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Has your daughter shared with you what she likes about this manipulative kid? There must be something about her that causes your daughter to admire her.
I tend to think that there must be something happening in this girl's life that is making her feel very powerless so she's bossing your daughter around because she can.
Obviously your daughter is going to remain "friends" with her sister. It's unfair for this friend to demand such things. I think I'd consider having this child over to your house. Maybe try to get her talking and it will come out in conversation why she feels such a need to manipulate so much. Maybe she needs someone to listen to her and give her some guidance.
When my son was young, he was friends with a kid who everyone considered a stinker. And he WAS naughty and I didn't like my kid hanging out with him, but I found out that he had a rough home life and a little brother who was deaf and demanded a lot of attention. Once I found the way to interact with him, he stopped doing so many things that would be considered "naughty" and just played nicely. He felt safe at our house and we treated him with kindness. I don't know if that would work with most kids, but it worked with him.
Your daughter will most likely get tired of being bossed around in such a manner and the friendship will either burn out spectacularly or just fizzle. It would be nice, though, if BossyPants would rethink her ways.
OP, I have an 8 year old daughter as well and at 8 years old I can still pick her friends! This girl is a bully! I say tell your daughter that this girl is not acting like a friend should and she probably needs to not play with her anymore. DONE!
At 8, your daughter needs to start learning how to use her words to describe her internal dialogue. That's a difficult thing to do, many adults can't do it.
You can help her by being quiet, for minutes, if you need to, to give her time to answer your sincere (not accusative) questions (one at a time, please!) about why this girl is so important to your daughter, and what does your daughter think a friend is, and how your daughter becomes self-directed about what kind of people and activities she allows in her life.
This is a wonderful opportunity to start building these skills and ideas in your daughter. Take advantage of it, and do not bowl her over, she's just starting to take baby steps. Let her talk and make mistakes. I'm sure you're doing a great job of showing her how much you love her, it comes through in your concern.
Is your daughter complaining about the bossiness or is it more that it bothers you? What did your daughter tell her bestie when she said she didn't want her to talk to her other friends? If she acquiesced, then that would be a problem, but if she's still talking with them, then she's dealing with it.
I agree with the posters suggesting that you talk about expectations of good friend behavior, but that you also let this play itself out. It's really only through experiencing different friendships that we begin to understand what we individually need to feel happy in a relationship.
Also agree about trying to learn more about how the friend's life is going generally. There's a lot in your post that suggests insecurity. Maybe the controlling kid lives with a controlling parent.
I almost felt like I was reading a post I could have written. My daughter is 8 years old and this year, she had a similar friend. She, too, is a social butterfly with lots of friends but was really drawn to this one girl. I'm a leadership prof and author, and I've been a big believer in developing the leadership potential in my daughters from the time they were born. So when I found out this girl was bossing my daughter around, I insisted that she diversify who she was hanging out with. I explained how much leadership potential she has--the amount of power she has to positively influence the lives of others. I adapted that a bit to her language of course, but she got the message and now is still friends with that girl, but also hangs out with many others where they all make decisions about important things like what games to play on the playground.
At 8, your daughter needs to start learning how to use her words to describe her internal dialogue. That's a difficult thing to do, many adults can't do it.
You can help her by being quiet, for minutes, if you need to, to give her time to answer your sincere (not accusative) questions (one at a time, please!) about why this girl is so important to your daughter, and what does your daughter think a friend is, and how your daughter becomes self-directed about what kind of people and activities she allows in her life.
This is a wonderful opportunity to start building these skills and ideas in your daughter. Take advantage of it, and do not bowl her over, she's just starting to take baby steps. Let her talk and make mistakes. I'm sure you're doing a great job of showing her how much you love her, it comes through in your concern.
This is such an awesome answer!
Asking questions can help her discover things about her relationship with her friend and how she feels about it. As her mom you can subtly assist in this. The point is that she needs to learn how to do it for herself not to just take directions.
If you tell her what to do about it you aren't acting all that much more different than her friend is. There's a quirky paradox!
You have my sympathy, OP. I remember well when my own daughter started to experience the confusions and hurts that came when her group of friends began to experiment with this kind of behavior. It was downright painful to see.
The temptation is to "fix" it for her. And when we do that we might rob them of the chance to gain another skill they'll need out there in the world.
Fortunately at age eight these things are on again off again and one hopes that the experience will develop a sense of empathy in your daughter that she remembers what it feels like and uses that piece of unpleasantness to be a woman who chooses not to inflict it on others. That's always one positive of having an "owie."
When you're nine years old you're learning a lot about relationships and part of that is having a best friend. I had a best friend at that age and we were together after school, on the phone, and yes she was more assertive than I was. We spent most of our time at her house and it was her mom that mothered me and corrected me when my mouth got away with me. And you know what? I listened to her.
There were times when we 'broke up' and moved on to other friends. She was jealous when I had new friends, when I didn't have as much time for her. But you know what? You either move on or go back and patch things up. Like I said, you learn and grow. The best part is I still am in touch with her and she's still as assertive as ever.
Let the kid learn and you do the parenting when anything comes up that you need to step in on.
My daughter has a best friend that she really likes. They have been friends a while and get along fine mostly. My problem is that her friend is always bossing her around. My daughter is pretty outspoken and is not afraid to speak her mind, but she thinks highly of this friend and takes what she says to heart. Lately she has told me that her friend told her she doesn't want her to be friends with her other friends. My daughter is a social butterfly so she has a lot of friends at school. Her Bestie even went so far as to tell her she doesn't want her to be friends with her little sister.
She tells me things this girl says to her all the time. For example the girl told her she cant say hi to her in the morning, told her she cant sing anymore. For two weeks this girl wouldn't speak to her and my daughter still has NO CLUE why that happened. It was upsetting for her but she doesn't know why there was a problem.
Any advice would be appreciated. I have talked to my daughter about standing up for herself and told her that its not right for her friend to expect these things from her. Any other advice?
Lordy! I used to BE that friend when I was that age. LOL
I was the oldest of 5 kids, and I was quite used to bossing my siblings around, and thought I should be able to boss everyone else too. PLUS, I would get SO jealous of ANYONE being friends with MY special best friend.
What was my motivation for being such a brat? I'm not sure. Maybe being the oldest of 5, I was tired of always having to share everything. Had to share a room, had to take baths with my sisters, had to share a bedroom with my sisters, and on and on. Maybe I just didn't want to share my friend. LOL
At any rate, my best friend didn't see things quite the same way as I did. She had other friends, and some times her time was occupied by the other friend(s). It used to eat at me, but then one day, I got to know 'that' friend, and lo...she was a nice person, and the 3 of us became friends.
As the mother of your daughter, I think you're doing everything exactly right. You're blessed that your daughter talks to you and tells you what's going on, and you can continue to encourage her to be kind to EVERYONE, and that her bestie is NOT the boss of her, and that it's OK to have other friends, and to sing, etc.
Let your daughter sort it out...within the parameters of always being kind, and not doing dangerous things. Kids need to figure this stuff out for themselves.
I would encourage your daughter to make and hang out with some other friends. My daughter will be 8 and she was having some problems with the some "friends" in her class. We had a talk about what was happening and how she should handle it. I asked her why she wanted to play with someone that made her feel bad. I told her friends shouldn't make us feel bad. My daughter has a lot of girl's in her class this year and most of them are the 1st born kids. They are used to being in charge at home and they think it isn't any different at school. My daughter is a 2nd child and is a go with the flow type girl. It's made for an interesting year with a lot of teachable moments.
I read this AFTER I made my post.
I'm thinking being a bossy first born has a lot to do with it.
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