Bullied...

 Poor Jayden had his first- and hopefully last experience with bullying a couple of weeks ago. I didn't realize how mean they were being to him until one of their moms came over and told me about it.

 Here's the story. A couple of weeks ago Jayden was out in the neighborhood riding his bike, which is very normal for him. I check out the window to see if I can see him sometimes and there he was sitting on his bike, just outside of the park on our block. Just sitting there looking towards the park, not moving, just hanging out. Gavin and I decided he was being weird and maybe watching the girls at the park play, who knows maybe he thought one was cute?

 He finally comes home about 20 minutes later and one look at his face and I know something was wrong. So I ask him whats the matter, and also ask why he was being weird by the park. He starts crying and says, "They were bullying me." I told him he needs to be very careful with that word because it's such a focal point in our lives right now, and to please explain to me how he thought he was being bullied. Don't get me wrong, I believed that they weren't being nice to him, the look on his face made that clear but I don't want him being the boy who cries bully either so I needed to be clear.

 I got what I thought was the whole story and decided that yes, it was probably bullying and it was really unnecessary but I wanted to chalk it up to a learning experience. See there were 3 girls, 2 of which are our neighbors and actually normally are quite good friends with Jayden. The other girl is significantly older, 14 to be exact and the other girls are 5 and 10. The 10 year old just started middle school and was befriended by this older girl. I told Jayden that as much as it hurt and as much as it didn't need to happen...it is going to happen again. I tried to help him to understand that girls , and boys too, change when they get to middle school. Some even become mean.  I tried to get him to understand that this is not his fault and as much as it hurts he can't let it get to him. He is strong, and smart and we love him and that is all that matters.

 About a week later my neighbor comes over looking totally distraught. I guess she had no idea this had happened, she works crazy hours and her teenaged daughter is left to take care of the younger kids a lot. Anyway her daughter pulled her aside and told her about what the girls had said to Jayden, seems she witnessed it from the end of her drive and tried to talk to Jayden when he came home but he started crying and ran away. So my neighbor rushes over, completely mortified and frankly, PISSED at her girls. Turns out it was a lot more mean than Jayden even told me. He was being called nasty names and being told he wasn't allowed to play at the park and to leave. They were laughing at him and being horrible to him. So the girls are sent straight over to our house when they get home from school to apologise to him. I stood back and let him answer the door and listened to their apology, I wanted so badly to intervene, because in my opinion their excuse was lame, but Jayden was happy with the explanation and just wanted his friends back so I stayed back.

 They haven't really been playing much since then though, Jayden never asks to go see if they can play and they don't seem to come here. We see the girls with their new older friend and I think Jayden is intimidated by her so I figure that's probably why he stays away. I hope this doesn't affect him too much, there are lot's of kids in the neighborhood to play with and so he said he might try to start talking to them more.

 Did  I handle this ok? I wonder if I should have stood up for him more? If this happens again I will go to the older girls house and talk to her mom. To me there is no excuse for a 14 year old girl to be picking on an 8 year old boy!!! I used to babysit kids Jaydens age when I was her age and I would never have dreamed of trying to make one of them cry.

 At the same time, I think it is so important for him to learn that there are some people in life who just aren't nice. I want him to be able to stand up for himself, but not be afraid ever to tell us about it. I want him to be strong enough so that he can hold on through these upcoming difficult years of his life. Hopefully this is it, and he coasts through middle/high school drama free. I doubt it...but I am going to keep hoping and keeping my fingers crossed. Here we go....