Any advice? REALLY dislike DD’s new friend

[Lisa2677]

My 14yo DD is a quiet kid with lots of insecurities and has recently started hanging around with a girl I really dislike. She’s loud, brash and the total opposite of my DD. I’m very lucky that I have a very good relationship with my DD and she does communicate well. She told me this new friend shoplifts regularly while they are in town together but has sworn she’s never done it herself. She told me the friend smokes, vapes and drinks too, she’s only 13 and I’m terrified of where this friendship is going and what my DD sees in her. She is so different from her other friends and I’m afraid DD will lose her nice friends if she continues to hang around with her. I really don’t want them being friends but I know the best way to push them together is to stop her from seeing her. Any help or advice would be gratefully received.

Keep her busy. Redecorate her bedroom together. Go away to London for the weekend. Go to something at the NEC. Find some interesting out of school activities. Sewing, tap dancing, rock climbing.

Encourage the other friendships.

Invite her for tea regularly . Once she sees your dd has rules she will likely back away from the friendship. The girl not your dd.
Ime..

You are lucky that you have a good relationship. Make how her friendships are part of your conversations when you are talking together. Ask how she manages not to join in and if there's anything you can do to support this.

*join in with the shoplifting/ vaping etc

I think personally, and this is said in a kinder way than intended, your DD quite possibly doesn’t like all your friends either but keeps her nose out!

The worst thing you can do is try to come between them, either explicitly forbidding the friendship or implicitly by taking her to London, for example. To be honest, she’s going to want to be with her friends not you. The world is opening up for her in a way it doesn’t with your parents.

Talk to her. Ask her why she thinks her friend smokes and shoplifts - what’s the background. The trick here is to not judge. Coming between them will force them closer together.

Keep the lines of communication open OP. Don't ban her from seeing this girl but encourage other friendships and hope that things will fizzle out between them naturally.

@continuallychargingmyphone

That's really poor advice. She's her mother, whatever the dd thinks of her mother's mates is wholly irrelevant. Presumably her mother's mates aren't involved in criminal activities? She's 14 not 24 and needs guidance. She could very easily be implicated in any of those activities herself.
You need to try to distract through facilitating other friendships and prevent them meeting up whenever you can.

Your DD may be the help the other poor kid needs to turn away from her unhealthy and unhappy lifestyle.
Invite her round, make her welcome, give her a role model of normal family life and encourage her to join DD in fun activities that don’t involve lawbreaking.
It sounds like the child has problems, and is using alcohol, nicotine and the thrill of stealing as ways of distracting or comforting herself.
If your DD is mature for her age, you could even discuss this with her, and ask her to suggest ways you can both help her friend to have a happier time and ditch her self destructive habits.
Understanding and sympathy will be more effective than banning the friendship - you say you already know that would have pushed them closer together.
DD2 had a friend like this at school, who shoplifted, but she was stealing presents for friends at Xmas, as she was embarrassed she couldn’t afford to buy them in return for their gifts to her. She was caught while with DD, and the police got involved - luckily DD had receipts for all her own shopping. I felt heartily sorry for the girl and her mum, and invited her round in the holidays while I was out at work, deliberately to show I trusted her. The friendship lasted through school but fizzled out naturally when DD went off to uni.

My DN was like this at 13/14 - into the works inc weed etc. Family tried all sorts and nothing worked / my DD was ‘good influence’ on her, supposedly but only saw each other on a cousin basis so your DD’s good standing prob won’t help. Nothing implicitly wrong w her home life, just bored as older DB at uni, parents straightlaced/a bit anal and that was the recipe for disaster so we weren’t ‘saving’her from a bad home situation.
If I were you I would encourage your dd to see her other friends more, don’t get involved in the group that this girl is in and it’ll prob peter out ie, the girl will see your dd not interested in the vaping etc.
My DS, although a bit older, def has friends who vape etc - he’s been offered spliff but has said no - he was honest w me for saying he was even offered. Although he never says no to a bit of booze but he is 15 and generally ‘good’. As they get older you have less influence and just hope they take your ‘advice’ on board. At 13 you can still engineer things a bit but not for much longer.

Thanks everyone for your replies, it's a mine field alright! Myself and DD talk a lot about her motivations, apparently she is very unhappy at home, her mother is not a nice lady and DD has witnessed her shouting and being horrible to the friend.
I will try to approach this with more sympathy and try to help DD be a good influence on her instead of the other way around!
Thanks again ladies 🙂

Personally I would treat this friendship with caution. There's a chance your DD could end up in trouble by being in this girls company while she shoplifts. If this girl smokes and drinks then it's likely she will experiment with drugs too. While is counterproductive to ban the friendship completely I would make it as difficult as possible for them to spend too much time together and hope things fizzle out. A ban on hanging out with this girl in town while she shoplifts for a start.

DS had some pretty awful friends at this age and it was a worrying time. I think he was attracted by the idea of being part of the 'cool' crowd. As he didn't have many other friends it was either have a social life with people who might get him in trouble or have no social life.

He was however into sport so I made sure that we encouraged that and made it easy for him to do that and less easy for him to hang out with the drink/ drugs crowd.

Now he is older he seems to have moved on from that (most of them have left school for colleges) and we are breathing a sigh of relief.

So I guess the best advice is for you to keep encouraging the friendships with her other friends, invite them round, take them out together and keep the lines of communication open about why the things you don't like about this new friend are not a good idea.