Train A Kid To Be Strong

I have 7 yrs girl who is very very sensitive. She is like us. When i was little, i was always a scaredy child, always bullied in school, phsyical bullying. My mother would go complain but nothing would happen. I was scared of things. If someone would make fun of me facial feature or dress or lunchbox or name, i would not bring it to school or hate myself or do all those things, would not laugh because some body made fun of how my face looks when i laugh etc. I would not complain thinking i am wrong. Thats true.
Inspite of having so many family/relatives around in India, i was grown up insecure and zero confidence. Ok that is past story.. and india was different that time.

Now, I want to protect my daughter and make her strong and not be affected by these silly things. Kids will do that and it is part of life, will help her grow and she will always encounter such bully people.
She has to learn to face and keep moving but as a working mom of 2 kids, i have much less time on my hand to dedicate to preachings. and kids do not listen to mom's preachings.

My daughter has a close desi friend X who is kind of bully. X's mom herself accepts that. X is very smart and intelligent but has problem keeping friends. So she has tagged herself to my DD who can not fight back. X's mom herself said not to bother my DD much else you will lose her as a friend.

DD and X going to play, DD ready to wear shoes, DD got new pretty shoes and showing her to wear.
X tells her ' i do not like your shoes' . Now she is not wearing them and wear those one less size slides everywhere and run and tripping.

My DD got new trendy toy and took to school to show her and others. She made fun of it and instigated other kids to make fun of her. My DD got sad. She never tells me all these stories, but that day she was too sad coming from school and i asked her something about toy and she burst out. Now she is not taking it to school.

X bosses her on playdates and makes her do things 'not allowed' or DD herself do not want. X lies sometimes and too smart to answer. So I have cut down playdates but school i can not stop. I ask her to play with everyone but X is bit controlling.

So my worries are if she is not wearing shoes or not playing with toy, because she did not get validation, she might end up like me. Here in this country, we have so less support system.

Other close family friend Y. She is her best friend but still she/DD feels insecure in front of her. When together, I ask to feed my DD, because she does not eat very well, she screams at me infront of others. Y s mom is feeding her, instructing her what to eat, what not to eat, not touch this sugary thing etc, i do not interrupt much specially when others around, i do nto see what she is eating what not. Only when she does not eat, i offer to feed and she pushes me, even when i ask her should i give u rice or more curry. I ask really politely.
I am trying to understand her behaviour. Now it is bothering me.

 

thanks a lot for kind words. I talk to her everyday and ask if something bothered her today or someone said something mean to her. Just to cancel out any negative thoughts she had brought in. I give her my examples ( in positive way)

 

However, things like kid not wearing shoe because friend did not like it...etc kind, How far we can go poking into that ? these instances by chance i found out.
She does not wear a dress because her dad said he did not like it... ( I know, dads does not thinki much). but it happened in front of me, so i know. Shoes incident also happened almost in front of me. For toy incident, she was stressed out and coincidentally, i asked about you, she talked.
I do not get time to extract things out of her and then negate her thoughts and fill in with positive thoughts.
I try to generalize by saying if someone says some thing bad about your anything, u say, you do not need to look at it...

 

So True... I use the time to teach her at pickup/drop offs. I talk to her if someone caused any mental damage that i need to undo.

Other thing, i feel she gets intimidated by her close friends. Why would that be? why would she feel inferior in front of her super close/best friends? Her best friends are more vocal than her, means more demanding or clear about needs.
Example - with more people, they would ask for certain programme on TV, rather than watching what everyone or other kids are watching. My LO does it only in front of us and in our home. When her best friends are there or in their home, she is quite. They would ask what they do not want to eat. My LO is very picky at home in front of us, but in front of others, she is shy and some mom's think i control her.
I feel its like sibling rivalry with her best friends, love when in distress and hate when get too much attention

I know it is just childhood and will change as they grow.