How do you and your smart kids handle jealous people?

Parents Forum
41

Please get some counseling to help your daughter…and you…see this from others’ perspectives. She sounds like a great kid on many levels…but something isn’t clicking the right way if she is off putting to people in situation after situation after situation.

My engineer husband says the LEAST successful people he knows are the ones who think they are THE best at everything…and subtly or overtly let others know. So this could affect your kiddo in the workforce someday as well.

Your daughter is 19, and this has been going on in varying situations for a while.

She needs to self examine what she is saying, doing, body language…etc…that makes this occur again and again.

AND if she is being bullied…she needs to know where to go for help. And how,to,deal,with this form of harassment.

A good counselor will help her understand all of this.

42

You are asking for opinions, so here you go: In another thread you talk about moving to her OOS college for a month to be there for her, and in another go into deep consideration about the best possible future career she should aspire to before she even started college. Both seemed extreme and overthought. In this thread you speak of a pattern she keeps falling into (that would concern me), and how to deal with jealousy (how do you know it’s jealousy–could this assumption be part of the issue?). A few themes I’m noticing are humble bragging, hovering and perhaps trying to engineer her life, which seems to be causing you both anxiety. I think you and your daughter should consider counseling. This is in no way meant to be snarky or judgmental. The saying about giving our children roots and wings comes to mind.

43

OP you have received excellent advise on this thread. You want your daughter to be a social success in life as much as an academic success. She will not live the rest of her life in a vacuum.

It is not uncommon for an only child to miss out on some subtle social cues. She just needs to learn them. Counseling can help her social education.

44

“Gotta say, I think the casual way you label people and talk about status is extremely offputting. I’m sure you don’t mean it to be. I don’t think you realize how arrogant it could make you sound to many people, or how judgmental. Might be something to give a second thought and extra consideration to.”

I’m quoting this because I shared this with my daughter who, unfortunately, has a bit of a bully history (we’re working on it) and has always been a fairly popular kid. She explained that there were two types of kids who got bullied by the clique. The first is the stereotype - the odd loner kid. The second describes your situation to a “T.” It’s the high-achieving “stuck up” (her words) kid who, whether consciously or unconsciously, lets everyone know about their achievements. And, it may not even be the child who is doing the damage - it could be the parents. My daughter even said this was their preferred target because the child is “a challenge.” Interestingly, both type of victims tend to be introverts who just don’t understand social situations.

Considering I just spent time at a dance competition where even adults can say some nasty things about young children, I believe that bullying is alive and well with all ages. Since your daughter seems to be unable to shake the pattern of being the victim, I would also suggest counseling. It not only gives her an opportunity to let off steam, but she might learn a couple of ideas about how to thwart it.

My daughter suggested that your daughter keep her grades and other accomplishments to herself. Also, asking the older kids for help (even if she doesn’t need it) sees her as being more humble and goes a long way.

** ETA: My daughter goes to a large, urban high school. She and her friends make deliberate decisions NOT to wear certain designer clothes or exhibit behavior that they feel will put others down. There is a lot of poverty and a lot of wealth at that school, but somehow you wouldn’t know it by walking the halls of the school.

45

There are many wealthy, over-achieving, smart, leader-type, athletic, cute, witty etc students out there in all schools who do not have these problems. You can’t immediately change the behavior of others, but you have total control over yourselves and how you react to such behaviors. A counselor will help figure out what you and your daughter are doing which may be contributing to these problems. Again, I am not saying that your daughter deserves this treatment ( she doesn’t) but she/you do need to learn what you are possibly doing/saying to contribute to it. Changing yourself ( your words and behaviors) can change how others treat you.

How was your daughter bullied by her teacher at the age of 7 because she was too smart for her class? Was she exhibiting behaviors in class ( not unusual for gifted kids) that the teacher did not understand or know how to handle? Was she well behaved, knew all the answers etc and the teacher was mean? This comment seems odd to me but maybe I am missing something…

46

OP, The title of your thread “How do you and your smart kids handle jealous people?” is an interesting one in that it shows your perspective that the jealous people are at fault. Time and time again, from elementary school and now in college, the jealous people need handled. And how do you, as her mom make it all better?

Your post speaks of your D being smart, tiny, cute, funny, outgoing, athletic. She is so cute and small, in fact, that D gets all the boys. At 7 she was even bullied by a jealous teacher. The pattern of mean girls being mean has continued from HS to college, where you told her things would change when she would be around like minded, brilliant, athletic, wealthy people like herself.

You said your D gets friends initially, but then they become jealous of her, perhaps because she is self pay, her stellar GPA, that she is cute and small, or that she is a freshman on a varsity team… D is bullied time and time again.

(Let me interject that I don’t condone bullying. Ever.).

But what you describe is a cycle. And you both need to take a different path or this cycle is going to go around her whole life.

You posted this thread seeking advice. In additition to agreeing that you need to stop hovering and D needs counseling, Here are my two cents:

  1. You need to buy two copies of Dale Carnegie's book, "How to Win Friends and Influence People", and you both need to read that book. I'm not talking book club, where you discuss the chapters, either. I'm talking read and soak it in.

https://www.amazon.com/How-Win-Friends-Influence-People/dp/0671027034/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1492176284&sr=8-1&keywords=book+how+to+win+friends+and+influence+people

  1. Let your D spread her wings and fly.

(Otherwise, flash forward 6 years and you are going to be asking advice on how your Manhattan attorney daughter should handle her mean boss who gives her all the boring cases because she is obviously jealous of the fact of blah blah blah blah…)

47

I’m sorry to say that I agree with the other posters who say that your daughter may be unintentionally giving the wrong impression… It all depends on how she’s phrasing things.

For example, you say she’s “a humble kid because she always says she doesn’t think she is that smart.” Depending on how she presents that, it could really annoy a lot of people. Saying “Yeah that Orgo exam was super tough, I didn’t do as well as I wanted to” is one thing, saying something like “UGH I only got an 80 on that exam I’M SUCH AN IDIOT” is entirely different, and it’s a bad look. There are probably a lot of her classmates who would be thrilled to get an 80 on that exam; when she says something like that she’s calling THEM idiots, even if she doesn’t realize it or intend to. It comes off as false humility, as if she’s fishing for compliments.

But honestly the whole “everyone’s just JEALOUS of my daughter because she’s smart and rich and funny and pretty and all the boys like her and she’s just so EXCEPTIONAL and PERFECT” vibe that I’m getting from this is making me think that this is an attitude problem.

48

“For now, it is not abusive to the point that my daughter can’t handle it.”

Learning how to “handle” abuse is not good. As others have mentioned upthread, this could set her up for a lifetime of putting up with abusive employers or even an overbearing spouse. There is a difference between learning how to rise above the occasional petty interaction and coping with a pattern of systemic abuse. I will add to the chorus and suggest that she seek some counseling to help her come up with healthy, active responses to these situations.

I also think it’s appropriate to speak out - first to the girls who are behaving negatively and then to the coach, if the girls are not responsive. If she quits, that does not make her weak. It means that she knows how to protect herself from harmful situations.

@twogirls I have heard of examples of gifted kids who had problems with teachers at a comparatively early age. I don’t know if it rose to the level of bullying, but discomfort and hostility, yes.

@kchendds I am sorry your daughter is having difficulty. In HS, I was that kid - high achieving, intellectually curious, not really accepted by my peers. I was not short, cute, bubbly, and an athlete, however, just a socially-anxious nerdy girl. I had few friends and was on the receiving end of many unkind remarks. Like you, my mother told me that it would get better socially in college. And it did. I entered an ordinary public university with a very good honors program and found lots of students like me. They became lifelong friends.

Efforts by very bright kids to fly under the radar are usually unsuccessful. The other kids will “find out,” even if your daughter doesn’t brag about her grades. In addition to seeking some counseling, I think she should seek out those like-ability peers. Is there an honors program at her college? Are there specific clubs that attract high-achieving kids?

Best of luck to her.

49

@mamaedefamilia that is exactly what I meant. If this student is highly gifted it is very possible that behaviors emerged early on ( tantrums, emotional intensity, frustration that the student could not handle, etc) and maybe the teacher did not know how to handle these behaviors. I was wondering if this happened and that maybe the possible lack of experience ( with this population) on the teachers part could have been perceived as “bullying.” On the other hand… If this student, at the age of 7, was a smart, well behaved kid who was kind to her peers… It strikes me as odd that she was “bullied” by a teacher if nobody else was. However… I don’t know what the OP meant and what the details were.

50

I can understand some of what OP was feeling, because I recall telling S back in grade school and even in high school, that when he got to college he wouldn’t have to deal with the bozos. Which was good advice at the time, but when I heard about some of his struggles with the same type of nonsense in college (of course, at a different level), I felt I had not done a great service to him, and I had let him down. Especially if you are a naturally gifted student, you will run into others who are not as smart as you are, or who have a hard time dealing with not being in control, or whatever.

Without going into too many details, what I realized eventually was that DS was not really complaining to me about getting picked on - he was simply sharing how he was working through something new to him. It was ME that was projecting my own shortcomings and failings, that I had not prepared him how to “deal with the bozos”, making much more of it than really was there.

And I remember starting to feel some of this when talking on the phone with DS about certain comments he shared from other students, and DH was on the other phone downstairs. DH simply asked him “so how do you think you should deal with this”, showing confidence in my DS that we had faith in him to work it out. Suddenly the mommy part of me that always wants to solve all of pups’ problems stepped back, stopped trying to evaluate my own performance and what I thought was a failure, and I listened as DS worked out the solution himself.

Everyone can be picked on or made to feel different if placed in the right/wrong circumstances. Much of that is well beyond our control. How we respond, that is how we allow ourselves to feel about this, is of course, up to us ourselves.

51

I am inclined to think that your D is not being “bullied” as such. The only example you’ve given is of a junior teasing her for being “dumb.” Now, obviously your D is not dumb. I think it quite likely that what happened was that the girl(s) were joking in an admiring manner, the way groups do amongst themselves, sometimes with pseudo put-downs that are the reverse of what the words literally mean. To a friend who is spectacularly gorgeous and besieged by would-be boyfriends laughingly, “Oh, that’s our Mary, so hideous that she can’t get a date.” Or whatever.

I wonder, frankly, whether you have encouraged her to view such things as “bullying”? Whether you have encouraged her to see “jealousy” from hoi polloi in every joke and comment. You know, there are few things more genuinely irritating than a person who thinks that you must be jealous of them because of their “superior” gifts (superior by their own definition).

Is she inclined to the “humble brag”? If so, yes, she probably does annoy the hell out of people, unwittingly. If she IS genuinely being bullied, there is no excuse for it. But in either case it really sounds as if she could use a professional perspective on this issue, in order to escape what appears to be a pattern that is negatively affecting her life.

52

“For now, it is not abusive to the point that my daughter can’t handle it.”

As a parent do you wait until a kid is crumpled into a corner and unable to function (or worse) before you suggest getting professional help?

I don’t think so. This is how kids end up in all kinds of spiraling behaviors… the people who love them who could have intervened early on assume “she can take it, she’s strong”, or “he’s dealt with worse”.

53

@twogirls I see what you mean. I probably wasn’t clear in my earlier comment. I was thinking of the situation of the unobjectionable kid who happens to be super bright and does not engage in anti-social behaviors. I have also seen bad behavior by bright kids at math competitions, so I know it can cut both ways. But as you say, the OP has not provided details, so it’s hard to determine what the issue is.

@gardenstategal What the OP describes seems out of step with the college’s reputation for academic excellence. Intellectual peers should not be hard to find there. Comments made here at CC suggest that the overall vibe is more collaborative than cutthroat.

Hopefully, the OP’s daughter can discover the root of these social dynamics and figure out how to initiate proactive changes.

54

Agree. The old “don’t hate me because I’m beautiful” thing.

I think most of the posters here have picked up on the unlikelihood of any one person generating jealousy everywhere they go without that person contributing to it, no matter how unwittingly.

Introspection is in order for the OP’s D, and counseling can help with that. A counselor can help the D with strategies on how to deal with difficult people and how to cope when actual bullying takes place. It’s not obvious to me that actual bullying is really occurring, certainly not the degree the OP relates. As with jealousy, if the D is bullied everywhere she goes, something needs to be looked at on her end as well. Bullies go for blood when they smell it…they don’t bully confident individuals who have an appropriate, healthy self esteem. Counseling can help the D make herself someone who is “no fun” to bully.

55

How would the students know that this student is full pay? How or why would this ever come up in conversation except … possibly …maybe… between two students who are very, very close friends? That seems odd to me as well. My daughter attends an OOS school and the subject of who pays what, who got financial aid etc never comes up as a topic of conversation. Nobody talks… Nobody cares. Again- it strikes me as odd.

There are too many “things” here that suggest to me that there are possible issues with boundaries, humble bragging, difficulty with social cues, etc.

I am not suggesting at all that the student deserves to be mistreated.

I am going to add something: there is a term used in the “bullying literature” that is called “provocative victim.” That may be what’s going on here… I am not sure of course, but it’s a possibility.

56

Going back to my earlier point, sometimes it’s not what the individual HERSELF is doing, but how others are treating her as a consequence - and by extension the effect of that treatment on her peers. Imagine for a moment that you have TWO daughters, but that you and everyone else lavish attention on D1 and basically ignore D2. Is D2 bad because this bothers her? D2 may take her resentment out on D1, because that is her only outlet, even if D1 is small, cute, smart, and athletic.

If every time the coach needs someone to take a lead, he chooses your D, while others are left sitting there, they are going to resent that. If all the boys swoon when D walks in, leaving the other girls without hope, they are going to resent that. If everyone around her is always saying "wow, that D, she really has it all going on. Too bad no one else has anything like that going on, " others are going to resent that. Nobody likes a teacher’s pet. I don’t know what the answer is for a situation like that (maybe others can provide ideas), but I do know what it’s like to be on the negative end of these scenarios and it is not fun.

I’m also wondering if some of this might be cultural - along a number of directions. For example, you have mentioned at least twice that your D is “small”. In some cultures this is a sought-after feminine trait, but in America women come in all shapes and sizes and being tall or big-boned are not considered traits that make one ugly or unappealing. Which is to say that people are probably not jealous of her because she is petite.

57

@sylvan8798 what you are saying could very well be true, and I want to thank you for posting another perspective. I also want to add again that there are many, many “cute,” witty, smart, leaders, teachers pet, etc kids who always get picked for awards and positions again and again… and never get treated the way this student is possibly getting treated. This leads me to think there are other things going on- although your suggestion may be happening as well.

58

There will be jealousy anywhere, so my advice to your daughter is to try to act in a manner that will minimize jealousy and try to handle it with grace.

59

It’s true that jealousy may be anywhere, but it’s certainly not everywhere. If someone is experiencing negative reactions from people wherever they go, and it has pretty much always been that way, it’s time to look at the common denominator.

60

Some things to keep in mind about perspective:

“Cute” can be interpreted by some as being flirtatious.

“Witty” can be interpreted as sarcastic put-downs.

“Leadership” can be interpreted as bossy.

“Smart” can be interpreted as “showing off.”

“Teacher’s Pet” can be interpreted as brown nosing.

A good counselor should be able to read her body language and responses and help her adjust. Even if she is “fine with it” as it stands, things won’t change until she does. She will go through life with an inflated sense of self, always be in victim mode, and/or have very few friends.