Daughter super jealous of another girl in class

How do you know her DD could do better if she works harder?

Life doesn't work like that.

Yup. That's what I thought reading said post. It's a life lesson that you can't always be better than everyone else, regardless of the amount of effort you put in. Because that's life. And coming to terms with that hard fact is just part of growing up.

OP telling her daughter she could 'easily' do better than the other girl with hard work is not helpful. The reality is she may not. It's also unlikely that this other girl is better than everyone else in the things she's good at. They're just in a very small pool at the moment.

Everyone can improve. And taking steps towards improving something you work on and getting better actually does marvellous things for people's self esteems.

Take a look at all the stuff on the "growth Vs fixed mindset". What I say is backed by research - if OP wants her DD to develop better self esteem then this is the way to do it

So true. My Dad had a degenerative neurological disease that started in his 40s. He was never bitter or resentful that he got this at a relatively young age. He looked at people who were less able to do things, and felt sad for them and lucky that he could still walk etc. This is the attitude to cultivate.
There will always be someone better than you at something. Even if you become top in the world at a sport , as you age a younger person will take that place. You might win an Oscar and in a decade be almost forgotten. We all like to have things we are good at, but what is most valuable about us is the enduring uniqueness of us all as people. What makes us loved and lovable is the combination of qualities that only we have.
If your daughter gets too stuck in this mindset then life will be miserable. You really don’t need to be the best at everything to be happy. You can focus on being the best that you can be.
Your daughter’s mindset is very self obsessed and inward looking, which is obviously a mid teens state to some degree, but happiness comes from looking outward and just enjoying other people’s skills, enjoying your friends, not feeling in competition with them.

this. I suspect that the girl is kind of....but not entirely....a sort of excuse mechanism.....a sort of "oh I'd be ok/better/happier if it wasn't for xxx" maybe she could understand that there will, for most of us, always be people who seem to excel at everything and that all too often those people are not as golden and as happy as they appear to the rest of us.

Sadly, it is your DD who is hindering her view of herself by making comparisons with others. School is such a short time in the scheme of things and she needs to focus on her own future (not what she imagines will be someone else's) so that she can grow, develop and be her best self. It doesn't matter that this may, or may not, be "better" than others. She will not be living their life.
I do wish her well, and it will be hard to change her thinking, but she is lucky that she has her life, and not others (think Gaza, Ukraine, Somalia, Afghanistan, etc.) where she would be having far greater struggles to focus on.

Gawd. Why say this?

Sometimes you absolutely can't be better. Despite more work, more effort etc etc that's totally delusional.

Why not spin it around and admire someone else for their achievements?

My kid will never be an olympic hockey player- but that shouldn't impact on their joy of playing hockey and neither should it make them be insanely jealous of another kid who may have the talent to get there.

I echo others.

I would see if there is something your DD can have as 'hers' where she can excel. Something this other girl does not do. And I would be very very focused on decent therapy. The fact the school has identified she is a risk to other people due to her jealousy is not something to be dismissed lightly- it's very serious indeed.

Jealousy is a normal emotion and as a pp said can actually be useful in that it can drive people to pursue what they want. But this sounds like your DD needs some specialist intervention before it becomes something really toxic. For her own sake as well as she must be so unhappy with it.

Does your daughter interact anyway with the girl she’s jealous of? Or does she just let off steam about it all to you? I think the diagnoses of personality disorders are a bit premature 🙄

I love the sound of this kid.

It's not 'deluded self confidence' btw. She has self confidence- despite her mother it seems

Self-confidence and lack of jealousy - some people are born with it, some are not, I am afraid. My sister's little daughter was looking at herself in the mirror age 3 and would say 'gorgeous hair' - and she had the thinnest, most pathetic hair and my sister was worried that it would never grow and would lament (loudly) about how non-existent (!!!) her daughter's hair was. Her little daughter? Water off duck's back! Her daughter filled out a bit when a teenager and her mum was trying to restrict her diet, whilst her daughter used to refer to herself as 'a skinny legend'. My sister is now on her to 'put some makeup' on and her daughter is convinced she is gorgeous without any makeup. Same goes for clothes - she has one 'default' outfit and wears it to uni all the time. Convinced she is a film star appearance-wise. Literally deluded self-confidence. Where from? Nobody admires her at home or at school?

I once read that jealous feelings are great because they tell you what you want from life - then you can use that knowledge to work towards what you want.

Your DD could easily do better than this girl if she works harder - it's in her hands, she just needs you to tell her she can change reality if she works for it.

Even things like charisma/social skills etc can be taught with some practice.

It's always interesting on this sort of post how you get responses knocking the other person.
"The people who were good at school, never really made it" type answers.

Thank you for saying that @MargaretThursday The posts dismissing the "perfect Pollies" at school are in the same mindset as the OP and her DD.

OP, what did you say when your DD told you her counsellor wasn't very good at her job? I'm a bit astounded that you wouldn't challenge an unqualified 14 year old making a judgement about a trained professional ...

Your DD is not silly - she is going through a tough period of adolescence, and you should be focusing on her, not the other young girl, nor dismissing the school's concerns.

One of my daughters grew very jealous of a girl at school. The girl came from a wealthier large family. She was very clever. Athletic etc. lovely girl.

my dd was becoming very fixated on this girl. I found it very worrying much like you. What actually broke this unhealthy behaviour was my dd being around less fortunate people. I volunteer and took her along on a few things. She then decided to help out at a local stables that gives disabled children the chance to ride and interact with the horses.

she soon realised how lucky she was and she found a lot of pleasure in helping people.

I think sometimes teens become too focused on what they don’t have and forget how fortunate they really are.

it’s lovely that your dd can confide in you. You sound like a great mum x

I think the comments about these kids not always doing well in later life applies to the OPs dd tbh! She’s trying to build herself into a person that is top of the class etc but that’s not where future success lies

often ‘those kids’ who are considered ‘perfect’ are very kind people and that’s the trait that sees them ultimately go on to have a good adulthood.

the academic superstars who are unkind with it don’t tend to have people jealous of them!

I have a DD who is high achieving. Top sets at school, county netball, top 10 nationally ranked athlete etc. There is a girl at her school who has become fixated on her and is quite intent on destroying her life. She’s spread vicious rumours at school, e.g. DD is anorexic, lies about things DD has supposedly said about others to destroy her friendships. It’s now at the point that she’s joined her out of school athletics club to infiltrate and destroy her out of school friendships as well.

It’s quite frightening the level of hatred and obsession this girl has about DD - who keeps herself to herself and just goes about doing her homework and her 20 odd hours a week of sports training. From a parent on the other end of this, please try and get your DD some help. It does sound unhealthy and it’s great you’ve recognised it. I’d suggest finding something this girl doesn’t do and get her involved in that so they’re not directly competing with each other. My DD doesn’t play football for example, she’s never picked for the girls football team, she’s also hopeless at music, but this girl doesn’t see that at all, she just sees that she captains the netball team. Which is really quite a small part of the overall school experience.

Well, maybe that's the way @cheshirecat2913 looks at the world? It can't have come from nowhere ...

The perfectionism, giving up easily if she thinks she won't be the best, and escaping reality via gaming makes me wonder if it's worth looking into the possibility of ADHD. Possibly it's been masked well at primary but is becoming increasing difficult to do so at secondary level and this is how it's manifesting.

I'd really try to push the narrative that what other people do is none of her business - she is the most important person in her life. Boosting her self-esteem and resilience by focussing on what she can and does achieve.

it’s just this one person that seems to be hindering her view of herself

The other girl isn't hindering your ads view of herself - your daughter is hindering her own view of herself

I agree. I had a “friend” who was jealous of me ( and others) and it grew to ridiculous proportions. It started out being things that kind of made sense and escalated to being jealous of me for insane things like having a zit on my nose.

Get your DD to read Othello. Jealousy really does “ mock the meat it feeds on” and can ruin otherwise happy lives.

It's always interesting on this sort of post how you get responses knocking the other person.
"The people who were good at school, never really made it" type answers.

OP. I don't think those sort of answers will help your dc at all. Those would be encouraging her, by saying that she can wait and hope they fail. What you are wanting to do is raise her up to not mind what others achieve because she is confident in herself.

I do agree with what others had written that you seemed to be doing her down. From the first post, I got the impression that she was struggling academically and not good at anything. Later you tell us she's doing well.
So when she tells you something, concentrate on how well she had done, tell her you don't care how well others have done, it's her that matters and praise if praise is due and sympathise if she hasn't done as well as she wanted but no sympathy if all it is is comparison to the other girl.

Get her into different things. I wonder whether volunteering, being treated as an adult would help? My ds found something which he loves because he felt he was treated as an adult at that age. It's made a huge gain in his self-esteem because he's gone through school (in his words) "not good enough to get rewarded for being good, but not bad enough to get the rewards for not being bad".
Maybe a charity shop, or if she's into acting, you may find backstage work gives her more of an adult feel (under 16s have to be chaperoned for on stage, but not backstage). Or if she could help with a younger group at her drama school. Something which makes her want to be more adult-like and feel that she is gaining. That may give her the mental growth she needs to not care about this girl.

Does she engage in any activities where the outcome is totally subjective like art or music or writing? Maybe a focus like that could help, where your daughter could strive to find her unique voice/style in a more free form setting.

sounds like this other girl is nailing school, that doesn’t say anything about her future (in my industry being a “high achiever” tends to actually hold people back). And as loads of pp have said, nobody knows what’s actually going on for this “perfect” girl.

God high school was brutal, I’m feeling sorry for everyone here.

This one person isn't hindering her view of herself, her own poor mental health is. If it was't this girl there would be someone or something else. Unhealthy thought patterns like this often stem from some sort of trauma....which might not even have seemed like a trauma to you or it might be something you think couldn't possibly have affected her. Something like the loss of a parent, divorce, a big unsettling move, even things like bring in hospital as a child. You mentioned it's just the two of you, is her father on the scene at all? Have you any ideas what might be behind all this? If you don't mind me asking, how is your mental health and self esteem?

Once she stops comparing herself to her peers she will be okay. Sadly with the rise of social media this has become harder for our youths in todays society. The sense of pitting herself against her peers is hard but with correct support she can shift her mindset onto her achievements and focus.

It's not silly. If this was a boy obsessed with your daughter the way your daughter is obsessed with this girl, you'd be complaining if the school weren't keeping an eye on him.

Can your daughter join groups that the other girl has no involvement with? Establish things that she does that she can not compare against the other girl.