I desperately need some advice. I have a DS12(just turned) who is in 6th grade. We moved to our current location when he was getting ready to turn 8 and in 2nd grade. His transition into new school was terrible and he never made any friends. He never complained though and said things were fine. In 3rd grade he was tested for gifted and moved to a gifted class in 4th grade. I did not want to move him in the middle of 3rd as he was finally making friends. 4th grade was a disaster, no friends, all of the kids in the gifted class had been moving along together since 2nd grade and were very clicky. He actually ended up getting beat up by an older child at school. 5th grade was even worse, still no friends, but he never let on how much he was really bullied and how miserable he was. Towards the end of 5th grade, I finally realized what a bad situation he was in and had been in this entire time. We got him into counseling and decided he would start middle school at a new school this year.
Middle school was going good socially, he finally had friends, which was very evident at school functions I attended and talking to kids etc. He still wasn't Mr. Popularity, but the situation was 1000% better. This is a science magnet school which is right up his alley accademically. However, magnet schools are in rough, minority neighborhoods where they want to change the diversity of the school population. Needless to say there are a lot of fights there. The fights really traumatized my son and he decided to develop a plan to avoid becoming bullied again or the target of a fight. Get ready for this, his plan was to come across as a racist to appear tough and mean. (This is a school where his race is only 15% of the population) I have no idea where this idea originated, but obviously I was sick to my stomach when I heard it. For one our family doesn't believe in anything of the sorts. I really felt like his safety could be in danger from this word getting out. Not to mention the few friends he made (of minority races) probably aren't that interested in being his friend.
Of course, I am really wondering why he didn't confide any of this to the counselor or me about his idea or what was happening with it. When the issue came to light, he reported that he just wanted to present a tough image and didn't really think about the consequences and then got too embarrassed to tell the counselor or me as he knew we would be disappointed.
His social skills are really lacking and his judgement just terrible. Today I got a note from the teacher about him teasing another kid. I don't know what is going on or where to turn. I just feel he is making extremely poor decisions that are having a lasting impact on him. I know he was bullied for a very long time and his self esteem probably very damaged. He has never had any real close friends. He does have 2 boys in the neighborhood he plays with that are much older than he is, but very well behaved and they seem to share interests in robots, video games, science, etc. I am having a hard time believing anything he is telling me and don't think he is always 100% honest with the therapist either. Starting him in this new school was a new start and he says he likes it, but if this don't work out, I'm at my witts end about what to do with him. Is some of this giftedness, is there a social disability, is it personality, puberty, teenageness or what?
Any advice greatly appreciated.
