"Catty" little girls!

SONS GONE WILD

Moms goin' crazy
Hello all. I usually post in PE or Substance Abuse forums due to my difficult child, but this is about my 7 yo easy child, girl. After having 2 sons, I can't believe how catty little girls can be! My easy child is, from what other moms have told me, one of the "popular" girls. Okay, only 7 years old here, how can they label kids already!? Anyway, I've had several instances of children getting mad or upset with easy child when they are playing and then one of easy child's closer friends walks up and easy child begins playing with her more, or talking to her more, etc. I've tried to tell her to try to include everyone and play with everyone together in a group, and she really is a sweet child (I realize I'm partial to her, but I don't find her to be catty or bratty - at least most of the time) - but this is getting to be a real problem. At the end of the school year she would come home very upset because one child would get so upset with easy child because she wanted to play with her closer friends instead of her. Then easy child would be the one stressing over the other girl being mad at her. Today at the playground same problem with her playing with one friend (same one from the school incident) then a closer friend comes up and the first friend storms off pouting (this child is known to be like this to others). I'm afraid the other parents will think my child is the bratty/catty one (but it seems easy child is the one most of the others want to play with). Any words of advice? The boys were much easier in this department!!! Thanks.
 

totoro

Mom? What's a difficult child?
You know even though K is BiPolar (BP) she is still dealing with this on some level. This is the first time she has ever had friends in school. She has been in school since 2.5 yo. So it is very exciting for her. Her best friend is a boy, they both get along with everyone. But, "I" has told K that she can not play with ANYONE else... K would come home devastated a lot because "I" would play with other kids yet she could not.
So we had to have lots of talks about how we show our feelings and how we treat others. How No-ONE can tell us what to do. I told her she can play with anyone else and she should include "I" and if he did not want to play, he would get over it. It took a couple of months but slowly she did play with other girls and he got mad, but they figured it out and she stood up for herself.
She still had bad days, but it was more her Mood Disorder.
She had talks with "I", "I can still be your friend even if I play with other kids"
She would tell him that she was sorry that he was mad but she still liked him.

K happens to be very empathetic though. Very sensitive. She still got upset when he was mean. But we are working on it for next year.

We have not had the snooty girls yet.
 

Hound dog

Nana's are Beautiful
As a mother of 2 girls all I can say is that this stuff is gonna happen, and will get worse with time if easy child can't learn to deal with it now.

easy child was more "popular" than Nichole, but both girls had to deal with the problem, so it may not have as much to do with actual popularity as it seems.

I told my girls to play with whom they wanted, not to deliberately hurt feelings, and to be kind to everyone. But I also taught them that you simply can't please everyone and if you try it's gonna drive you batty. For those that got really catty, they usually ended up dumped as friends cuz I taught my girls that friends simply don't treat each other that way. For others, usually it just took some kind words and such to mend hurt feelings.

easy child is a real people pleaser and I had much more trouble teaching her to cope with this sort of behavior than Nichole who took no nonsense from anyone. Eventually my girls learned to play with who they wanted and if someone wanted to pout about it then too bad. That's life.

Awful that it starts so young isn't it? sheesh

Hugs
 

Marguerite

Active Member
Your easy child sounds like a really nice kid. However, the day will come when she will feel she has no friends, that nobody likes her, that everyone else has better friends etc. That's what MY easy child was like even though she also was one of the more popular kids (and one of the nicer kids, as well as being very moral).

I venture to say - your easy child is not responsible for how other kids feel. If she starts bending over backwards to make everyone else happy, she will be setting herself up for a lifetime of burying herself and her ambitions purely to make everyone else happy. While she shouldn't ride roughshod over other people's feelings, she also has to learn to be herself and to value herself.

Your easy child can say to other kids, "I'm playing with G today/for now. Maybe we can add you to the game? Or if we can't, then maybe you and I can play tomorrow. You are all my friends."

It is the other kids feeling insecure who will grumble and complain. If easy child tries to please them, she is giving them power over her. However, if she is kind to them but still makes a point of not excluding anyone, then although she may later on have times when she feels left out, she at least will know she can value herself for being a good person.

ALL kids should have the capability of playing on their own, or of reaching out to someone new or different. That is in theory - in practice, we tend to spend time with certain people over others, and feel a bit lost when our regular friends are not so available to us. But that is OUR responsibility, not our friends'.

It happens with adults, too. I think the adults who play the same sort of games are the ones who were not nice friends when they were children. mother in law & I were talking about this today - it is the funeral of an old friend tomorrow, a woman who was a good friend to many, who was kind-hearted and genuine. We expect the funeral to be crowded. And also attending - a woman who I think believes herself to be the current reigning queen of the village, the one who other women flock to and who always has the latest information (= "gossip"). mother in law is polite to this woman but is not part of the crowd that flocks to her. In fact, only a small group do so, and I suspect purely for the assumed social status of being part of the "in" crowd. THis woman is mean, a backstabber and a gossip. mother in law has her number and tends to avoid her without being obvious about it. I think this woman feels sorry for me because I'm disabled. Certainly she can be very condescending towards anyone with a disability (whereas the woman whose funeral is tomorrow - she would make a cup of tea and come and sit with you to talk about everything - natural, unaffected, genuinely friendly).

This is what these kids grow into. The little girls who are mean and spiteful CAN grow up to be decent people, or they may never learn anything (other than how to get their own way and control other people) and become like this woman, who I feel is in fact lonely, insecure and desperately needing to control the other women around her, using gossip and manipulation to get her own way.

easy child had a classmate who was like this woman - the little girl would tell the other girls, "easy child isn't my friend today. If you want to be my friend, you will not have anything to do with easy child."
So easy child would find herself alone at lunchtime at school, left to her own devices by her friends in their zeal to stay "in good" with the bully. The next day things might be different and the bully might be feeling generous, and invite easy child to play. The bully believed that she controlled the other girls completely, but she didn't - easy child would get phone calls from the other girls when they all got home form school. "I'm sorry I was mean to you today; A made me," to which easy child would reply (sounding like me), "And if A told you to jump off a cliff, would you do that, too?"

Looking back on all this from the distance of 15 years, easy child has wonderful people skills. The friends who managed to break away from the control of the mean girl have also found their feet professionally. One girl, more in thrall than the others but still trying to find how to do the right thing when she was younger, has found it hard to work out what SHE wants because for too long she has followed other people - the mean girl, other friends, boyfriends especially.

And the mean girl? She's as bright as easy child but has failed professionally because of her own insecurities. She can't stick at any one career path, because when the work gets difficult or the going gets hard and she tries to manipulate the situation, she can't control it and so chooses to drop out instead. She never had to work through the unpleasantness to find the good things on the other side (including her own self-reliance).

I feel sorry for this mean girl because I know a lot of her insecurity stemmed from getting almost zero attention in the home - she is the younger sibling of identical twins and people would always be saying, "Oh, aren't they cute?" or "How are the twins going?" as if there were no other children in the family.

Very sad. She tried to get the love and attention from her friends, to replace what she didn't get from home. She's been into drugs, under-age sex (and her parents STILL don't know) and is a very unhappy person.

Do not let your daughter grow into an unhappy person, someone who can't find that well-spring of strength deep inside. Now is the time she needs to learn about its existence, and to also learn how to be a good friend - to her friends as well as to herself.

She must do this by herself, but you can support her by listening to her, advising her and helping her to feel she is a good person.

If your daughter is already popular, then she clearly already has good qualities which will stand her in good stead. However, she will also be an early target for jealousy (as easy child was, from the mean girl - this is why she was mean to easy child, because easy child had what mean girl did not).

Keep your girl on the moral straight and narrow, give her the courage to do what is right even if it is not the popular thing to do. She must learn that you can't please everybody.

It IS much more difficult with girls, isn't it?

Marg
 

janebrain

New Member
Oh, I remember those days with both my girls! difficult child 1 somehow ended up being in the "popular" group of girls--I think because she was outgoing and also "daring" so she was the "bad" girl in the popular group. But it became very stressful in middle school because the ringleader of the group was so bossy and would tell other girls to shun her if she was doing something "wrong". Also, these girls were doing well academically and difficult child wasn't so that was a problem. I thought they were all bratty, difficult child included.

difficult child 2 suffered in elementary school and to some extent in middle school and the beginning of high school because she was different. I remember it breaking my heart to hear that she was playing alone at recess because no one wanted to play with her. She was kind of shy and didn't really have the same interests as the "popular" girls. Now she is happy she is different and does have many friends. She doesn't like the popular girls anyway, thinks they are very shallow.

I think in general it is harder with girls. My son did fine socially--I don't remember it being such a struggle for him. He had friends, they didn't have all the problems of who could play with who, hurt feelings, all that stuff. I really hate all this **** you have to go through with girls--it was no fun going through it myself and it is worse to go through it again with daughters!

Jane
 

tiredmommy

Well-Known Member
I remember thinking when Duckie was in preschool that it all reminded me of the movie "Heathers" starring Winona Ryder. The girls were very mean to each other (and Duckie was one of the ring leaders :( ).

It's really about establishing a social, or pecking, order. in my humble opinion, all the parents need to help their respective girls learn how to fit together. Also, girls use these tactics as they grow older to shun each other. It's bullying, maybe some resources to help the girls understand that would help. That's what finally got through to Duckie... I told her she was a bully and that was unacceptable in our family. Good luck.
 

SONS GONE WILD

Moms goin' crazy
Thank you all for the replies. I will surely take your advice. easy child is a really good and sweet child, and I so want her to stay that way. I talk to many of the girls' parents about trying to keep the girls from growing up being too catty. I think we all agree, but unfortunately it happens anyway (probably because some of us moms can be catty too!)

The big thing I worry about is that the other parents will think my easy child is the bad one here because their children pout and get upset when they want easy child to play with them exclusively. easy child looks like the bad guy when she wants to play with her closer friends. So frustrating! Thanks again.
 
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