To want to tell this girl's mum about how nasty she has been to DD?

[MurphyJim]

DD has just started secondary school. She has gone up to secondary school with a group of friends that she spent most of her primary school years hanging round with. One of them, I'll refer to her as G, is very much the head of the group of friends and has been unkind to DD quite a bit over the years. Mainly low level nastiness such as telling others in the group not to talk to DD, or making fun of DD and getting others to laugh at her. She is very manipulative.

G's mum is, unfortunately, one of those mums who thinks her DD is absolutely perfect and is the first to get on the phone to, or approach, the mum of any child who has made a tiny or perceived slight towards her child. I have heard of it happening many a time throughout primary school, and she has phoned me a couple of times in the past about things such as my DD not being her DD's partner in PE and her DD being upset.

Anyway, today it's G's birthday and she has had a huge party/disco in a hall, followed by a sleepover with several friends. She has told DD since they went back to school 3 weeks ago that she was inviting everyone except DD, as she doesn't want DD there. And true to her word she invited the rest of their friendship group, as well as every other new friend DD has made at secondary school. And didn't invite DD.

This in itself was upsetting enough for DD. However all through the party this evening G has repeatedly sent DD texts with photos of her and all of DD's friends having fun at the party with captions such as "I love my besties". She also tried to facetime DD several times throughout the party, presumably to rub it in DD's face that she wasn't there! DD sensibly ignored the texts and calls, but was understandably very upset.

I am so angry about it all and feel like giving this girl's mum a call or a text tomorrow just to let her know about how upset DD is by G's behaviour. Especially as the mum is always the first person to complain and to kick up a huge fuss if her DD is upset.

WIBU to contact the mum? I don't want to make things worse for DD.

I had some issues the first year of secondary with one girl who made up lies about me and tried to turn my friends against me. I only knew something was amiss when no one would speak to me.

I found out the lie and fought my corner, I used laughter to win my friends around. They believed me over her thankfully.

I still remember how bloody awful and stomach churning it felt to have noone speak to me. It was completing out of my control and it just boiled down to jealousy (looking back) although at the time I was just totally bewildered by it and couldn't understand why anyone would act this way.

I remember speaking to my Mum but she didn't get involved.

I can't imagine how it would have been if social media would have been around back then (early 80's) it would have made the situation one hundred times worse.

I do dread ds having social media in his life.

Hope you get this resolved op.

We have a female 'g' that is like this in DS's school. I would say don't contact the mother, although it is tempting, as I did and it turned out she was a cunt! Let it lie and support your dd to back away from 'g' and explore new friendships. With us it was a case of giving her enough rope etc etc, 'g' bullied too many children and her mother was a twunt to too many parents. Neither are popular now!

Cauliflower, what a tremendous post, every school should have someone like you 💐

Another poster who thinks cauliflower is absolutely spot on.
Hope your lovely DD doing OK, OP. And you. It's so, so hard.

I'd screenshot and forward all shots to the school.

DD was cyberbullied outside school time and the school was extremely helpful in dealing with it.

I also forwarded all screenshots to the mothers I knew of the dc concerned. Absolutely. None were my friends so I wasn't worried about losing it; I wanted them to see what their dc got up to.

But, yes, school first.

Your poor dd. This other girl sounds like a right bitch.

Cauli what you suggest is genius, what a sensible, pragmatic response.
Will be interesting to here what op decided to do and what if any response she has had from school.

From experience speaking to the mum will be an utter waste of time and actually better not to engage with them on any level rubbed salt on the wounds x100

How awful bullying is the worst my sister was bullied at school and it really was so hard to watch but maybe her mother won't be as bad as you think. I love my DD and think the world of her but if I ever got a hint of her bullying someone she would be in serious trouble and I would definitely want to resolve it so the other child didn't feel upset. Maybe she doesn't know what's going on so the email the other poster said to said might be a good idea and you may get a completely different reaction than you think. I would definitely want someone to inform me of my child was being nasty and I didn't realise!
Hope it all works out for DD girls can be so bitch

I wouldn't normally get the other parent involved either but the op did say that the mother has done when the shoe was on the other foot so in this instance I would.

I couldn't agree more that the party/sleepover must have been rubbish for that girl to fall back on attacking the girl she is clearly jealous of as 'entertainment'! I bet most there were just scared to go against her. That's not friendship!

I would let her know that because of her daughters unreasonable behaviour, your daughter has made the decision to block the girls calls and texts. Then organise a sleepover soon and invite some of the girls and new friends. You will find that they may also dislike this awful girl and they will have a far better time without her. Tell your daughter to ignore her completely.

That party / sleepover was clearly rubbish if all the poisonous hostess had to offer in the way of entertainment was to attack someone she is blatantly jealous of!! What a loser!

I would not be able to keep quiet. What a little bitch!

Pollyanna 9
How dreadful for your poor daughter. However as a secondary school teacher I am deeply saddened to hear you have such a negative impression of teachers.
I spend a lot of my spare time (breaks and lunch) trying to resolve friendship issues. Often the situations are unpleasant; excluding is so awful. But surely you cannot blame everything on the school? Do you have any idea how hard we try to resolve these issues?

I also find it deeply unpleasant that 'adult women' refer to teenage girls as 'bitches'. This a deeply unpleasant term. Have you ever considered why children bully others? While it's totally unacceptable behaviour, there are genuinely underlying readons.

*reasons

We had a similar thing with our son in year 6. He had been best friends with the same boy since reception, they did everything together; Cubs, rugby, football, birthday parties, cinema trips, sleepovers everything. Parents are nice, we get along although we don't socialise together.

Both boys were being tutored for the 11+ (through different companies) boys mum wasn't happy with his learning so asked if my son could tutor him ..anyway results day came, my son passed, (then got a place at the school they both wanted) awkward phone call from mum explaining her son had failed, I didn't really know what to say. It wasn't such a huge deal for us my son was a bit meh about it all to be honest, he is clever but it wouldn't have been the end of the world. The other parents acted like their son had killed someone & he apparently spent weeks crying about his result (what the mum told me!) which is really sad.

So long story short the boy treated my son like shit for the rest of the school year, got mutual friends to ignore him & be horrible, cut him out of games & events, completely ruined his residential trip etc etc. The other boy didn't normally have parties but this year he did & spent weeks telling my son it was going to be amazing but he wasn't invited then spent the weeks after telling him everything mutual friends got up to.

My son was always really friendly, happy & outgoing. He loved school from day one & was always well behaved but spent his last term at primary school hating every day, getting into trouble with teachers because of his mood & behaviour & spent most lunch breaks on his own because he had no friends. Literally makes me cry remembering how unhappy he became because of a boy that was supposed to be his best friend.

I wanted to go all guns blazing at the other boys mum & tell her how nasty her son was being. My Son didn't want me to make things worse, husband thought it was just boys being boys & they'd be friends again soon!! So I talked to the school. They tried to keep the boys apart which eased tensions a little but as I had no "evidence" there wasn't much else they would/could do.

We all celebrated when school finished!
My son then he has his birthday party & sleepover (invited lots of friends) & the other boy was texting & FaceTimeing my son & other boys at the party!! Very childish but I felt rather smug knowing that he was now on the receiving end.

So my son started grammar school 3 weeks ago, he didn't know a single person but has made a lovely bunch of new friends. His old happy smiley self & love of learning has returned

Last Friday scouts started again, I prewarned son to ignore the other boy.. his response was it's ok, he can't upset me or take away my friends now, he was just jealous he didn't get the school place!

Cauli your method is great. I wish more schools were so on top of bullying. What G has done is really extreme and I feel so bad for poor DD. I would bypass G mum and go straight to the school welfare officer or head of year if there isn't a WO. Tell them you think it could be a matter for the police - the harassment.
G sounds oddly obsessed with DD. Is she jealous of her?

This girl sounds horrible (probably learned this behaviour from her mother) and I completely understand you wanting to give mother a piece of your mind but I wouldn't lower yourselves. This will be a good opportunity to show your daughter how you rise above such ridiculously spiteful and nasty behaviour. This girl is a bully and your daughter will be well rid of her. I understand it will be a difficult transition period for her but I'm sure having just gone up to big school your daughter will find others in a similar situation and make new friends, probably for life. If it was a one off incident from an otherwise good friend then I would say the friendship might be worth saving but she's been nasty to your daughter on several occasions so be thankful as she's well rid of her. Just be as supportive as you can for her during this tough transition period and for you both.

For the people who are suggesting ignoring h the bully, telling DD to rise above it, or confront her directly, have these strategies ever worked for kids you know? I don't mean to be argumentative I just think an adult would be challenged to have the mental and emotional strength to carry that advice out and I can't see how it would help an 11 year old cope. I can't see an alternative to contacting the school particularly because of the cyber angle and I really hope the OP did that.

I really don't think this would fall under any cyber bullying policy even though it isI. The child can invite who she wants and will probably say she was just texting your dd
So she feels involved.

I don't think your dd feeling excluded from the group really amounts to cyber bullying

DId you read the OP? THe girl was texting her and trying to facetime her throughout the party.

That would not be classed as cyber bullying otherwise what about fb?

This girl is a bully get in touch with the mum, tell her your not having it anymore, tell your daughter to make some new friends as well xxxx

It absolutely IS cyberbullying, a8mint. What do you mean 'what about Facebook?'

Cyberbullying is ANY bullying that happens over the internet/email/text (ie remotely - not face to face), from nasty emails to events such as this OP describes, to people sharing texts/emails/photos from someone without their permission.

My dd's school took it very seriously when this happened to DD.

Of course it's bullying! The other girl tried to contact OP's DD expressly for the purpose of making her feel excluded. What other reason might this girl have had for repeatedly texting and calling the daughter from an event to which she had not been invited? That is bullying and as it took place other than face to face and using technology it is cyberbullying.