Social exclusion - Bullying?

[Raeosun]

Im really worried about my 14 year old daughter. For the past 2 years she has been very close friends with a group of 5 other girls, in school and socially. Three weeks before Christmas, they ALL started to show signs of socially excluding her in their group. She stried to ignor it at first but was very confussed and upset, as she felt at a loss why they would be doing this. I felt her pain so bad and encouraged her to talk to them and ask them. She was so upset that she missed her last day of school before they broke up. I decided to try and talk to the girls' parents, this was a disaster as i ended up falling out with them and some really nasty things were said to me personally too. The excuse that these girls have given my daughter for them 'pushing her out', is that she has been miserable for so long now that its 'bringing them all down'! What the hell? Surely if your friends see you down, they support you and care for you rather than ostrasize you from their lives? One of the parents said that their daughter had felt that she had simply 'drifted apart'....what? Collectively 5 had decided to 'drift apart' from my daughter? She is dreading going back to school and i must admit that this upset has cast a sad shodow on our Christmas. Im trying to encourage her to make new frends and move away from these nasty girls, but she is worried beyond belief that this will escalate when back at school. She is so depressed and low. The only time she is happy is when she is stuck to me...im not allowed to go out with my partner without a rage of jealous ranting. What on earth can i do? She has gone from a fun loveing bubble, to a sad dowdy young lady....its heartbreaking. :(

I personally don't consider social exclusion as bullying. If you were working with someone you didn't really like, you wouldn't be a bully if you avoided spending time with them.

I think the key to what's happening with your dd is what one of the other girls said, that she's miserable and it's having an effect on them.

Of course if she's upset about something specific you'd expect her friends to rally round and cheer her up but this sounds more like long term depression, in which case they may feel at a loss to help her and, brutal as 14 year old girls are, they have decided they can't handle it and have turned their backs on her.

If I were you I'd look into the possiblility that your dd is depressed. Classic signs are:

Sleeping more or less than usual
Avoiding socialising (ironic I know)
Lack of appetite
Loss of interest in things previously enjoyed, eg sports/activities
Irritation
Risk taking behaviour

In my view if she's so down that her friends see it as a problem, you should take her to the GP and see if you can organise some counselling for her.

I also agree with you that she needs to make more friends but that isn't easy when they're presumably in yr 9 now, and friendship groups are not that fluid. What may help is for her to join some activities outside of school so that she makes a completely separate set of friends, eg Air Cadets or whatever she may be interested in.

I hope things improve OP

Op
Thank you for giving your opinion on bullying, but i dont think you were very fair to say that my daughter sounds like she was depressed and thus that is the reason they have turned against her.
As i said, before this started she was a happy, bubbly girl with a healthy lust for life. their social excluding her has caused her upset. The more she was aware of this happening, the more upset she got and so the vicious circle started. To blame her for her being depressed and hense their excluding her is not accurate.
I find your answer quite patronising and unsympathetic to be honest.

IMO social exclusion IS bullying as it is often caused by intolerance of someones characteristics (Low level, their annoying, high level, racism) My daughter suffered this as well except she helped out a kid being bullied (punchs) and yelled at the bullys to leave him alone. Unfortunatly the bullys appear to be the "populars" of the school, so now they've turned everyone against her, even her best friend has drifted away becuase she's sick of people asking "why are you friends with her?" It can ruin your life nd you need to get this sorted out. Try telling your dd to be more upbeat, sort out the problem at its source! Tell her to be happy and friendly (fake it till you make it sort of thing) then hopefully her friends will stay, and she really will get happier.

I think perhaps you need to reassess OP. You say that mumblechum wasn't fair in saying you daughter sounds depressed, when actually it was a really helpful sensitive post. The friends have said your DD was bringing them down. Now, although you may not be able to see it, there sounds like there could be something in that. Do you want sympathy or to help your daughter?

Well dd's school saw social exclusion as bullying. It got to a stage where dd was having so much time off with the bunch of bitches girls' literally controlling her life.

I will get no brownie points for this...but it took her older sister's "input" iykwim to stop it all! A year down the line,dd has got 2 new friends from another form,the bully girl group split up,Queen Bee got swatted by everyone and now sucks dd's arse!

Karma's a bitch.

Weirdly...they said it was dd who was causing the exclusion (the bully girl's said) as she was anxious all the time. Point was...it was them causing the bloody anxiety in the first place!

Peppa, thanks.

OP sorry if I misread the OP, but you gave the impression that it was because your dd was "miserable all the time" that her friends were shunning her.

I do hope that things get better for her and for you. It's horrid if you feel that your dd isn't happy.

Peppa, please read the mail from crazy...they have got this situation right! Its because of the exclusion that my dd has been depressed...not the other way around! And like crazy posted..its my dd excluders' that say she has been bringing them down with her anxious and miserable behaviour....good friends dont kick you when your down, nor do they simply decide, collectively (4 of them) that they have no place for my dd in their social group...these girls have been friends with my dd for 2 years...its not like working with someone you dont like...nothing like it. Idont think it was ;sensitive' post from mumblechum. It was prescriptive and cold. I am after support and help, but this was an inaccurate observation of the situation.
Thank you last post mumble...i do hope things dont get worse next week..back at school...i have been 'coaching' my dd to be positive and I have hopefully put some support in place with some of her older friends.....

raeosun girls are quite horrid to each other. I was wondering just the other day if it was just French girls as my dd has yet another problem with her group of 'friends' but no it looks like it is just girls. Dd has been suddenly dropped by her friends, I'm dreading Tuesday when they go back to school. I'm also hacked off as they were meant to be doing a school project together for next week and despite bloody facebook, mobile phones etc no one will answer her request to complete it.

I just don't know what the answer is I'm afraid. Normally I do let them get on with it and don't chat to the parents as one usually find the kids are ok chatting to each other and have forgotten their spat whilst the parents are seething and hateful to each other....

I've always tried to get dd to show that she isn't bothered by other's behaviour. Find someone else to talk to in the playground there normally is another group/singleton that they can chat to. At school I usually found people hated it if they thought they hadn't got the upper hand and would sidle back!

Good luck to your dd. Might be an idea to speak to the school if it carries on next week.

Well guys...my daughter went back to school yesterday...very anxious, but convinced that the bullies were not gonna get to her...
She had a gud day with new friends and ignored the bullies...then, last night...one of them text her a long appologetic text!! She asked my daughter to forgive her for being so cruel and said that one of the others felt sorry too...my daughter wants nothing to do with her..they ruined her Christmas holiday and my daughter has got her head around the true meaning of friendship...and she knows that the bullies were not true friends after all...a hard life lesson learnt, but learnt never the less..
Thanks for your support guys...Happy New Year..xx

Raeosun - I am so pleased that things are better for your dd - girls really can be horrible and I would have hoped that being in a larger group (6) would have made her less vulnerable to this.

Hope that things stay good.

Told you Karma's a bitch...didn't I OP?

Fantastic, Raeosun, well done you and your dd.

There's a thread here you might be interested in, too.