All the other kids have got it and I haven't.....

[leakycauldron]

Anyone have any tips on navigating this one?

A few months ago it was a Stanley cup. She used her pocket money to buy a fake one. It was broken within a week. Thankfully the shine of it was already dulled and we hoped she'd kind of learnt a lesson about not buying in to every fad.

But now it's air ups. Everyone has one apparently and she was gonna save her pocket money for one. Fine. But then a friend got one recently and now apparently she's the only one not to have one.

It's not like we can't afford it but for the love of god why do water bottles got £30-£50 and how/why does every parent give in and stump up the money??
We've explained to DD they are a lot of money plus the cost of the pod refills.

Shes only 9 and I thought we'd have a few more years before worrying about them having the latest trend.

She gets upset about these things and doesn't know how to deal with mean girl mentality of "you can't play with us with you don't have xxxx"

is her birthday soon at all? I’m a sucker for wanting my dc to be happy and feel heard and if they ask for something and I can afford it then I will get it. I don’t spoil them though. There’s a fine balance. We went through the airup phase a few years ago and I bought two flavours pods. They never asked for more, the novelty wore off after 3-4 months BUT they still use them as their school water bottles so it’s not a complete waste. The bottles are about 3 years old now and still perfect.

It’s no different to when we were that age, just different items and more exposure due to the internet. Honestly I make sure my boys get some of the ‘fads’ usually the more practical ones, but not all of them.

I was the child that never had any of them, I never had stationary for back to school, or nice clothes and generally appeared ‘not looked after’ not because my parents couldn’t afford it, but my mum just couldn’t ever be bothered and my dad was absent. I suffered significantly bullying because of the lack of care from my parents, not just not having any of the cool stuff.

Hence probably overcompensate to some degree.

Obviously not everyone has one, most probably don’t. Life isn’t about what you have it’s about who you are. She needs to learn this and honestly marketing is insane and unending so you’re not going to solve the problem by getting her this. It’ll be the next thing and the next etc etc forever.

You could offer to pay her for particular tasks etc if you want but honestly I’d just be rising above this as a parent, completely unimportant.

My 9 year old DD can be like this sometimes over material things she wants.

My response is usually:

A. You can save your pocket money for it and when you have saved X amount I will pay the rest ( I will only do this if I think the item is worth it)

B. You can save some more of your pocket money or use birthday or Christmas money and buy it yourself, but I will not be putting any money towards whatever item it is .

C. You and I have had this conversation DD and the answer is still no I am not buying you it rinse and repeat.

Does she have a birthday coming up op?

I got my 2 air ups for Christmas, they were desperate for them and had been harping on for MONTHS! Honestly they were a waste of money. My sons doesn’t even suck up liquid properly and neither of them have mentioned getting any more pods since February. I wouldn’t bother op.

This was around the age that DH and I started having conversations with DS about how much we earned. He’s a bright kid and could do the math. Nothing majorly in depth but if he was asking for eg. a Stanley cup he’d know that ok, if we are buying that for you, mum has to work 4 hours to pay for it.

We very much favoured the method a PP has recommended, save some pocket money, at least half, and we might put the rest towards it.

As another PP said, it’s already been the Stanley cup, now it’s the air up, and in a few weeks it’ll be something else, then the next thing.

Time for her to start learning the value of money.

OP if you don't teach them now that they don't need every thing everyone else has, then when?

Absolutely all of these responses are the exact thoughts I've had!

This afternoon after seeing her face when she saw her friend had one I went online and ordered one but she doesn't know.

Then this evening she got all stroppy about not having one and acting so hard done by that I was annoyed for ordering it.

I like the idea of getting her to save half. She only gets £3 a week so saving for one is gonna take for ages!

She struggles socially (she has a referral for potential AdHd ) so everything to do with friends is such a big deal! I can't keep up!

Ah well I understand that you just want her life to not be any harder than it has to be.

However it really isn’t going to give her friends, having all the right stuff. In fact her having the resilience to learn to say “No I don’t have one, my parents won’t let me,” and realise that the world continues on would be a good lesson. Just tell her she can always blame you!