Mean Girls

Kids can be very cruel. When I was 13, my Momster took it into her head that I should be pulled out of public school and go to a private one. I hated this idea but had little choice in the matter. In 7th grade at the public school, I had my own little group of nerdy girls that I hung out with. We were all pretty smart, we wore glasses and we were into music and played in the school band. So we weren't part of the pre-cheer leader bunch. We couldn't have cared less.

Eighth grade, I found myself in a Luthern sponsored school with a bunch of fundamentalist kids who had all attended school together there since kindergarten. I was the new girl and I was already an agnostic at age 13. To say I did not fit in is putting it mildly. My Dad who was the parent I always had a special connect with was ordered overseas to Vietnam at around the same time. I was one very unhappy kid. For the first half of the school year, I allowed the other kids to demoralize me. I eventually got fed up with it, however, and started giving back as good or better than what I got. The little fundie reptiles finally backed off when I started standing up for myself and by 9 th grade, I was hanging out with two of the more popular girls in my class. Then my father came home and interceded for me and I got to go back to public high school and spend the remainder of my high school years with the nerdy kids in the band again. Happy ever after.

You can't fight your daughter's battles for her. What you can do is be a warm, supportive loving Mom. She'll eventually work it out, painful as it is for you both right now.