Just leave me alone.

In my new group I have a little guy (he turned seven recently) who always sees himself as the lowest point in any gathering of kids.

Brian believes that he's being picked on all the time. He's not making it up for effect, he sincerely believes that no one likes him.

He told me during my first week that, "Everyone bullies me."

When I see him coming toward me, little face all cloudy and frowny, I know he's coming to inform me of still another perceived slight.

He's a nice boy. He's smart and has a sense of humor. He just has this perception of himself as being bullied. In my personal observations, that's not the case.

If someone disagrees with him or doesn't want to play a game his way, that's his go-to. He says they're bullying him.

I don't know any of the kids very well yet, so I don't have even a clue as to why he thinks this way.

I'm guessing that part of it stems from what's going on during the school day, but have no way of knowing that.

I've watched his interactions with other kids. He's quick to take offense because he thinks everything is directed at him.

Yesterday afternoon, Dave and Mike (they're both six) were walking around the cafeteria, talking. When I say they were walking and talking, what I mean is they were sort of skipping/hopping rather than walking, occasionally smacking into each other's shoulders in rollicking little boy camaraderie.

It's not just a boy thing, it's a kid thing, but boys are the ones who can't seem to dial it back. It just escalates and escalates until an adult steps in and reminds them that, "We don't need to crash into our friends to have a conversation."

And yes, it's funny.
Kids are hilarious, usually unintentionally.

So Dave and Mike were walking around crash-talking, and Brian was following them about eight feet or so away.

They stopped and talked to him twice, but I wasn't able to hear what was said. Then they came to me and told me that, "We asked Brian to stop following us around and he won't."

So I asked Brian, who had approached while the other two were talking to me, "Did they ask you to stop following them?"

"Yes, but I know they're planning to do something mean to me."

Mike and Dave looked at each other in surprise. "What???" they said together. "We're just talking!"

So I sent the two of them on their way and invited Brian to sit down with me.
"Why do you think they're planning something mean, Buddy?"

"Because they don't like me. They've always been so mean to me."

"What do they do that's mean?"

"I don't know. They just don't like me. They have always been very mean all the time."

Well, they haven't.
I have witnessed some behaviors that I don't like, but Brian isn't the only recipient. They pick on each other a lot. There's always a sprinkling of you're not my friend anymore or I don't like you leave me alone and you can't play here or straight up shoving in anger. Although that last is usually brotherly love between one of the sibling pairs I have.

Shorter version? Basic kid behavior.

But telling Brian that they're just acting like kids and it's not personal isn't going to help him feel better. He won't believe it anyway.

What he needs is someone who listens to him. That means I stop what I'm doing (paperwork or trimming someone's yarn project or cleaning a tabletop or sweeping up snack crumbs) and focus. I look at his face while he talks and I let him tell me what's bothering him.

While he runs down, I try to ask relevant questions around the edges and reassure him that I won't allow anyone to bully someone else. He's never satisfied, he still thinks he's being picked on, but it does seem to help him to be able to say what's on his mind.

Bailey is one of my assistants. She's been in the kid business for awhile, and seems nice. She's helpful and quick to catch most of the little things kids do that they shouldn't be doing.

She watched the interactions with Brian and the other kids, and later told me that Wendy, who used to run that site, told her that when Brian came to 'tattle' on the other kids, Wendy would have him write down his complaint and put it in a jar. At the end of the day, she would take his complaints out of the jar and read them. If any of those complaints required further action, then she'd follow up.

Then Bailey said, "I'm going to poke around in the cabinets and see if I can find that jar for him."

I kept the shock off my face. I think.

I said, "Wow. I really don't like that. Imagine coming to me and asking where something is or needing help in some way and me telling you to write it down and dismissing you. What we'd be saying to Brian is, 'Your problems aren't important enough to me to bother giving you my attention. Here, write it down and go away.' Do you see what I mean?"

She said yes, but I could tell from the way she said it that she doesn't agree with me and that she'd prefer not to help Brian with his problems because he's "tattling".

Now I don't think just listening to him is going to fix anything, but that's not my goal. My goal in my interactions with children is to try not to make anything worse.

I've said it before, to me it's a blip in the day. A minor thing. A little kid conflict.

It's my job. What I do for a living.

But to the kids, it's their entire world. The whole universe. And to a kid like Brian, who thinks everyone is out to get him, telling him to go away and write it down and don't bother me with your petty bullshit (of course no one is using those words, but he's hearing a variation of them all the same) is going to make things exponentially worse.

I can't fix what's going on with him. I'm not even qualified to try. But I can do my best to avoid hurting his feelings or adding to his anguish.