4maybabies Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 I need ideas for helping my dd7 with confidence and sticking up for herself. Honestly, she's such a good hearted and sweet girl, she's getting eaten alive lately. Backing up....she's played soccer for a few years now, and she's pretty darn good at it. This year, she wanted to try softball. So we signed her up, and the team she was placed in has a bunch of girls that have played together for a few years now. Normally, my dd has no trouble making friends. She's not a shy girl...but she can be very timid. She is SOOOO afraid of making a mistake...she can't even think straight when placed into a position where she gets asked a question in front of other people and she has to answer. Anyway, the girls on the team aren't very welcoming, and really can be downright rude. For instance, at yesterday's game a team mate spit sunflower seeds in my dd's face....:confused::confused: seriously, I don't get these girls...AT ALL. As we were leaving my dd said bye to her teammate, and the girl just looked at my dd and looked away...as her parents were standing right next to her.:001_huh: I don't want to fight her battles for her, but I also don't want people to walk all over her. I've tried to talk to her and let her know she will not get into trouble for sticking up for herself! She's just so afraid that an adult will yell at her. I think it does bother me more than her sometimes...as no parent wants to see their child get treated like that. What would you do if you were in my shoes? How do I instill confidence in her and teach her that she doesn't just have to sit there if someone spits at her?!?! How do I let her know EVERYONE makes mistakes, and that it's ok...we learn from our mistakes? I've talked to her about this a lot, but obviously that's not enough... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soposie Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 I'm all ears. I'm very interested in how to enable my girls to stick up for themselves (especially since I was exactly like your daughter and have only learned how to stand up for myself in late adulthood, and I'm still not good at it). The only thing I can think of is role playing. For instance, going back over what happened and brainstorming ideas on what the child could have said or done that he/she would be comfortable with and then role playing it to gain a bit of 'experience' with standing up for him/herself. Repeat with any other situations that have happened recently. Maybe making up imaginary situations so the child gains more confidence about 'this is a situation in which I've been treated wrong and can stick up for myself' versus other situations in which one could handle in other ways. For instance, situations in which you should tell an adult right away. Mainly, reassuring the child that pretty much any time they feel like they've been treated badly he/she does indeed have the right to say something, and practice some rehearsed phrases that he/she can resort back to without having to try to think of them on the spot. I've had a couple conversations like this at bedtime with my girls, right before or after bedtime reading before saying goodnight. But not enough. I even made them repeat the phrases a couple times so they'd be ingrained. I remember reading two books that were on this subject a couple years ago, but can only remember one of them, "Queen Bees and Wannabees." An Amazon search might turn up similar ones, with reviews. I recall that there were some ideas in there. It was more geared toward middle school age, but I do remember that I went away from it with the recollection that I should re-read it when my daughter is about 8 to 9-ish. (which is now) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
4maybabies Posted May 1, 2012 Author Share Posted May 1, 2012 Thank you so much! I'm going to go check out the book right now! My dd turns 8 this month, so hopefully it will be perfect for her! We will have to try the role playing, I think that might help her. We've talked about it, like you at bedtime, but I think the role playing might give her an extra boost of confidence. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amsunshine Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 Also, American Girl has a couple of helpful books called Friendship Troubles; Friends: Making Them and Keeping Them, and Meet Chrissa. The first two have sections on bullying behavior and offer suggestions for responses. Meet Chrissa is a story about a girl being bullied and how she is finally able to deal with it in a healthy way. The Chrissa movie is also pretty good. HTH. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farrar Posted May 1, 2012 Share Posted May 1, 2012 Indoor rock climbing. No, really, when my ds7 is feeling completely DOWN on himself, this really helps boost his confidence. On some level, I think you can't step in and fix the relationships in the group or help her on the team (though I think I would have a quiet word with the coach about the spitting in my kids' face). So I think you go sideways and do things regularly that help her feel more generally confident - personal challenging things like rock climbing or just hiking together, and places where she can show off whatever her skills are with a different set of kids. That's really sad though... what in the world *is* wrong with 7 yos that they would think for two seconds that's okay? Sometimes I despair a bit that my kids aren't always as polite and thoughtful as I would like, but they would never in a million years do that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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