To ask for your experiences raising a quirky child?

[Catchtheice]

I don’t know if quirky is the right word but my DD is quite unique in her ways. Outside making friends with a ‘worm with a nice face’, always coming up with elaborate stories and games. Spent two full days playing with an empty water bottle, tucking it up in her cot etc at night. Brilliant imagination and really good speech but just seems a bit alternative compared to others her age. At a local club recently she was perfectly happy but it did seem more like she was trailing around after the others rather than in the middle of things. She is 3 and a half so I know it’s young but I do worry especially as girls can be so cruel, whether she will get on ok and how best to support her. She is a fantastic clever little girl and I just want her to be happy. I’d love to hear any experiences of raising a more unique child and hopefully some positive ones too.

She sounds cool. Just let her be her! Concentrate of celebrating what she is, rather than trying to force her into being what you think she should be.

Yes I agree. It seems a bit odd and pick-me behaviour to call a 3 year old quirky when their behaviour falls within the normal realm for all kids of that age. It feels like forcibly fishing for compliments that she's more creative or imaginative than other children.

It's also not fair for the child because they internalise certain labels as the result of their parent's attention-seeking. Phrases like "old souls" or "quirky" are almost always projections of the parent onto the child but can have serious defining roles in their personality.

A child might grow up thinking they are strange, odd or different when it's not even the case. That sort of parental projection can cause serious harm to a child who may actually be neurodivergent and already struggle with the sense of being different to their peers. If their parent comes in all guns blazing and loves telling everyone how quirky (ie. weird) you were as a toddler then that wouldn't help things one bit.

FWIW Teens and adult children can be described as quirky, especially if they appreciate and own that personality themselves. Most quirky or unmasked ND adults have no issues with it. But 3 seems very early to label a child just because she displays a few signs of imaginative play that seem amusing and entertaining.

Totally normal for her age.

Another vote for normal for 3. I taught infants for years, and quite honestly the non-weird children were very much in the minority.

Yes I have one quirky child. He is a lovely stubborn teenager now. He still looks at the world a bit independently. I was worried when he went to school that he wouldn’t make friends, then he did, then I worried as they aged they would notice him being a bit different. I think a couple might have but he’s made other friends too so it’s maybe nothing to do with him! His friends really like him (maybe more than he is interested in them) he’s never asked for friends over.

I worried going to secondary school more, he’s in a “bubble” a lot of the time. Mind thinking but less aware of his surroundings. I thought he’d forget to get off school bus, wouldn’t manage a timetable.
However it’s all, so far, been fine. He doesn’t love school but is very clever, he knows many (what seem like) random facts and when I think about his train of thought before he tells me one, I am often surprised that there was logic there.
I think to others he must seem quiet and then randomly say something like “this mark on the floor looks like an Egyptian hieroglyph and means xxx”. Not linking it with someone talking about going to hospital and only being able to get parked outside the museum, then me remembering we went there last year and he was interested in the Egypt section. That type of thing.

He may have some autistic traits but I’ve never taken him for formal assessment as he’s not finding any problems in
life. Hopefully no one would want to change a thing about him.

Yes I mean boys being cruel to other boys. Though I’m sure they can be to boys as well.

I’m sorry you had such an awful
experience.

I could have been described as a quirky child too I guess - but I was lucky in that I found a group of quirky friends in secondary and people are ok to you if you’re in a group.

So the boys are cruel too?

She sounds fab! I remember being in the supermarket with my three year old and feeling a bit indignant at people giving her odd looks - but then tmreminded myself that she was wearing two bobble hats and a pair of welders goggles. She's now an adult and the most 'normal' of the lot of us!

So sweet. My 6 year old can be similar and has got one fine at school but I was told she likes her own company in Reception. She was and is happy.

She’s only 3.5 years she’s just finding herself

Mine wore the craziest outfits as soon as she was able to dress herself.
I cringe when I think of the things she wore to nursery but it wasn't worth the fight to get her to change into something less "unusual" and as long as she was warm and decent I let it go.
We love reminding her of it now! "Remember when you wore a swimming hat all day - and not to swimming?!" etc etc 😂

Have to say this thread is mumsnet at its best. I’ve realised with everyone saying how she sounds great etc and those saying am I actually looking for compliments, that I’ve been very hard on her in my thinking and very pessimistic, jumping ahead to school and problems. I obviously do think she’s amazing and love her so much but this has been causing me a lot of worry and I definitely don’t want that to be apparent to her. There has been no mention of any labels to her and I have joined in all her games etc so I would hope she is none the wiser but I have been trying to encourage her towards board games and puzzles and to do things more in what is my view of the norm.

So this thread has been a bit of a wake up call that I need to accept and embrace her how she is and stop overthinking re things that might happen down the line and that this might be all totally standard too just not in line with what I’ve seen of kids her age so far. So thanks all - much appreciated and I’ve taken a good hard look at myself.

One of my kids (7yo) is firmly in the “quirky” demographic. They are rather fabulous at knitting, and won’t stop talking about making their own clothes. It’s amazing and I’m in awe, but yeah can be tricky finding friendships.

At 3 though I’d say it’s much more normal to not have much to do with other kids.

Sounds entirely ordinary at 3. They all say the most random things and we all think ours are the most profound and interesting ever a d they're all just 3

My children all have SEN so their fair dose of quirky in very different ways, I have worked really hard to go with their quirks and interests helping them to celebrate who they are as individuals worthy of kindness, love and respect.

The process has been really healing and good for me having had a parents who are both emotionally immature and struggled not to mold us into what they thought we should be I am finally learning to be myself with my own wonderful individual quirks.

It is honestly so damaging when your parents treat you or your interests as weird because they don't understand it all my children have grown in confidence yes they have had friendship ups and downs but no more than any other child.

My ds was pretty much universally described as quirky by everyone when he was at primary. Not remotely interested in football or sports, very imaginative, and not bothered if he had friends or not. Ironically, this meant a lot of the girls were pretty keen on him him. Mums would regularly tell me their daughters dislikes all the boys except DS. He's now at uni. Loads of friends. Super sociable. Very confident. Did very well in his A levels. Definitely not neuro divergent. I think he's always just known what he's interested in and has never tried to be anything other than himself.

PFB eh?

She’s 3, I was expecting this to be about a mid teen or something. My DS used to play with stones.

Just popped on to say I was out for a walk with my (also quirky) son today - having read the OP earlier today - and the phrase “a worm with a nice face” popped into my head and made me smile. So sweet!

They sound amazing!!
I have 2 DS’s with ADHD. They’re both fucking brilliant too. They’re both hilarious particularly when they’re together. I wouldn’t change them for the world x

I remember meeting DD’s form teacher in y7 - he’d known her for four weeks and he said “how can I describe your dd? She’s got quite a character.”

i replied, “shall we settle on quirky?” And he laughed and said “exactly the word I was looking for!”

She is an amazing kid, with dozens of friends, eclectic interests and moreover she is happy. She has never asked to download TikTok, or wondered if she might really be a boy, or bothered with makeup. She does as she pleases. Since she is her own person in every way, it has made her quite resilient in an age of SM pressures.

I did worry that being “a bit different” might make her a target for bullies but this generation is very tolerant of difference. She’s never had any bother.

I had one who had great social skills and one who is kind but a bit different. The different one had a few friends at primary school but the cool/unkind ones looked down their nose at her and made her feel unpopular. They could be unkind.
She then went to secondary school (comp) and got on fine. She had a bigger group of nice friends and there were zero dramas with them. The cool/unkind kids left her alone as they were too busy having dramas with each other. She was pretty happy.
The unkind ones tend to have similar parents.