Mother worries

[Karid1496]

How does everyone cope with their child being at high school? I'm such a mess with worry about my child socially. I'm worried she's going to be left with no friends. She is a quieter girl until you get to know her and doesn't tend to go out a lot. She has been ditched by her best friend before and I'm in a constant state of tender hooks waiting for it to happen again. Im finding it so hard not to worry and feel like I'm failing miserably as a mother. Any advice is welcomed

I assume she’s year 7 - did she go up with any friends, has she made new friends yet? Tbh there’s not much you can do except boost her self-esteem so she’s confident in herself. Don’t make her think she’s ‘weird’ if she hadn’t got many friends, it’s a jungle out there!! If she does any out of school stuff then keep it up for as long as possible too.

I was painfully shy and self conscious at school but I still had lots of friends. There are loads of other quiet kids at school and we all seemed to make friends with each other. I also made friends with louder, more confident people. People don't dislike quiet people. Often we're seen as being good listeners. Also your daughter's fellow pupils will have a lot of time to get to know her and see beyond her quiet facade. I always found that in general once people got to know me they liked me. You might need to be patient with your daughter but I'm sure she'll make plenty of friends

Success for a mother of teens isn't about them having a charmed life with no failures or heartaches. It's about helping them to find the strength to cope with difficulties while remaining decent people.

And as SallyWD said, people don't actually hate shy people.

There will be quite a few other kids that are shy, my dd has never been that confident but she has still made lots of friends over the years.

I know that if she's started secondary school it is nerve racking. However you are going to wear yourself worrying over the next 5 years, often there will be a lot of friendship drama throughout secondary. And often there will be chnages in friend groups esp in the first couple of years.

There's nothing you can but just support her if things go wrong