Here's the scenario:
Playgroup. Three girls are your daughter's age (3 years old) and have been friends since they were old enough to play with other kids. You have noticed that your daughter is often left out of this group and she plays by herself or with a younger girl who is left out because of her age. Then one day at playgroup you look up just in time to see one girl point at your daughter and say, "We're not going to play with her!" And the other two follow suit.
What do you do? (Besides cry in the car on the way home even though your daughter doesn't.)
She has told me that some of the other girls aren't nice to her. I've asked her if she still wants to go to playgroup and she says yes. I've told her to play with the kids who are nice to her. But it breaks my heart. I know I can't stop other kids from being mean to her or excluding her, but what do I do to help her face these situations which come all too early?
I saw a quote recently that said something about filling up your child's bucket of self-esteem so full that no matter how many holes the world pokes in it, it will never be empty. But how do you do that?
This makes MY eyes fill up with tears! That is sad and I'd have cried on the way home, too! That stuff totally stresses me out about sending my boys to school, too. Did the other Mom's say anything? I have a hard time with that with one of nieces, sometimes and it totally makes me sad!
ReplyDeleteI don't know how to do that exactly, either. Did you follow any of the Elizabeth Smart stuff? (The girl who was kidnapped out of her bedroom in SLC and found 9 months later) She says now that no matter what he told her or did to her, she knew how much her Mother had always told her she was good and would always be loved. I don't know all the details about that one, either, but I want to be a Mom like that!! <3
At least Ivy didn't seem to notice or didn't let it bother her a whole lot. I don't have any good advice, I guess, but I agree with you!
I despise that! It used to happen to Kizzy all the time! Right now there is only one little girl in our ward the same age as Kizzy because the other 3 moved away. The girl that is left used to be the ringleader in excluding Kizzy. But just today she walked up to Kizzy in the hallway at church and gave her a hug. Maybe sometimes us moms aren't supposed to "fix" everythng for our kids even though we want to. I think it's good advise to tell Ivy to just play with the kids who are nice to her. Because no matter the age there will always be kids who won't be kind, and surrounding ourselves with people who will lift us up is a lesson you can never be too young to learn.
ReplyDeleteI didn't know that kids purposely excluded each other so early, that is very sad. My niece has been experiencing this lately in her new young women's group. They all have known each other for a while and were not nice to her when she moved in. This is my niece with celiac that I am speaking of, one of the girls sat down next to her when they were all eating cupcakes and purposely ate it in front of her saying "oh this is so good, too bad you can't have any" and then laughed and walked away. I think its important to teach our kids to how to welcome those who are new or different, even if it is inconvenient. Many times when there is bullying or exclusion it seems to be because someone is new or different.
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