Fragile confidence and self esteem

[mummyflood]

DS2 (14) has been having quite significant problems with the above for the last year or so, and we are currently awaiting a CAMHS appointment as the school have become involved as he had a couple of 'breakdowns' - crying, extremely distressed, etc. around the time of the options choices, and was seeing the connexions advisor very regularly. He is quite a sensitive, slightly immature 14yr old.

Over the last few weeks however, he seems to have turned a corner and has been much more upbeat and positive, having found a small group of seemingly nice friends who he walks to and from school with and spends time with within school. One of the boys is a re-acquaintance from primary, who he has also seen out of school a few times over the last few months, and I am keeping my fingers crossed that this upward spiral continues. We have really been through the mill with this issue, and it breaks my heart to see DS in the state he was getting in. He felt he had no friends and couldn't imagine how he was going to get through the next two years at school. There were a couple of other issues going on as well - I think he is struggling with some aspects of puberty.

However, to cut to the chase, there is a particular boy who, without being openly nasty, is making DS's life a bit difficult at the moment. DS was starting to consider this boy a friend, and said boy sounds like he is one of the more popular kids. He is certainly intertwined with the group that DS is a part of at the moment. Apparently if DS is talking to any of their mutual friends, said boy will 'commandeer' said friend, with something along the lines of 'oh, Fred, come over here with me, I want you to do xyz', and attempt to march them off, leaving DS standing. DS did mention this a few weeks ago, to which I advised him to take no notice, it probably happens to others as well, but he has now said it is happening quite a lot more. DS was also trying to take a couple of photos of a few of them the other day for his facebook (a recent thing, of which I have mixed feelings!!) and said boy was again trying to disrupt things by trying to persuade the other kids not to participate, etc, without directly saying so. You know the type of thing.

Does anyone have any good advice as to how DS would be best handling this? I would hate for him to go backwards again and convince himself that no-one wants to know him, etc - we have had that by the shedload, however as they have several mutual friends, and DS is starting to get a bit p**ed off at school by the sounds of it, I would hate for him to handle it badly and alienate the still fragile social scene he has developed over the last few weeks.

any words of wisdom, anyone?

My DS is 13 and doesn't have any problems with self esteem/confidence but still has issues with other boys who are supposed to be his friends 'behaving like idiots' as he puts it. Fortunately he is quite open about the whole thing and we usually talk it through - I try to give a perspective on why the other boy was behaving that way and offer suggestions for how to handle it. It doesn't stop them all behaving in an immature way but it does mean that my DS is less likely to take it personally.

I'd make sure your DS gets a chance to talk about it to you and then give him several suggestions on how to handle it such as taking photos with whichever boy is the most friendly or offering the annoying boy the chance to pull a face in his own photo. Then your DS is free to do none of the suggestions but at least he feels he has some choices and a bit more control over the situation.

Mummy

I really feel for you as this teen friends thing takes up so much 'head space' as a parent.(give me a toddler tantrum any day, wait a minute, he's still doing those )

IME boys tend to hang out alongside each other without being 'close' and 'sharing 'in the way girls are, and as a woman I admit to finding it hard to comprehend.

My son is tentatavely making friends, but still lacks the self belief that others find him likeable.

I am sure you have considered this but are there any activities your son could join that he could build a skill in, in his own right, such as martial arts, sailing, boys only dance classes, scouts, drama, teen gym etc?

Fortunately my son is still very close to my darling god-daughter, his friend since babyhood and this helps them both as they accept each other like siblings.
Does he have any non school family friends like these he can meet up with and reassure him that he's a good lad?

Thanks webwiz & iwas.

Apparently this boy was ok yesterday and today, and we have had a chat about different ways DS could react if he feels bad again. Fortunately DS is definitely a 'talker', and often asks to have a chat with me about his feelings/issues.

Webwiz, about giving him a perspective about other boys behaviour - that's something that has cropped up previously with another friend - was having quite a difficult time at home and was acting up with everyone and everything. At the time we had a talk about how he might be feeling, and how he was probably expressing it in bad behaviour towards everyone. He has now started to mature into a lovely lad - he's the one from primary who DS is re-acquainting with.

iwas - dead right about the amount of headspace this involves!! DS1 has recently discovered girls big-time, and is finding out the hard way how 'complicated' they can be emotionally. He seems to have an uncanny knack of upsetting them without even trying! When facebook is involved as it usually is, it drives me MAD!!

DS2's 'thing' is tennis, he goes a couple of times a week and enjoys the banter with the coaches as much as the game itself. So we are encouraging him in that, and hopefully he will shine in p.e. when they start playing - next week I think.