2 days into the new school year and my youngest has already had to deal with 7th grade (a.k.a. the birthing ground for mean) girls, who seem to be prepping themselves to be catty women when they grow up (if ever), and it’s breaking my heart.
Unfortunately, it’s easy for us parents to say things like, “they’re just jealous” and “because the new boy talked to you at lunch, first” or “they see you as a threat” because we’ve ALL been there, right?!?
Aaaaaand, therein lies the rub.
You see, my kids have a real hard time understanding (or even believing) that their parents may or may not have dealt with mean behavior, at some point in our lives, and that at least one other person in the bathroom/class room/gym/hallway/lunchroom imagined it to be really funny, at the time, too.
In this case, calling your name out loud, turning their backs and then giggling their little fool heads off or just walking into a room…
[cue: giggling little fools]
…then casually glancing down at yourself, wondering if you’ve mistakenly put your pants on backwards or something and, well, as if being 12 years-old wasn’t difficult enough, right?!?
So, having lived through a couple of mean moments (or twenty) of their own (dammit), I asked my two oldest girls (they are 19 and 17) and my son (he’s 14) for their thoughts on dealing with mean girls (or boys) from a teen’s point of view.
Because I am very open-minded, not to mention they are MUCH smarter than me, like that!