To feel tired of other people's kids

[LemonyMabel]

DS has gone through so much with different kids at school and their crappy behaviour for so long now. It started in year 5 and really wore him down by year 7. Different rounds of kids, different rounds of shit behaviour.
After a really difficult time that knocked his confidence, DS started to pick himself back up again in year 8.
Now in year 9, he's started to make a group of new mates who he's been getting on well with. It's been quite hard breaking into an established friendship group who've all been friends for years, but he's persevered and has been happy to be accepted into this group over the past couple of months and he's been feeling really positive about it and has been hanging out at school with them.
Then today, walking out of school, they all started taking the piss out of my DH. DS's dad. Imagine DH's name is Steven. DS is walking out of school with the group, having hung around with them at lunchtime and all was good, and suddenly 1 of them randomly, and without any context, suddenly says to DS "Cheesy Steven!" The group all burst out laughing and suddenly six 13/14 year old boys are all loudly chanting "Cheesy Steven! Cheesy Steven!" and laughing at DS. Then 1 of them says "Steven's head is so shiny it's like a mirror!" met with rounds of laughter and then they all walk off in their direction home whilst DS splinters off in his opposite direction.
He walked in from school looking really deflated. Inititially he wasn't going to tell me about it, but eventually did after I said I could tell something was bothering him. Said he felt really happy to have made these new mates at school who've been nice to him so far and now they've all been mean today about his dad. 1st time anything like this has happened since he's been hanging out with them since September.
DS is really close to DH and he didn't like them taking the piss out of him today.
I've had to teach DS a lot about boundaries re bad behaviour from other kids over the past 3 years, and have had to put in a lot of support on an emotional level as a lot of behaviour he was subjected to from other kids resulted in him developing clinical anxiety.
I think I need a bit of guidance here, as in, is this normal teenage boy bantering stuff do you think, or is this the start of yet another round of nasty behaviour?
I know that's what DS is wondering tonight, and I haven't told him but I'm wondering the same.
He said he thought he'd made friends with them and now they've been out of order towards him.
I find it so draining. Why can't kids just be nice. DS struggles to understand because shit behaviour because he hasn't got an unkind bone in his body and he is never mean to anyone. He really understands that stuff can hurt people's feelings so never does it, even if someone has irritated him or if he doesn't like someone, he doesn't behave badly towards anyone.
I'm left thinking here we go again. But after the years of problems with other kids and bullying type behaviour towards DS that we've gone through, I don't know if I'm being over sensitive this evening.

I'm so sorry that you and your son are going through this. It really is awful.

Personally, I wouldn't say this is banter, this is bullying. I think people often confuse the two, but it's definitely bullying. I had similar in school, and it made me feel so shit.

I hope they stop soon, because it isn't fair in the slightest x

It's hard to know without knowing the context if this is just teenage banter or something nastier. Your DS is understandably sensitive to this sort of behaviour because of past experiences - if these friends are normally nice, I wonder if it was a bit of teasing that got taken too far? I have 5 sons and have witnessed quite a lot of pisstaking in their friendship groups, it's often the way teenage boys banter with each other and not always with malice but sometimes taken too far when they get carried away and think they're being funny. Do these boys know your DH? Were they just taking the mickey of him being bald?

Yes they were taking the piss out of him being bald by saying the bit about his head looking like a mirror.
He's not an old man. He's late 40s, and shaves his hair grade 1 all over due to receding hair loss.
It's bloody rude I think. But I've got no idea about what's normal for teenage boys. DS's view is why would his new friends be mean to him about his dad.
As for "Cheesy Steven" I've no idea what on earth that means.
They don't know DH, but they've all met him briefly when they came round as a group to call for DS, and DH was on the driveway and he politely said hello to them all.
Yes, up until today they've all been nice to DS, including him in stuff, chatting to him, playing football or ball games with him on the school field, walking to school with him.
DS has gone to bed confused by them taking the piss out of his dad today, with no context, for no reason.
Do teenagers take the piss out of someone's parent?!

Have you or your DS ever watched 'The Inbetweeners'?

Boys taking the piss out of each other within friendship groups is fairly common. Not all groups and maybe your DS needs a different kind of friendship group. But to me it does sound like the sort of stupid teenage boy banter you hear all the time. If your DS had laughed and told them to fuck off they probably would have stopped.

It probably would before it him to toughen up a little. Although he shouldn't continue to be friends with them if their banter/friendship style doesn't work for him.

Oh come on OP. Its stupid illogical teenage banter! They took the piss out of him being bald! He now has clinical anxiety? What is that exactly?
Yr 9 is the worst year, they are feral, irrational & general dick heads with raging hormones.
Laugh it off, teach him some witty comebacks & teach him resilience.

My DS was in a very similar position. I'd suggest perhaps having a quiet word with school, ask them to keep an eye on the kids' behaviour around your DS. Our school was great actually, I was very pleasantly surprised with how well it was handled. They cracked down when they saw the kids doing something similar to someone else, they were spoken to, and it wasn't linked to DS. The behaviour stopped and the friendships seem to have survived.
I agree it's very hard to tell when it's crossed the line from banter into bullying. For us it was when DS started not wanting to go to school we realised something was properly up - I appreciate your DS may be made of stronger stuff!

I think you need to process what you read more carefully.
Try again.

Boys taking the piss out of each other, yeah.
But what about taking the piss out of your mate's parent?

It sounds like teenage banter. Your DS needs not to react and banter will move on.

What I find astonishing is that these boys had no compunction about being rude to an adult never mind a parent . Dont want to sound ancient but no one would dare when I was that age . Hugely disrespectful.

If it's a one off occurrence, I suspect it might just be normal teenage boys, rather than bullying.

I'm a girl, and there were certainly times we poked fun at each other's parents, though to lesser degree than I've seen boys do. They aren't likely to know or have the maturity to understand why previous friendships and general personality means your son finds those kinds of things difficult.

Ribbing each other and everything is part of growing up for a lot of teenage boys. Teens are dicks at times lol. He may be better with 1-1 friendships, or finding other friends through a hobby he enjoys, if those kinds of banter group dynamics aren't for him

Honestly though, it can be part of social capital for teen boys in school, and I'd possibly just teach him to give it back a bit e.g. 'yeah well at least my dad hasn't got...'. If they're the kind of boys who can dish it out, they're hopefully the kind of boys who can take it!

Why can't kids just be nice. DS struggles to understand because shit behaviour because he hasn't got an unkind bone in his body and he is never mean to anyone. He really understands that stuff can hurt people's feelings so never does it, even if someone has irritated him or if he doesn't like someone, he doesn't behave badly towards anyone.

I sometimes regret teaching my DC to be kind. So many kids aren't. I completely understand your frustration.

What exactly would you like me to process?

What? You seriously went through your entire teen years never mocking an adult with your mates? I was a teacher's pet and very polite and respectful to all adults in person, but it didn't stop me poking fun at them out of ear shot! This has been going on since the dawn of time. It's quite normal for teens to find adults a bit cringe and to banter about people like teachers with their peers 🤷

I'm not sure how old you are, but for generations teenagers have found a way to banter about a parent. Ginger, old, teacher, god I remember getting ribbed because my parent was a copper!

It might be a one off and they will have forgotten about it and think up something else by tomorrow. I’d advise him to ignore it and carry on as usual even if he feels hurt as I suspect that anything else might actually make the situation worse. Probably saying something stupid back about one of their parents would have been the best riposte but it’s hard to think that up in the moment.

Did you go straight from child to adult? Surely this is typical teen dickheadness no need for all this angst

Tbh I can see why @Manchestermummax3 responded as she did.
Imo as a mum of two sons you do need to advise him to
Laugh it off,
teach him some witty comebacks
& teach him resilience.
Encourage your son not to react - make it a non-issue so they’ll get bored. Being over-sensitive will work against him.

Yeah, par for the course I think. Your parents are the most embarrassing thing about you at that age.

I'd recommend giving The Inbetweeners a watch. It's extreme for comedic effect obviously, but the constant banter between the boys is quite accurate!

Seems very teenage banter to me. They seem to come out with all sorts of rubbish at this age. There is probably no actual logic to the jokes and making jokes about parents is fairly standard. Most teens find their parents a bit annoying as they are trying to establish some independence and most parents couldn’t give a fuck about what some random teens say.

However if your son doesn’t like this he obviously doesn’t need to keep hanging out with these boys. He may struggle a bit with friendships though if he’s not going to participate/cope with any banter as it is very common and finding a group that isn’t like this will be harder. He either needs to try shut it down by pointing out that he doesn’t like it or just go along with until it moves on to the next lot of rubbish.

Can I suggest your son finds a hobby or activity that will give him a friendship group that isn’t attached to the school? Especially not a team sport but one where he can go at his own pace. Actually, martial arts could be good .. two of my brothers and a sister were black belts in judo, I took it up later. It was the friendliest group of people I’ve ever gone round with!

@Manchestermummax3 Yeah I can understand slagging your parents off to each other . My father was seen in checked golfing trousers and my friends mother wore yellow jodhpurs once which still gets talked about ( my Dad dead 15 years ). But I meant we would never dare slag an actual adult to their face .

It’s pretty normal to for teen boys to take the piss out of each others parents. What they said was really immature, but very tame. Sounds like given your ds past issues with peers, he’s quite sensitive and doesn’t have the skills to respond. Most teens would laugh it off and say ‘haha very funny, piss off’.

I would probably keep it low key for now, play it down with son but keep an eye on things. It sounds as though they have been a nice, inclusive group so far so the likelihood is that it's a saying they have heard somewhere. Don't make too much of it because you don't want them thinking they should keep on doing it because it's winding him up.

You could invite them all to your house for pizza?

My son, when in his teens, once stood up to one of his female friends who was very rude to me in our house. He put her right in her place immediately, told her not to insult his mother and distanced himself from her after that. It made me very proud indeed.

School and friendship groups is such a difficult time for so many.