By Shirah Salters
It was my daughter’s first year of middle school, just entering sixth grade, fresh, and ready to experience a newfound level of independence. We moved a few months prior to the school year, so she had to attend a different school from the one she had been so excited to attend. For her, this meant making new friends.
The school year began and cliques started to form. She met new people, and got along with everyone pretty well. Then one day a group of girls decided they were going to slip a letter into another girl’s gym locker simply saying, “We the people don’t like you.” When they approached my daughter, hoping she would join in, she had a tough decision to make; Follow the crowd or stand alone. Fortunately she chose correctly, and told them that they better not do that because it was rude. A few days past and they decided to put the note in the girl’s locker any way. When the girl found the note she was devastated, began to cry and told the coaches. The coach called each girl into her office one by one questioning them. My daughter was now faced with the moment of truth as the coach asked her if she knew anything about it. She was honest and told them the story.
By the time fifth period rolled around, after the girls had gotten in trouble, they assumed it was my daughter who had told. They confronted her, and she simply told them that they were wrong and shouldn’t have done it. By sixth and seventh period the story had spread throughout the campus and total strangers were questioning and accusing her.
She returned home sobbing, not wanting to talk to anyone. I gave her some time to herself and then went to talk to her. As she cried her way through the story, I listened and embraced her. When she was done I reassured her she had done the right thing. I informed her of all of the horrible things that can come out of bullying. More importantly, being Christians, I let her know God was proud of her actions. I took this opportunity to teach her the difference between associates and friends and to show her that these girls didn’t possess the qualities of a friend. I told her she needed to learn to be a leader not a follower. I also assured her that this was just a bad day that would soon blow over, which it did the very next day. When she returned to school the girls apologized to her and tried to be friends again. However, taking notes from our conversation, she accepted their apology but knew they weren’t the right fit for her.
Long story short, our kids are faced with these types of situations daily. Life is so much harder for them with all of the technology and different forms of bullying. Their desire to fit in only makes it easier for them to fall into peer pressure. Let’s make sure we are consistently talking to our children, so we know what’s going on in their lives and be conscious of the kind of morals and values we are instilling in them.
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