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My 12 year old son does not want friends

NAS64118

My son has just started in Year 8 of a mainstream secondary school.  He is the only one from his primary school to go here and since he feels he lost all his ‘friends’ from primary school,  he is adamant that he will not make a single friend at secondary school.  He has managed to get through the whole of Year 7 with not a single friend.   One of his EHCP targets is to make 3 friends and attend one school club. However he has stated very clearly that he doesn’t want this.  The Advisory Teaching Service are telling me that when his hormones kick in properly, having a leas oe friend could save his mental health. But I wonder whether I should respect his wishes and leave him be? I’d appreciate any opinions or experiences that anyone has with regards to this.  Thanks. Anna

Parents

  • Hi Anna - I'd leave him be - you can't force him to make friends and it's a stress he obviously doesn't need.

    Does he have any hobbies that would naturally involve others?     If he has, I'd gently encourage him in that hobby and see what happens - he needs to measure and judge others as 'worthy' of his attention and that their contribution to his life would be worthwhile - like if he's into cars, someone else with comparable or higher knowledge would be rated as 'interesting'.   That might develop into a friendship - but you can't force it.

    I'm in my 50s and have probably only 7 friends - lots of acquaintances and people I might socialise with (if I can be bothered) - but only 7 friends - and I rarely see them but we keep in contact via e-mail..

  • in reply to Plastic

    Thanks for your reply. The more replies I get to my post, the more I realise what I already knew - that you can’t make friendship happen. Unfortunately he’s being bullied now at school and I wish he had even one ally to watch out for him. However he does have us - his family and we think he’s the bees knees. And if it comes to it I will take him out of school. Just troubling times at the moment.

  • in reply to NAS64118

    Have you considered private education?      It's crazy expensive (around £20k/year) but if he's bright, you'll find the price acts as a filter that removes a lot of the nasty elements - and with smaller classes and more teacher involvement, there's normally a lot less bullying and their academic potential is maximised.

    Another thing you might try is getting him into Scouts - a couple of hours a week of adult-controlled, activity-driven interaction - and again, the kids tend to be 'nicer' kids - the horrible kids just don't do Scouts.

Reply
  • in reply to NAS64118

    Have you considered private education?      It's crazy expensive (around £20k/year) but if he's bright, you'll find the price acts as a filter that removes a lot of the nasty elements - and with smaller classes and more teacher involvement, there's normally a lot less bullying and their academic potential is maximised.

    Another thing you might try is getting him into Scouts - a couple of hours a week of adult-controlled, activity-driven interaction - and again, the kids tend to be 'nicer' kids - the horrible kids just don't do Scouts.

Children
  • in reply to Plastic

    Private education is probably not possible for us right now, but I am going to look into whether I can get control of his EHCP budget, in which case I might be able to flexi school or home educate and pay for him to do courses that match his interests.  Scouts could be a good idea. I know 2 of his primary school class are involved with Scouts so it’s definitely something I will encourage him to try. Thanks for the suggestion. A