And that got me through -- just seeing that incremental process over the longer term.
Finally, I am sorry. Those preteen years were incredibly difficult, and the stress of managing a high-strung kid feels like you are living on a powder keg. And she will blow -- trust me, once you start implementing boundaries, she will escalate (because you gave in before, so she thinks if you push more, you'll do it again). And she will keep escalating, because she has these overwhelming emotions, and you are the one safe place where she can blow and know you will still love her. But the thing it took me forever to realize is that sending her to her room and ignoring that sort of crap is
helping her, not hurting her! You are her safety valve; she doesn't actually mean what she says, it's not personal at all -- you're just the pressure relief valve where she dumps all the emotion and anger and frustration and hurt. So don't feel bad about sending her to her room at XX o'clock, no arguments, no extensions -- no matter how loudly she yells, no matter how many doors she slams, she actually
needs you to do that -- it is reassuring to know that as far as she spins out of control, as much as she tries to push you away, you are still her solid anchor. Think about it this way: you job is to set the rules, her job is to try to break them -- so when you send her to her room, and she yells and screams, you are actually both doing your jobs very well! :-) Her throwing big fits is not a sign of failure, it is what she has to do to work through her overwhelming emotions. And then, in calmer times, you can help her learn how to self-calm and manage those emotions.
*Don't get me wrong: I was absolutely livid most of the time! But I had to learn to react unemotionally to her -- she was looking for the fight, and only by staying calm and refusing to engage could I control the situation.