What to do when your child gets dumped by their best friend
That moment is going to come when your child fights with their bestie and its going to break your heart when you see how heartbroken they are.
When they get dumped by their friend they really do struggle with emotions like feeling confused, and angry, especially if it happens abruptly which tends to happen.
The whole situation will probably leave you feeling very helpless and unsure if you should intervene or not because of course you want to protect your little one as much as possible.
Here are some tips to help your child get through this tough time:
Show your child empathy, even if you think it's silly, it really isn't to them.
Be supportive and comforting.
Give your child time to work through their feelings before you focus on problem solving
Ask them about their relationship with their friend, was a it a mutually beneficial friendship? Did you they make each other feel good, or was it a very one sided friendship.
Help them to understand their friends perspective too,
Try not to get overly involved. It is good for them to solve conflict and work through these things by themselves. Little children tend to be mean because they're still learning empathy. Remember there are always two side to a story, no child is perfect, yours included. Unless of course its bullying (that's a totally different thing)
Discourage your child from trying to get even.
Explain to your child that the "break up" may not be forever, sometimes people do just fight because they spend too much time together and having a little break may be a good thing.
A tip that may help in the future are:
Encourage your child to cultivate friendships in different parts of their lives. like school friends, home friends and family friends. The quantity of friends is not important.
Remember children are resilient and friendships ending are part of life and something we all have to go through.
Has your child gone through a big friendship breakup yet?
Tell us how you dealt with it....
