11 year old hates himself

[Askingadvice123]

My 11 year old son has always lacked self confidence. He’s clever, funny and kind. He’s always made friends reasonably easily - he’s not one of the cool gang or sporty gang but has a lovely group of friends who have similar interests to him. He’s always hated being centre of attention, although he’s ok being on stage.

He’s often said that he hates himself, thinks he’s a bad person and is stupid and now I’ve just found that he’s cut himself out of some photos or scribbled out his face in others. He once had to do a self portrait and he was in tears about it.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? It seems so sad that he has such a low opinion of himself. We’ve tried to boost him up but it doesn’t seem to help at all. I’m worried it will get worse when he goes through puberty so looking for advice on how to help him.

That sounds so tough, what a difficult thing for you to hear and watch him go through.

When talks negatively about himself do you often try to persuade him otherwise? E.g you say you try to boost him up. You may be unintentionally invalidating his feelings.
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From Janet Lansbury:

“that’s another common thing that every great parent I know has probably felt at some point, which is, we just want to say, “You shouldn’t feel that way, I don’t want you to feel that way. Don’t feel the way you’re feeling.” She says that’s her instinct, so I don’t know that she’s actually telling him those things. But that’s the message that children get. “You shouldn’t feel depressed, look at all the things you have in life that are so positive.” Have we ever heard that? Or have we ever said that to someone? “Well, yes, this sad thing happened, but look at all the good things that you have going on in your life. It could be worse.”
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We’re denying feelings when we do that. We’re denying the other person’s feelings, we may be denying our own feelings, and it doesn’t help us process through the feelings, learn from them, and move through them, leave them behind. Somebody else can’t do that for us, we have to do it for ourselves, and children have to do it for themselves, in their own unique way and time.
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We can trust in ourselves when it’s okay to go to all those dark places in ourselves.
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When we can share those, just that act of sharing them and being accepted and acknowledged for what we’re sharing, sometimes that can be all we need to start to let go of them and move through them.
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But this is not our process, it belongs to our child. So we have to trust him to do it his way, and staying connected is the best thing that we can do. Show him that support. Obviously, you’re not agreeing that he can’t do anything, or that he doesn’t deserve anything, but you’re really interested in what he’s feeling, where he’s getting these things, and what’s the feeling within those feelings? It sounds like he’s hurt, and that’s the part we want to help him get to if possible.

www.janetlansbury.com/2022/07/boosting-your-childs-self-confidence/

Oh wow, yes I guess I do try to talk him around and count his blessings etc. Thank you. I’ll read a bit more on this.

My DS is same age and has been saying similar things. I'm thinking of taking him to a counselor but it's expensive and I don't know where to begin to look for one that I feel is trustworthy. I think back over his life and I think there are various factors. He was lonely during lockdown, but I think it goes back a bit further. Self help style advice, like what's been posted is helpful, but I'm not a psychologist, and like you said, it's probably going to be exacerbated by puberty. I think I will likely just find a therapist local and hope they are good.

Glad that’s helpful. I find it unfair that this stuff is so counter intuitive. Like you’d think that piling praise on children would improve their self esteem, but it can actually damage it.

The book How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids will Talk is great on this. They recommend trying descriptive praise rather than evaluative praise

Yes therapy sounds like a great route for both of your young people.

There are free options through charities/NHS and the waiting lists aren’t always long (sadly often are though).

There are lots of virtual counselling services which can appeal to that age group

www.mind.org.uk/information-support/for-children-and-young-people/useful-contacts/

I arranged counselling through the GP for my dd. I think we got signposted to a charity and support was very quick.

That sounds so tough.

Does your employer offer an Employee Assistance programme? Mine offers free counselling to family members so worth checking if you or your immediate family are eligible through work

Thanks everyone - very helpful replies. I’ll look into counseling for him.

Thank you @UKgovMurder i found this really helpful. Although I don’t over praise, I do a lot of “oh that’s really lovely, we’ll done you” rather than what I should be doing! Going to describe from now on! Might order the book, I’m fascinated in child development & obviously want my DD to have healthy future etc too.

Op, I’m sorry I don’t have anything more helpful to add but wishing you good luck, you sound like a great, caring Mum.