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It's a life lesson . . . people move on . . . it hurts sometimes. Tell your son to find new friends (plural) and not to put all of his eggs in one basket. Diversify!
Yeah, this is normal stuff. You kid will find a new friend. Just let things happen. It is no one's fault, just kind of normal.
"Has anyone dealt with this and what advice can you give."
yes.
advice:
13 vs.14 is a big maturity difference.
throw in some puberty for spice.
my son had to deal with this.
nothing special for him.
EVERY one has to.
he will handle it.
his own way.
stay out.
For me it was the opposite. I just reached 6'2" tall when I entered the 6th grade and turned 12 a few days later. Mothers would not let their kids associate with me, as due to my size they assumed I was dumb, and been held back a few times, and thought I was too old to associate with their kids. My best friends were a year older, and one also had reached my height and the other was 6'5" tall. All of us had broad shoulders and looked much older than our age. When kids had birthday parties, everyone in the class would be invited, except us.
Your son is a year younger than his old friend, smaller and a year behind in development. His friend due to his development and growth, is being invited into the older group, who get to hang around with the girls, and that group considers your son to be a little kid. His friend has moved on to his own age kids, not wanting his age to shun him for palling around with a little kid. Your son gets ostracized for looking too young, and I and my two friends, way too old to be friends with. It hurts either way. Your son needs to find friends his own age and development level as I did.
Young teens start switching friends on the middle school years. They are changing interests as well as physically. Your son most likely will find someone else to hang out with before long. You can't force them to stay friends just because they had a long grade school friendship.
Young teens start switching friends on the middle school years. They are changing interests as well as physically. Your son most likely will find someone else to hang out with before long. You can't force them to stay friends just because they had a long grade school friendship.
Yes. A lot of things change in middle school. My daughter has had a best friend for years, a boy. But she's starting to lose interest. I think once she gets into middle school she'll drift away from him, because they are one year apart in age and there's also the gender difference.
This is so common, and normal, and it is heartbreaking to watch your kid go through it. Only thing I can think of is to encourage your kid to branch out to other kids, make new friendships.
Talk with your son. Help him to understand that middle school is a time of tremendous change, that right now his former best friend has very different interests and friendship goals, is looking to establish his position with a new group of kids whose interests match his. Clearly, your son ignored a lot of recent signals the kid sent, like the kid changing who he sat with at lunch.
Your son has to find a new friend - and preferably more than one! He needs several, and across different settings - like school, church, sport, club, etc. That way, when something blows up in one setting, he still has friends in other settings.
Oh, and the common interest being solely video games? Not healthy. Try as hard as you can to get your son interested in other things, too, like a sport, club, talent, church group, volunteer work, anything that's not just a joystick and a screen.
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It's good that you're clearly able to determine a "why". Your son is still interested in playing video games and doesn't care how he dresses, and the friend is interested in dressing nicely and girls.
It's much harder when they both still have the same interests but a friend is rejecting.
The problem here is there is no socially acceptable way to say "I'm no longer interested in being your friend but I wish you the best" and walk away. It always ends up being wrenching.
In the long run, your son will develop skills through this incident that will be very helpful for him. Learning to make new friends and persevere through hurt are life skills that will prove invaluable.
OP, sorry to hear your son is going through that. I experienced something similar around 5th grade (in a K-thru-8 school), a few years younger than your son did, after having a decent time in school in K thru 4. That's when students moved to a different floor for classes, and started platooning (switching rooms "as a team" between subjects). Sure enough, my early elementary school friendships fell by the wayside. Long story short, I couldn't reestablish the same in-school friendships I had before. The best I found was what I now call "acquaintances": people I can buddy up with for group projects and shoot the breeze with on field trips, but that's about it.
I didn't make a new solid group of friends until high school. More like "classmates who hang out occasionally" at first, but the friendships "came of age" by end of freshman year. In high school, everyone has a collective "let's just get through this prison!" mindset, and little things aren't as relevant as in middle school. Plus, when you're hanging out in someone's basement, drinking vanilla extract (80% alcohol) mixed into Coke (that you and your friends bought to bake cookies, of course ), it just doesn't matter if one person is a sophomore, and most are juniors. Or if one person likes "Garfield" cartoons, while most like horror movies. Furthermore, high-schoolers can appreciate Garfield's deadpan sarcasm, while middle-schoolers can see only childish animation.
Your son is 13, which means he will be starting high school soon, if he hasn't done so already. Unlike middle school, high school offers lots of extracurricular activities you can join, where you can present a different side of yourself. Classes aren't the only venues for making friends. You can be a nondescript smart kid in Geometry, but an intriguing railfan in the Train Club. (The Train Club will attract mostly guys, but hey.) Explain to your son the importance of reaching out to people in a new environment, and even more so, reciprocating when other people sincerely reach out to him. This way, he can make a group of friends in high school, rather than one person he depends on for socialization.
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), it just doesn't matter if one person is a sophomore, and most are juniors. Or if one person likes "Garfield" cartoons, while most like horror movies. Furthermore, high-schoolers can appreciate Garfield's deadpan sarcasm, while middle-schoolers can see only childish animation.
