DD first mean girl experience help

[Anonymous]

DD13 attended a friend’s birthday party over the weekend. The friend is obsessed with collecting scented hand sanitizer from Bath and Body Works…it’s her thing, according to DD…so she thought it would be fun to make her a gift basket of different scents and keychain covers. I questioned it at first and she said she was sure, her friend loved these.

The day of the party she texted me to get her early, said she wasn’t feeling well but wanted me to pretend like she had to leave early. I picked her up and when she got in the car she burst into tears and said her friend opened the gift and immediately laughed at it and said something along the lines of, what kind of person gives hand sanitizer as a gift, and the whole room exploded in laughter. She said she doesn’t want to be the girl’s friend anymore.

I sort of just comforted her and didn’t know what else to say. Now I’m questioning what to do as a parent. Do I allow DD to still be friends with this girl if she changes her mind? It just feels messy and I don’t know what to do or say to DD.

[Anonymous]

I'm pretty surprised that she's 13 and this is her first mean girl experience.

B-day girl, sucks, OP. We all know that. Be supportive, and follow your daughter's lead. If she can forgive and forget, then so should you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm pretty surprised that she's 13 and this is her first mean girl experience.

B-day girl, sucks, OP. We all know that. Be supportive, and follow your daughter's lead. If she can forgive and forget, then so should you.

You’re right I’m sure, but it was the first real big one to be sure. Thanks for the advice

[Anonymous]

Take a breath. 13 year old girls have hormones and are learning to navigate friendships. It's messy sometimes. You shouldn't do or "allow" anything. She has to go through this, feel the feelings, make her own decisions. You can remind her that friends make us feel good, not bad. And that friends sometimes say things they regret. Who knows. Give them time to work through it.

[Anonymous]

I'd follow her lead. I also have no problem telling my kid that some kids are immature and that they kind of suck. Especially that tween/early teen age.

[Anonymous]

Look, you mean well, but you are way too involved in trying to direct your child's social life.

"Allow her" to be friends? The days of picking your kids friends ends in middle school. She needs to learn these tough lessons for herself -- what real friendship is and isn't, and how much she is willing to put up with.

If she wants to talk -- listen. Give her the standard advice that real friends don't laugh at you or make your feel bad about yourself. Tell her she is wonderful and assure her that she will make true friends, but it can take a while to find your people. Encourage her to give overlooked girls a try. But in the end she's the one who has to navigate this world, not you.

--mom of two HS daughters

[Anonymous]

When I think of “mean girl” behavior, I think of repeated moves designed to exclude others. I’m going to offer that this may be more about immature 7th graders. The girl blurted out something rude followed by spontaneous laughter. They’re all just fools sometimes.

As another poster said, follow her lead. You could role play some different scenarios so that dd is ready with a response. The birthday girl might come up to her as if nothing happened. She might not talked to your dd. She might come up to her and say something rude. Talk through how your dd might respond to each of those situations.

[Anonymous]

Mom of grown daughters here. This will happen, it happened to both my girls. You teach them that when people show you who they are, believe them. It's okay to back away, go solo for a bit until you find a new friend or group.

The last thing you want is to imply as her mother that you stay with a friend who treats her like that. Nope, not okay, it's okay to wipe her hands and to walk away. Always have your dignity, and self-respect. You will run into other people in life who will treat you badly, and they will do it for as long as you allow it. Say no.

[Anonymous]

She's 13 and this is her first mean girl issue? She's lucky! Maybe she got it wrong and the girl collects scented hand lotion but not hand sanitizer. Whatever, she should shrug it off. The best social skill you can have is being able to laugh at yourself and being able to defuse a situation. She should have laughed too and said "Yeah, I wanted you to be prepared to perform all kinds of surgery" or "Yep, this way you can coordinate with your outfits" or something. Just roll with the joke instead of taking offense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:She's 13 and this is her first mean girl issue? She's lucky! Maybe she got it wrong and the girl collects scented hand lotion but not hand sanitizer. Whatever, she should shrug it off. The best social skill you can have is being able to laugh at yourself and being able to defuse a situation. She should have laughed too and said "Yeah, I wanted you to be prepared to perform all kinds of surgery" or "Yep, this way you can coordinate with your outfits" or something. Just roll with the joke instead of taking offense.

Wonder if the other girls did not know about the hand sanitizer obsession and so bday girl was trying to play it off…. Reality is like other posters say, almost all girls insecure at this age and say and do stuff daily that will sting others. The more can teach daughter to be strong in herself the better- then she can decide if still hang with people or pull back.

[Anonymous]

This isn’t mean girl behavior. They are 13. The other girl was insensitive and had poor manners, but it doesn’t sound like she was trying to be mean.

If your DD feels slighted and doesn’t want to be her friends, fine. I would just support her and stay neutral.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Look, you mean well, but you are way too involved in trying to direct your child's social life.

"Allow her" to be friends? The days of picking your kids friends ends in middle school. She needs to learn these tough lessons for herself -- what real friendship is and isn't, and how much she is willing to put up with.

If she wants to talk -- listen. Give her the standard advice that real friends don't laugh at you or make your feel bad about yourself. Tell her she is wonderful and assure her that she will make true friends, but it can take a while to find your people. Encourage her to give overlooked girls a try. But in the end she's the one who has to navigate this world, not you.

--mom of two HS daughters

This is it. It sucks. She more than likely will go back to the crappy friend (and more than once) and you have to just watch. They figure it out and it's important they do figure it out. You just keep messaging what PP said. True friends don't make you feel this way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mom of grown daughters here. This will happen, it happened to both my girls. You teach them that when people show you who they are, believe them. It's okay to back away, go solo for a bit until you find a new friend or group.

The last thing you want is to imply as her mother that you stay with a friend who treats her like that. Nope, not okay, it's okay to wipe her hands and to walk away. Always have your dignity, and self-respect. You will run into other people in life who will treat you badly, and they will do it for as long as you allow it. Say no.

Just be careful you're not so heavy handed that if your DD wants to go back to being friends she feels she needs to hide it from you. They're kids. It often takes a couple rounds for them to figure out their boundaries and if you make them feel like you'll judge them for being friends with someone again, they'll just stop talking to you about anything.

[Anonymous]

Every kid will have some blunders they regret or may not even notice. Some are especially egregious like this bday girl who is probably so preoccupied and overloaded, she wasn't being thoughtful. Hope your dd can shake off the sting and maybe give the girl a second chance.

[Anonymous]

I just asked my 13 year old how she would feel if someone gave her hand sanitizer in a basket for her birthday. She chuckled and said she'd say thank you, and wouldn't be rude becauae she wouldnt want that eorson to feel bad, but, she'd be wondering why someone would give that as a gift. Your DD will be fine. I don't know if it's worth ending a friendship over. It's totally up to her on that. Make sure she knows going forward, what is appropriate to give as a gift and what is not.