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10 Fredericksburg Parent and Family • April 2023 ask mom MEAN ASK MOM offers parents two perspectives on today's child-rearing issues —one from a mom with grown children (Mary), the other from a mom raising a small child (Kristi). If you're looking for creative solutions, or your mom isn't around to ask, drop in! If you have a question for Mary and Kristi, we'd love to hear from you. askmomyourquestion@gmail.com M A RY Daughter is Illustration by Suzanne Johnson WRITTEN BY MARY FOLLIN AND KRISTI CROSSON THE PROBLEM: I'm worried about my daughter and how she treats her friends (she's 11.) When they tell her something about themselves, she tries to make it seem less-than-spec- tacular. Like, when her friend Megan won a prize at school, my daugh- ter said, "I heard they just gave it to someone to help with their self-esteem." Or when her long-time friend, Sylvie, got a new haircut, my daughter told her she might like it better when it grows out. Her com- ments aren't totally mean, and some- times her friends don't see what she's doing. But I do, and I don't like it. Ideas would be appreciated. MARY SAYS: For whatever reason, your daughter feels poorly about herself, so she's trying to make sure her friends feel even worse about themselves. Only, she doesn't know she feels this way. Rather, she feels confident her harsh judgements are true, and she's the only one qualified to dish them out. In a twisted way, these snide remarks help her feel better about herself. Passive aggression is so confusing, isn't it? I applaud you for recognizing these tendencies in your daughter at this young age. Passive aggressive adults are never really at ease, and over time, suppressed anger robs people of even small amounts of joy, which is what your daughter is missing out on. Joy. When one can only find joy in one's own accomplishments, the supply is limited. But if one can truly experience joy in a friend's success, the accomplishments of strangers, and good news anywhere on the planet, opportunities for experiencing joy are boundless. You might be tempted to scold your daughter for speaking so unkindly to her friends. But if you can share with her that you see these comments as a cover for her own insecurities, she might be willing to open up to you. What's bothering her? Why is she so upset—or even angry—with her friends? Why is she feeling so poorly about herself? Let her know that joy is her birthright, and with practice, she can experience it wherever she goes, even if it 'belongs' to someone else. Tell her also that if she really wants to feel good about herself, she doesn't need to be better than anybody. All she has to do is experience other people's joy as her own, and her friends will be right there with her when she has her own happy news to share. to Her Friends