DD2 is struggling with friendships.

[lougle]

She told me today that she doesn't seem to have many friends. A boy who she loves and was loved by in year 1, according to her, doesn't love her any more and he gets annoyed when she follows him. The more she follows him the more annoyed he gets. If she follows all her friends, they get annoyed and then she'll have no friends at all.

She said, also, that when she goes out onto the playground, everyone looks the same because they are all wearing blue, so she can't find her friends, because she can't tell who they are.

I asked her what I could do to help her with these problems; what the options were to help her. She said 'my option is to learn at home'.

Poor child.

She said that if she could learn about anything, she'd learn about space because it is so interesting.

It's so heart breaking, isn't it? My ds doesn't have friends either and really struggles socially.

No advice but just a hand to hold as we a going through the same thing.

We don't do playdates, generally. We have quite a full schedule after school except for Fridays and we have a bouncy dog. We do have the next door neighbour's children in when the weather is good, and a child from further up the road. The trouble is that DD2 tends to drift off (remembers the day that she decided that she would watch 101 Dalmatians instead of playing...) and then the other two pick up the thread and run with it.

Being slightly face-blind myself your DD has my sympathy! And a few suggestions – as usual take them with whatever sized pinch of salt you need….

My DS isn’t face-blind but he has lots of other social difficulties. At one point his teacher organised a lunchtime rota of kids to sit with him so that none of the kids felt over-burdened. They were all volunteers and the teacher had explained some of DS’s issues to them. Any chance of anything like that, with a rota of her friends or other sympathetic kids to come up and remind her about their names and ask her to join them for that one break time? If it’s an organised rota with different days then there will be less temptation for them to be unkind so as to push her away, and she wont need to follow them.

And are there any specialist “social / communication skills” groups she could attend? In my area the NHS SALTs run them and my DS gets 10 weekly sessions every year or two (I usually have to contact them to ask for another round) She’d meet some other kids there with similar kinds of issues, and at the groups my DS has attended as the kids get older they start to share their own strategies for coping.

Another thing that’s helping us is the book The Unwritten Rules of Friendship I wish I’d had it when DS was younger when I could have used more of its practical suggestions directly, but I’ve still found it useful for thinking out my own strategies. I was surprised at how many different chapters applied to him. It very much takes the approach that there are things children can do to improve their ability to make friends, and gives the positive side too. And it has some very concrete information, like a list of signs that show when other people are starting to get fed up!

But it is painful for us when our kids find it so hard to make friends [sigh]

DS had photos of the other children and practised labelling them. We only started with 3-4 of the ones who were most interested in him. There are usually are some who are interested.
She's not very old is she??
Does she have support in the playground?
We have to do structured games with DS but his 1:1 makes themselves and the game interesting so the other children want to join in.
But some days the NT' children run round shrieking their heads off in a totally random way and on those days DS doesn't have a clue what to do as by the time he's figured it out they have moved on.

Thank you, these are all good ideas. Right now, on the scale of 0-10, we're on 0.5/10, ie. Until now I've got 'everything's fine, there's nothing wrong with her..' and now I'm getting ''hmm...she's not listening in the classroom and can't follow basic instructions'.

We're no way near 'let's put things in place to make things easier for her.'

I've started another thread with a video link - this is her reaction to practicing her singing for singing club on Monday here.

I havent watched your video yet but will in a minute. It does sound like your poor Dd2 is struggling

I struggle with facial recognition too and also picking out which people are talking in groups, Dd3 has similar issues.

In her old school she used to spend time walking around the edge of the playground by herself. Where she is now there are lots of children with various disabilities and she always has someone to play with.

She has recently found a best friend for the first time, the relationship is strongly supported by both families we do day trips and have even been on holiday together. Even with loads of support Dd3's autism gets in the way of the friendship sometimes and I find myself cringing and feeling sorry for her friend regularly. Luckily the friend has a little sister with Asd so there is good understanding in the family.

Sorry your Dd2 is having such a hard time at the moment and I hope the school will support you in getting some assessments for her.

Good luck

Thank you, Ineed I dream of DD2 having an equal friendship.