Reply to 13 birthday party drama

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Wow. This is a hard one.

I know from experience that not inviting the mean girls will almost certainly means that your kid will start getting bullied by them.

If you try to do separate activities with either your DD and the mean girls or DD and the one friend, it could still lead to bullying. Example, you do something separate with the bullies and they lord it over everyone how much better/special they are to the other girls in the group. Or you take the solo friend and the mean girls find out and just bully her over that.

I’d invite everyone and the email all of the parents a note like, [b]“I’ve heard rumblings of bullying behavior in the group. This behavior will not be tolerated. I’ll have a chat with the girls before the party starts but would appreciate if everyone reminded their kids to not bully.”[/b] Or something to that effect. [/quote]

I've worked with girls this age and have my own daughter and I can tell you

[b]a.) Many moms of bullies will not even consider the fact their own child could be a bully. Denial runs deep.
b.) Relational aggression is often done in such a passive aggressive way it is hard to call someone on it and you could cause a big issue if the kid tells her parents she was falsely accused.
[/b]
  During years our kids are in these kind of sticky groups we just have a family birthday or allow just one friend for a special hang out. Our son also has these situations some years. If our kid chooses the bully for the hangout we decline. My kids can choose their friends, but we do nothing to help support friendships with mean kids and we talk with our kids about what truly matters in life. Life is too short to waste time obsessing over parties where  kids could either be bullied or feel ostracized. This isn't about special snowflakes. It's about us not spending money entertaining kids who can't be kind to eachother and not having to police them.[/quote]

I'm another person who works with kids this age and I want to add on one more to the PP's great points:
c) Relational aggression is a learned trait and most frequently girls who use relational aggression have learned it from their mothers at home.  It is highly doubtful that the mothers will even recognize the daughters' behaviors as bullying or mean girl behavior, and it is very likely that the pack will turn on you and your daughter.

So while I appreciate the kindness of your thoughts, I do not thing there is any amount of hovering or pre-messaging that will "protect" the girl being bullied if she is at the party.  Unfortunately, I think you will either need make the party very small with two or three best friends, or you should just have a home party with family and maybe one friend.

I think your daughter should seriously consider saying something to her guidance counselor at school so that they can begin to attack the problem.  Relational aggression won't fade away.  It needs to be addressed.[/quote]

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