Dd friend wants to come and play but exclude my other dd.

[kindamean]

I have 2 dd who are only a year apart 6 and 7 and share a bedroom.
One of my dd has a friend who comes to play but doesn’t want other dd to play with them and wants to come for sleepovers but again wants other dd who’s room it is too, not to play with them.
When my dd goes/stays with her then they can play together as obviously my other dd isn’t there but if this friend is with us I can’t allow them to exclude her from her own room or not bring her to the park if I take them.

Of course I encourage them to have their own friends and they do but I don’t want to feel obligated to make plans so dd2 has somewhere else to be every time this friend comes over just because she doesn’t want to include her.
How would you handle this? bear in mind this is one of her closest friends.
We have summer holidays coming up and I’d love to plan days out with their friends but if I’m taking them to the park or something I will be taking both mine.

I'm sure you're right that some people have no concept of what having an ODD child is like. I don't doubt that it's incredibly challenging.

But some of us are also thinking about what having an ODD sibling must be like for your dd1, and we're suggesting that her needs should not be set aside in order to make it easier to manage dd2's behaviour.

I do get that it isn't easy, but dd1 deserves to have her own independent friendships. She isn't responsible for dd2.

It sounds to me that the friend is the least of your problems. Who are you working with to develop strategies to manage your DD2's behaviour appropriately for her ODD? We cannot just let our ODD children run the household because we don't know how to manage them! Do you have support from qualified people? Are the school on board? What are you doing to make sure the impacts of these screaming violent meltdowns on eldest DD are minimal? It doesn't sound like you have a grip of this at all.

I wouldn’t force the younger child on them, definitely not. YABU.

There is 1 year between me and one of my sisters. It was fine sometimes but I absolutely got fed up of having to have her around constantly because she was my sister.

I felt like I wasn’t known for me. Whenever I heard my name it was always attached to hers as well. I was always jay & Kay (not real names) never just jay.

Now I am a mum (just 1 child though) I can empathise at how hard it would be as the mum in that situation. I would hate it if one child was left out. But it’s difficult knowing my own feelings on it.

I think organising structured, supervised activities for all three girls is going to be the way to go when they're at your house. Get them all involved with baking or gardening or something crafty etc. If anybody needs time alone that's ok but the rules have changed and the two older girls aren't going to be allowed to go off to the bedroom to play unsupervised excluding the third.

The secret to this is going to be finding an exciting activity they all enjoy or one that the older two enjoy and the younger one gets bored of and chooses to go and do her own thing.

The seven year old friend needs to be taught that when you're a guest in someone's home you can't be rude to the other people who live there even if they're not your favourite people.

The sisters can and should have their own friends but that doesn't mean they have to put up with the other's friends being rude to them in their own home or being excluded from their own bedroom. You wouldn't let a housemate's friends do that.

There's also going to be a difference for the three girls in interacting with a supervising adult and playing together as an unsupervised threesome. Given her ODD it's not fair on your youngest or the older two to expect them to manage unsupervised play.

Longer term, as the girls get older they may pick your house less often but you'll be able to find different swaps of effort with the girl's parents rather than directly reciprocating invites to each others houses.

Op I've got two daughters 7 and 10 and they share a room. sometimes if my eldest has playdates they will often let youngest play with them and if all is happy I'll let them do that for a bit, but I always try to get youngest downstairs with me for at least half of the playdate so my eldest can have time with friends alone.

Sometimes my eldest and friends won't want to play with youngest at all and that is more difficult as have to explain to youngest to give them some space. It's tricky but I usually do some baking with youngest or play a game with them or something. It's really important they have friendships without siblings being always involved.

With your daughter having odd I would think even more need to keep her separate a little when eldest has play dates. You really will have to try and think of something you can do with your youngest to keep them occupied. Even if it involves letting them go on a screen perhaps? May avoid the meltdown?!

I'd go by what older dd wants. If she wants to play with any of her friends without younger dd she should be allowed to do that. I would say They don't have to play either younger dd but they can't ban her from her room or insist she won't come to the park.

If younger dd nags them to pkay with her I'd tell her tjr same. She can be wherever she wants to be in her house and come to the park but she csnt insist that they play with her.

I'm hating all these suggestions that are telling OP to invite another kid as well so every time there is a play date she has to be responsible for 4 kids, two of which aren't hers. Fuck that! The older sibling has to suck it up. It's part of being a family and the friend should be told if she wants to come and play then little sister will be there too. Kids are given way too much say in things these days. Don't ask them, tell them. This is how it is.

I would bet that if this friend is so unkind to your younger DD, she is also unkind in other ways, and probably isn't very nice to your gentle and easygoing older DD either when no adults are watching! I don't think it would be the end of the world if the friendship waned.

The older sibling has to suck it up. It's part of being a family

Being in a family doesn't mean that one person always has to do the sucking up.

Ok? So then deal with the meltdown.

This suggests she wouldn’t exactly be a lot of fun for the friend to be around.

honestly what is she like when she joins in? If you can’t manage her I can’t imagine a 7 year old to cope with her

Then you sit in the living room/kitchen or whatever and physically sit in front of the door so she can't get up there.

I don't mean to sound horrible about a child but it's no wonder the friend doesn't want her to play with them if this is the kind of behaviour they're having to put up with.

Invite the friend.
Have a mummy and (other)DD movie night in. Watch a movie eat junk paint each tigers nails or whatever she likes doing.
In regards to the park just say if you want to go park you all have to play nicely together or you wont go to the park.

My girls are 12 months apart so we have had similar experience.

My personal opinion is that her behaviour sounds manipulative, possesive, nasty and selfish. It would have no place in my house and would not be a friendships I would want to encourage.

As your girls get older that age gap because less noticeable and they likely will have some shared friends. They need to learn to play nicely as a group, not learn how to leave people out.

If the friend is an only will the mum mind if your DD goes over to hers more often? Does your younger DD’s ODD make it harder for them to play together. If your youngest was a boy would you expect them to be included?

I wouldn't be tolerating that behaviour from a guest in my house. The guest is obviously showing typical spoilt only child behaviour and needs to learn to share and integrate into the social aspect of the family she is visiting. Your guest doesn't get to make the rules in your house, that's just rude and your second daughter shouldn't be excluded from her room. There's developing individual friendships and then there's mean exclusion and the latter shouldn't be happening at home. The spoilt only child has some social lessons to learn.

Absolutely. So many on this thread who clearly have issues with dd1 not making dd2 the priority and centre of things. It's very sad.

Something tells me you have some kind of issue with only children.

Objectively speaking, it is the younger dd’s behaviour which is the greater issue.

I think it might be a case of not having any sleepovers until the girls are a lot older or just not have any at all.

Not every household does sleepovers. She will still see and play with her friend at school.
Could always arrange playdates at the park instead.

I don’t think you can reasonably insist on them all playing together, even if it happens with other friends.

For those mentioning the friend being an ‘only child’, I had even less tolerance as a DC to other people’s “annoying” younger siblings, being bad enough having my own at home!!

We would always tell them to “go away” and don’t think that’s particularly unusual.

The shared room makes it more challenging.

Maybe for the reciprocal sleepovers the friends can stay in the lounge?

If I have a group of my female friends round I don’t always want DH to sit with us and join in

😂

@gardenflowergirl I have an only child, not spoilt. He gets on very well with siblings of his friends, and in fact has sometimes then got separate friendships with siblings, so might socialise with them separately as well as together.

If a child displays the behaviour of DD2 I can understand why a visiting child might not want to play with them.

In my house if one has a friend over they all play together nicely or the friend goes home. I try to invite a friend each or schedule play dates when the other children are out or doing different activities or play with the friendless child myself but sometimes it’s not practical. 6&7 are close enough in age to want to play the same things. Does dd1 want dd2 to play and it’s the friend who is excluding her? I wouldn’t tolerate that. Sleepovers at age 6&7 is quite early anyway and I don’t think work with your dynamic.