The Corridor: What to Do When Your Child Is Being Bullied
The instinct is to fix it in an afternoon. The thing that actually restores a child is slower, quieter and almost entirely about whether they feel believed.
Written by Sian Trombley · BEd, MACP, CCC
You will usually find out by accident. A comment in the car. A blazer that keeps going missing. A stomach ache that only ever arrives on a Sunday evening. By the time it reaches you, it has almost always been going on for longer than your child admits.
And your first response — the one that arrives before you have chosen it — will shape how much they tell you next time.
Why they did not tell you
- 01Fear of escalation
Children predict, often correctly, that adult intervention can make the next week worse before it makes it better.
- 02Shame
Being targeted feels like evidence of a defect. Most children privately assume they somehow invited it.
- 03Protecting you
Children with worried or stretched parents routinely edit their own distress downwards to avoid adding to the load.
- 04No language for it
Exclusion, rumour and group silence are harder to name than a shove in the corridor — so they go unreported for longer.
The first conversation
Working with the school so it actually lands
- Put it in writing — email creates a record; a corridor conversation does not.
- Use the school's own language: refer to their anti-bullying policy by name and ask which part is being applied.
- Ask for specifics: what will change by when, and who is responsible for it.
- Request a named safe adult your child can go to without asking permission.
- Diarise a review date before you end the first meeting.
“No child recovers from being disliked by many. They recover from being genuinely liked by one — and our job is to make that one possible.”
Sian Trombley
Rebuilding, afterwards
Once the immediate situation is contained, the work changes shape. What has usually been damaged is not resilience but belonging. Build one small, reliable social context outside the school gates — a club, a cousin, a Saturday team — where your child is known for something other than what happened. Confidence returns through evidence, not encouragement.
When to seek more support
Speak to your GP or a mental-health professional if there is persistent low mood, panic, self-harm, refusal to attend school for more than a few days, or any talk of not wanting to be here. Bullying is a serious risk factor, and early support shortens the recovery considerably.
Children do not need a perfect parent. They need a predictable one who returns after hard moments.
Sian Trombley, Canadian Certified Counsellor
What you can try this week
Ask sideways
Not "is anyone being unkind to you?" but "who did you sit with at lunch today?" Specific, low-stakes questions surface more than direct ones.
Promise process, not silence
Say: "I won't do anything without telling you first." You cannot promise secrecy. You can promise no surprises.
Start the log
Dates, times, what was said, who saw it. Schools respond to patterns on paper far faster than to a worried phone call.
- Children conceal bullying mainly because they fear losing control of what happens next.
- Belief and steadiness come before problem-solving.
- Written, dated records change how schools respond.
- Repeated, targeted, power-imbalanced behaviour is bullying — one-off conflict is not.
- Recovery is rebuilt through one reliable friendship, not through toughening up.
Does my child believe I can hear this without exploding?
Am I trying to restore their safety, or my own sense of control?
Where in their week do they currently feel liked?
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This article is educational and is not a substitute for individual clinical advice. Comments are closed so the Journal stays a calm place to read.
