I started a thread a while back about the volume of food DC1 was eating under her secondary school's new lunch system (you pay online into an account, the child's thumbprint is scanned every time they make a purchase and the money debited from their account)
Well, it's come to light as to why she is buying so much food and it's not because she has grown a second stomach. She is subisidising her friends on free school meals.
She claims that sometimes their free school meal money does not get paid into their account on time, which I don't believe. I believe that they are following DC1 and other non free school meal friends and buying snacks at break, which their funds don't cover.
It's not so much the money that is bothering me, it's amounting to £2-3 a week, which whilst I'm hardly rolling in it, is not going to bankrupt me, especially if the girls in question would genuinely go without lunch otherwise (doubtful)
What's concerning me is the potential for bullying. For background info, DC1 was bullied relentlessly throughout year 6 and this is how it started.
She had a friend who never seemed to have any money. This friend would spend most weekends at our house, eating our food and joining our family activities, which didn't bother me at the time, she appeared to be a nice, if somewhat lonely girl, whose parents may be a bit busy to deal with her (she just turned up one weekend and stayed)
If they had plans with other friends this girls parents would never give her money, so without my knowledge DC1 funded her from her pocket money. Paying for her lunch in town or snacks after swimming and loaning her swimsuits etc because she had none. It was very sad and if I'd known I'd have felt for the girl.
One day DC1 didn't want to buy her lunch, she wanted to spend her pocket money on a book she'd been waiting for. This girl then threatened her, telling her if she didn't give her half of her pocket money, she would turn all of D1's friends against her. DC1 didn't give in, the girl stuck to her word. It got very nasty and didn't stop until I told the school if it was not dealt with I'd have to involve the police.
I'm worried that if DC1 has no money one day or simply wants to spend it on herself, that these two girls also start on her and that they may be taking advantage of her generous nature.
They seem to be spending most of their money on cakes and cookies (not ideal I agree) so I've suggested to DC1 that she make a couple of batches of cakes and cookies to take in with her and save everyone a bit of money, but it doesn't stop me being concerned that she is setting herself up to be bullied again. The girls are all in year 8.
AIBU?
To be concerned about this?
Frequency · 30/09/2015 10:33
This reply has been deleted
Message withdrawn at poster's request.
This reply has been deleted
Message withdrawn at poster's request.
Sorry, I went out to buy cake to do RL stuff.
I think some people have assumed she is buying them food every day. This isn't happening. There doesn't seem to be any pattern to it.
For example, if I look at the last four weeks on her account, then on monday of week 1, she has bought 2 sausage buns, 2 fresh orange drinks and 1 water at breakfast and 2 cakes at morning break. She only bought her own lunch. She didn't buy anything for anyone else the rest of the week.
On Wednesday of week 2 she bought 3 cakes and 2 milks on morning break.
On week 3 she bought cake and fruit because I'd spoken to her about making better choices 
but it does only seem to be for herself (cake on morning break, fruit after lunch instead of cake for both)
On Wednesday of week 4 (last week) she bought 1 tuna salad, 1 sandwhich, 2 fresh grapes, 2 cakes and 2 bottled waters at lunch time and 2 hot chocolates at Friday breakfast.
This week, up to now she hasn't bought anything for anyone else, that I can see.
The system they use is parent pay, I have no idea how parent pay works for FSM but DC1 insists that her friends on FSM get random amounts paid in on random days and never know how much money they are going to have.
This system is supposedly to bridge the gap between the haves and the have nots and make it less obvious who is on FSM, but clearly is not working as it should be.
We got a new head half way through last year and this is one of the changes he made, it was implemented with a truck load of other changes this year. Parent Forum (also new) is to discuss these changes and whether they are working, which is why I was going to raise it then but have made an appointment to speak to DC1's personal adviser (also new) on Monday.
I was the child on FSM while all my friends were buying pizza at break and it's miserable, which is why I looked for a way to make sure every one could have their cake and eat it 
but I take on board that it might not be a good idea and will have a re think.
OP - i think you're dd is a beautiful soul for having such compassion for others (and at her age too) - and you can tell her i said that 
She sounds like a lovely person and a wonderful friend to have and is also strong enough to say 'no' and stick to it. I'm seeing aspects of myself in your dd, and from my experience i just want to say that you need to keep a very close eye on this- esp given the bullying.
i found that whilst friends were happy to accept my love of sharing with them - some of them turned very nasty and aggressive when i said no or wasn't able to share. i didn't expect them to reciprocate but even when they could and they knew i could have done with that help - they didn't and some would point blank refuse if i dared to ask. At that age it's easy to end up in a pattern and end up believing that you can only have 'normal' friendships if you are constantly giving. I didn't get support to navigate through those years and it ended up affecting my self esteem and self worth for years and played its part in abusive relationships.
It isn't your responsibility to make sure her friends get enough to eat or 'treats' but i do understand why you don't mind sharing what you can spare. No matter what happens, those kids will always remember 'the kindness of strangers' , and hopefully your and your dd's love and compassion for others less fortunate will rub off on them and they too will want to do the same as they experience life.
Just ensure that she has the support in place to help her if/when her being assertive results in her boundaries being breached/violated by others. Give her some good excuses she can use to easily get out of the situation if it's turning bad, something like "my mum's been checking the account, she doesn't mind me helping when i can but i'm not allowed to go over my budget". That way they're aware that you know and so any funny business from them will backfire on them. It also gets your dd 'off the hook'. Then, as you suggested, do something where she can take in 'treats/food' to share with them - might be a good idea if she could drop your name into somewhere - just something like "guess what my mum got for us all?" - so again they're aware that what's being shared is being done so out of love. hopefully they have it in them to appreciate that and will respect your dd's wishes when she says 'no'.
Our school doesn't allow buying of two items other than drinks for this reason. In some ways the fingerprint system cuts down on kids taking physical money. In another way I think its bad for them understanding what they are spending. When dd started I toped hers up for a month and she spent it in two weeks 
buying extras at break times while I was going to work with a cheap pack lunch. That soon stopped!
To comment on this thread you need to create a Mumsnet account.