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need advice - sorry about length

4 replies

LJL69 · 05/06/2013 13:36

I am very new to the forum so please forgive any newbie errors.
My DD is 9 and the youngest of 4 (her elder siblings are 21, 19 & 15 and are my step children) She has good relationship with her brothers and sister and apart from the usual stuff, family life is pretty normal - older children are with us half the week. We had an awful situation while she was 6 when she was sexually abused by 2 older children living in Foster care next door. (They were not hugely older and both girls and it is cosidered that they were acting out things they had witnessed prior to being taken into care) This was dealt with by police and SWD and my DD was given play therapy etc to help her through.
She has had the usual periodic fall outs and issues through school but nothing major and we have dealt with them as they arose and moved on.
However this year she has been very unhappy at school. Not wanting to go and very withdrawn. She is ordinarily quite a bubbly, creative wee person so I spoke with her class teacher (who is lovely and DD really likes her) who has been keeping an eye on as much as she can and letting me know of any issues.
FF to last week. I had been worried and trying to chat to DD re how she was feeling, how her day had been etc each evening. On this particular evening she was less guarded and told me she never has a partner for activities. Noone wants to be her partner and those left without a partner will argue about being left to be her partner. If they are made to be her partner others will tease those children. She was feeling humiliated to even tell us about it. My heart just broke for her.
I made an appointment to meet with CT and HT the next day and my husband and I went along. The only thing the school could see may be causing a problem is that my DD can be quite uncompromising and stands her ground if feeling hard done to. However they think DD is expressing a need to gain a sense of control and that it may stem from her experience of abuse and its aftermath (the joint interview etc) we came up with some plans that we could try and have kept in touch daily (HT emails me)
I got email last night saying that DD had had a bad time at lunch time and was definitely being left out and isolated by a group - witnessed by HT. She took my DD out of class and instructed the CT to speak sternly to the class about it and it not being acceptable. She asked I pop in to see her this morning.
When we met today the HT was at a bit of a loss. She cannot understand it and says my Dd is nice wee girl. She thinks my DD is trying to remain in a group of girls who just dont want to be her friend and that this isnt the best for her. My problem there is that this group have been friends since starting school so if DD doesn't fit in there now - who does she fit in with? And why has this happened?
TBH I am probably not explaining this very well as am so upset and unsure how to make things better for my DD. If anyone thinks they can give me a bit of advice I would really appreciate it. I think I am just looking for someone who has been in a similar situation re school friendship groups/ bullying with their DC and can offer some suggestions of ways to approach making things better. So sorry for my rambling

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GooseyLoosey · 05/06/2013 13:41

I have no advice about how you can make it better with this group of girls. I do know from first hand though that exclusion is a terrible thing - for both parent and child. It happened to ds over a number of years and eventually we had no option but to move schools (which we did when he was in Yr 4).

He is much happier now. A lot of the other children's behaviour had become a habit and whatever we did we were never going to break that. In addition, there are reasons why they picked on ds - he too can be uncompromising and too loud and we discussed with his new school in adavance how they might prevent this from being a problem.

Ds will never be the most popular child, but he is so, so, so much happier than he was.

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LJL69 · 05/06/2013 13:48

Thanks for your speedy reply. I trust the school and know they are fair etc. I just feel so sad for my DD. If there was something obvious that could be causing it I would at least feel I could help her adapt. I know she is not perfect but she is usually so bubbly and cheery that it all seems so odd. I feel I must be missing something but nothing is apparent. I am glad that your ds is happier now

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GooseyLoosey · 06/06/2013 10:41

Keep talking to the school. They may see things you don't. Hope things get better for your dd.

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LJL69 · 06/06/2013 12:30

I am meeting CT and HT again on Friday. Spoke with DD last night about "going with the flow" a bit more. Will keep chipping away

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