4 year old being bullied by neighbours child

[Oopydoops]

Hi, new to this forum but seeking some advice. I have a recently turned 4 year old LG who is being bullied by my next door neighbours daughter. There's not much difference in age between them. My LG is obsessed with this little one despite the meanness. Next doors LG excludes my daughter, tells her nobody likes her, and nobody wants to play with her, she pushes and hits and I've caught her making faces and hitting my baby (12 month old). She comes up to our front window to get my LOs attention only to be nasty to her. My heart is breaking for my daughter as she would be anxious at the best of times and she is desperate to be friends with this LO. I've tried avoiding contact but it's so hard when they live right next door. My neighbour admits its only my daughter that hers is like this with but refuses to address the situation, and refuses to keep her daughter away or chastise her for her nastiness. She would prefer to keep her head in the sand about it and gets defensive when I mention it. How do I tackle this?

If your neighbour cannot or will not parent her child appropriately you will just have to look after your children. Keep them safe. Do not allow this child into your home or garden. I'm sorry if this makes your LO sad but you can't allow this to continue for anyone's sake. Hopefully your child will be going to nursery soon and will make friends there.

Maybe some closer supervision is required all round - a 4 year old shouldn’t be at someone else’s front window unsupervised, and a 12 month old shouldn’t be in a position where an adult ‘catches’ a child hitting them.

We’ve had a few issues with our neighbours children being unkind to our DD, chanting “DDs a weirdo, DD’s a weirdo” calling her ugly/stupid, saying her garden is rubbish, her mummy and daddy are nasty or saying they want to play with her then saying “haha we don’t want to play with you” or asking for her toys then not giving them back or they have been thrown back over covered in pen.
They’ve also told her that a monster and wasps live under her bed so every night we have to check to make sure there isn’t any there.
It’s probably just kids being kids but it breaks my heart seeing her upset, and the more they are unkind the more she wants to play as well and she has started copying the things she has heard which I hate.
We’ve just distanced ourselves and put up trellis to give us a bit of a break and allow us to use our garden without having to engage constantly and encourage them to play nicely.
Sometimes when the weather is nice rather than using our garden we go somewhere onto a field or go for a walk rather than playing in the garden.

Keep sending her home, don't allow them to play together.
When Dd says she wants to play with her be firm, say no. When she whines "why" tell her, x is not a very nice girl, she is nasty to you and tries to hurt your baby, so she's not allowed here anymore. Don't back down.

you'll have to tell the child every single time when she comes round that she can't play with your daughter before she gets as far as her - be your daughters shield. Just tell her straight what her mother should be doing every time you play you're unkind to her and upset her and i don't want her playing with mean children. Keep your daughter well away from her.

So the neighbour knows that her child is bullying the OPs and that she hit her baby - and won’t do anything?

I agree with FedUp - don’t let her come over - send her home every time. Be firm and factual (don’t she she is bad/nasty etc or this will turn into WW3 with the parents). Tell her parents what she does/say so that she doesn’t go home and complain that you were horrible to her/you chased her away with sticks etc. Get a decent catch on the door/squeaky hinge so she can’t sneak in!

If she was coming to my windows i would be firmly telling her that she is not being kind and she needs to go home, and returning her home if she didnt leave.

If her own mother isnt going to parent her the only thing you can do is keep removing her from your property. Who lets 4 year old children wander around like that anyway?!

As above. Tell your neighbour that this behaviour is unacceptable and if she wins tell her dd off then you will. Don't let her in and send her home whenever you see her.

Thanks everyone for your replies. @pastapestoparmesan, just to clarify my baby was in my arms at the time when she took her toy out of her hand and hit her with it. My baby is always supervised. It's difficult to keep the child away from the window because the houses on the street have no front gardens so the window is right at the path. I've asked mum to bring her in, but 'she wants to be outside with her dad' is the constant reply. I'm going to have to say it to my neighbour that the child isn't to come near my daughter but I don't know how to say it without her getting defensive and it causing aggro. Thankfully they both go to different pre schools. I've also invited some other little friends of my daughters around to play but when the other girl spots this or hears them playing out the back garden, the bullying escalates. I honestly didn't think a 4 year old had the capacity to bully and to be so conniving about it.

Just be firm with the mum. The girls don’t play well/get along - no one wants to hear that their child is a bully and won’t ever admit it (more likely to get on the defensive and be unpleasant).

And a 4 year old absolutely can be a sneaky bully!

@Oopydoops sorry I didn’t mean to imply you abandoned your baby to be hit by random strangers! It was the turn of phrase ‘caught her hitting my baby’ which made it sound the baby was not with you.
Sounds like a really tricky situation, some other friends from preschool sounds like a great idea 👍

If your frint room is right onto the pavement, each time she tries this close the blinds on her.
She will eventually get the message.
She's shouting and screaming abuse over the back fence, call the mother and tell her to ask her to stop or you will, get the kids in your yard to make more noise, sing, and drown her noise out. .
Don't let a 4 year old take control like this.

OP really sorry you're in this position. I can sympathise as have had a similar experience with our DC and neighbours DS where we had a communal garden.

Our DC was the same age as yours when it began, with our neighbours child who up until then had been a very good friend and lovely. It began with him ganging up to try to 'get' my DC when he had friends over. Then it progressed to constant name calling, and just constant relentless put downs, even telling DC that he would kill them. Given that they were neighbours there was absolutely no let up, DC was scared to go out in the garden, lost all self confidence and was so upset. I really hesitate to call any small child a bully, but there's simply no other way to describe it. We talked to the parents who, like you, acknowledged the issue and said he was only that way with our child, but really downplayed it. They did very little about it and were clueless about the impact on our DC (and us for that matter). Our DC, for reasons I'll never understand desperately wanted the DC to like them again, almost like an abusive relationship. It was a very hard time. We tried to keep them apart as much as possible but live in a small community, where the parents are 'pillar of the community' types involved in everything and friends with everyone. The impact on my DC was massive during the worst period and we became outcasts too.

We ended up moving, but whilst we were waiting for that to happen we kept them apart as much as possible and encouraged our DC to do activities away from the other child. That helped to build DC's confidence back up a bit and see that he wasn't that great a friend. In the meantime things the neighbours child did eventually start being nice again, but still reverted back to his old ways frequently. I am very glad we moved.

Doing what others suggest here is the right thing, but also incredibly difficult. It's not easy to constantly be telling off someone else's child when you should be in the comfort of your own home, or telling your own child that they can't play with someone. Just a horrible situation so you have my sympathy.

@sunfunrundum thank you for your response. Sounds like a carbon copy of whats been going on. Thankfully we now have very little to do with them and my daughter no longer wants to be friends with her and recognises her behaviour as bullying. I'm actually really proud of her!! I'm anxious about them starting big school though but I've time yet to plan for that! And we will hopefully be moving within the next year too.

Oh gosh, I'm sorry I didn't spot the date of your post! I'm really glad you were able to get the distance needed and that things are so much better, good on your daughter (and you).