When your kid is being bullied

Help! After two 1/2 years of the same girl teasing and harrasing my daughter of eight, I have come to the point where I feel like grabbing this girl by the ears and approaching her mother to let her know what a nasty dirty little b@#*! she has been. The

school has not been able to curb this girl's behaviour and I'm not to sure that they believe that there is anything going on. Whilst boys hit and punch, leaving physical evidence, girls leave emotional scarring. My daughter is a very pretty, caring and intelligent girl who has formed wonderful freindships at this school.Leaving is not an option for her. She does not see why she should leave her friends when she has done nothing wrong. Yet it only takes the consant verbal abuse of one girl to squash self confidence.This little girl never works alone, of course bullies are cowards and never really amount to anything in life. But as it is happening now, and scarring my daughter now! what do I do? I have given her all the tools I can think of, from ignoring everything and walking away, to turning around and sticking up for herself without being physical though she has the abilty. My daughter refuses to name call as she believes that will make herself lower than this ratty dirty girl!!! What do I do now to help my daughter???? Angry and Desparate

I understand you. You see your girl is suffering and you feel like there's little you can do to help her. But actually, I think there is something important  you can do. In fact, I think it's the only thing you can do; and that is to appeal to the parents' and teachers' maturity, and talk. Sit down and talk like adults. Go to your little girl's teacher and explain your concern. Tell her you're worried abouth her self confidence, and how all that bullying is affecting her. We all know school is hard enough without having another kid attack you and make you feel bad, and I'm pretty sure your daughter's teacher will empathize with your concerns if you express them in an adult, civil way. Because, believe me, I understand the urge to just grab that damn girl by her hair and drag her all around the school --she's being mean to your daughter, and your impulse is to make her feel bad too. But you know the saying: you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar (or something like that. He he). Tell the teacher you want to meet with the girl's parents, because you want to personally explain the situation so they can see how you and your daughter are feeling. And then talk to them as calmly as possible. Of course, there's no way to appear impartial, but that's not what we want. We want to, vey politely, make them feel embarrased for what their daughter is doing, because that way they will reprimand her and make sure she leaves your daughter alone.

In summary, talking goes a long way if you handle it in a smart way. Hope this helped!