Parents Mean Girls and Move-Ups

[cathiann]

Not sure I need advice or just a place to vent, but I am SO upset with a girl at my daughter's gym.

They do a team camp every summer--over a long weekend and the girls do a lip sync contest each year. Typically they get together with their friends or an entire level will do a song. It's pretty elaborate!

Last year all the level 9s did a song together. This year all the 9s, but Beth (my daughter) want to move to 10 (I can tell you now that some won't make it, and if they do, will be poor 10s). Beth wants to stay 9 so she can really do well as a 9.

Why do I mention this? Because one of the girls who wants to move up has decided that because Beth will "only" be a 9, she can't do the song with them! Despite the fact that they've been together--and supposedly friends--for years, suddenly she can't associate with my daughter anymore because they might be different levels next year (and I say "might" because her skills are similar to my daughter's--Beth is better at some events and this girl is better at others). Needless to say, Beth is pretty upset about being dumped and isn't happy at all.

I've never run into this before--do you see it at your gym? I'm friends with her mom--but I can't imagine telling her that her daughter is being a little snot LOL! Advice? Suggestions? Comforting words of encouragement?

 

[mariposa]

That is sad for Beth Sadly, mean girls exist everywhere. And I think that in gymnastics, this is intensified because a lot of those girls have crazy gym parents that push them to be even worse. I really think that most kids end up acting like their parents act. If their parents push them and lead them to think that they are better than the other girls, that they are "special", have a "step on anyone that gets in my way" attitude, etc, the kid ends up believing it and acting that way, too. In the end though, both the crazy parents and the mean girls end up all by themselves and without any friends because they alienated them all along the way.

Hope that Beth can find some teammates to do the contest with and that they rock! The best thing for her to do is show that mean girl that she has no power over her and that she is better off without her (because she really is). True friends don't do that, good teammates don't do that.

 

[bigtiny]

I don't come to Chalk Bucket much anymore, but I happen to see this thread, and I wanted to respond with some support because my daughter is in the same situation right now! I'm sorry that your daughter is facing this, and I know how upsetting it can be. You don't say how old she is. My daughter is still pretty young, and she is easily hurt by insensitive comments by her teammates. She has a teammate that has been her good friend for several years that recently moved to a new training group and now has decided that she is "better" than the girls in her old training group. It's hard to know what to tell your child when you want them to be nice to their teammates who clearly do not have a "team" mentality. Of course, this is all picked up from the parents. I try to stay away from the gym as much as possible, because of OVER-INVOLVED parents, and just do damage control with my own child. The best advice I can offer is see if your daughter can find a REAL friend, one that will act like a friend to her no matter what level/training group either of them is in. It is a tough lesson to learn, but a true friend is the one stays a friend no matter which level she is on. Good luck to your daughter.

 

[Bella's Mom]

My daughter has a mean teammate too. The mean girl is school friends with my niece and says pretty mean things about my daughter to my niece. Unfortunately, my niece decided that my daughter's birthday party was an appropriate place to tell everyone what had been said. Nothing like watching your daughter burst into tears while having birthday cake.

Girls can be so very very mean. I just figure the girls have to learn to cope with hateful mean comments sometime.... unfortunately.

 

[bogwoppit]

It sucks for Beth to deal with this right now, but I imagine things will even up quite nicely in fall when the mean girls get moved back down!

You know girls who do that to their "friends" will one day have none left to turn too. As for the whole I'm better than you crap, that can only come from one place their parents. Mind you there is a lot of similarity between bullies and mean girls, so lots of insecurity and self loathing come in to play, then if you get a pushy parent in the background things get very ugly.

We had a parent at out gym who would go to the coaches and tell them stuff about my kid, such as "BBB wants to do less hours, or BBB is planning on quitting etc" all not true, but all to further her kid. The lengths some parents will go to are amazing, the sad thing is it rubbed off on her kid and the whole I'm better than you BS began.

I think the only thing you can do is use this experience to educate your child on what true friends are and about the fact that they will meet mean people all the way through their lives. THe most important thing is learning how to react to them.

I told BBB that the parent was so obsessed with her kid needing to be better than her that she made the kids life miserable and pressured her to beat BBB, this eventually had to rub off on the kid and make her crazy too. Funnily enough the pressure got to the kid and she quit, years before BBB every stopped gym.

 

[MdGymMom01]

Ugh...mean girls suck. My dd has had to deal with her fair share and they are EVERYWHERE. And if you look at the family dynamic, the parents are the same way. Over-involved, sucking up to coaches, and always have to know everyones else's kids skills and levels so that their kid can be "one up on them". My dd's mean teammate from level 4 left to go to a new gym but unfortunately, I hear that she is acting the same way there, so, she hasn't changed her behavior. I try to tell my dd to try and ignore the behavior or if someone says something mean to her, I have my dd say something like "That wasn't very nice. You don't have to be so mean and nasty" and just walk away.

The whole "I am better than you" attitude totally stinks. We had some of that going on on our team, but as karma has it, things worked out in the end. It turns out that the mean girl that has been saying stuff to one teammate about how she doesn't belong in her level isn't doing too well this season and her teammate who supposedly "wasn't good enough" is now that level's top scorer for the team!! Just goes to show you that Karma will always win out in the end!!!

It seems that insecurity and jealousy are the main reasons why mean girls/parents act out. They can't accept and appreciate themselves or their kids for who they are and live off of always being "the best" or "better" like that really means anything.

So, tell Beth to hang in there, and kick butt in the lip synch contest!!! Karma will come around and burn the mean girl eventually.

 

[NGL780309]

My DD hasn't had any of the mean girl stuff yet at her gym, but I'm sure it's coming eventually. I do hear from other parents that a few of the girls in DD's groups are snots to their kids, but my DD is blissfully ignorant at the moment. No advice really except she'll just have to deal. I do know that I think it's better to not get the parents involved unless it's something really serious. One of my good friends had a situation where her DD and another girl would have little spats and the girls mom was always calling my friend and emailing her about every little petty teenage thing her DD had said. It drove my friend crazy because she wanted to just let the kids handle it since it was not serious stuff.

 

[MdGymMom01]

My DD hasn't had any of the mean girl stuff yet at her gym, but I'm sure it's coming eventually. I do hear from other parents that a few of the girls in DD's groups are snots to their kids, but my DD is blissfully ignorant at the moment. No advice really except she'll just have to deal. I do know that I think it's better to not get the parents involved unless it's something really serious. One of my good friends had a situation where her DD and another girl would have little spats and the girls mom was always calling my friend and emailing her about every little petty teenage thing her DD had said. It drove my friend crazy because she wanted to just let the kids handle it since it was not serious stuff.

Getting the parents involved didn't help at all in my dd's situation. It actually made it worse, because the behaviour worsened. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree .

 

[Deleted member D3987]

Getting the parents involved didn't help at all in my dd's situation. It actually made it worse, because the behaviour worsened. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree .

well, i would like to be told this as an owner/head coach so that i might intervene. sometimes these issues must be handled at the place that the group resides. and that's the gym. my house my rules. takes the parents and kids out of the equation. and i would request from the parents their permission to do so, and if granted then they must stay out of it after that.

 

[gymmomntc2e6]

This happened to my DD too. A couple of girls she.did L4 with did a higher Prep Op level than DD. They became very bossy & would make comments about being with the bigger girls, higher level..... basically turned into little snots. Their parents really are not CGM's unless they hide it well. I think they just got cocky. Well now they will be doing L5 with DD in the fall, so it really didn't get them anywhere except that some of their teammates dont really like them anymore.

 

[sally]

Well that happened to my dd as well and the girls mother was just as bad. With great advice from here they were right they ended up leaving now all the girls in my dd team are like best friends

 

[AGM78910]

Wow, this kind of thing happened all the time at my DD's first gym. The HC would not rein in the mean girls and as a result several team girls left the gym and the ones who stayed were miserable. The team went from 70 girls down to 20 in a few years.

At our present gym, the HC will not put up with any of this type of behavior. They will warn the girls and parents once and if the behavior is repeated they are invited to leave. Needless to say, the girls all get along and we have no crazy gym parents. I think a lot of gyms are afraid to put their foot down. We were given a written set of rules and told that if we were willing to abide by them than we were welcome. As a result we have a cohesive team and awesome parents. It is a great place for my DD.

 

[Galadriel]

We had this a few years ago, but thankfully we are calm at the moment!
There were 2 specific girls who were real prima donnas (and cousins) and they would become 'best friends' with someone, usually a quieter girl, and dominate them and make them feel wonderful with all of their attention, and then start gossiping about them and dump them. We had a lot of waterworks in the gym over them! This was when they were around age 10 - 12.
The hc did intervene several times when it impacted in the gym. The girls are still at the gym 4 years later, but thankfully have 'grown up' now!

 

[cathiann]

well, i would like to be told this as an owner/head coach so that i might intervene. sometimes these issues must be handled at the place that the group resides. and that's the gym. my house my rules. takes the parents and kids out of the equation. and i would request from the parents their permission to do so, and if granted then they must stay out of it after that.

See I wondered if the owners/head coaches would want to know. Thanks for offering your opinion!

 

[Tumblequeensmom]

I am so sorry that you're having to deal with this issue!!! With the young ones, the whole "I'm better than you" mentality does tend to come from the parents... they don't know any better at very young ages! Who tells them that??? The crazy gym moms! Unfortunately, as these girls grow older, they don't learn the "people skills" they need to develop to become successful adults. Let's face it.... gymnastics is temporary!! Yes, you can definitely learn valuable lessons such as work ethic, discipline, etc., BUT if you have a CGM telling you that you're the best, you don't need to be friends w/a child because you're "better" than them, etc. this child is sunk!!! There will ALWAYS be someone bigger and better out there! I feel really badly for the two girls mentioned at the beginning, not only are their girls' egos and feelings being squashed, but the girls who have the entitlement complex are really the ones who will have difficulty in the future!!!

I think these posts should serve as a warning to all of us out there in CB land.... is it really worth it to allow or teach your daughter (or son) that they need to step all over everyone else to achieve their dream? Don't we all want our children to grow up kind, caring and empathetic to other people's feelings?

PS. "Mean girls" ARE bullies... it's just that girls and boys tend to bully in different ways

 

[Kiwi]

This was when they were around age 10 - 12.

I remember being bullied at school during those years. By bullied I mean the spiteful stuff that girls do like leaving you out of the group. It seems that this is the age when sweet little girls turn into ... a word I won't print here. I'm not convinced that this always comes from the parents, though. I think it is a phase girls go through at that age.

 

[MdGymMom01]

well, i would like to be told this as an owner/head coach so that i might intervene. sometimes these issues must be handled at the place that the group resides. and that's the gym. my house my rules. takes the parents and kids out of the equation. and i would request from the parents their permission to do so, and if granted then they must stay out of it after that.

I did bring the situation up with the coach and she did have a sit down talk with the team. So, she was definitely aware of the issue. Unfortunately, mean girls tend to bully in very sly, subtle ways (when the coach isn't looking). Eventually my dd felt strong enough to stand up to her and either say things back or just plain ignore her. Plus, my dd made friends with other teammates which showed the bully that her antics were not going to affect or hold my dd down. Bullying is about power and taking that power away from someone else. The bully will not feel satisfaction and continue the mean behavior if they are stood up to, confronted and not given that power.

 

[Gymdad2]

We have always encouraged dd to have at least one very non-gym friend. It has given her a non-gym relationship to focus on when gym jealousies/problem have arisen.

 

[emandelsmom]

I'm sorry. What little snots!
They are everywhere though. We have a couple at our gym. Most of the girls have slowly as they mature come to realize that gym is not like school. Everyone at the gym is working at her own pace. And a faster pace does not always mean success. The snotty girls we have are some of the younger girls. One is plain mean and will trip girls as they run down the vault runway or grab the beam when a girl is on it or grab the bars when a girl is doing her routine. She is special according to her parents and of course-olympic bound. LOL They always are.
Hang in there. Have your daughter recruit her own group with a special song and pick her close friends. The level a child is not a "class" level and therefore everyone can be friends.

 

[Tumblequeensmom]

One is plain mean and will trip girls as they run down the vault runway or grab the beam when a girl is on it or grab the bars when a girl is doing her routine. She is special according to her parents and of course-olympic bound. LOL They always are.

She should be kicked out of the gym... she is an endangerment to the other girls!