Is it my fault my daughter has no friends

[kazza113]

Hi i'm new to this so please bear with me. I have a 13 year old daughter who is in her first year at secondary school. She seems to really struggle with friendships and hangs on to one friend from primary school who lets her down quite a lot and doesn't seem to share the same feelings. I'm sure its my fault as i've only really socialised with one friend and her daughter and my mum and sister. I worry that i'm not a good role model for how to nurture friendships and put the effort in. Have I caused this, is it my fault and what can I do to change this. Thanks

First year at secondary is really tough. They all move on and change. Friendship groups change a lot in that first year too.

I agree, the best thing to do is join everything. Try every lunch time club and after school thing going, by the end of the year, hopefully, your dd will have got to know lots of new people and made a nice group of friends.

IME they often don't stick with the primary school group so much - they change so much at this age.

The other thing is to make a real effort to make all their friends welcome in your home. It pays dividends through the teenage years.

This happened to one of my children when she started secondary. Her primary school friends dumped her in the second week and wrote nasty graffiti about her in the toilets. I spoke to her tutor about her having no friends (lunch and break were difficult to be alone and she was too shy to go unaccompanied to lunchclubs).

The tutor changed the seating plan at tutor time and put her next to some girls he thought she would get on with and some other teachers did the same in their classes. The tutor also reminded the class about the lunchclubs and paired people up who were interested in some so they had a mate to go with. My DD talked to the girls a bit and after a couple of weeks was in their friend group and going to lunchclubs with some too - she stayed friends throughout with them. The tutor never let on or spoke to the girls asking them to be my DD's friend as this can backfire.

perhaps talking to the tutor/school could give you some help like this or leads about who she seems to hang out with/ likes etc that you could follow up?

Good luck - I know it can be a great worry

Thanks for your replies. I'll speak to the tutor and my daughter and see if we can help a bit and make a few changes. I think she feels the other girls are all more grown up than her. Does anybody have any advice as to wether if we haven't mixed that much as a family if it will affect her ability to mix and make friends. It's such a worry. I feel so responsible.

We aren't massively sociable either, prob have a dinner party every six months or so as dh really can't be arsed, however I've always encouraged ds to bring friends home, and at 11 it's still perfectly acceptable for you to call the other girls' mums and make the arrangements if you think your dd will be too shy to approach them directly.

kazza113 you sound like a really loving, caring mum and that is the best thing your daughter can have. I think lots of us beat ourselves up over wether we have done the right things in our childcare and worry that our own failings have manifested themselves in our children beacuse of our example.

But some children, like to have small groups or even one close friend - it can be down to personality or all sorts of other factors. My DP worries about this too - when our DC were small and we lived in London we had lots of dinner parties, big birthday bashes, people round for coffee most days etc as he thought this would educate the children about dealing with people and making friends. Due to a business collapse we downshifted and moved to a new location - where I know no one, the children have made friends at school and tell me they are much happier now that we have a small cosy homelife without all the entertaining and random people to play. I am a much more calm and chilled person and don't spend lots of time servicing "friendships". However, any time one the children have a friend problem it is always blamed on our lack of friends!

Haggis, I think I love you. Ha ha. You have made me feel a whole lot better. Your experiences should prove that whatever we do as parents you feel you should have done the opposite. Thanks for making me feel better xx