Is My Child a Bully?

No parent ever wants to ask "is my child a bully?" However, if identified you can help your child turn things around.

How do you sort out the accusations from the truth? This is difficult to think about. There is not a parent on the planet who wants to believe their child is behaving in a cruel and intentionally harmful way towards others.

However, you must realize you are not a bad parent and your child is not a bad kid. You are both doing the best you can with what you know.

If you get a call advising your child is the leader in a bullying incident;

You recognize the warning signs of your child being a bully

Please do not make excuses or minimize the situation. Don’t blame the target or yourself. Beware of your parenting instincts that have you rising to defend your child before you have all the facts.

Steps to determine if your child is a bully

1) Stay Calm. (Yeah I say that alot because we are parents and tend to react "BIG" when our cub is somehow threatened)

2) Get the details. Remember it is never easy for anyone to bring these types of issues to a parent. So, be respectful and listen being sure to let the reporting person know you are going to follow up with your child.

Ask the person reporting to you what happened and really listen. Keep an open mind.
Ask if there were any witnesses?
Ask who was involved?
Ask if this has happened before? How often?
Ask if there were any other incidents involving the same children ?(Sometimes a bullied child acts out against the bully and gets blamed)

3) Once you are satisfied you have all the details. You need to talk to your child.

#1 thing to remember is to stay calm. Until you know all sides you are not going to make the mistake of ASS-uming anything or judging your child. Let your child know they are not in trouble. There may be consequences for their actions but you are not going to punish them. You just want them to be honest so the two of you can work through this together. Understand your reaction
Let them tell their side of the story. What happened? Who was involved? Has it happened before? (In some cases the bullied child gets labelled as the bully because they defend themselves.

HERE IS THE SURPRISE ANSWER: TO is my child a bully?

You do not need to take sides.
You do not need to take responsibility.
You do not need to punish your child.
You do not need to decide who is right or who is wrong...
Whether or not you believe the accusations is not important.

The simple fact that it has been brought to your attention and/or you recognize the warning signs is enough.

Whether or not your child is the bully now you know bullying is a part of their life and you need to take action. Is my Child a bully is not as important as what are we going to do about the bullying? It is important to be there for your child if you want them to be able to move forward without bullying

problem solvedeal with it.

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