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Last one, I promise!
Dear Care and Feeding,
My husband and our kids recently moved into a new neighborhood. Our reason for moving was a better school district and bullying issues at the prior school which negatively affected my daughter Liz (13). Liz essentially lost many friends during the pandemic as we decided early on that masking, vaccines, and online learning would be the only way for our family to keep safe. She slowly became excluded from many gatherings, in-person and online. Eventually kids started becoming really mean to Liz and bullying her in online games and on TikTok. Moving was our only choice to change schools.
Liz ended up having a great summer with the kids in the new neighborhood, and all of them would go house-hopping every day with some sleepovers. Unfortunately, there was a neighborhood birthday where all families were invited, but we left early to walk our dog, and one of the girl’s mothers, “Grace,” had a talking-to with all of the kids about how she felt they had not been playing nice with her daughter. Liz felt singled-out for scolding in particular. It really bothered me when Liz told me the story, so I told her she not to go over to Grace’s house anymore. If you have a problem with my kid, you talk to me and you certainly don’t have my permission to verbally ostracize her without me and especially in front of other people. I don’t know her well—so confronting her was not an option.
Anyway, when the kids were playing and about to all go over to Grace’s house one day a few weeks ago, Liz told the kids she could not go. Shortly after that, the kids stopped coming over to our house. Little by little, we saw the kids playing outside—but none of the kids were asking Liz to come out and play anymore. Then, other kids disconnected from Liz on online games. I also started to see social gatherings with all the kids at houses or birthday parties on social media—all the kids except my Lizzie. Grace’s family also unfriended us on social media.
Obviously, if they are having gatherings and not inviting us or Liz—our family and my poor Lizzie has been excommunicated by many in the neighborhood. We are at a loss, as we moved to get away from the exact situation of mean girls, and it’s happening all over again.
Only now, Liz can see it all unfolding from her windows upstairs.
At school she is adjusting fine, making some new friends and keeping A’s and B’s, but this neighborhood exclusion is triggering flashbacks of her old bullying friends and school, and she is sad and mopey at home, constantly talking about how she doesn’t know why they are all excluding her and ignoring her. I bought her some books about why girls are mean and how to get over girl drama from Amazon. My husband is over talking about it and says we need to get over it: Not everyone is going to like you and it builds character. But this character-building is breaking Liz’s heart and mine as well. What can I do to turn this around?
—Heartbroken
Dear Heartbroken,
Ugh, kids suck. I am really sorry Liz has to deal with this, and I know how hard it is to be OK as a parent out in the world when your child is suffering. This sounds like a pit-in-stomach-all-the-time situation. But—and I mean this in the most loving, understanding, empathetic way possible—I think you’re in too deep! Liz is obviously lucky to have a mom who she can share her feelings with, and a mom who desperately wants to protect her from hurt and harm. What I suspect you know, though, is that you can’t. I do think you could have talked (and still could talk) to Grace. It wouldn’t need to be a confrontation. But you could say you notice that the girls don’t hang out anymore, and Liz seemed to think that Grace was upset with her, and is there anything that Grace would like you to know. (Who knows: Maybe Liz did something cruel to Grace’s kid! Even great kids are jerks sometimes. That doesn’t mean she should be ostracized.)
But beyond that, unless there is real, targeted bullying going on, Liz is now old enough to, with your ear and support and love, navigate this stuff on her own. And it seems like she’s doing that pretty well, actually? She’s making some friends at school, getting good grades, and feeling bummed about being left out in the neighborhood. Sounds about right for 13. This is going to come off as trite, but I think the best thing you can do is just be there for her—not to overly obsess about those girls, but to be an ear and a source of unconditional love. The tween and teen years are going to be a series of awful social experiences (mixed in with great ones, I hope), and Liz just needs to know that home is where she’s safe and loved, no matter how many friends she has or how her social life is going.
You can’t stop yourself from feeling heartsick for her. But you can be careful to make sure she doesn’t think you think this is the end of the world. Yes, you want her to have more friends and easy friendships. Of course you do! But if that’s not in the cards right now, please make sure she knows you don’t think it’s abnormal or wrong to only have a few friends or to struggle. And then just love love love her. (And talk shit about those girls to your husband in bed at night.)
https://slate.com/human-interest/2021/10/introverted-parent-worries-care-and-feeding.html
My husband and our kids recently moved into a new neighborhood. Our reason for moving was a better school district and bullying issues at the prior school which negatively affected my daughter Liz (13). Liz essentially lost many friends during the pandemic as we decided early on that masking, vaccines, and online learning would be the only way for our family to keep safe. She slowly became excluded from many gatherings, in-person and online. Eventually kids started becoming really mean to Liz and bullying her in online games and on TikTok. Moving was our only choice to change schools.
Liz ended up having a great summer with the kids in the new neighborhood, and all of them would go house-hopping every day with some sleepovers. Unfortunately, there was a neighborhood birthday where all families were invited, but we left early to walk our dog, and one of the girl’s mothers, “Grace,” had a talking-to with all of the kids about how she felt they had not been playing nice with her daughter. Liz felt singled-out for scolding in particular. It really bothered me when Liz told me the story, so I told her she not to go over to Grace’s house anymore. If you have a problem with my kid, you talk to me and you certainly don’t have my permission to verbally ostracize her without me and especially in front of other people. I don’t know her well—so confronting her was not an option.
Anyway, when the kids were playing and about to all go over to Grace’s house one day a few weeks ago, Liz told the kids she could not go. Shortly after that, the kids stopped coming over to our house. Little by little, we saw the kids playing outside—but none of the kids were asking Liz to come out and play anymore. Then, other kids disconnected from Liz on online games. I also started to see social gatherings with all the kids at houses or birthday parties on social media—all the kids except my Lizzie. Grace’s family also unfriended us on social media.
Obviously, if they are having gatherings and not inviting us or Liz—our family and my poor Lizzie has been excommunicated by many in the neighborhood. We are at a loss, as we moved to get away from the exact situation of mean girls, and it’s happening all over again.
Only now, Liz can see it all unfolding from her windows upstairs.
At school she is adjusting fine, making some new friends and keeping A’s and B’s, but this neighborhood exclusion is triggering flashbacks of her old bullying friends and school, and she is sad and mopey at home, constantly talking about how she doesn’t know why they are all excluding her and ignoring her. I bought her some books about why girls are mean and how to get over girl drama from Amazon. My husband is over talking about it and says we need to get over it: Not everyone is going to like you and it builds character. But this character-building is breaking Liz’s heart and mine as well. What can I do to turn this around?
—Heartbroken
Dear Heartbroken,
Ugh, kids suck. I am really sorry Liz has to deal with this, and I know how hard it is to be OK as a parent out in the world when your child is suffering. This sounds like a pit-in-stomach-all-the-time situation. But—and I mean this in the most loving, understanding, empathetic way possible—I think you’re in too deep! Liz is obviously lucky to have a mom who she can share her feelings with, and a mom who desperately wants to protect her from hurt and harm. What I suspect you know, though, is that you can’t. I do think you could have talked (and still could talk) to Grace. It wouldn’t need to be a confrontation. But you could say you notice that the girls don’t hang out anymore, and Liz seemed to think that Grace was upset with her, and is there anything that Grace would like you to know. (Who knows: Maybe Liz did something cruel to Grace’s kid! Even great kids are jerks sometimes. That doesn’t mean she should be ostracized.)
But beyond that, unless there is real, targeted bullying going on, Liz is now old enough to, with your ear and support and love, navigate this stuff on her own. And it seems like she’s doing that pretty well, actually? She’s making some friends at school, getting good grades, and feeling bummed about being left out in the neighborhood. Sounds about right for 13. This is going to come off as trite, but I think the best thing you can do is just be there for her—not to overly obsess about those girls, but to be an ear and a source of unconditional love. The tween and teen years are going to be a series of awful social experiences (mixed in with great ones, I hope), and Liz just needs to know that home is where she’s safe and loved, no matter how many friends she has or how her social life is going.
You can’t stop yourself from feeling heartsick for her. But you can be careful to make sure she doesn’t think you think this is the end of the world. Yes, you want her to have more friends and easy friendships. Of course you do! But if that’s not in the cards right now, please make sure she knows you don’t think it’s abnormal or wrong to only have a few friends or to struggle. And then just love love love her. (And talk shit about those girls to your husband in bed at night.)
https://slate.com/human-interest/2021/10/introverted-parent-worries-care-and-feeding.html
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