6th grade DD is being excluded from social events with longtime friends

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My oldest is 8 and this thread has me terrified.

I have twin daughters. From the moment they were born I thought, well, they'll have each other. And they do. Was still hard though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gotta love all the moms whose kids get dropped from a friend group and place blame on all the other kids and not look at their own child. And they throw out queen b and mean girls to rationalize that your kid is “so innocent” but maybe your kid did some things or are nothing like the rest of the group. That the other moms forced the friendship and your kid had fake friends for years. And now they are sick of mom engineered friend-based groups and moving on.

My youngest is high maintenance. I knew once Girl Scouts and group activities would start falling off, her friendships would too. It sucked but I am not an idiot to know that my daughter isn’t the coolest to hang out with. She is immature, likes playing kid games, and is kinda loud. Most of the other girls stayed friends. My daughter eventually found her tribe and all was well. I would never ever ever place blame on other children and name call them like some of you nasty moms here. And I certainly wouldn’t let my daughter bad mouth anyone. I made her rise above. She is even friendly with 2 of them again now that they are in 8th grade and she has matured more to their level.

The throwing around bully, mean girls, and queen b on friendships that die once they can do their own things is embarrassing. Over-involved moms are the toxic ones.

Your parenting style is not one I would hold up as some exemplary style. Nor is your post one that demonstrates your ability to "rise above." I literally laughed when read that, given how judgy, smug, and bit---y your post is.

Yikes, you laughed when the PP asked her daughter to rise above and not bad mouth other kids her age and move on? Is good parenting calling the parents, demanding their kid still gets to hang out, and make their kid conform to others.

What the heck is wrong with you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gotta love all the moms whose kids get dropped from a friend group and place blame on all the other kids and not look at their own child. And they throw out queen b and mean girls to rationalize that your kid is “so innocent” but maybe your kid did some things or are nothing like the rest of the group. That the other moms forced the friendship and your kid had fake friends for years. And now they are sick of mom engineered friend-based groups and moving on.

My youngest is high maintenance. I knew once Girl Scouts and group activities would start falling off, her friendships would too. It sucked but I am not an idiot to know that my daughter isn’t the coolest to hang out with. She is immature, likes playing kid games, and is kinda loud. Most of the other girls stayed friends. My daughter eventually found her tribe and all was well. I would never ever ever place blame on other children and name call them like some of you nasty moms here. And I certainly wouldn’t let my daughter bad mouth anyone. I made her rise above. She is even friendly with 2 of them again now that they are in 8th grade and she has matured more to their level.

The throwing around bully, mean girls, and queen b on friendships that die once they can do their own things is embarrassing. Over-involved moms are the toxic ones.

Thank you for being the only one here to not point fingers. There are always 3 sides to every story. Your daughter's side, their friend's side and the truth somewhere in-between. The fact is even before moms starting deciding friend groups in the 2000's + (which I personally think exacerbates this) friend dynamics change in middle school. Some mature faster than others. Some now have the autonomy for their own interests. Some have the choice to call on the phone or see who they want to see. And for many, there are a lot of new kids in middle school. My kid's school has 4 other ES that join in. Elementary school friendships rarely stay intact through high school. Sometimes they let go for awhile and come back, and others they just simmer and die. It seems that groups of girls that were forced to do all things together in ES definitely split apart. Same with boys. But the hurtful part is when a group of girls no longer connects with just one girl. But normally it severs in multiple places. Two stay friends, three go their own way. I can see how in this case the one girl feels excluded, especially if she was hanging onto this group instead of looking around at all the new friends she could make. And the mom is making it worse because she is wanting to keep the connection with the moms.

Maybe the other girls were mean, maybe the daughter was mean. Maybe the connection that forced them together all of the time is lost. It doesn't really matter. Teach your daughter self worth and move on and find friends that WANT to be with her. This will help her maintain positive relationships with woman AND men down the line. The mom that asked her to find out what bothered them and change it gave terrible advice. Unless your daughter is being abusive, she shouldn't change her personality, her quirks, or her values for ANYONE. She will find her people. Mom, ask her to invite a girl or two from school over to hang out this Friday. Get some pizza, make Halloween cookies, watch Hocus Pocus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Gotta love all the moms whose kids get dropped from a friend group and place blame on all the other kids and not look at their own child. And they throw out queen b and mean girls to rationalize that your kid is “so innocent” but maybe your kid did some things or are nothing like the rest of the group. That the other moms forced the friendship and your kid had fake friends for years. And now they are sick of mom engineered friend-based groups and moving on.

My youngest is high maintenance. I knew once Girl Scouts and group activities would start falling off, her friendships would too. It sucked but I am not an idiot to know that my daughter isn’t the coolest to hang out with. She is immature, likes playing kid games, and is kinda loud. Most of the other girls stayed friends. My daughter eventually found her tribe and all was well. I would never ever ever place blame on other children and name call them like some of you nasty moms here. And I certainly wouldn’t let my daughter bad mouth anyone. I made her rise above. She is even friendly with 2 of them again now that they are in 8th grade and she has matured more to their level.

The throwing around bully, mean girls, and queen b on friendships that die once they can do their own things is embarrassing. Over-involved moms are the toxic ones.

[Anonymous]

See this is the problem. Over-coddling moms who point fingers at others instead of themselves. The previous post is spot on and the retort from another mom is a picture of the mean girls. It's so immature for parents to bad-mouth kids. Like so petty and ridiculous and they see no wrong in it or themselves, or their own kids. I am right and you are wrong. What a way to parent!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:See this is the problem. Over-coddling moms who point fingers at others instead of themselves. The previous post is spot on and the retort from another mom is a picture of the mean girls. It's so immature for parents to bad-mouth kids. Like so petty and ridiculous and they see no wrong in it or themselves, or their own kids. I am right and you are wrong. What a way to parent!

I'm a parent that definately thinks "what did my kid do wrong" when I'm told stuff. I thought that with my girl in ES when her good friend (x) would make complaints about very petty stuff and that my kid was being mean, etc. (I was best friends with X's mom for awhile). Then I began learned to question the other kids involved when there were issues (via asking their moms, also good friends). Amazingly, I learned that 99.9% of the trouble in the group of 4 kids was kid X; the stories Mom of X was telling me were complete lies, and my kid was telling the truth 99.9% of the time. Kid X tried to control what they girls did at lunch/recess and tried to turn the other 2 against my kid in ES at times. Eventually, I learned that my kid was the one telling the truth and Kid X was the one "bullying" others. If kid x didn't get her way at recess (the girls would rotate who got to pick games each day, to try and keep it fair), she would pout and try to pull the others with her or she would tell my kid she couldn't sit at their table at lunch (and the other 2 kids were too shy, scared to say anything---my shy kid spent 2 months of first grade forced to eat at a different table by Kid X, yet Kid X was someone do activities with after school and Kid X would ask for playdates, etc. ). By 4/5th grade one other in the group learned to stand up to kid X as well and that helped put an end to it (my kid had always just walked away and would join another group) . Moved away in MS and then I heard even more stories about Kid X from my kid. Learned I should have done a lot more in ES---my kid stood up for herself the best she could and didn't turn mean. I think Kid X just did these things because she wanted more attention from her parents and she enjoyed being able to be mean and have the adults assume it was others being mean to her.

Also figured out by 4th/5th grade that Kid X's younger sibling (lets call them Kid Z) was a terror/violent/mean when around Kid X. I'm talking sending Kid X to ER a few times for throwing stuff/hitting hard/etc. Her Parents always believed Kid X and blamed the younger Kid Z. Then I had Kid Z with me and my kids several times for longer periods and I quickly learned Kid Z exhibited NONE of those behaviors when Kid X was NOT around (ie when not being bullied/taunted). I suspect the older sibling was bullying (verbal and extreme sibling physical taunting) and got away with it because the parents believe kid X and "no way my kid could be doing that, she said she wasn't so it's not possible". Kid X parents always complained about everyone else's kids, but Kid X could never do any wrong.

Well turns out they were very wrong. And this behavior was very mild compared to alot of what happened in ES

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:See this is the problem. Over-coddling moms who point fingers at others instead of themselves. The previous post is spot on and the retort from another mom is a picture of the mean girls. It's so immature for parents to bad-mouth kids. Like so petty and ridiculous and they see no wrong in it or themselves, or their own kids. I am right and you are wrong. What a way to parent!

+1

Also, it's worth pointing out that in the OP, the OP said "The group attending these events tends to be somewhat amorphous -- a portion of the group will be invited, in most cases -- but DD is never one of the kids included." To me, that shows it's less likely to be a mean girl/bullying thing and more likely just a normal shifting of friendships. If it was usually all of the girls minus OP's DD, then that's one thing. If get togethers are amorphous groupings of a portion of the girls, that's completely different. OP's DD was always most likely one of the more peripheral members of this group. Now that they're generally getting together in smaller groups, she's not going to be one of the few picked for something. It absolutely hurts, but it's not necessarily malicious on the part of the other girls.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:See this is the problem. Over-coddling moms who point fingers at others instead of themselves. The previous post is spot on and the retort from another mom is a picture of the mean girls. It's so immature for parents to bad-mouth kids. Like so petty and ridiculous and they see no wrong in it or themselves, or their own kids. I am right and you are wrong. What a way to parent!

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:See this is the problem. Over-coddling moms who point fingers at others instead of themselves. The previous post is spot on and the retort from another mom is a picture of the mean girls. It's so immature for parents to bad-mouth kids. Like so petty and ridiculous and they see no wrong in it or themselves, or their own kids. I am right and you are wrong. What a way to parent!

I'm a parent that definately thinks "what did my kid do wrong" when I'm told stuff. I thought that with my girl in ES when her good friend (x) would make complaints about very petty stuff and that my kid was being mean, etc. (I was best friends with X's mom for awhile). Then I began learned to question the other kids involved when there were issues (via asking their moms, also good friends). Amazingly, I learned that 99.9% of the trouble in the group of 4 kids was kid X; the stories Mom of X was telling me were complete lies, and my kid was telling the truth 99.9% of the time. Kid X tried to control what they girls did at lunch/recess and tried to turn the other 2 against my kid in ES at times. Eventually, I learned that my kid was the one telling the truth and Kid X was the one "bullying" others. If kid x didn't get her way at recess (the girls would rotate who got to pick games each day, to try and keep it fair), she would pout and try to pull the others with her or she would tell my kid she couldn't sit at their table at lunch (and the other 2 kids were too shy, scared to say anything---my shy kid spent 2 months of first grade forced to eat at a different table by Kid X, yet Kid X was someone do activities with after school and Kid X would ask for playdates, etc. ). By 4/5th grade one other in the group learned to stand up to kid X as well and that helped put an end to it (my kid had always just walked away and would join another group) . Moved away in MS and then I heard even more stories about Kid X from my kid. Learned I should have done a lot more in ES---my kid stood up for herself the best she could and didn't turn mean. I think Kid X just did these things because she wanted more attention from her parents and she enjoyed being able to be mean and have the adults assume it was others being mean to her.

Also figured out by 4th/5th grade that Kid X's younger sibling (lets call them Kid Z) was a terror/violent/mean when around Kid X. I'm talking sending Kid X to ER a few times for throwing stuff/hitting hard/etc. Her Parents always believed Kid X and blamed the younger Kid Z. Then I had Kid Z with me and my kids several times for longer periods and I quickly learned Kid Z exhibited NONE of those behaviors when Kid X was NOT around (ie when not being bullied/taunted). I suspect the older sibling was bullying (verbal and extreme sibling physical taunting) and got away with it because the parents believe kid X and "no way my kid could be doing that, she said she wasn't so it's not possible". Kid X parents always complained about everyone else's kids, but Kid X could never do any wrong.

Well turns out they were very wrong. And this behavior was very mild compared to alot of what happened in ES

posts like this are what concern me. You are so heavily involved and invested in your kid's lives. Are they able to think and do for themselves?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:See this is the problem. Over-coddling moms who point fingers at others instead of themselves. The previous post is spot on and the retort from another mom is a picture of the mean girls. It's so immature for parents to bad-mouth kids. Like so petty and ridiculous and they see no wrong in it or themselves, or their own kids. I am right and you are wrong. What a way to parent!

I'm a parent that definately thinks "what did my kid do wrong" when I'm told stuff. I thought that with my girl in ES when her good friend (x) would make complaints about very petty stuff and that my kid was being mean, etc. (I was best friends with X's mom for awhile). Then I began learned to question the other kids involved when there were issues (via asking their moms, also good friends). Amazingly, I learned that 99.9% of the trouble in the group of 4 kids was kid X; the stories Mom of X was telling me were complete lies, and my kid was telling the truth 99.9% of the time. Kid X tried to control what they girls did at lunch/recess and tried to turn the other 2 against my kid in ES at times. Eventually, I learned that my kid was the one telling the truth and Kid X was the one "bullying" others. If kid x didn't get her way at recess (the girls would rotate who got to pick games each day, to try and keep it fair), she would pout and try to pull the others with her or she would tell my kid she couldn't sit at their table at lunch (and the other 2 kids were too shy, scared to say anything---my shy kid spent 2 months of first grade forced to eat at a different table by Kid X, yet Kid X was someone do activities with after school and Kid X would ask for playdates, etc. ). By 4/5th grade one other in the group learned to stand up to kid X as well and that helped put an end to it (my kid had always just walked away and would join another group) . Moved away in MS and then I heard even more stories about Kid X from my kid. Learned I should have done a lot more in ES---my kid stood up for herself the best she could and didn't turn mean. I think Kid X just did these things because she wanted more attention from her parents and she enjoyed being able to be mean and have the adults assume it was others being mean to her.

Also figured out by 4th/5th grade that Kid X's younger sibling (lets call them Kid Z) was a terror/violent/mean when around Kid X. I'm talking sending Kid X to ER a few times for throwing stuff/hitting hard/etc. Her Parents always believed Kid X and blamed the younger Kid Z. Then I had Kid Z with me and my kids several times for longer periods and I quickly learned Kid Z exhibited NONE of those behaviors when Kid X was NOT around (ie when not being bullied/taunted). I suspect the older sibling was bullying (verbal and extreme sibling physical taunting) and got away with it because the parents believe kid X and "no way my kid could be doing that, she said she wasn't so it's not possible". Kid X parents always complained about everyone else's kids, but Kid X could never do any wrong.

Well turns out they were very wrong. And this behavior was very mild compared to alot of what happened in ES

posts like this are what concern me. You are so heavily involved and invested in your kid's lives. Are they able to think and do for themselves?

Yeah, PP! Don’t you know that bullies should be allowed to bully as they please?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:See this is the problem. Over-coddling moms who point fingers at others instead of themselves. The previous post is spot on and the retort from another mom is a picture of the mean girls. It's so immature for parents to bad-mouth kids. Like so petty and ridiculous and they see no wrong in it or themselves, or their own kids. I am right and you are wrong. What a way to parent!

+1 Million. I have heard so many times people accuse other kids of being mean/bullying without realizing that their kids are treating other kids meanly too.

[Anonymous]

The teachers has mentioned this shift of friendship at the end of 5th grade, 6th grade and throughout middle school many times. A big shift they said. Kids start to find their real interest and not the interest of their parents.
And you just hope the social skills you taught your kids will kick in. And activities is where people meet other people, even for adults.
So, your child can not be looking at a screen all week long. He/She needs to be doing something. Try a new thing. Find an interest. And at this age, it is hard because they no longer want to be controlled by the parents.

[Anonymous]

I think what helped, is that I had school friends and neighborhood friends. Some of my neighbor friends went to my school, but I still kept friends separate. I usually only hung out with my neighbor friends. Very rarely with school friends out of school. I felt no pressure to change much because I didn't see them as often.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gotta love all the moms whose kids get dropped from a friend group and place blame on all the other kids and not look at their own child. And they throw out queen b and mean girls to rationalize that your kid is “so innocent” but maybe your kid did some things or are nothing like the rest of the group. That the other moms forced the friendship and your kid had fake friends for years. And now they are sick of mom engineered friend-based groups and moving on.

My youngest is high maintenance. I knew once Girl Scouts and group activities would start falling off, her friendships would too. It sucked but I am not an idiot to know that my daughter isn’t the coolest to hang out with. She is immature, likes playing kid games, and is kinda loud. Most of the other girls stayed friends. My daughter eventually found her tribe and all was well. I would never ever ever place blame on other children and name call them like some of you nasty moms here. And I certainly wouldn’t let my daughter bad mouth anyone. I made her rise above. She is even friendly with 2 of them again now that they are in 8th grade and she has matured more to their level.

The throwing around bully, mean girls, and queen b on friendships that die once they can do their own things is embarrassing. Over-involved moms are the toxic ones.

Your parenting style is not one I would hold up as some exemplary style. Nor is your post one that demonstrates your ability to "rise above." I literally laughed when read that, given how judgy, smug, and bit---y your post is.

Yikes, you laughed when the PP asked her daughter to rise above and not bad mouth other kids her age and move on? Is good parenting calling the parents, demanding their kid still gets to hang out, and make their kid conform to others.

What the heck is wrong with you?

You should be directing that to the other poster, who was indeed judgmental, smug, and bi---y.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Gotta love all the moms whose kids get dropped from a friend group and place blame on all the other kids and not look at their own child. And they throw out queen b and mean girls to rationalize that your kid is “so innocent” but maybe your kid did some things or are nothing like the rest of the group. That the other moms forced the friendship and your kid had fake friends for years. And now they are sick of mom engineered friend-based groups and moving on.

My youngest is high maintenance. I knew once Girl Scouts and group activities would start falling off, her friendships would too. It sucked but I am not an idiot to know that my daughter isn’t the coolest to hang out with. She is immature, likes playing kid games, and is kinda loud. Most of the other girls stayed friends. My daughter eventually found her tribe and all was well. I would never ever ever place blame on other children and name call them like some of you nasty moms here. And I certainly wouldn’t let my daughter bad mouth anyone. I made her rise above. She is even friendly with 2 of them again now that they are in 8th grade and she has matured more to their level.

The throwing around bully, mean girls, and queen b on friendships that die once they can do their own things is embarrassing. Over-involved moms are the toxic ones.

Your parenting style is not one I would hold up as some exemplary style. Nor is your post one that demonstrates your ability to "rise above." I literally laughed when read that, given how judgy, smug, and bit---y your post is.

Yikes, you laughed when the PP asked her daughter to rise above and not bad mouth other kids her age and move on? Is good parenting calling the parents, demanding their kid still gets to hang out, and make their kid conform to others.

What the heck is wrong with you?

You should be directing that to the other poster, who was indeed judgmental, smug, and bi---y.

+1