Bullying – When it becomes a lose/lose situation

Amy - 24 Mar 16

Last year our DaughterNo1 was bullied.  Every day for over 6 months she was pushed around and taunted by the same girl.  She had her friends used against her, her looks and clothing made fun of and it eventually got the point where we would have to listen to DNo1 being bad mouthed, on the way home from school, outside our house and in our neighbours back garden.

Our beautiful, confident little girl was reduced to having panic attacks before school, convinced if she stood up to the bully she would lose all her friends.

Turns out as a family we all lost some friends, but hey ho, we stayed true to our values and did what we thought was the right thing.

Over the summer we cut ties with the problem family and ploughed all our time and love into building up DNo1 and even after receiving more flack when the new school year started, she was now confident enough to shrug it off and make new friends, even her teacher was impressed with the difference.

High five to us right? We made it through an awful emotional rollercoaster, we did some proper grown up parenting, gold stickers all round.

Turns out during the start of that new school year Daughter No2 had been picking on a friend, every day for the last few weeks.

Mortified.

How could she watch her sister go through a year of bullying to then do this?

Parent Fail.

Being the parent of a bullied child is devastating, it’s actually very difficult to deal with – you can’t ‘toughen’ up a child.  You can only build up their confidence when it’s chipped away and provide a safe place for them to come to, if they are not confrontational – they never will be.

But being the parent of a child that’s being mean to others is also so upsetting, the shame, the guilt that runs through you – ALL children have their moments but to reach a point when a parent has to contact you about your child’s behaviour brings you to  a parenting low.

I can almost understand why the mother of DNo1’s bully overlooks her daughter’s actions, the feeling of shame almost makes you want to pretend it isn’t happening but sadly it’s a harsh reality that needs to be dealt with.

Thankfully it was a small episode in comparison and we dealt with it quickly and maybe a little too harshly but it changed DNo2’s way of thinking.

As karma would have it, she is now having trouble with another sibling of the same old family, which gives us as parents another opportunity to work with our daughters on how to overcome bullying and not allow it to become an issue within our family unit, our principles won’t allow us to accept bullying in any form even if ignoring it may be the easier option.

I have never experienced anything like this in my adult life before.

As a parent you too have to been seen to ‘toughen up’ but what if you are just not like that? What if you are not confrontational and you actually CARE about bringing up decent human beings?

Although I know we will come through in the end, there are days when I am tired of trying to do the ‘right thing’ –it feels that by doing the right thing sometimes it’s a lose/lose situation.

Its days like that I am thankful for the friends that do stand by us and of course the gin that flows to take the edge off it all 😉

Amy

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