Worried about the drama of having older daughters

[IWantAWittyUsername]

I have two DD's (7 weeks old and 2 years old). I know I have a long time until they are at school (and even longer until the teenage years ) but after reading some threads about bullying I'm feeling disheartened about the stresses that preteen/teenage girls seem to go through (I've not read any about boys). I know not all do/will but it makes me feel sad that my girls may go through these things and that I will be limited in how much I can protect them. (I was bullied briefly at secondary school which was horrible but resolved quickly - other than that I just had the usual dramas of being a teenager falling out with friends, however that was before social media so we had to leave arguments at school and pick them up the next day! I know this is not the case nowadays with cyber bullying ).

I guess I'm hoping people can tell me that it's not going to be all that bad? Can anyone reassure me that the cases I'm reading about are not representative but are anomalies?! (I am well aware that I only have tiny kids and have a long time for anything like this to happen but I think I'm still hormonal after birth!)

Bullies find victims, boys and girls.

I'd not encourage any kind of gendered expectations of behaviour.
And I'd really not waste any valuable nervous energy on something that may or may not happen.

Fwiw, I am a girl and was not bullied at school (admittedly, a VERY long time ago ).
Most children are not bullied.

You are getting ahead of yourself in really rather an exhausting and unhelpful way IMO.

Enjoy your DCs, raise them to be happy and confident, trusting that there will always be an adult in their corner to take them seriously and to support them IF they run in to any kind of difficulty and hopefully they will enjoy a very happy childhood.

I have a 10, 8, 7 and 4 yr old DD. The stuff I have seen makes my toes curl. Giving kids a phone at an early age really seems to exacerbate this. I always hop onto threads if this nature to get hints on how to approach this in the future. I know phones/social media is unavoidable at some point, but I think strict rules, followed by adults and children, seems to help.

My 10yo is very sensible, but my 8yo has ASD and I'm particularly concerned how she will negotiate social media.

Thanks for the replies.
@PacificDogwod I promise you I'm not exhausting myself about this at all!! Like @imip says, it just makes my toes curl/me feel really sad when I read some threads and I was curious to see if they are just bad examples? (As I said, I'm aware not everyone gets bullied either )

Adolescence brings difficult times for most children. I have boys and there are fitting in issues, a schooling system that seems stifling for many of them and a lack of support between them even if they say they are friends!

I would say don't waste energies worrying about what may happen. Enjoy each age. Preteens and Teenagers can also be great company and provide a mental challenge little ones don't! Parents here post more about their problems, naturally.

Try to bring them up to be kind and robost. Hopefully the kindness will teach them to help others through their tough times and the robostness will see them through any tough times of their own. Teenage years are hard, but your girls will be fine with a lovely mum who clearly cares so much about them to come home to.

It happens to boys and girls equally. Even body image issues. The best you can do is make sure they grow up to be sensible and trustworthy. Most bullies tend to be ignored/abused at home and so they pass on that behaviour - if you teach your child how to escalate issues appropriately as they arise then you've probably done the best you can.

I'm not exhausting myself about this at all

Good
I think it was making me feel quite stressed, reading your OP

I enjoy my pre-teens and teens so much more than I did babies and toddler, cute as they are, but I found them much, much harder work and far less rewarding, interesting and stimulating.

I agree that social media are a worry.
We have not agreed to phones until they started secondary school (the older 2) and have parental settings clamped right down on the younger ones iPad access.
Also, they have not had Instagram/FB/similar account until they were 13.
So far, so good.
Some inappropriate/poor taste jokes, but hey ho...

I may eat my words yet!

Thanks @Sadfacehappyface 

@PacificDogwod good luck! I was always been a baby person but now my eldest is a toddler I realise that it just gets more fun the older/more interactive they get!

OP, my DDs are nearly 15 and 13. I can tell you it's not a problem. In fact, teenagers absolutely rock.

The two most important factors are family/upbringing and school.

When choosing a school, one of the most important factors to consider is how the school handles bullying and bad behaviour. If this goes wrong, so will the learning and even health. I would ask the teachers about bullying and the kids about the school rules. (My friend's teenage DS has been bullied badly at school and the school has handled it so badly that he now has anxiety issues).

On a side note, I often get upset about other mothers making the ridiculous generalisation that girls are bitchy. Mine aren't and nor are any of their friends. I do understand that girls and women are more likely to be manipulative than men and boys, but most are not like this. Conversely, boys and men are more likely to use their fists, but most don't!

Anyway, good luck. Enjoy your DDs growing up.

I went through a period when my DD (now 6) was a toddler of worrying about this stuff too. Yours are very tiny and vulnerable and it's hard to imagine how they will gradually become less reliant on you.

For a me, the worry has eased as she has gotten older and I've watched her deal with playgroup, then nursery and now school. She comes home and chats about all her friendship up and downs and it's a joy watching how well she navigates it all.

Model strong and kind behaviour, so no gossiping but also stand up for yourself and your dcs. Hold off social media and phones for as long as you can. There are some fantastic resources for children around the 7 Habits book by Steven Covey. I actually find the children and teenagers books better than the original:
7 habits happy kids

My four girls were delightful teenagers and young women - bright, kind, compassionate, interested in everything and really wanting to make a difference to the wider world. The odd stubborn moment around 10 but quickly grew out of that. They were/are honest, hardworking, interesting young women. Bullying would not have crossed their minds but they would hold their own in a disagreement.

I've got a slightly different side. I've two teen girls, neither of whom are brilliant socially and both have been bullied.
Social Media has actually been brilliant-particularly for my older girl. She's very shy and won't go up to people and join in in rl, but she got into some message groups (set up round subject groups at school) and in that she's much less shy so she got to know them and they got to know her and now she has a reasonable friendship group, which she seems happy with.
Although she does a lot of Social Media, she doesn't have issues on there, and the boys and girls seem to much in together much more than I did at that age at school.

I have taught them both to come to me if they're not comfortable with things and not add anyone as a friend if they aren't one. It means that they don't have the 100s of "friends" some have, but that's fine.

I've had very few issues with my almost adult DD.

She has never been bullied ( thank goodness) and never been part of a 'bitchy' set. Her gang of mates (boys and girls ) are very warm hearted and mutually supportive. They seem perfectly accepting of each other's differences and genuinely pleased about the successes of others.

And if anyone steps over the line they're quickly told to pack it in.

OP, you are in a fabulous position. Well done for thinking of this now.
Raise your dds to be strong and confident. Get them into martial arts groups, any sports, any other activities that they enjoy and make them feel confident in themselves. Encourage them to try things and to take opportunities.
Always assure them of your love, don't take it for granted that they know.
If they have well-rounded, interesting lives with good parental support any bullies they encounter will have less chance of making them feel bad, and your dds will be strong enough to repulse and report any attempts to bully them.

Whether or not your DD is bullied or a bully will depend very largely on the environment you choose for her.

Neo how do you do that? I don't necessarily disagree, but we're limited in the effect we can have on their schools- it's more effective to bully proof our dcs, surely?

I wasn't particularly cool as a teenager. Scratch that - I was phenomenally uncool and 13 wasn't much fun. But 14-19 my teen years rocked. I had a small group of nice friends and, generally, found that people were kind and helpful and tolerant. I suppose what I'm trying to say is that adolescence isn't always horrible and lots of teenage girls are lovely.

Make sure you don't slip into victim blaming when you talk about bully-proofing children and finding the right environment for children.

Sometimes kids get bullied because they happen to be near a bully.

Bullies come and go, in fact some children who are usually nice and kind-hearted can slip into bullying behaviour sometimes.

My lovely son, who had one of those "well-rounded, interesting lives with good parental support"- a friendly, independent, normally-good-looking-normally-sporty boy, who was always happy to try new things----was bullied in year 9-10, by a few boys who were being mean. They did things like get up and move if he went to sit down with them. They excluded and teased him and made him feel bad about himself.

In this situation, the only thing you can do as a parent is to be on the ball, to notice if your child seems a bit unhappy, and NOT to put moodiness and changed behaviour down to "hormones" or "normal teenage stroppiness".

Kids often are unable to tell parents about people who are bullying them, because being bullied is humiliating and because victims feel like the fact that they are being bullied means there is something wrong with them.

As a parent you have to be a bit of a detective if your child seems unhappy, and you have to immediately take strong action if the problem turns out to be bullying. I would say you have to talk to the school right away, and if the school is ineffective at dealing with the problem you have to change schools.

Most people (myself included) wait too long to deal with bullies, and try to get the victim to change something (often their emotional response to the bully or their actual response to the bully). I know that occasionally victims can turn the situation around, but most of the time the victim is not in a position to do that.

Dawnedlightly - obviously parents' ability to choose the "right" environment for their DC is not limitless. Sometimes parents have no choice at all and need to work hard to give their DC's thick skins in suboptimal environments. But I still think that being very aware of the crucial role of environment for mental health is a real parenting win. You also need to remain open minded about what your best option is: our family chose a Catholic school for our DC although we are non-believers of Jewish (DP) and Anglican (me) descent. It has been so very much the right choice for us as an environment for our DC's well being.

Thanks Neo
I honestly can't see how one environment can be bullying though. Was it that the school you chose was a particular size, or mixed rather than single sex? What might be a toxic environment for one child could be perfect for another surely? Bar ensuring they don't end up in a South American jail, I think our ensure they avoid bullying environments is very limited in comparison to our ability to bulletproof them.

It's the ethos of the school community that affects the relationship dynamics.

To be honest you don't know until it happens to you.
My dd is beautiful, friendly, talented, polite, hard working (but not too geeky) and a really nice sweet person who I laugh and laugh with.
She adores school and has many friends until the end if year 9 when a new girl joined the school and took an instant dislike to her.
In two terms she has turned half the school against dd, got her attacked in the street twice and even turned her friends against her.
She is now out of school and home educated.
She's been brought up to be "bullly proof" and attended an OFSTED outstanding school with a seemingly good bullying policy.
Ir was the behaviour of one girl who changed this.

That said op, I have 3boys and 2 girls and id boy swap that fir the workd.
Love being a mum of girjs and watching them grow into fabulous young women and learning to guide them.
Enjoy x

"Not swap"

Thank you all so much - such lovely responses. I really appreciate you all taking the time to reply (this is the first ever thread I've started!) - I will certainly strive to bring them up with the correct attitudes and to understand they will always be supported by myself and DH. (And of course in the meantime I'll continue to enjoy the baby and toddler years that I have now!)
xxx