I have thought about this all weekend and it is time to write this one. A few weeks ago, my daughter came home from school and told her sister a woman approached her during lunch. The woman was another student’s mom and she asked my daughter to stay out of her daughter’s seat at lunch. They are in third grade and they do not have assigned seats. She also said something like “You haven’t been very nice, have you?” My child was sitting alone at the time it happened. When I found out about this incident it was the very next morning and I was getting ready for work. My husband came up to me and told me what he overheard and I was so mad I couldn’t see straight. I told my baby girl not to be afraid and not to keep anything from her parents. If she had told me when I picked her up from school, I would have taken care of it then. I got ready in a hurry and marched into the school on a mission. I saw the principal and asked for a word right then and there. She was about to go into a meeting, but I told her she needed to be informed of a woman who was being rude to my child at lunch. I explained what happened and also told her that she needed to let this woman know to take up her concerns with the classroom teacher, not my child. I thought it was very odd behavior on the part of the mother, but I hoped that was the end of it.
On Friday, this ridiculous human being came back. This time, my daughter was not alone and several other students overheard the whole incident. My daughter was sitting at a table with her friends trying to eat her lunch and the mother came over and said something like “Stay out of my daughter’s seat!” My daughter responded “We do not have assigned tables or assigned seats.” The woman said “I know that, but that is my daughter’s seat. Do I make myself CLEAR?” She then proceeded to go over to bring her daughter bottled water since she can’t drink from ummm public water fountains. After that, she went over to my daughter’s friend and asked why she was friends with my daughter. Here’s where the slow motion scene comes in like Matrix.
I received a phone call at work from my daughter’s principal. She told me she needed to let me know something that had happened at school. When she told me the above things and the fact that my daughter and several of her friends ran over to her when she came into the lunchroom, I started seeing red. My first thought was that the principal never contacted the mother after the first incident. I mean, why would a grown woman keep coming back if she knew we were all aware of this? My second thought was that I was going to kick this woman’s ass. I am not going to deny it. That was my second thought. I heard the principal like a buzz in my ear saying something like “and I have never banned anyone from school before, but I have banned her from the school grounds”. Okay, whew. I don’t have to put on some black leather outfit and ride up on a Ducati 996, because don’t think I won’t. She went on to say that she took statements and had her security guard check the grounds for this woman. Finally, she said, I thought about having you two meet…stop it right there. Yes, I interrupted her and said that. I went on to say “You don’t want me to meet with this woman. Trust me on that. I am a professional and I would like to keep it that way. I have to set a good example, and I can see no good coming out of a meeting with her.” She then told me to think about it over the weekend, and I did.
What I came up with is this. I have zero tolerance in bullying of any kind. I have taught my children to be friends with everyone including this woman’s daughter. I want the teacher to step in and have the girls talk. Once that is done, I never, ever want to hear about this woman again. She will be banned for the rest of the year. I’m not sure how old this woman is or what kind of problems she had in school, but when I was a kid, my mom didn’t come up to school to fight my battles, and believe me, I was picked on just like the next kid. What the teacher said was iron-clad back then and if your mom came up to school and talked to the principal, well it was all over then. I never would have gone home and made up a story about a little girl sitting in my seat and even if I did, my mom would have told me to deal with it. This mother has turned to using intimidation on 8 and 9-year-old girls, and has completely bypassed talking to the teacher. The sad thing is, my daughter never finished her lunch and told me when this lady was leaning over her she got a weird feeling in her “tummy”. That upset me most of all, but I am proud of my daughter. She stood up for herself, and that in itself, is a lesson.
“Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one’s definition of your life, but define yourself.” ~Harvey S. Firestone
