Helping 13 yr old DD with friendships

[Brightlights23]

Hi,

my DD, 13, is in tears again this evening, after discovering the other 2 girls in the trio have made plans for tonight but have been keeping it secret all week and when it was obvious today that they were doing something, then was in effect ignoring her.

we have had this on and off and recently got through some bullying (by other girls). My daughter is so upset that she is left out, they are lying about it until she sees evidence on social media. She asks other girls to meet up and do things but never gets anywhere.

She talks about a lot of other girls in her year, but when we’ve said to try to develop friendships with other girls she says she can’t as when she tries they are only interested in the friendship groups and no one allows them to join already existing groups.

she is in an all girls school and there are 210 girls in her year!

as a result of the bullying she is seeing the school counsellor as she found it hard to understand how her friends could still be friends with the bully knowing how horrible they were towards her, plus other stuff. She also has a year 12 peer mentor at school.

today she’s come home ill, plus with hormones and the confirmation that her friends have yet again planned something together, the lying all week and generally being rude to her today, she is beside herself.

I’ve told her to build friendships with other girls alongside this, but she’s tried before and got no where so is fearful of rejection.

she does netball out of school but it is only friendships while at netball.

I’ve suggested clubs at school but not interested.

She has a sleepover planned for last day of term with a friend and the pair that had plans tonight are also going. Just don’t think the pair will ever put the same effort in with her as she does with them and they have known each other since primary.

any tips on how to navigate her widening and building friendships outside of her core group. She just needs a wider circle so she can do things with others and not feel left out.

heartbreaking having her sobbing yet again.

thanks x

Toxic friendships. So common at this age sadly. There is nowhere like school when friends will be decided merely on chronological age as they are within these years. My daughter struggled very badly with this but then she's also autistic which definitely didn't help. If it helps she far happier now she's out of school.

Thank you for your reply.

it does seem to be very common. I’m not really sure what the answer is , as I suspect there are many other girls in the year having friendship issues.

difficult when you have a distraught child and you can’t fix it.

My dd didn't have the overt being left out but felt she hadn't found any friends. Also a girls school. She wasn't keen on clubs but I really encouraged her and now she has seemed to settle into friends a little more. Things like pottery club and choir. Choir in particular is good as they sometimes perform out of school time so that naturally means meeting up away from school.

I'm sorry. It's horrible when your kids are upset and you can't fix it.

Thank you.
yes with her it’s not always the obvious being left out/excluded but the not thinking of inviting her and people not responding to her asking about doing something. Might need to work on how she words it, in case it’s coming across as vague.

will look at the clubs school has and see if I can persuade her to join some in the new year. Choir would be a good idea if she hadn’t inherited my singing voice of sounding like a cat screeching!

It is horrible. I remember this age well and not fondly.

Unfortunately she may have to be a bit more strategic about friendships. Being in a trio with two girls who’ve known each other for years was unlikely to go well (I know hindsight is easy …)

She may do better to focus on the girls who don’t have an obvious pair/group, even if they don’t initially seem her type. I know she says they all have groups but I bet there’s a few quiet ones floating around who don’t, or who do but are kind of on the edge like her.

Does her school mix up classes? Ours did at year 9 and it was helpful to some extent. Even if they don’t, she will be in different groups in y10 depending on who chose what gcse subjects (appreciate that is a way off).

I would push the clubs at school to the extent you can. Chances are the ones at the clubs are open to making friends too.

Seek clubs that aren't attached to the school. If she's not binding wit others there it can't be forced. Does she have any hobbies or interests outside of school where she may find clubs and others she hasn't met yet

Of course if she is autistic she could also be misunderstanding intentions and behaviour of others and not knowing if it's a friendship or not. Masking. Fitting in. It's very complex and gets way harder for an autistic girl at teen level.

I don’t think the OP has mentioned autism. Girls are just catty at that age and can be very cliquey. Anyone who thinks slightly differently can just get excluded. It’s horrible and very distressing for the parent.
No advice OP other than what a pp said… that there will probably be girls on the periphery of other groups who are in the same “boat” . Often it gets better in year 10 when they are divided into different classes for GCSE.

Dd had this and still does to a certain extent. Suspected autism. I would really recommend she finds activities outside school to hold friendships and then at school try to find a new girl or a club she might like.

@aliceinanwonderland oops my bad. I had replied to another thread and didn't realise it wasn't that one.

Thank you for the replies.

yes becoming the third with the other 2 knowing each other since reception was always a risk. DD goes to the school in the next town and they all get the bus, which is where the friendship has developed. They are all in different forms so at least that helps.

the school us really good at mixing the forms up since they started in year 7 and she only the odd class is with her whole form. The boys school where my sons go, didn’t mix forms that much till year 9/10.

not autistic at all.

will look at clubs at school so she sees other girls. She does play netball but finds the autumn training at lunch useless, as not much time to play. After Christmas I will encourage this again as the session is then after school and she has one friend that plays and who is joining her netball club outside school.

she plays netball but most of the team go to school in the next town (not same town as where she goes) and even the 2 girls who live in our town go to try catholic school. She gets on really well with them all but there is no meeting up outside of training/ clubs.

will look at other interests and see what is available locally too.

why do they always want to be friends with the people that aren’t always the best choice. Think she might be beginning to see that they can not give her the same level of effort that she does and this could be the time when she starts to build other friendships.

just when the bullying situation has calmed down, now this. So glad we pushed for counselling through school as I will mention to her that she should talk about this situation at her next session. She just gets so upset with us, it’s hard to talk about it all.

I really felt your pain reading this I’m also
going something similar only that my daughter now Dosnt attend school. This must be making you really anxious and upset l. Leave the counselling sessions to do their job. Any time I try to talk to my daughter it makes it worse

I'd have a discussion with the school. Ask them to identify all the girls across the year group who are lonely or socially awkward and create a social club for them.

DS really struggled with friendships and his school had a breakfast club for people who hadn't made friends. They have all been friends now for 12 years and were by far the closest friendship group of their school year, the envy of all the more alpha groups that bullied each other.

Tell her not to judge girls who seem quirky or introverted or seem to have nothing in common with her, but to seek them out and organise some informal meet ups. If this happens regularly, the shared experience bonds them.

It might help to join some clubs outside school - drama or scouts or a sports club, whatever her interests are. And it could help to join the choir or orchestra - not exactly places to make friends ime as you just do the work and then leave, but it gives some structure to the week where she has a place to be. Same with any lunch time art or debating club.

Overall, help her develop some resilience and self-compassion with CBT techniques, so she learns early in life that there is nothing wrong with her and that she has the power to judge those ^friends6 and find them lacking due to their behaviour.

Also teach her that following SM is a route to FOMO and misery. People who post on SM a;ll the time are desperate to make others jealous. Just switch it off and do other things. She;ll be surprised how empowering it is.

Act asap, it can be so damaging at that age to be the target pf bullies and to believe there is something fundamentally unlikable about you that you can't fix. Build her self-confidence in any way you can.

There can be an awful lot of insecurity at that age and often insecure, frightened girls are weak friends. The desire to belong is massively wrapped up with having someone below you in the pecking order. It’s a difficult thing to stop once it starts and the best thing to do is move in from it - these girls used to be fun and friendly but now they aren’t. You can’t be below someone in the pecking order once you’ve left the order. I can guarantee that not every one of the 210 girls in her year has too many friends to be able to tolerate one more but it is definitely hard, especially after bullying and knock backs. When my dc was struggling with bullying and friendships the book “bigmouths, bullies and so called friends” was a game changer. You dd is probably a bit too old for that now but there are similar books aimed at teen girls (queen bees, drama queens and cliquey teens) which may be helpful. I think it’s important to separate the idea that bullying is not the victims “fault” from the idea that because you have been bullied then you don’t personally need to do anything about it to recover, move on and build better relationships in the future. It’s easy to think “this isn’t fair, Katie is a bully and is mean to me and now Alice and Emily are leaving me out and lying to me and hanging around with Katie when they know what she is like” Because it isn’t fair, but it not being fair doesn’t mean that Katie is going to unbully you and Alice and Emily are going to start including you again. Passivity doesn’t right everything that has gone wrong and you can’t go back, only forward and you are now building friendships from scratch rather than depending on habits formed in primary.
The worst things about having “no friends” in school is not having anyone in the dead time of break and lunch and the gaps between lessons. When you have been bullied it’s also the self consciousness of being seen to have nobody to hang around with as your former friends flick their hair and laugh. The absolute best thing she can do is join as many clubs as she can but it’s difficult if she doesn’t want to do this - perhaps the upset/sobbing is more about what she has lost in that her old friendships have weakened rather than upset that she is not able to make new friends. Perhaps she is still focusing on trying to get her old friends back so isn’t really invested in meeting new people at clubs (which would take away time with her old friends if she is still mostly hanging around with them). Which is fair enough really - she’s invested a decade in these people and needs to process those changes and negotiate the new terms.
Out of school I can’t recommend cadets highly enough. The bonds of friendships between those kids is incredible.

Thank you.

I am going to see if there are any youth groups locally as all other suggestions of activities and clubs have always been met with a no. Netball she enjoys going, but 5 of the 8 girls in the team are all at the same secondary school so see each other all the time. I will see if I can encourage her to arrange to meet someone.

DD does seem to have loads of friends, in her year and even in year above. Guessing she doesn’t feel that she has that close bond with anyone, although I think she thinks that she had it within the trio and the duo do!

am going to see if we can get a list of girls that we can start to encourage her to contact and then once lines of communication are open a bit more to move onto meeting up. We could suggest she has someone over on a Friday.

she has clear ideas on how she is as a friend and expects the same back, which unfortunately isn’t the case.

one of the duo definitely likes to be popular and is the one invited to do all sorts regularly, but it doesn’t appear that she invites them to do stuff with her. I also think they are just thinking about themselves like teenagers do and don’t think how my DD will feel or anyone else for that matter.

with only a week and half left till term ends, I will hold off on speaking to the school. I am not aware of any breakfast club for those having issues socially. Will also get across that she should speak to her counsellor about this situation, as she is more likely to listen to them than us.

have told her to not look at social media too much as well.

think what added to yesterday was that she came home ill before break and neither of the duo contacted her to ask why, and they had got the bus with her in the morning. Another friend did.

so hard.

It's very hard at this age (13). My daughter has had so so many friendship issues over the past 18 months. It is very draining for the child and also for parents. I get all what you are saying because we have experienced it and it is still ongoing with some different girls. Friendship issues has deeply affected our daughter in feeling left out, being ignored & has impacted on her motivation to learn at school. We are encouraging joining other clubs & making new friendships but it isn't going well at present due to self esteem matters. We are supporting increasing self confidence. It has been a v hard 18 months with teen friendship issues..

School refusal this morning from DD. It now transpires that her friends are not talking to her on the bus or really at school. They talk about things that she has not been included in outside of school and when asked if she was there, can only say no and then can’t join in the conversation.

at lunch times they are only allowed into their own form/class room and risk a sanction if caught by a teacher. As they are all in different forms and DD doesn’t like to disobey rules, she is on her own. Also the girl at the centre of the bullying is in the class that they all seem to congregate in so she avoids that.

so she has spent lunchtimes in the toilet by herself as no one is in her class room either.

I have emailed the form teacher to ask for any suggestions to help. We have suggested she ask one of her friends if she wants to go ice skating after school on Friday and have dinner - she is so unsure of herself and being rejected that she is thinking about it. Hoping she agrees.

we asked her to contact her peer mentor in year 12 and request to meet tomorrow (she will be back to school tomorrow) and talk to her about the issues and she if she has any Advice to help.

in her head the situation is a huge thing and we wonder as she is so negative with everything, that people are trying to communicate with her but she’s not open to it. She is fearful of rejection and is protecting herself. Not sure what answer is.

there is a youth group so will see if can get her to go along. She just has no confidence and it’s so sad to see. She was so upset this morning.

being a parent is very hard.

Did you tell the school she refusing to go in today due to bullying?
If so the school should ask for details.
Once your dd is feeling a little less out of sorts, ask her to write down the incidents of bullying, first draft is likely to be quite emotional, which is fine, but then ask her to re-write it, taking out all the emotions. Keep it factual and honest. School should deal with it.
If school don't deal with it, I'd strongly suggest moving her if possible.
Yes its utterly crap seeing your child hurting.
It's a big thing in her head, because it is a big thing OP, sounds like her confidence has taken a bashing, and it'll take a while to rebuild.
Bullying is never okay. School need to take this seriously.

Ugh it's so brutal isn't it. Your poor DD.

I think (as well as talking to school about the bullying) you need to concentrate on building your DD's confidence and rather than getting her to invite people to do stuff (because this is high risk), spend time doing things she likes and is successful at. What does she like doing? This doesn't have to be a competitive thing. In fact I feel like it's better if it isn't really.

Spend lots of time with people who build her up and make her feel like a good person to be - be that family, or your friends, or just you. It is so normal for us to want to go in and sort everything out for our kids but we just can't make people be friends with them. But we CAN try to help our kids feel like they are people worth being friends with.

Is there a library or something she can go to at lunch times? School can advise on this.

The bullying was dealt with and has stopped. The girl that was the cause of it is part of the wider social circle and all my DD friends are still friends with this girl. DD gets some looks and the odd comment but that is it and is just ignoring the girl.

we did spend time together yesterday as went Xmas shopping and she was fine. It’s the thought of school.

we can see family more but ultimately she wants friends that will talk to her, invite her to things, message her and be a friend.

inviting people over with hopefully help these relationships develop as in the larger groups at school this is not happening: my DD is a quieter child and isn’t as loud and outgoing as some are, which I am sure isn’t helping.

will continue to see if there is anything she can attend locally to help build confidence and self esteem.

moving schools is not necessarily the answer as friendships could be the same elsewhere. I have friends with girls in other local schools and same year as DD and it happens there too.

she is quite resilient after the bullying but this is too much for her deal with.

she has finally realised that although she wants to be close friends with certain members of the group, they are not going to be the friend she wants them to be.

will search for local things she can do and suggest.

very hard when they struggling so much. I can’t fix it for her, but I can offer suggestions on how she can help herself and make stronger friendships. Even if that means her friendship group changes.

In her head the situation is a huge thing and we wonder as she is so negative with everything, that people are trying to communicate with her but she’s not open to it. She is fearful of rejection and is protecting herself. Not sure what answer is.

This happened to DS2. There were two boys who were genuinely keen to become friends. Unfortunately neither of them lived near us, so there was no chatting on the way home or bumping into each other. But he just missed all the overtures of friendship from them. He is friends with both of them now, in adulthood. But it took him a long time.

Try to bolster her confidence by reminding her that she is too good for this manipulative bullying, and that there are dozens of girls in her year group who are nice and kind and loyal - she just needs to find them.

What do the other girls in her class do at lunchtime, that they are never in the form room?

@Brightlights23 I found this thread while searching for advice as my DD13 is in a very, very similar boat.

I just wondered how things have worked out for your DD after all this time. Was there a happy ending? And also do you have any tips for helping someone in this situation. I'm so worried about my DD I can't sleep!

@loopylou459

sorry to hear about your DD.

things improved a bit with my DD after the Xmas but a few weeks before the end of term in the summer it all imploded at a sleepover and we had to collect her in the early hours.

school agreed to move her to the other half of the year so she had to make friends and put her in a form with a friend who had left the original group.

autumn term wasn’t too bad overall. She is seeing a counsellor via school to help.

first half of spring term was not great and people weren’t talking to her for no real reason. Improved a bit before half term and then seemed ok mainly till Easter. This week again no one talking to her and struggled to get her in.

who knows if she is coming across as not wanting to talk as she can do this with family.

no bright ideas as at a loss of what to do.

she moved netball teams to be with eveyone from school and I’m sure in time it will but it’s a slow burner. They do have a tournament on Sunday so hoping 9am to 2pm will help build something friendships wise

@Brightlights23 thanks for the update. It sounds like a bit of a rollercoaster for her...and you! It's so hard to know what to do for the best in these situations really. I've thought about moving schools but maybe it would be too disruptive and it may not improve things anyway (I suspect most friendship groups are pretty well established by year 10 so hard to be the new person). It's excellent that your daughter has netball though - my DD refuses to do anything like that. I just hate the thought of her gritting her teeth through the next two years 😕