Your daughter should not have friends forced on her.

mrsconn23 · November 2021

Dear Prudence,

My wife and I moved for my work over the summer. She has been unemployed since COVID hit, and we couldn’t find anyone to take care of our young son. She has been a stay-at-home mom ever since and hasn’t really enjoyed it. She finds it isolating, especially since the move (big city to tiny town) and hasn’t made any friends. We also have a 13-year-old daughter together who actually has the opposite problem—she has bloomed into a true social butterfly.

My wife has found one friend in Nan, our neighbor. Nan has an 11-year-old daughter herself: Anne. They come over, at least three times a week, for dinner or a movie night. I am fine with family time being neighbor time because it makes my wife happy and Nan and her kid are genuinely alright to be around. My problem is that Nan and my wife keep pushing our daughter to be “besties” with her kid and take her along when our daughter goes out with her friends.

Anne is “quirky” at best. She collects animal bones and snake skins and constantly jumps into conversations to roll out random animal facts. She is fairly thin-skinned and will go on rants about how “stupid” other girls are for liking makeup and fashion. It is clearly a self-defense mechanism, but my daughter loves makeup and fashion, and so do all of her friends.

The few times that my daughter has made attempts to include Anne in her social group without adult supervision have ended in tears. One of the girls called Anne “creepy” for showing off a rabbit skull she had in her pocket and she cried; another time, Anne threw away my daughter’s new makeup because she didn’t want to watch braiding videos on YouTube and got voted out. My daughter has confessed to me she doesn’t like Anne and hates having to “babysit” her because their moms were friends. I asked if she was ok with Anne being over while us adults were here and could she be kind then. She affirmed.

I tried talking with my wife. Our daughter will be in high school next year—she needs to navigate her own social groups and not be fenced in by us. My wife said that our daughter had it easy compared to Anne and could stand to learn some empathy. What should I do? Press, let up, or hope it all goes away?

— Forced Friendship

banana468 · November 2021

Hello pot. Meet kettle.

YOU could learn some empathy Mom. Adolescence is hard enough without your parents trying to get you to be someone you aren't.

How about a compromise: Anne can come over from time to time when your daughter does not have plans however she has to respect your daughter's possessions.

But just as you can't force the wives of your friends to befriend YOUR wife, your wife can't force your child to befriend the children of her friends. People have different interests and some things are just unlikely to work out.

flantastic · November 2021

Anne needs to be able to find friends who actually like her. Same for LW's daughter. There's no need to force this - it's not going to be actually good for either of them.

short+sassy · November 2021

The parents need to stop trying to force this friendship. The daughter sounds fabulous. She's cool being friendly with Anne when she comes over to the house, despite Anne destroying her make-up (wtf???). But just doesn't want to include her in her friend groups because it hasn't gone well. That's fair enough.

In addition. 11 and 13, at least to me, are actually big age differences for kids. At 11, Anne is more in "little kid" mode. 13 is when children are starting to blossom into teenager-ship, which is totally different in many ways. Including interests.

climbingsingle · November 2021

short+sassy said:

The parents need to stop trying to force this friendship. The daughter sounds fabulous. She's cool being friendly with Anne when she comes over to the house, despite Anne destroying her make-up (wtf???). But just doesn't want to include her in her friend groups because it hasn't gone well. That's fair enough.

In addition. 11 and 13, at least to me, are actually big age differences for kids. At 11, Anne is more in "little kid" mode. 13 is when children are starting to blossom into teenager-ship, which is totally different in many ways. Including interests.

This was honestly my first thought too. These kids are not related, and trying to force a friendship is not going to work. Clearly.

mrsconn23 · November 2021

climbingsingle said:

short+sassy said:

The parents need to stop trying to force this friendship. The daughter sounds fabulous. She's cool being friendly with Anne when she comes over to the house, despite Anne destroying her make-up (wtf???). But just doesn't want to include her in her friend groups because it hasn't gone well. That's fair enough.

In addition. 11 and 13, at least to me, are actually big age differences for kids. At 11, Anne is more in "little kid" mode. 13 is when children are starting to blossom into teenager-ship, which is totally different in many ways. Including interests.

This was honestly my first thought too. These kids are not related, and trying to force a friendship is not going to work. Clearly.

As the parent of a 10.5 year old, this is so true. The difference from year to year at this stage of life can be massive. Kids mature at much different rates.

It sounds like Anne is young/immature 11 and LW's daughter is an on-track to above average 13 year old. They might as well be 5 years apart in age.

Also, this also is a bad lesson in consent. If you force shit on your kid and pressure them into a situation where they feel they can't say 'no', it will likely bleed over into other life scenarios.

MissKittyDanger · November 2021

Even if these 2 were same age, they shouldn't be forced to be friends. You can have a family friend and the kids interact but they don't have to be friends. Just be nice.
Anne doesn't like LW's daughters stuff? Fine. Anne should be her own stuff to do since they don't seem to enjoy same things.

Wife and neighbour are friends. Not the kids.

banana468 · November 2021

climbingsingle said:

short+sassy said:

The parents need to stop trying to force this friendship. The daughter sounds fabulous. She's cool being friendly with Anne when she comes over to the house, despite Anne destroying her make-up (wtf???). But just doesn't want to include her in her friend groups because it hasn't gone well. That's fair enough.

In addition. 11 and 13, at least to me, are actually big age differences for kids. At 11, Anne is more in "little kid" mode. 13 is when children are starting to blossom into teenager-ship, which is totally different in many ways. Including interests.

This was honestly my first thought too. These kids are not related, and trying to force a friendship is not going to work. Clearly.

They also clearly have their own unique interests. Not all kids are into makeup and not all kids are into animals. If you wouldn't do this to adults then don't force the kids.

STARMOON44 · November 2021

Anne threw your daughters stuff out. She shouldn’t be allowed back in your home let alone force your daughter into being friends with her.

downtondiva · November 2021

short+sassy said:

The parents need to stop trying to force this friendship. The daughter sounds fabulous. She's cool being friendly with Anne when she comes over to the house, despite Anne destroying her make-up (wtf???). But just doesn't want to include her in her friend groups because it hasn't gone well. That's fair enough.

In addition. 11 and 13, at least to me, are actually big age differences for kids. At 11, Anne is more in "little kid" mode. 13 is when children are starting to blossom into teenager-ship, which is totally different in many ways. Including interests.

I completely agree. I think it says a lot about the daughter that she's agreed to be kind to Anne when she comes over, even after all the problems of trying to include her with her other friends. Asking her (or any teen, really) to do more than that is asking too much.

And yes, I was a very different person at 13 than I was at 11. Two years is a big age difference at that point in life. Also, these two clearly have nothing in common and I'm not sure they would even if they were the same age. Common interests aren't mandatory in friendships, but they do help, especially (I think) for kids and teens.

But regardless of any of this, kids don't have to be friends just because their parents are friends, and parents don't have to be friends just because their kids are. LW's wife needs to stop forcing this friendship.

kerbohl · November 2021

I remember my parents doing this when I was younger, the forced friends when the other person was much younger. It sucked. Two years is a big difference here, and the mother isn't teaching the daughter good things. I think this daughter is already showing empathy by being willing to hang out when they have their "neighbour" time. That should be enough.

Your daughter should not have friends forced on her.

Re: Your daughter should not have friends forced on her.

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