Respectme

John (12) had been looking miserable for a few weeks.  Mum had tried to get him to tell her what was wrong but he would just get angry and go to his room.  On Wednesday John didn’t get in from school until 5.45pm.  Mum was very angry with him and demanded to know where he had been, what he had been up to and why he did not phone her.  John also got angry and told his mum to keep her nose out of his business, went upstairs and slammed his door. 

Mum didn’t give up this time and followed him into his room where she found him crying.  She apologised for shouting so much but explained how worried she had been about him.  She told him that when he was ready she would be there for him to tell her what was going on.  At this point John became extremely distressed and blurted out that he was being picked on by a girl in the year above him and he hated her and was going to ‘get her’ one night.  Mum said nothing but comforted him until he calmed down a bit and went downstairs to turn the oven off. 

Mum came back upstairs with a cup of tea and a biscuit for John and told him that they were going to have a good talk about things and see how they could sort it out.  John seemed to have closed up a bit in the time that Mum had been downstairs but she wasn’t put off.  She started by saying that she wanted John to tell her as much as he could about the bullying and then they could discuss what he would like her to do about it.  This seemed to get him to open up again.  After a long talk Mum and John agreed that she would call the Pupil Support Manager at school the next day to let him know what was going on and that he would have a word with John himself.  Mum promised that they would get it sorted out and made John promise in return that he would not do anything to the girl in the meantime and try to keep out of her way.