DS’s friend killed his hamster

[HamsterAccident]

To cut a long story short DS’s friend came round and held DS’s hamster, hamster nipped him (didn’t draw blood, but I’m sure it was a shock obviously), and friend flung hamster across the room, she landed on her back and died a little later.

DS is absolutely distraught and has vowed to cut friend out his life completely. They are year 6 age.

Any advice on how to manage this? I have reiterated that it was an accident but also I do blame myself as this friend is known to sometimes aggressively overreact with sibling so in hindsight I shouldn’t have let him hold her.

DS doesn’t have many friends so I feel really sad about the loss of this friendship, but I also see his point that even knowing it wasn’t intentional, it’s a hard thing to get over.

Poor wee Hammy :(

Gosh what an awful and horrid situation. We have a hamster same as you, it's made me think that other children handling might not be a good idea as it means everything to my child.

I think if my child's friend killed the hamster the child and family would be cut out completely, absolutely no forgiveness.

An 11year old doing this is horrific.He wouldn’t set a foot in my house ever again and my child would not be allowed to mix with him.Doesn’t bode well for his future acting like that.

I think I agree with this really.

The lack of an apology from the mum afterwards would make me wary of them too-I would hope they will come back with a more heartfelt apology soon .

I do think this was a child of 11 and as pp above have said when you feel a sudden pain you sometimes do react without thinking.

Not that they ever did anything similar to this but at age 11 one of my DC would have struggled to apologise in the ‘moment’ and would have been embarrassed and maybe shown that by looking uncaring- when something went ‘wrong’ ( example if he broke a cup or something at my mums house ) He struggled to regulate his feelings and emotions at that age. Always will have felt remorse and apologised afterwards.
I am not excusing this at all OP - and I’m so sorry this has happened to your poor DS.

You have to be this child’s mum.
Your posts here are extremely worrying.

as an aside an instinctive reaction is to drop the hamster
this 11 yr old didn’t act instinctively he stood up and threw the hamster over arm. That’s evil.

Your reaction wouldn't be normal either. It's disturbing.

No way to know 100% if it was a deliberate throw or reaction to a bite but the lack of remorse by either mum or child would have me giving them a wide swerve in future. Give your son a cuddle and say X probably didn’t mean it (for your DS peace of mind rather than defending the other boy) but that it’s ok not to be friends. He has the right to set boundaries too.

I'd be outraged if I'd been bitten. I wouldn't be upset or sorry, either. Requiring particular responses from people is a non-starter, and it's unreasonable.

@StopStartStop thank f you’ll never be anywhere near my animals!

That is really horrible and is no-one's fault but your son's friend. By the time children are in year 6 (and very much younger) they should know that you don't treat any animals like that. The reaction of the mother was also disgusting and I would have asked her to leave my house immediately.

I sincerely hope you frogmarched the little shit home and told his parents

@HamsterAccident i feel so sorry for the wee hamster and your son. His ‘friend’ has no empathy, a normal 11 year old child would feel terrible to have killed an animal.

Your son is absolutely justified to end the friendship, and you should absolutely support him and not be tempted to minimize the situation.

The boy’s mother sounds clueless and callous, an animal is not an object you just replace. I really hope these people don’t keep pets.

It was in NO WAY your fault! The only people at fault were the horrible brat who threw the poor hamster across the room and mother who raised a child who could treat an animal like that .

OP I am so sorry for you all.

Firstly, please stop blaming yourself. You have done nothing wrong. (Perhaps been too understanding if anything!)

The child sounds unhinged. He had time to stand up and throw the poor hamster shows it was deliberate, not just an involuntary reaction that caused an accident. There was nothing you could have done. A hamster bite was hardly going to have caused lasting trauma or injury.

Please respect your son’s boundaries and cut this horrible behaviour out of your life before it gets worse. Nobody should treat an animal like this. His mother’s response to simply replace it shows where his attitude is being learnt. I am so angry for you.

Allow your son to grieve, it is normal. Give lots of TLC and maybe if/when the time is right let him be involved in a burial, like decorating a box for her and putting a toy etc in it.

sending lots of love xx

The boys mother's reaction is just as worrying, thinking buying another hamster will resolve the issue is odd behaviour and lacking in empathy.

There is something very wrong with that child. 😞

Cutting ties with this boy would not be a bad thing. It's not normal to deliberately hurt an animal and feel no remorse whatsoever.....

Am so sorry for your poor son, Op.

One thing that I don't think anyone here has mentioned yet is that hamsters are nocturnal animals. They are not always at their best during the day and, my experience has been, that if they get woken up and handled during the daytime they are more 'nibbly' than if they are handled later in the evening.

I noticed this a lot when I used to clean mine out at different times during the day. They are at their liveliest in the early hours of the morning. . . . . as most hamster owners will know if the wheels in their cages are at all squeaky!!!!!

It could be worth bearing in mind when children are handing them . . . .

the kid has killed your pet... there is no accident about it.

sounds like your 11 year old has more sense than you... i wouldnt let that freak of a kid anywhere near my son or house again.

@HamsterAccident
Sorry - can I just ask something? How exactly did the boy's mother react to him throwing the poor animal and how did she deal with him in the aftermath?

I would be over the moon if my kid decided on their own that they don't want anything more to do with a friend like this.

Even more so if they only had a few friends as that means the relative influence that this friend had on them would be even greater.

Having your child hang out regularly with someone violent and unable or unwilling to contain it to the extent that they managed to kill a friend's pet is something I would desperately be trying to avoid.

That your kid has said he wants to cut this friend out would be such a huge huge relief. Kids that demonstrate that they don't have the boundaries you'd want with violence towards animals will probably have many other boundaries with behaviour that you'd also find troubling. Avoiding having your child influenced towards the normalisation of these boundaries by constantly being that child is an utter blessing.

I'd be extremely grateful, sigh a huge sigh of relief and try to invite his other friends over more often.

Do you all realize how extreme and unreasonable your comments are?

The deliberate hurting of the hamster is dreadful but the lack of remorse is chilling. The mother sounds as bad. If one of my children had done this (they wouldn't as they're massive animal lovers) they'd have been devastated and so would I.

"Oh no" is a pretty shit response to learning your son killed his friend's pet.

Neither would be welcome again. Don't let the bitch replace the hamster either. Maybe you should get your son another one though? Not to replace this one but to give him the joy of owning another pet. Maybe a guinea pig or something, just to make it different?

What, ALL the comments? Every single one of them? Why?

Do you realise how lacking in empathy and human decency your comments are?

I find them quite shocking tbh.

Lol. You’re just trolling at this point, surely.