Who said these guys were not cute!?!

So many serious posts, I had to share this fun one!  And, next post to come is about finding and advocate, as opposed to finding just finding someone to exact revenge for you.  Not that we couldn't always use a laugh!

Lessons Learned... Part Three

I began with something we did right, followed it with something of hindsight, so now I believe I should follow with a tip I learned along the way.

As a parent, I tried hard to be calm and help my child walk through the situation as long as she could, thinking as long as I was there and she said she could handle it, that I should let her learn to deal with people and learn to stand up for herself but comport herself with manners, like the person she wanted to be, and not run.

And yet, there I was, the day the sheriff called me to discuss the welfare of my child, feeling like the worst failure of a mama.  I took the call from the sheriff about a call to the school where a friend of hers felt that she was at breaking point, and had gone to a teacher they both trusted, and the teacher had called in the sheriff.  The sheriff called me as I left the doctor's office from a pre-op appointment with my aunt.  I raced back to the school.  After speaking with the sheriff, my daughter had unloaded everything to the school's dean.

Sitting with the dean, I fought the urge to pull the children, head home and lock the gates of the property.  Discussing everything, the dean seemed to understand that what had happened outside of the school, the vicious bullying, had also bled over into at least one class at the school.  I wanted her removed from the class, having tried repeatedly to address things with the teacher.  The school felt things at the school could be handled with classroom management, and I could address the outside things.  The dean reminded me to not fall apart in front of the children, and that perhaps my daughter needed to stick to her extracurriculars at the school, where they saw the value of the dedicated team player that she is.

I checked in with my daughter before leaving the school, she excused herself to get the water bottle she had left in my car and we talked a few minutes about being thankful for real friends who had her back, and she said she wanted to stay at the school for the day.  I didn't know at that moment just how special those real friends were.

I left the school, and went straight to the office of the group that oversees the extracurricular which had been at the heart of this mess.  This extracurricular had been a huge part of the lives of both my daughter and son, and even as the stress had built and we had dreaded the meetings for dealing with the gossiping bitties and increasing bully behavior, the children hadn't wanted to give it up.  My son had wanted, as the worst of the attacks unfolded, for me to stop them from doing this to my daughter, but I couldn't make them stop, they had lied to enough people and tried to cover their tracks well enough that it would still be another couple weeks before I knew just how thickly the lies were layered.  They really still are, to be honest.  They went to so many people of a period of time, laying down allegations of lies to such an extent that so many believed them, despite the fact that they had never once looked into the truth of their allegations.

I didn't fully unload on the leadership I met with that day.  I had been told by the bullies that they had believed the lies and signed off on sanctions against my daughter, and were told to be concerned about my son.  I struggled to stay as calm as possible, trying to figure out whether I should press charges directly with the sheriff, just pull the children and run, or try to enable her to stand up, hold her head high and walk into the remaining meetings of the year, so she wasn't somehow admitting to anything untrue by running.

As I sat there at the table with these two leaders, they both listened.  One had a daughter at one of the service academies, who had gone through bullying at the hands of an adult in a sport a few years back.  He acknowledged my worry.  He said she would come out of it better if she was part of the decision in what to do.  They gave me a few options, and said they would be glad to sit with my daughter to talk things through to help her decide her direction.

I didn't feel any better, but I did try to work with that.  I know all this isn't over and that there really isn't any closure, but I do know that I believe it helped her to make each decision with us, day by day.  When she chose to walk into a meeting that following weekend, knowing they would stare at her, and point and gossip in whispers, her father, brother and I walked in there with her.  The night before, she hadn't slept, and I had looked at my husband in the morning and asked when was the time to step in and stop it all.  We each spoke with her, and she seemed adamant about going through with it, that she would not give them a chance to bad mouth her that day without seeing her stand up.  So in we all walked, flanking her and standing there as a family. When they tried to be uncharacteristically nice, as fake as they were, we were nothing but mannerly, but when they wanted us to stand around and wait for them to do other things they wanted to show were more important, I did flatly state that we were not there to waste our day waiting for people who were not ready to do the work, if need be, we could do it for them and move on with our day.

Before we left, my daughter made sure to check in with the youth who were in their first year, trying to make sure they knew what to expect and let them know she would be there to help if they needed her.  She offered a hug to one, after giving the family a scare- they had been unprepared for knowing what they needed to do.  But they are really so sweet- we wouldn't want them to be caught off guard.  Then, as my daughter turned and said her goodbyes, one of the people who had very carefully hurt her so deeply held out her arms for a hug.  I was floored, but my daughter held strong and used her manners, not wanting to make a scene.  She let the person have a hug, and we headed off the property.

I told her I was proud of her for holding together so well and maintaining her manners in the face of it.  She said one day at a time, but she didn't want those people to take what was left away from her, or to let them be able to say she hadn't fulfilled even one of her commitments.  And she didn't want thme to be able to do anything to her little brother.

So that is my tip for tonight.  To keep talking them through it, and let them make the decisions of what they want to do for themselves, to help them to be completely informed, and make sure they know they are not alone.  I have appreciated that advice, even as I often want to lock the gates of the property and make the mean people go away.  It is all far from over, we will be dealing with this for some time.  My daughter deserves a real apology, with an admission from those who did this to somehow help restore her reputation.  We are certainly not holding our breath for it, but she does deserve it.  But we have certainly not lost our reality check in all of this.  We will continue to make decisions as a family, where each of the children can state for themselves what they need to do to move forward.  I hope that little bit of advice helps someone else empower their child to persevere for themselves and what is right for them.  I have certainly appreciated the reminder.  I hope you never need the advice, but if you do, I think it has helped us a bit.

Hugs to you all, and a brighter future too.

Lessons Learned... Part Two

Tip Number Two, Be careful with whom you trust your child, even if you have had well placed trust in the individual previously.

This seems so obvious, like something we would all get right.  And yet, when faced with vicious, vindictive folks who have no actual base for the lies they are telling in their gossip, otherwise well meaning people can fall prey to the mob mentality.  Normally nice folks who are generally tireless volunteers and seem to have nothing but every one's best interest at heart, can be sucked into the bizarre vortex of the mob and sweep it along, giving validity to the bully ringleader.

As unkind as the statement may seem, and as much as I have often been accused of being overprotective in an extreme, it is when we let out guard down that the bullies see their chance, and they take it, often with great abandon.  This was certainly true in our case, and looking back, I knew the tide was changing, but didn't want to believe those previously nice folks would be a part of it.

Around here, we have something called "The Wyatt List."  My mother reminds me regularly that the lord doesn't taketh away unless he gives something else in return first.  In our case, our younger child had a rough time with deployments and the endless TDY cycles that are the nature of a military family these days.  For periods of time, sometimes long ones, Wyatt didn't speak.  Then he needed speech therapy and has some processing issues. 

But what Wyatt has in return is this innate ability to see whether adults should be trusted.  Basically anyone other than his age.  The Wyatt List represents a VERY short list of people who he trusts, and often in varying degrees.  Being on the Wyatt list is an honor.(I know, the whole thing sounds odd, but if you qualify for the Wyatt list, you really had to earn it.)  Sometimes he looks at me and says of someone, I really wanted to like her.  She loves animals, but it doesn't feel right.  Funny to watch him.  And he may look at someone at say "I'm shy, I don't want to meet them." 

Imagine my surprise earlier this year when I went to get Wyatt from Bailey at the robotics lab, only to find he was across the hall with her biology teacher walking through the room asked her every question he could think of about her displays.  Shortly thereafter he spent over an hour helping Bailey catch her a tarantula.  This person ended up interceding to help Bailey.  I should have listened more deeply to her, too, though that is another story.

For the first time this year, I saw Wyatt remove people from the Wyatt List.  Previously, the ringleaders of this, and their close friends were never on the list.  He was known to hid under chairs, behind water coolers, whatever to get away from them and not have to speak to them or their children.  When one of the people had been at our home under false pretenses, preparing to drive the largest nail into Bailey, Wyatt had initially tried to help me speak with her, I thought maybe it was going to be okay.  When she left, he said, "That was weird.  What did she really want?"

He had already removed some other folks from the list, ones who he had previously selected and given hugs to.  Looking back, I really wish I had listened to him, and my intuition when their behavior seemed strange.  Maybe I could have somehow protected her, stepped in sooner, or done something to have prevented things from getting quite so bad.  You see, these people were the pillars of the community type.  And yet, even as they said they were not part of what was done, they were spreading the gossip, snubbing our daughter and then asking for hugs from the cuddly sweet girl- very publicly, playing the hurt with her good manners.  And standing back as part of the gossip ring so clearly that would turn their back on her as she walked into a meeting and faced the angry ringleader who said nothing kind. 

And you could read on the ringleader's face and in her strange remarks when she was lying most and gossiping most viciously. And my blind feeling, having gone to those I previously had trusted, allowed them to help the ringleaders to continuously hurt my child more deeply.

So even if you feel that certain people have always been nice in the past, done right by children before, even done special things for your child, don't ignore warning signs that say you should withdraw your trust.  And if you have to withdraw that trust, keep records of what is being done.  But that is the topic of another post, this one is long enough!  So be careful who you trust, and don't blindly continue to trust someone just because you have in the past and other folks continue to do so.  Our parent intuition is there for a reason!

Lessons Learned... Part One

I began this blog several months ago, in the hopes of opening a dialog that would help my children cope with bullies, and share strategies with others where my children and others might have a few more tools to surviving life in a sometimes cruel world.

At the time, the bullies involved in pushing at the lives of my own children were gleaning help from adults and they were increasing in the frequency and intensity of their bullying activities.  Over the course of this school year, things got really bad.  I don't mean crying on the drive home from school bad, I mean vomiting, sleepwalking, not sleeping for weeks and then the adults finishing my child off so that we were just trying to get through the year and my child was promising she could handle it and the school called in the sheriff bad. 

But there wasn't much the sheriff could do, unless I press charges.  And the bullies' cyber activity had been very carefully deleted from the cyber places right before the final set of proverbial knives were thrown.  So pressing charges would take significant work.  But I still may, if it protects someone else.

Fortunately, my child had some great people in her life who closed ranks around her and have helped her through.  I have set through numerous meetings with people in charge of the extracurricular activity these folks were a part of, and they helped a little, but not much beyond getting through the end of the year, and from the place where I look, I don't know if they have done anything to prevent this from happening to another youth.  And I believe they would do it again, if given the chance.  Maybe they are doing something, but they cannot tell me what it is.  A real apology would be nice.  And for something to correct the lies told where these folks worked to ruin my child's reputation.

So now, here I sit, with the family putting the pieces back together and trying to finish the school year strong.  And I reflect on what I should have done before, what we did right to survive, what I ignored along the way to them hurting her so deeply, what I could share to help someone else walking in my shoes.  So for the next several posts, I am going to try to share some of those things.  I will go one at a time, so the posts aren't so long, and if you all have any tips to share, please do.  While I moderate comments to keep things positive and avoid anyone personally attacking another, the more ideas and options, the more tools in the tool belt for parents and you.

Here is my first tip, something we did right:  Don't let any one activity be all that your child is. 

In other words, it is easy to get wrapped up in a favorite sport, like soccer, or activity like robotics or 4-H or the like.  I am not, under any circumstances, saying that they should participate in a multitude of activities.  We as parents must gently enforce a balance between, school, activities, and down time.  But sometimes it is easy to let your child contine to expand further and furth in one activity, say multiple projects in 4H or multiple teams in one sport, and when the bullies show up, and start pushing things around, you are backed into living with those bullies or giving up that activity, becoming isolated from the friends there, and it gives those bullies WAY too much power.

While other folks made fun of us, told us we were holding our children back, my husband and I stood our ground at Football that our son could balance it with 4-H, and at 4-H that our children could play football, (basketball for our daughter, and this year she traded basketball for robotics and Science Olympiad.)  In the end, it was the youth in one of those activities which closed ranks around our daughter and reminded her of what a great kid she was.  When the bullies even went to that saving grace activity to hurt her reputation, and she teetered on the fence of falling apart again, one leader of that saving grace activity looked at her and said that they knew who she was for them, who she really was, and that was what mattered.  Sometimes I wonder if that leader knew just how much that one statement meant.

This is getting harder than I had thought to be as nondescript asa possible about who her bullies were, but just don't worry about who they were.  The important thing now is, what we learn from having gone through this.  Having had my child's reputation publicly maligned by bullies, I have no desire to have folks pointing fingers here, just to learn and share strategies to survive and thrive as a community we can all be proud of.  Anyhow, you get the idea.  That variety of friendships and experiences helps your child learn who they really are, and whom they want to be in this world.  So enough for now, I'll share another next time.  Hold strong, hug tight, say I love you adnd mean it.  Tlak to you soon.