Daughters being bullied - What to do?

good times

Thu, Jul 04 2013, 9:42 pm

In the past year we moved to a new (small) city. The problem pertains mainly to my daughter who just finished 3rd grade. I have several children but this is the first year that two of them are in grade school. I have found it to be a challenge and exhausting the amount of times my kids come home with stories of children being nasty to them. The school does not do to much about it and I don't find parents being overly receptive to issues that come up. I only call parents for really big things (usually physical or inciting others to not be friends with them etc) and mainly talk to teachers and administrators for the smaller things (as well as the big things) such as verbal nastiness. I have several questions. How can I protect my children from being bullied in school? How can I make the parents of the bullies and the administrators take these issues seriously? I am a very on top of it parent and teach my kids how to fight back and be assertive so others don't walk all over them as well as the importance of good midos and not behaving badly just because others do. I have also invited some of theses (bully) children over to make friends with my daughter (s) and made the play dates very fun (treats, projects etc). I am not sure what else to do and it makes me sick when I hear about how they are treated. I feel so helpless and sad. What can I do to make things easier for them?

FranticFrummie

Thu, Jul 04 2013, 10:01 pm

It sounds to me like you're doing everything right!

I try to put it this way "Those kids don't seem very happy. Happy kids just want to play, not to be mean. I wonder why they're so sad?" This makes my daughter more empathetic, and instead of feeling like a victim, she feels pity for kids who have to go through life being jerks. She doesn't need to know what goes on in the other kids' homes, that's irrelevant. She just needs to know that they must have some sort of disadvantage that makes them lash out at others.

She feels very fortunate that her home life is stable and loving enough that she doesn't have the need to wield power over others in order to feel good about herself. Knowing that the bullies are not so lucky helps her to not take things personally.