My 5 yr old girl doesn't have close female friends and never has. Advice?
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Anonymous
| Sounds like it's over for her. If she's 5 and she hasn't had any deep female friendships yet, it's probably never going to happen. Sorry. |
Anonymous
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When I was a little girl, all my friends were boys. This was chiefly because of geography as mine was a neighborhood of boys. You are right to be concerned Girls and boys do naturally separate out later on in age. It's not anyone's fault but there came a point when the moms did not want to invite me to slumber parties because I was a girl. Boys and girls started to have crushes and I was the weird oddball that didn't fit in with my peer group. And now, parents often choose to do boy only or girl only parties just for an easy, seemingly "nice" way to cut down on birthday party invitee numbers. I did eventually make some friends who were girls but there was a weird transition period when I was lonely and felt left out of everything.
I'd say to maintain the friendships she has now, but to also try to cultivate a couple of girl friendships because yes, it is good to have all kinds of friendships. |
Anonymous
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If left to figure it out themselves, the kids don't segregate themselves by sex/gender as early as you might think.
DD's second grade class seems to split out into three groups for recess, free play and lunch -- there are a handful of girls who play together, a handful of boys who play together, and a mixed group of boys and girls who play together. The mixed group is bigger than the other two. And of course there's plenty of movement between them, too. But no one is on the "outs" because they choose to play with the other sex/gender. Adults think and worry about this far more than kids do. Let your child find her way. She'll be fine. |
Anonymous
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I know this is taking a hard left turn but here goes...I didn't have a girl friend until I was almost 8 years old. I have all brothers and every house on my block - every single one - was all boys. I wanted desperately to have a friend - any friend - but it was the late 70s and boys just didn't play with girls (even tomboys like I was). So an older boy started paying attention to me and playing with me and you can probably guess where this is going - he molested me for 3 years (starting at age 5). Finally a new housing development went up next door and a girl my age moved in and suddenly I had a best friend (turned out to be my best friend for life, we are in our mid-40s and still are very close).
I guess my point of sharing this story is that little kids NEED friends. If boys will play with your DD that's great - but be careful about the age of the boys and keep a close eye on her. How my parents didn't know or think to question my friendship with an older boy...that just baffles me to this day. |
Anonymous
+1 Your daughter is very smart social-emotionally! The fact that she avoids the not -so- nice girls is huge, kudos to her! And the fact that she has boy and girl siblings and navigates those friendship circles with ease, tells me she is self confident and pleasant, and you have nothing to worry about! |
Anonymous
This was me. Not too many close girl friends and tons of male friends my entire life. Worked out fine until about four or five years ago when a lot of my male friends were getting married; and I discovered a lot of their significant others didn't like me or found me threatening. I've been married for eleven years and have four kids, so it's not like they could think that I was a threat romantically. It made me depressed at the time because I lost three friendships with people who had literally known me for decades. If I could go back, I probably would have made more of an effort to be friends with girls. Op, this is probably not an issue and likely never will be. But if you are concerned about something like my story happening (which honestly probably isn't common), maybe get her involved in classes or activities that only attract girls. Things like ballet, or girls softball, or maybe gymnastics. You could also proactively set up play dates for her. Kids that age aren't mean and will play with someone if they show up at their house. |
Anonymous
Thank you for sharing this. I'm so sorry that happened to you! If I may ask, what age was the boy? And other than age, were there any other red flags your parents -or any parents - should have noticed, or should notice? I'm glad you found your best friend for life at that age! Also not very common! |
Anonymous
Also in agreement. Your DD sounds smart, sticking with the kids who are nice to her, while according to you, what would make a good friend is "some cute little girl in her class." So what if she doesn't have a "huge social calendar" like her sister? If you really want to support her friendships, with boys or girls, find out if there are any kids she'd like to have over, and initiate playdates. Otherwise, be supportive of her and the type of person she is, rather than the type of person you think she should be. (And if you're wise, you'll also help your 7-year-old develop friendships with a broad range of people, not just 3 BFFs. If and when some of those relationships fall apart, you might start to see the value of your younger daughter's ability to get along with everyone.) |
Anonymous
So sorry. My male younger cousin had a best friend who was a girl when he was around nine. The boys next door who were 12 or 13 came over and asked to play hide and seek with them. My mom and I were there and thought nothing of it and would have said yes, but my aunt was suspicious and said no to protect the little girl. |
Anonymous
I was this girl. I didn't really have female friends until after engineering graduate school - by then the men had paired off with wives so no more playing with the boys. I now have a ton of female friends and I totally love them (going on 20 years of female friends now). I guess that i was basically a boy growing up - I didn't really like girls. I grew up in a rich area and the girls could be very catty and mean and didn't care about much except for weird social issues that I didn't care about. I mean, come on, I was a future engineer I was a bit more academic. My mom sent me to an all girls high school too - NIGHTMARE! I'm now married with kids and women friends. Women are a lot more fun as adults then as boy desperate teens. I love my women friends now so much I would pretty much die without them. Let your daughter do as she pleases and don't criticize or try to change her please. I also basically dressed as a boy growing up (now I'm tall and beautiful and like prettier clothes. Started in high school maybe?) which drove my mother insane - don't be that mom. Her insanity never helped or changed anything. And just in case you are wondering I have gay female friends now - and they always had a LOT of women friends. In fact they had very very few male friends, they almost exclusively had all female friends. Just something that I have noticed from my lesbian friends. |
Anonymous
| Thanks everyone. I thought I was clear but maybe I wasn't with the fact that it's not that I don't want her playing with boys. I'm more concerned about boys dropping HER and she being left with no friends as kids age and start to flock to their genders. I am happy she has friends, any friends. I, like all parents, just want my child to be happy and having a social sphere is a part of what makes children happy. That was all. I'm not trying to change her and I think the friends she has are very nice boys, as are their families. |
Anonymous
Don't worry about it now. It's entirely possible that they won't drop her (as several PPs have illustrated). If they do, it's a teachable moment about why some parents encourage their kids to gender segregate. |
Anonymous
+1 |
Anonymous
| She's FIVE. Please get a grip. |
Anonymous
| Yeah, you need to get a job. |