Helping DD (11) through her first big fallout

[RandallLOVESBeth]

I suppose it’s inevitable really, but after a lovely, relatively trouble-free time of friendships during primary school, my about-to-start-secondary-school DD is in the middle of a big, ‘mean girls’ falling out with her friendship group.

All but one of them seem to have turned on her, and are telling her they hate her and accusing her of saying unkind things about them. I’ve taken her phone off her to stop the barrage of mean messages (she only got the phone a few months ago) and have read through the exchanges, and it seems to be one girl that’s the ringleader and nobody is really accusing DD of anything specific, just saying they don’t like her /want to be friends anymore.

She’s really, really sad and there have been lots of tears.

All of this friendship drama seems to have come out of nowhere in the last few months (end of year 6/lockdown), and other girls seem to have been targeted (she wasn’t involved, but has told me about it) and now it seems like it’s DD’s ‘turn’. I’m just listening and reassuring, trying not to feed the drama and thinking it will probably blow over. What else should I be doing?

At age 11 I'd be dropping a text to the relevant parents to let them know that you're giving them the heads up that you've had to take your DD's phone away, due to the nasty messages that she's been receiving.

Sounds like the ring leader might be a little psychopath in the making.

I think it's a good time to have the discussion about knowing when to walk away from people who treat you with anything less than the respect you deserve. Make sure that she knows that hanging about and trying to be nice to nasty people is not smart and will not make nasty people stop being what they are. When people show you there true colours, believe them and run.

Chances are that the ringleader will alienate all the others in time and then they will come sniffing back and it will be up to your daughter to decide if they can be forgiven. But for now I would tell her to look for a new friendship group at the big school and that it's good timing she found out these jerks true colours before this.

I'd also tell the other parents that their children are involved in group bullying, and show your daughter how to block people.
I think it is relatively common at about age 11/12 - puberty - for friend groups to change, especially in the case of girls. My daughter and her friends had a few months of nastiness, then all the girls formed new groups more based on their newfound personalities. I'd explain that to your dd and reassure her that new groups will form, but also make it clear that bullying is not just an unfortunate thing you have to put up with, but something that is unacceptable and needs to be dealt with by adults.