Helping your kid deal with exclusion and cliques

[Myira]

DD, 8 years old, is going to summer camp at her school and has been going there for the last 2-3 years. She was telling me today that girl A and girl B, both exclude her and hang out together. Girl A's mom had reached out to me last year and was happy to know that DD was in this package for summer camp when girl A joined for a short while last year. (Girl A was DD's classmate in K, but now all 3 girls are in separate schools so only meet in summer at camp. DD knows girl B only from camp).

I told DD to hand out with other kids and totally ignore them. DD said girl A especially made it a point to say girl B was her best friend or something to DD, which made her feel hurt.

How do you help your kids deal with exclusionary behavior? I think this situation is pretty much deja vu for me, not only as a child but even as an adult. A friend starts giving you the cold shoulder or makes it especially obvious that they prefer someone else's company over yours. I wonder if I am or used to be a magnet for these personalities, may be my lack of self-worth makes me a target just like DD here? I've found this behavior always stings, even when you can do without that friend.

Also, I wonder if this my experience even as an adult, I am just a magnet for abusive, selfish people(I cannot help but call it abusive to some extent, intentional or not I'm not sure. Being social and making more friends has got to be different than giving a cold shoulder to an existing friend right? A healthy, kind and secure adult would not have a reason to make you feel bad while still meeting their need to expand their social circle right?). May be a person with more boundaries and self-worth would not attract such personalities in the first place?

Would like to hear your take on it.

[daisyd]

Hugs to you and DD. I'm sure others will post with practical suggestions, but I couldn't read this and not post.

[mackmama]

I hear you putting yourself down, and I think the responsibility is not on your shoulders for people like this but on the offender's. That kind of behavior is unfortunately somewhat common for both adults and kids (esp among females), and it's just awful. I think you did the right thing with your DD by telling her to play with other kids. I'd also help her understand why girl A would say that... that girl A is insecure and is trying to feel more powerful by having girl B all to herself. I like the "Have you filled my bucket" books to help explain this kind of stuff. Girl A's bucket is not full so she is taking stuff from other people's buckets to try to make herself feel better. Helping your DD have empathy for both Girl A and Girl B ("How do you think Girl B feels? It must be hard for her being in the middle. How do you think she feels? How do you think she should act?") Just explore it with her. Help her communicate her hurt to you while also encouraging her own empowerment to step outside of that harmful triangular dynamic and find other friends. I also like to remove the behavior from the child... such as "Girl A is making a bad choice right now" rather than "Girl A is bad" and to leave the door open for the possibility of future friendship such as "Hopefully Girl A will learn to make better choices in the future and maybe you can be friends when that happens, but for now you should be around people who make you feel good and happy since that's what good friends do."

[Kindra178]

Only advice I can give is find new friends. Don't be stuck in that cycle of the third wheel. Reach out to others. I'm sorry she is going through this.


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[Myira]

Thanks for the suggestions.
I talked to her and tried to drive home the point that she has to mingle with other kids and surely will find people that are kind and fun to be with. We talked about how she deserves to be treated well and there is no reason to fear that she will be alone.

My heart just breaks for her. She is such a simpleton, so kind, sensitive and lively. The school year wasn't without relational aggression from a classmate, could she at least have a happy carefree summer? Anyways, holding out hope that she will make other friends and be able to have fun without stress.


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[bisous]

I hear you putting yourself down, and I think the responsibility is not on your shoulders for people like this but on the offender's. That kind of behavior is unfortunately somewhat common for both adults and kids (esp among females), and it's just awful. I think you did the right thing with your DD by telling her to play with other kids. I'd also help her understand why girl A would say that... that girl A is insecure and is trying to feel more powerful by having girl B all to herself. I like the "Have you filled my bucket" books to help explain this kind of stuff. Girl A's bucket is not full so she is taking stuff from other people's buckets to try to make herself feel better. Helping your DD have empathy for both Girl A and Girl B ("How do you think Girl B feels? It must be hard for her being in the middle. How do you think she feels? How do you think she should act?") Just explore it with her. Help her communicate her hurt to you while also encouraging her own empowerment to step outside of that harmful triangular dynamic and find other friends. I also like to remove the behavior from the child... such as "Girl A is making a bad choice right now" rather than "Girl A is bad" and to leave the door open for the possibility of future friendship such as "Hopefully Girl A will learn to make better choices in the future and maybe you can be friends when that happens, but for now you should be around people who make you feel good and happy since that's what good friends do."

This is good advice. If people are mean to you or to your DD, it is not your fault! I'm sorry your DD has had a tough time with friends. That is just so heartbreaking whenever it happens. I had some spells with difficult friends growing up. It was hard but it taught me so much. It taught me to learn to like myself and feel "enough" all on my own. It taught me what real friendship looks like (and what it doesn't look like.) It taught me to be attentive to people who are being left out. In all honesty, one way to always make sure that you are surrounded by kind and gracious people is to seek out others who look lonely or like they could need a friend. I've met a lot of incredible people by reaching out that way and it has a way of filling me up and connecting me with other people. I think your DD could use a break from Girl A and Girl B right now. They might turn out to be friends yet, but if they aren't making her feel good, she just doesn't need to always seek them out. She can find other kids who she might get along with even better.

[magnoliaparadise]

I don't have anything to add to this, but just really loved the responses here and just wanted to say that I understand what you are going through. My DD1 is in third grade and we are seeing a lot of this in class in general.