Dear all,
I am not from the UK, but from „the Continent“, but don‘t want to discuss this topic in my local forum as simply my DD would kill me if she knew I was discussing this topic in public. Hence I feel safer here and hope you don’t mind :-)
And sorry for the loooong story to come.
Anyway, the story is maybe simply stupid and I may be stupid as well and completely overreacting, but if so please tell and this may help me to cope with the situation.
My 14 year old DD had her first boyfriend last year, the were together for 6 months and a nice couple, very much in love with each other. Then in January this year he broke up due to „lack of feelings“. Actually, his sister and also his mom said he had new friends who were weird and since he had been with those friends he had changed…So far so good so acceptable, this is life. My girl coped with it bravely, blocked him on social media and life went on. A few months later, just a few days before she went on a longer pupil exchange abroad, she coincidently bumped into him, he was with some friends and the friends made fun of her saying that he had never loved her anyway. 30 min later she received an message from him on WA (which she had not blocked) where he wrote that he wants to apologize for his „stupid friends“ and what they had said wasn’t true, he had loved her for real and urgently wanted her to know this. They shortly discussed the matter and then unblocked each other on social media. From that day on they were in virtual touch again, and the contact grew more and more intense, mainly from his side. By this time she had left the country already to go on the exchange and they wrote each other daily via Snapchat. Then he went away for holiday with his family. He wrote very much with my daughter and finally wrote her that he had made a huge mistake breaking up with her, that he always thought about her and that he missed her so much. They then had a 6 hours phone call where he explained that his new friends back then had driven him to break up, that he had been so miserable afterwords, etc. So they became a couple again (virtually). For one week they talked with video and audio chat basically every minute of the day, talking about how much they loved each other. Then the boy came back from vacation and two days later he broke up with her again. He wrote it all had been a mistake, he had taken his memories for love and now had realized it was no love. Ok, feelings are feelings and we cannot control them, my daughter needed again to accept this. She called him to say that she didn’t have any hard feelings against him, but would block him again and they should not have any more contact. Ok, sad story, but again, this is life.
Unfortunately the story doesn’t stop here as the boy now started to tell everybody that he had only been with her in the beginning because he wanted to be with her sister and as soon as the sister had her own boyfriend he broke up with my daughter because she had not been of any use any more (which is a lie because the sister got her boyfriend a few weeks later). And the second time he had approached her he only did it because he wanted to „fxxx“ her (sorry for the wording) and she was so ugly anyway. My assumption is that he wanted to be cool with his friends because as long as he was on vacation all was fine and as soon he was back with his friends he changed his mind. I assume the friends had told him something like „what do you want with her, she is ugly anyway, are you stupid to be together with her again…“. Ok, you know, I can understand him in a way, this is maybe what a boy of 15 years does to be accepted in the cool gang. He is cool from the outside, but very insecure from the inside. He had told my daughter a lot about himself during their time together.
The problem is that he is not just a boy with 5 friends. He is extremely popular and basically knows everybody. And everybody in his school, in her school and beyond seems to know. My daughter gets approached by a lot of people about this story. She e.g. posted on Instagram and one boy commented whether she was „the ugly ex girlfriend of xyz“.
The situation is quite awful for her. She has always been nice and kind and understanding. And this is what she gets. I know the boy, he has been in our house three times a week. I really liked him and we took him in our family without problems. I cooked for him, I drove him every single time he came to our house. He also liked me and during the week they were together again he even apologized for whatever (he had not broken up with me, but we had a close relationship and I think he wanted to express that he didn’t want to make my daughter or me unhappy).
Also she met his family. His first girls friend he had never introduced to his family, but he took my daughter home and she was part of dinners or bowling events and all family liked her a lot. He even told his old grandmother in a far away country about her, I know for sure that what he says is not true, he cared for her a lot, at least in the beginning, about the second time it looked like, but who knows, it may have just been nostalgia. But still there were thoughts and feelings. And then his peer group makes him do such things to fit in. It is awful to see this nice boy telling such things about my daughter. And he is having a lot of fun while my daughter is miserable. Not because she was dumped twice, or at least not only. But because his stupid talking is ruining her social standing. Because how many kids will be friends with her or date her if this stigma is on her as the ugly ex of xyz who was just used to get the sister, etc. She will come back from the exchange soon and she plays cool, but I know she is not. She is wondering which side some of her friends will take. She may change school (for other reasons), but even there many people know him. Yes, she will find out who her real friends are, but this is not a lot of help for a teenager who also is working hard on developing true self-confidence (not the fake one she puts on display right now). Too many people have told her that her sister was prettier than her…once she went to a youth center with him and her sister - and some stupid friends of his came and asked him why he had chosen her and not her sister. My daughter is not ugly, but even if the sister may be a bit prettier, why do boys need to raise this topic without being asked? Obviously the boy, as said being insecure himself, can’t cope with such situations.
Basically he is polishing his social standing by ruining hers.
Does this all make a bit of sense? Sorry for being so detailed, but I tried to give the full picture as far as possible. I don’t know what to do, do I need to intervene and if so, how? Or just be there for my daughter because this is just normal kids‘ stuff? I just don‘t know, it would be so helpful to get your views please. Thank you so much for reading and letting me use your forum!