Girl on Girl Emotional Warfare

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My daughter is 6 and over halfway through Grade 1.

 

My Warrior Dreamer at Heritage Park.

(My daughter in one of her fave costumes)

 

 

She’s extremely empathetic and seems to thrive on routine and expected outcomes. She seems outgoing but has trouble expressing what she really needs from another person. (Which sometimes has her coming across as a pushover).

One thing she has come to expect is how everyone in her class relates to each other, the personal relationships everyone has formed with each other, and when that shifts she feels like a tiny sailboat being rocked by a gigantic storm and thunderous waves.

Today was no exception. One of the girls in her class that she counted as a friend is snubbing her. She sing-songs about parties that she has been invited to when she is near Izzy when she knows Izzy has been left out. She gives other girls in the class, mostly in Izzy’s close knit group actually, presents of stickers and glitter and loom band bracelets. This girl and my daughter used to be tight. NOw it feels to Izzy that this girl is deliberately trying to lure her close friends away from Izzy and lavish attention on everyone except my daughter.

Around the same time this shift happened a couple of new faces, both boys, joined Izzy’s class. She quickly became friends with them. Simultaneously, the girls started forming a group. They huddle on the playground in a circle and shout,

“NO boys allowed, girls only!”

when the boys come to talk or play with them, or tease them I would guess.

Izzy sees this exclusion as a travesty. She doesn’t like it at all. Her instinct isn’t to see it as a special get together to giggle and smile about. She sees it as what it is: exclusion, snobbery, and a division. Why should girls think they are so much better than the boys, to the point where they won’t play or talk to them at times?

Also, she spends a lot of time with two of the boys that seem very popular in her class among the girls and this may be causing a bit of jealousy, but I can only speculate based on what my six year old mentions to me.

 

I cannot believe this is starting already.

 

I told her some people have trouble being friends with everyone and that this girl is probably just giving a bit more attention to these girls (who are more girly than Izzy and may have more in common with her) for now. That it may shift back to her in the future and, even if it doesn’t, she should continue to put her own attention and love to the people who give the same attention and love back.

 

How’d I do fellow moms? I will have to ask moms who have older daughters how they have dealt with this. :/

5 Comments

  • Lindsay February 3, 2015 at 04:07

    I think you did GREAT Tianna! As hard as it is to watch our girls go through things like this already (like seriously…..I thought we had a good few years before the drama would start), it is what it is. They are all just little humans trying to find their place. All we can do is try to give our girls some positive guidance and the foundation to make it through their school years intact. I think the way you handled it was exactly what she needed to hear 🙂

    Reply
    • Tianna Wynne February 3, 2015 at 20:52

      Thanks! Maybe she is being too pushy too. Who can know without being there. But she was so hurt I gave her the benefit of the doubt. Thanks for letting me know what you think! <3 It takes a village.

      Reply
  • Vastra February 3, 2015 at 12:44

    Looking back on a maybe kinda similar situation growing up, the divisive force in my young life was uber jealous. She couldn’t tolerate people who felt happy, because she was inwardly miserable.

    The trouble was that no matter how I responded, it never satisfied her internal turmoil, because it was her internal tornado, not mine.

    We had been tight friends from a young age until elementary school, when she couldn’t tolerate that I wanted to be friends with everybody, not just her. She allowed herself to be friends with everybody (but very few actually liked her), but she wanted me all for herself, to ONLY be friends with her, like an imaginary friend or pet or something.
    I became my own person, everyone liked me, and she HATED that. Inwardly miserable.

    She then told rumour after untrue rumour so that everyone would be friends “with {her} instead.” It only worked in group settings though. Whenever she wasn’t around they were “free to be nice.”

    So, knowing that she was inwardly miserable made it slightly more tolerable for me in that I knew it wasn’t my fault. I knew that nothing that was happening was actually about me. Everything she did and said was about her, because of her misery. She didn’t feel awesome inside, it hurts to watch others feel awesome about themselves when you don’t. Unfortunately, pointing this out to her didn’t help.

    I was being my awesome self, and because she didn’t feel worthy of friendship, she thought that she had to steal it from me. She didn’t realize we could just, simply, all be friends.

    However, knowing this made it so much easier to keep being myself. That she is miserable because she is miserable. She wouldn’t tell anybody why, how could anybody help? So, she remained miserable, and it was never my fault.

    I don’t know how much if any this has much in common with Little Panda’s situation, but I would bet that there is something that Little Panda is rocking that the other girl feels insufficient about. Sometimes the only way to obtain happy is to take a bite out of someone else’s. Unfortunate, but misery likes company, and it happens to people at all ages.

    Little Panda is a shiny little star, she will draw much attention. The main thing for her to know is that she is a fabulous star being. So awesome that she must take very good care of herself and never put her self-worth into the hands of others. You are awesome BECAUSE you are you. That’s that.

    There is a safe place in the center of all star beings, a place where we know ourselves, where we shine our brightest.

    From this place we can shine light and see – see that others who try to hurt us – are hurting somehow, it is a call for attention and light. We help when we can, but if we can’t that’s ok. Often, like in this case, we have no idea what’s actually going on inside the hurting person’s void. Not much can be done, yet. We just keep shining our best, when we can.

    So we must shine on, being our awesome star being selves, knowing that our awesomeness IS within. Protecting our inner light source from black hole people, but still always shining as best we can.

    Love to the Panda’s, shine on you crazy diamonds 🙂

    Reply
    • Tianna Wynne February 3, 2015 at 20:55

      Oh you are the greatest. I love you. Thanks for this! I lose sight of what other little ones may be going through when my Little Panda is being emotionally hurt and it makes my Mama Panda rawr. And when I am rawring inside I am not very insightful. I will tell her the paragraph about being her own shiny little star. Let the other stars choose to be in your orbit and the black holes can suck up misery on their own instead! Very well put. Deep breath. Thank you.

      Reply
  • highly sensitive child August 22, 2015 at 15:46

    […] I realize I never updated on the story I started the other day about the Girl on Girl Emotional Warfare. […]

    Reply

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