SD’s DM doesn’t seem to care that SD is bullying

[SpongebobNoPants]

I’m posting because my DP and I are at a loss with what to do and he feels like he’s fighting an uphill battle with his ex regarding parenting.

SD has just turned 11 and has a history of bullying other children. She takes pleasure in putting other kids down and being dominating towards them.
She’s a pretty, smart and at times very funny kid, but this side of her personality is really horrible.

We’ve tried everything... appealing to her better nature, trying to instil empathy, talking to her about why she does it (she finds it funny apparently), punishment for her unkindness by imposing restrictions on her freedom or tech use.
Nothing seems to work.

Yesterday SD had one of my DP’s friend’s DDs over to play at her DM’s house (we all live in close proximity) and whilst this play date was happening SD prank called and messaged lots of girls she knows but targeted one girl in particular.
They called this child (a year younger than SD - only just turned 10yo) a dog, a pussy, called her out for a fight, called her ugly and a slut.

This child’s mother then got in touch with our friend and showed her the messages so she went over to speak to SD’s mum and she was completely not bothered. She rolled her eyes and said “Well that’s just how kids talk to each other these days”.

Our friend was pretty shocked by this as she punished her own DD for her part in the bullying and gave her a stern talking to about cyber bullying and its effects.

DP later on rang his ex to discuss what they should do regarding her escalating behaviour.
To give a bit more background SD has form for this sort of behaviour and most recently targeted one of my friend’s children with abuse during an online game. Both my friend and I impose restrictions and monitor our children’s tech use and the children are only allowed to add or talk to close friends or family members whilst online gaming or FaceTiming. But obviously my friend’s-DD felt safe talking to my SD as she is my stepdaughter and not a stranger to her.

It was so humiliating and upsetting to have to apologise to my friend and hear how SD had been so vile towards her DD.

Anyway, last night DP decided as he pays for SD’s mobile phone then he would take it away until Thursday and go through it all and put safety blockers etc on it. Also it was part of the punishment for her awful behaviour.

SD went back to her DM later last night and DP could see calls / texts coming through on SD’s phone and being answered by SD so she had logged onto her iPad and was continuing life as normal.
DP rang his ex to let her know and it transpired that she’d actually given the iPad to her for her use “Seeing as you’ve been petty enough to take her phone away”.
She said she won’t stop her using it and “girls will be girls” with regards to the bullying.

I feel like DP is fighting a losing battle to teach SD empathy and morals. I honestly don’t know what to do, we can try and have boundaries and parent her as best we can whilst she’s with us but it is unravelled as soon as she goes back to her DM’s house.

Her DM doesn’t seem to want to parent when it gets tough... don’t get me wrong, the girls are undoubtedly loved, fed, clothed and cared for but their DM seems to opt out of anything remotely challenging when it comes to actually parenting them and my 11yo SD seems to be getting no guidance whatsoever.

What can DP do? I’m at a loss on how to advise him as my ex and I coparent happily

Gosh, that’s hard!

Neither you nor DP can control what ex does or how she parents your SD.

Your DP has to keep doing things as he thinks is right.

Bit of a stalemate then!

Hold the line-you and your DP can’t control what her mum lets her do, but you CAN show her, effectively, right and wrong when she is with you. At some point she will grow out of this (hopefully) and the moral guidance you’ve given will remain.

As above, you have to hold the line on behaviour, expectations and consequences at your house. Step back from engaging with her Mum as you'll get no support.

As others said, you can't control what happens at Mum's.

I would be tempted to speak to the police about these texts. These texts sound horrible, and could amount to harassment? A visit from a police officer might scare DSD?

If I was the parent of a child on the receiving end, and the parent was doing nothing, I would report to the police.

All you could do, is insist that the ipad stays at SDM's house . When SD is at your house, IF she behaves herself, she will have use of her phone with DAD'S parental controls.

Thanks for the advice.
We do impose restrictions in our home. My DD is a year younger than SD and her phone & laptop is brought up to my bedroom at night time.
I also check her phone regularly... I don’t read all of her texts or invade her privacy but I monitor who she is talking to and if I had reason to feel I needed to check her messages I absolutely would.

With SD I feel she has felt absolutely no consequences for her behaviour and we won’t see her again now until Thursday, so it’s difficult to impose something then as 3 days will have passed since the original incident.

We are supposed to be having her friend for a sleepover on Thursday (not the friend from my OP) but I think we should postpone it until next weekend as it feels she’s effectively getting a reward as soon as she comes to our home, especially as she’s not had an consequences at her mums.

I wouldn't allow her to have sleepovers or contact other children in your home until the behaviour has improved or she has shown sincere remorse. She needs to know it's wrong.

Does DP pay for her phone directly or through her mum, could he cancel her contract?

I'd definitely not be having the sleepover. I couldn't trust her to behave towards her friends on the sleepover the way she ought. Until she'd had a month clear of any bullying known about, then there'd be no sleepovers.

Does she bully at school? If so I have a suggestion

I agree that the sleepover should be a no-go. You can't behave that way and have a friend over! Also, I'd take away electronics entirely for a time. Sometimes this can work better if you do it as a family, take a sort of electronics vacation. Rather than being a punishment it's about pulling out from that online world that seems to cause many of the problems.

I agree the mum seems like she will be hopeless, but it might be worth pointing out that if she carries on this way she will almost certainly face outside consequences sooner rather than later. Schools and other organisations are coming down harder on bullying and especially electronic bullying. If there were serious things like a child harming herself it could even be a life changing consequence.

Stop all playdates on your time. When she comes over she gets no screen time. No phones,no tablets, no consoles and no tvs

@LouiseTrees yes but she also acts like the victim so mum won’t believe it even when teachers are telling her about the behaviour. But please, share your idea

She starts secondary school next week, it sounds awful but I’m secretly hoping she’ll pick on the wrong kid and face some consequences for her actions for once

There's none so blind as them wot won't see. . .

My daughter got bullied online by another little girl, around the age of yours. Told my daughter to go kill herself. My older daughter was in the group chat, and she told us. We took a screen shot, and because it had been sent in school time, went to the school.

I wanted that child educated that this behaviour was unacceptable, she would be held accountable, and there were consequences - especially since a young cousin of mine had committed suicide after a campaign of similar bullying.

The school took it very seriously, the young lady and both her parents were hauled in. The parents were appalled and mortified. The young lady had her access to devices severely curtailed, both at home, and at school, and I believe there were other consequences as well.

One day she'll hopefully pick on the wrong person and have the smile punched off her face.

With any luck before some child kills them self because of bullying.

Agree with others, on your time you need to remove everything - tech, play dates, sleepovers and any other treats. That language is absolutely vile and her attitude stinks. Forget her mother, she sounds feckless. This is the kind of thing that makes other kids feel suicidal.

The parents were appalled and mortified

@mbosnz well yes I think that would the normal response from most parents. I’d be so disappointed if I found out my daughter was bullying anyone.
BUT we’re not dealing with a mother who has those reactions or can be bothered to deal with the fallout of imposing punishments.

The worst part is I’ve just found out who the little girl is... it’s my friend’s niece
She’s a really nice kid. It apparently didn’t start last night either, the messages began at the start of last week. Things came to a head yesterday when SD started calling her a dog over the phone and was woofing at her.
I’ve seen the messages, the little girl’s mum has forwarded them to me. They’re really vile and if I’m honest, some of the phrases she’s using are phrases I’ve heard her DM use.
It’s actually quite shocking language for a child who has only just left primary school.

Bullying is such an awful thing to do, and it seems to be rife and at best undermines the confidence of the victim.

Your dp is the parent who has to take control here. He's got the phone and can screen shot the evidence. The only thing he can do is to visit his ex and his dd telling them that it has to stop. He needs to make it clear that the parents of the other child could complain to the police and he wouldn't defend his dd in that case. He could also make it clear that if he hears

Amateur psychology but I'd say your SD is full of anger. She's venting it on defenceless kids, but that's what she feels like, or felt like when the hurt happened that caused the anger. She's furious that the world has done her wrong, and every other blithely happy kid is an offence to her: why should YOU be happy when I'M feeling shit and it's not my fault? Next step, I'll even things up by being the agent of their unhappiness. Bullying others might be the only thing that takes her pain away. My guess is, she needs therapy, she needs to talk about why she's so full of anger.

In your shoes I think I would be inclined to go to the school and ask for help. It shows that if nothing else, your SD has a father who is not putting up with this behaviour from the outset rather than waiting until the school finally contacts him after weeks or months of reports of bullying by his daughter.

The school can put things in place during the school day - I have had to monitor a student all day to ensure they did not get hold of a mobile phone from another student, or accessed any other messaging service after they were found to have sent some very inappropriate messages to others. It was raised as a safe-guarding concern - both the student themselves, those originally messaged and potentially their peers.

Otherwise, what your SD does at her mother's house is unfortunately predominantly down to her. It doesn't make it right and it certainly doesn't make it easy.

Who pays for her phone? If your dh have it cut off. Also talk to the school as this will escalate.

Oh she’s also at the age children can be arrested so she might want to stop with bullying - if she were an adult that would be harassment.

Oh my stars, just read your update, that is absolutely awful.

I agree that your DH should be making it very clear that he will be fully supportive of anyone seeking to hold DD accountable for her actions.

Just want to say that your situation sounds really hard, but you are doing the right things.

You can't control what her DM does (she sounds awful), you can only explain to her why she is experiencing these restrictions/punishments etc while at your DPs. Engaging with the school might help, or even the police if it escalates.

Hopefully when she is older she will look back and appreciate that you and your DP were in the right.

Good luck!

DP has taken the phone but can’t cut it off because he’ll be liable to pay anyway as it’s on a contract... that being said, I don’t know if/when he’ll allow SD to have it back.

@Furtwangler honestly I agree with everything you’ve written except I’d replace the word “angry” with “entitled”. I don’t think she’s a deeply troubled child at all, I’ve know her for most of her life. She has very little boundaries at her mum’s and has been able to eat / wear / do whatever she likes with very few consequences, certainly none imposed by her mother.
We had issues last year for example about her dressing very inappropriately for a young child. Her DM again had no issue with her having acrylic nails, full face of make up, extremely revealing clothing... all at 10 years of age.

Bizarrely my eldest SD was the one I thought would be trouble but she’s turned out to be a lovely teenager. She’s a very different personality to her little sister though and younger SD is definitely the golden child in their household.
She can do no wrong, it must always be someone else’s fault.
Before lockdown DP tried to talk to their DM about another incident of bullying and she actually tried to blame older SD for being a bad influence?!

It was so bizarre. Older SD wasn’t there when the incident happened and I’ve never heard her use the language / phrases that younger SD was caught saying to another child.