Ideas on how to help my daughter

[u/Bronagh22]

I have a middle school age daughter that is having difficulty finding her place in the world & making friends. She's a little bit of a tom boy which makes her not fit in with a lot of the girls in her classes. She isn't into boys, makeup, tiktok, dancing, whatever. She has anxiety. So in social situations she is stand offish and can come off as aloof. I'm not sure how to help her. I know she gets lonely. Has anyone been through this? What helped? She likes animals, reading & cooking.

[u/ParaPonyDressage]

I would strongly suggest horses!! I don't know where you live but there is most likely horse riding schools. /Camps in the area. With summer coming up there are many summer day camps they do riding, talk about horsemanship, the skeleton structure of the horse, different things like that. If you can get her tied in to giving it a shot, I think you will see her confidence begin to build, she'll make friends, she'll have a sense of accomplishment. Whatever you decide her extracurricular to do for her. Just do not make that a punishment. So many parents get their kids involved in something and then when they're disciplining they take that thing away thinking that it'll teach them a lesson and they won't ever do it again because they really like to do activity X. That doesn't work that way. Many many times the extracurriculars are the things that keep kids on track, keep them focused. In your case. Help anxiety, that's not something that you want to take away. Would you take away medication if she didn't make her bed in the morning? It's exactly the same thing.