10 year old DD shy and awkward, help!!

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How can we help our shy and awkward DD to relax a bit around people?

10 year old DD has a lot of friends and is more or less at ease around children she doesn’t know, although she can be very quiet in a new environment. She is however painfully awkward around any older children or adults such as coaches, teachers, family friends etc. She goes mute and can’t seem to put two words together, and ends up coming across as rude... she also hates any attention and would rather the earth open up and swallow her than having to talk about herself etc. She actually would have a lot to talk about as she is reasonably successful in her chosen sport, which she practises 5 days per week, but again she refuses to talk about this in social settings, or even to have her friends at school know exactly what she does in her spare time! Strange, as we thought he’d success in this field would be a boost for her confidence.

How can we help her relax a bit, to the point where she would be able to handle a brief conversation/interaction with people outside the family?

Children are just really horrible to one another, it's always been that way unfortunately but social media has definitely increased the scope and invasive nature/constant nature of the horribleness, so I wouldn't be surprised if it is affecting her a bit. Puberty and hormones do definitely make it worse as well and kids go through puberty younger and younger these days and they are not emotionally equipped for it (and probably it takes the parents by surprise too) so enjoy your next few years, probably plenty more of this kind of angst to come .

Poor girl, she probably needs a big hug, but I'd repeat again that the things she is experiencing/way she is now is not determinative of how her life will be. Most kids do experience being 'left out' or excluded from friendship groups at some stage (and IMO the 'cool kids' that never experience this may be the ones more likely to lack resilience out in the real world where not everyone wants to be their friend all the time). They do come out the other side of it and with lots of love and support most are not emotionally scarred!

I'd try and make her understand that being left out is not her fault, it's nothing she's done. And without trivialising her feelings or telling her she can't be upset, I'd reassure her being sometimes excluded when you are 10 is not the end of the world - sometimes at that age they can catastrophise, I vividly remember being about 12 or 13 (so a bit older than your DD but very emotionally immature), I was rejected by my 'crush' at a school disco and then laughed at (in quite a gentle ribbing sort of way, not horrible bullying or anything) by some other girls and deciding this meant I was fundamentally hideous and would never ever have a boyfriend, I genuinely believed that for quite a while afterwards and of course it became a self fulfilling prophecy because I was too scared to talk to boys for years afterwards. Silly really but shows how very young girls can take minor things seriously especially if they are trying to behave in a more grown up way than they are really ready for. Be reassured that by my late teens I'd got over myself and had plenty of boyfriends and now a DH so I was fine in the long run

I'd just try and keep her off social media as much as possible, she's certainly far too young for unsupervised access (not blaming you for what's happened at all, we all learn as we go with these things). I know it's hard with lockdown but try and distract her with less screen based activities, lots of family fun and outdoor stuff if you can manage it, encourage her while she's away from school to maybe act a bit younger even than her age rather than trying to be grown up and she'll forget it in no time - set the tone yourself by being relaxed and confident socially and she will follow.

Good luck!

My dd was like this when younger. Extremely shy and introverted. At secondary school she made one or two very close friends, who she never stopped talking too. Moving on to university took away the shyness to a certain extent and she is now a lot more confident. I am actually amazed at how different she is and she did it all by herself.

I was incredibly shy as a child still am! And what made me feel worse was when people used to say 'isn't she shy' I wished the ground would swallow me up. My mum always spoke for me, my seven year old daughter is just like me and I find myself talking for her which is wrong but I find awkward silences when people talk to her so embarrassing !!