![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.mops.org\/images\/cms_images\/alex-2.jpg\" "\\"\\"")
<\/p>\nMy heart began pounding faster as I listened to my friend\u2019s voice coming through my cell phone. Part of me didn\u2019t want to believe it was true, not my child, but part of me knew it was. I trusted the woman on the other end of the line to be a reasonable parent, neither accusatory nor drama-leaning, so I had no reason to question her. I simply couldn\u2019t believe she was describing my<\/i> daughter!<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the painful reality about mean girls: they all have mothers. So someone has to be the mean girl\u2019s mom.<\/p>\n
When I hear the term \u201cmean girl,\u201d I conjure up memories of the movie Heathers<\/i> or think of anti-bullying campaigns of recent years. When really every girl has her moments of being unkind and even downright malicious. I know my daughter wants to do the right thing. I also know how easy it is to get swept up in group think or behavior (no matter the age, right?). So what\u2019s a mom to do when her daughter is<\/i> the mean girl? Regardless of your girl\u2019s age, here are a few tips to help navigate the mean girl waters.<\/p>\nSee this as opportunity.<\/h3>\n
I\u2019ll confess \u201cteachable moment\u201d wasn\u2019t my first thought when I hung up the phone. I was angry and embarrassed. But as I talked to more experienced parents and my daughter\u2019s teacher, I realized how normal my daughter\u2019s behavior was. As her teacher said, \u201cWe\u2019re all learning here.\u201d How was my girl going to know any different unless we walked through this together? I have to remember she is a child, and it is my job to guide her.<\/p>\n
Since the behavior wasn\u2019t happening in the moment (no one was at immediate risk of getting hurt), I decided to take a few minutes to calm down and think through my approach. I landed on asking my daughter questions, listening and trying to not shut down the conversation from the start by shaming or accusing. In other words, I did my best to be the grown-up in the situation.<\/p>\n
Once I heard her side of the story I explained our family\u2019s rules around mean behavior. I let her know her dad and I were going to help her work through this particular situation, and we expected her behavior to be different the next time around. There would be consequences if behavior didn\u2019t change. Kindness is a baseline expectation for our family.<\/p>\n
Questions I considered: What resulted from her behavior that needs to be made right? Were there hurt feelings involved? Something more? Does she need to apologize? Does she need to replace a material item? Set her up for success as she approaches her friend or sibling and teach her that making amends is part of the process of moving forward. Coaching our girls through friendship conflict could be one of the greatest life skills we give them.<\/p>\n
Nothing says \u201cI believe in you\u201d than giving someone a chance to try again. It\u2019s important for all of us to know our choice last time doesn\u2019t have to determine our choice next time. Put your daughter in a position to practice the values and behaviors you\u2019ve talked about by setting up another playdate or calling her out of her timeout to try again. Your confidence in her to make the right decision will give her a strong boost in the right direction.<\/p>\n
I hold on to what my daughter\u2019s teacher said, \u201cWe\u2019re all learning here.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Alexandra Kuykendall My heart began pounding faster as I listened to my friend\u2019s voice coming through my cell phone. Part of me didn\u2019t want to believe it was true, not my child, but part of me knew it was. I trusted the woman on the other end of the line to be a reasonable parent, neither accusatory […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":12745,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"0","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_seopress_news_disabled":"","_seopress_video_disabled":"","_seopress_video":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas_manual":[],"_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable_all":"","_seopress_pro_rich_snippets_disable":[],"_seopress_pro_schemas":[],"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42,102],"tags":[104,127,26,32,157,198,55,181],"class_list":["post-297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","category-relationships","tag-advice","tag-alexandra","tag-family","tag-friendship","tag-learning","tag-life","tag-mom","tag-reality"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/297\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themom.co\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n<\/strong> As a mom to four girls, ages 3 to 12, Alexandra Kuykendall\u2019s days are spent washing dishes, driving to and from different schools and trying to find a better solution to the laundry dilemma. She writes to capture the places where motherhood meets everyday life to remember the small, yet significant moments in the midst of the blur. She is the author of The Artist\u2019s Daughter, A Memoir<\/em> <\/a> , a contributor to this year\u2019s Be you, Bravely, An Experiment in Courage and acts as the Specialty Content Editor for MOPS International. A city girl at heart, she makes her home in the shadow of downtown Denver. You can read more of Alex\u2019s everyday thoughts and connect with her at AlexandraKuykendall.com<\/a>.<\/p>\nHow do you handle mean kid behavior in your house?<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"