My Daughters Girlfriend

Do not allow them to hang out together. As a parent you're responsible for who she is friends with and what type of influence they have on each other. If that means getting the school to change her classrooms or moving schools or even home schooling, its worth it for the long term issues you will be avoiding.

My mother always told herself these things when I was a kid. The reality was that it was never this simple, and the more she tried to force the issue, the more I ran toward bad influences as fast and as hard as possible.

This girl is not a bad influence. This is a fallacy of responsibility for the problems your child is choosing to express. This child is a girl who is making choices your daughter is looking up to for some reason. You need to stay focused on what your daughter is reacting to in her overall life, which is making those choices seem appealing, and helping her learn to make her own choices no matter what her friend is doing.

You would be better off trying to help your daughter be a good influence on her friend, and understand why it's important to make the choices you value, and what the consequences are that she will face for all her options of choices, than to try to force anything. At the end of the day your child has a right to make choices. You need to be teaching her why some choices are better, what the risks and costs are with all choices, and how to evaluate them.

And you need to understand that she won't always agree with you. And you need to realize that she has a right to sometimes disagree. And it will drive her hard and fast toward the wrong choices to attempt to force things rather than help her reason through them and express disappointment when she chooses badly. Blaming it on this other girl makes her want to defend the other girl. Talking to her about her own path and values and why she respects what she does, has at least a chance of success.

If your daughter is making her own decisions based on the consequences she will face for them, and encouraged to learn to think this through, you will find that she will start to surround herself with people who also take responsibility for themselves, given time. And her self confidence will start to teach this way of being to others in her life as well.

Your question expresses a believed state of weakness in your child by saying any child can cause her to be something she is not choosing to be. Help her create an internal place of strength for herself which you and she both respect even when you disagree, where there is no illusion that she is too weak to decide on her own. Who knows, maybe the experience will have the added bonus of saving the other young woman by teaching her a new path in the process.

When I was a teen I made a few really bad choices in girl "friends" and boyfriends. My mom followed the "keep your friends close and your enemies closer" theory. The smartest thing my mom ever did was not giving me long lectures, or threats, or too many opinions. I knew she didn't care for them, and she would simply tell me that I could make better choices, and then she accepted them into our homes and our lives. They were always invited over, to hang out, for family night, for dinner, for holidays, for everything. The relationships usually ended fairly quickly because those friends were usually from very dysfunctional families and weren't comfortable with the simple kindness being offered to them, and I didn't really understand why they would be uncomfortable when my family going out of their way to want them to come over and spend time. In the end, I guess I was a family girl - I just didn't realize it during those rebellious years.

I'm assuming you don't mean a sexual relationship, rather a friend who is a girl who is a bad influence? I don't judge either way, it just occurs to me that you might unwittingly be being judged because of the phrasing of the quesiton.

At any rate, you are the parent. If this girl is a bad influence then talk to your daughter about the choices she faces and their natural consequences. At that age you can forbid until your face turns blue, but most kids would just lie to you and do things behind your back. That's the least safe thing that can happen.

Engage her in conversation (force her to engage if you have to) about the things her friend does that worry you and ask her what she thinks of it. Ask her what it makes her feel to be in the presence of such behavior and ask her what the consquences are to her friend and, by extension or temptation, to her. Make her think through these things and then ask, "so what do you think is best for you to do in this situation?" Even if she's snippy about it to your face, the dialogue in her own mind is valuable to her.

You've already taught her values, now it's time to teach her to think about actions and results. Everything, good or bad, has consequences. We make our own destinies by our choices. Lead her through this thought process. With any luck, she'll see for herself that this girl is a destructive force in her life. She might also repeat these conversations in her own mind when she's away from you and faced with tough choices.

Best of luck.

If a friend is being a bad influence you should not lecture your daughter or anything, but instead try to introduce her to new friends.

There are quite a few factors involved here-
1. Is she a leader or a follower?
2. Do you see her progressively going down hill/attitude? grades? listening?
3. Is everything running peacefully in your home?

With those questions...
I would start with concern and love, and explain the concept of who
we hang around with, talk, listen and laugh with..is eventually who we become. This is truth.
I would then 1st try to involve her in other activities to occupy her time.
(sports, music, church..etc) that way she won't have any time to hang
out with the friend that influences her in the wrong way.

If the above changes do not take place, I personally would pull out all the stops and either switch schools/or homeschool and find self esteeming
activities as a family.
I have 2 friends that have a boy and a girl that are "followers" and started
following the wrong crowd in school. Their lives were simply going completely downhill-heading for drugs and destruction.
Remember..EVERY single solitary choice we make, has a good or bad
outcome and defines our life.
such as: Bad choices of husbands=bad marriages=children in the middle of chaos=destructive behaviors.
Does that make sense?
One friend pulled her child from one high school into a better district/
worked on self esteem issues and gave her a fresh start.
2 other Aquaintances, homeschooled their teens- took language arts
classes with them, filled up their days with positive activities, travel, etc..
their teens were sidetracked from going down the disaster road, to the right
road.

Sometimes it takes extreme intervention, other times it takes
softer stepsIt all depends on the situation.

I applaude you for noticing, and taking action.
It begins in your home and in school- Each bend in the road
shapes our lives.

This includes things we have to change in ourselves too...
I had to realize that :) We all change together as a family-

Blessings to you!!!
T.

It really depends on your daughter. Some kids really can be a bad influence. She could change schools, but she may just find similar friends. You could talk to counselors about getting her into different classes, but again, she may just find similar friends. Try talking to her, try counseling, try whatever it takes, even if you have to pull her out and homeschool her. Do it all with love. I think many children who run from their homes are just not feeling enough love. I am not saying this is you, of course I don't know you at all. Does your daughter have a hobby or sport that she is into? Get creative, see if there is something you can do for this friend, but most of all protect your daughter. You know best.

You don't say if your daughter is following her friend's example.

My daughter had a friend who most moms would consider a "bad example", but I never kept her away from her. My daughter learned how to make wise choices even though her friend(s) were not.

Amalthea A. said it really well.

Nothing much can be done. By the time a child is in high school he or she believes friends (not parents) understand them better than you do. You must keep the same standard of life and goals which are already instilled in the teen. Remember when you were that age, when a voice in your head would tell you, don't do that, mom will find out. Your child now hear's that voice, and will make the right decision, when the time comes. PRAY!!

I have to be honest I looked at all your question and most them seem to be quite extreem. They do seem trollish. If it is all for real I do so hope you follow some of the great advice on here.

As much as she will allow, pull your daughter in closer to you at this time and do fun things together. Get her talking in the car or while you do a task together. Tell her your concerns and regulate the time she has with this girl when you are able to. You can do nothing about what she does at school really. You can get counselling if your insurance covers it or someone you know will do it. Try to offset the bad with the good you invest in her. This is a tough age and kids want to feel loved and that they're important. Do what you can on that score. Involve healthy, caring female relatives or friends if there are any around.

I think the best thing you can do is talk to your daughter about the friend and the undesirable behavior. You have to be specific and get to the heart of the problem and ask your daughter her thoughts on the behavior.

You must know you can't force her to abandon her friendship...that never works.

If you go without saying anything she may be thinking you don't have an opinion and that she's good to continue as is.

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