Teenage Frenemies, Getting worse, Becoming Toxic, Is It Bullying?

[NorahNorah]

What would you do?

Two thriving children with lots in common, became friends at school. Now, maybe 18 month later, my child is miserable, doesn't want to go to school, and dreads breaktime.
His once friend, now rallies children against him, talks classmates into either picking on him, or ignoring him.
They are boys, and I know the other father and mother - certainly well enough to have a conversation with them, but not well enough to expect anything other than siding with their child.
Bullying doesn't have to be strictly physical, everyone's mental health is different, as are peoples emotional needs and sensitivities.
So ... one comment to one child, can be a joke; the same comment from the right person, to a different child, can be terribly received and extremely hurtful.

What would you do?

I'd talk to the school.

Pm

Thank you @PritiPatelsMaker and @DancyNancy

Where/when is a line being crossed, could you suppose? Knowing you will hurt them, then doing, that's not great, pretty awful. Then rallying others, also pretty awful .. or somewhere else, as in, when is deemed too much? 'Children can be cruel,' right?

I had this problem with my son. Bullying that went under the radar, not physical so not noticed by the teachers. I think it’s called ‘relational aggression’. It happened all through primary for my son. Good news is he is now in secondary school and thriving. Just bad luck with his year group cohort in primary! So don’t think it won’t get better, it will! My top tip would be to tell his teachers your concerns, and ask them to have a look at break and lunchtimes if they can see anything amiss. My son was given a diary by his teacher to write in so he could note down things that happened so they could build a log/pattern of what was happening. He was allowed to pop in to the classroom to fill it in so it wasn’t a ‘thing’ the others would notice him doing. The thing that irritated me a bit was their talk of ‘resilience’. I did feel that they felt we were being over the top and that my son needed to become more resilient, rather than getting to the root of the problem coming from the other kids. Seems to be a buzz word at school at the moment. Don’t be fobbed off by them, persevere, say you will take it further(ofsted, governors) if they don’t support you. They will ask you what you want them to do so be prepared with your expectations , mention a diary, and them watching him at playtime. Also talk to your son about his feelings. My son had counselling for a bit and the therapist suggested he imagine he has an invisible protective bubble around him that can’t be popped by the children at school. This helped him, along with being very open about what was happening at home so he felt he could talk about it when he needed to. Hope that helps a bit, it will get better!!!