Apparently bullying starts younger than I remember.
Every year Abigail\’s school switches up the class make up (for whatever reason). Five of Abigail’s classmates from her Kindergarten class are in her 1st grade class. One of them was what Abigail called a “friend” (whatever that might mean in 5 year old land). But this year something is drastically different with this girl – she’s become mean, violent and protective toward Abigail.
As parents we’ve done our best to equip Abigail to deal with these sorts of situations – “Tell them ‘I’ll play when you can talk nicely to me’, and walk away”, “If someone isn’t nice you don’t have to play with them”, “Don’t let her bully you into doing things – you are allowed to have whatever friends you want”. And so on …
Abigail has done all of these, but the problem persists (her teacher has called Abbie a saint for how she’s handled this situation). The girl has lashed out at parent helpers and teachers as well (kicking, hitting, spitting).
The most troubling thing about this is the drastic change that overcame this girl. Whereas last year she was somewhat distractible and whiny (but never mean), this year she is just angry. Furious. Violent. All Sonya and I can think is “what happened to her to make her so angry?”
So this morning Abbie freaked out because she was afraid of what this girl might to do her today. It seems as if we’ll have to have a talk with her teacher soon to try and resolve this.