Part of The Amazing Me Top Tips Series
Top Tip #30: When the Answer Isn’t the One You Wanted
“She’s mean!”
If you’ve spent any time around kindergarten-aged children, you’ve probably heard some version of this.
“She won’t play my game. She’s mean.”
“He won’t sit next to me.”
“She said I can’t play with her today.”
“That’s not fair!”
This language does not disappear as our children get older – perhaps it just gets more sophisticated.
By the tween and early teenage years, “she’s mean” can acquire considerably more attitude, an eye roll, a group chat and, occasionally, a level of social manoeuvring that makes the kindergarten playground look refreshingly straightforward.
Ouch.
The language may change. The relationships certainly become more complex. But underneath, something very similar can be happening:
I wanted something.
Another person wanted something different.
And I didn’t like how that felt.
Sometimes, of course, someone really is being mean.
Exclusion, bullying, manipulation and deliberately hurtful behaviour are real, and we want our children to recognise them, especially when these behaviours are repeated and involve an imbalance of power. We never want to teach a child to ignore their instincts or explain away behaviour that is genuinely unkind or unsafe.
But sometimes there isn’t a ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.
There are simply two people who wanted different things.
And perhaps this is one of the less obvious lessons in consent education:
How do I respond when somebody else’s answer isn’t the one I wanted?
Because learning to say no matters.
Learning to recognise no matters.
And learning how to receive an answer we don’t like, handle rejection, and to build resilience from this matters too.
Disappointment Doesn’t Always Require a Villain
When our child says:
“She’s mean. She wouldn’t play with me.”
we might begin with:
“I can see you’re disappointed. You really wanted her to play.”
We’re acknowledging our child’s feeling without automatically agreeing with their interpretation.
Then perhaps:
“Do you think it’s possible she just wanted to do something different today?”
Maybe she did.
Maybe there is more to the story and we need to listen carefully.
Gradually, we can help our children recognise some important distinctions:
Someone can disappoint me without deliberately hurting me.
Someone can disagree with me without disrespecting me.
Someone can make a different choice without rejecting everything about me.
And someone can say no without being unkind.
We’re helping our children pause and ask:
What actually happened here?
That ability to see the other person, while equally not losing sight of yourself, will matter far beyond the playground.
And this is also why sexuality education is about so much more than conversations about bodies, puberty or sex.
As I explored in a previous blog I have written It’s Not Just About Sex, we are also helping our children learn about respect, relationships, empathy, boundaries, communication and how we treat another human being.
These seemingly ordinary moments are part of that education too.
What This Does for Our Kids
Our children are going to hear answers they don’t like throughout their lives.
“No, I don’t want to play.”
“No, you can’t borrow it.”
“I don’t want my photo posted.”
“Actually, I’ve changed my mind.”
Later:
“I don’t feel the same way about you.”
And eventually, perhaps:
“I don’t want to do that.”
Sexuality education needs to prepare our children for both sides of these conversations.
We want them to know their own boundaries matter. But we also want them to understand that another person’s boundary doesn’t become less valid simply because it disappoints them.
Our children need to learn that disappointment is something they can manage.
Disappointment doesn’t give them the right to pressure, coerce or force another person into changing their answer.
Because another person isn’t there to give us the answer we want.
They are a person too.
5 Ways to Put This Into Practice
❤️ 1. Love & Connection: Name the Feeling Without Endorsing the Story
Start with what your child is feeling.
“You really wanted her to come over. You’re disappointed she said no.”
We don’t need to respond, “That’s terrible. Why wouldn’t she come?” Nor do we need to dismiss it with, “Don’t be silly. It doesn’t matter.”
We can validate the feeling without deciding who is right or wrong.
You can be disappointed and still be okay. And the person who disappointed you can still be okay too.
👀 2. Presence & Awareness: Get Curious About What Actually Happened
If your child says, “She’s mean!” try:
“Tell me what happened.”
Was there deliberate exclusion, teasing or bullying? Or did another child simply make a choice they didn’t like?
Help them learn the difference between:
I didn’t like what happened
and
Something wrong happened.
🧭 3. Teach & Guide: Help Them Hear the Answer
Sometimes children hear no and immediately start negotiating.
“Come on.”
“Please.”
“Just once.”
“Why not?”
Negotiation and persuasion are normal parts of relationships. But children also need to learn where persuasion ends and pressure begins.
A simple message can be:
“You can ask. But you also need to listen to the answer.”
Because consent isn’t about getting the answer we want. It’s about listening to and respecting the answer we receive.
And if somebody changes their mind, that is their answer now.
🪞 4. Self-Awareness: Notice What Happens Inside You
What happens inside us when somebody says no?
Do we feel rejected? Embarrassed? Angry? Left out? Do we immediately want to persuade them? Do we decide they are selfish, rude or mean?
Children don’t need to be ashamed of those feelings. They need help learning what to do with them.
“It’s okay to feel disappointed. What matters is what you do with that feeling.”
🔁 5. Circle Back: Love Them While They Learn
None of us will get this right every time.
Children will keep asking when they should have stopped. Adults will push when we should have listened. We’ll occasionally let disappointment become irritation and say something we regret.
We circle back.
“You asked me to stop and I kept going. I’m sorry. I should have listened.”
We’re saying:
“I love you. You belong. And because I love you, I’m going to keep helping you learn how to treat yourself and other people with dignity and respect.”
Aligning the Tip with Family Values
Back in the day, many families had one television.
One.
If Dad was watching the cricket, you watched the cricket. Or you found something else to do.
If your sister wanted one program and you wanted another, somebody had to miss out. There was no second screen, no streaming service, no personalised feed waiting patiently in your bedroom.
Even dinner offered fewer choices. You generally ate what was put in front of you, perhaps after pushing the peas around the plate for a respectable amount of time.
I’m not suggesting everything was better back then. It wasn’t.
But our children are growing up in a world that offers them an extraordinary amount of personal choice.
Their playlist. Their profile. Their feed. Their game. Their show. Their preferences.
So much of the world around them can increasingly be tailored to ask – ‘What do YOU want?’
And there is nothing inherently wrong with that. Choice can be wonderful.
But relationships ask something more of us.
Because another human being is not an on-demand service.
They have preferences too.
They get to choose the movie sometimes.
They may not want to play the game we want to play.
They may have a different opinion.
They may not want to sit with us.
They may not return our affection.
And eventually, they may not want the intimacy we want.
This is where family values can help us widen the question beyond:
What do I want?
to:
What matters to me?
What matters to you?
How does my choice affect somebody else?
Can I respect your choice when it is different from mine?
Can we disagree without turning each other into the enemy, or myself become the victim?
Because one of the values we can nurture around the family table is the understanding that difference does not have to become division.
Sometimes we compromise. Sometimes we take turns. Sometimes we negotiate.
And sometimes we simply accept:
You get to choose something different from me.
That is not losing.
It is part of living alongside other human beings with dignity and respect.
And perhaps, in a world increasingly designed to deliver what I want, that is a value worth practising deliberately.
When Disappointment Becomes Entitlement
There is another reason these small, everyday lessons matter.
As our children move into adolescence, the situations become more complex.
They may experience attraction that isn’t returned. A relationship may end. Someone may change their mind. They may feel embarrassed, jealous, rejected or angry.
At the same time, they are encountering messages about relationships, gender, sex and power from peers, social media and popular culture, as well as pornography that may contain sexual violence, aggression or coercion.
This isn’t about suggesting that masculinity itself is dangerous, or that a young person who feels angry, hurt or deeply disappointed by rejection is destined to behave badly.
Feelings matter. And what we do with those feelings matters too.
Anger is a normal human emotion. So are disappointment, jealousy and hurt. Rejection can be painful. Wanting to feel strong, wanted, respected or attractive is human.
But anger can become frightening or dangerous when it is expressed through aggression, intimidation, control or violence.
And disappointment can become something more concerning when it becomes connected to entitlement.
The thinking shifts from:
I wanted something from you.
You didn’t want the same thing.
I feel hurt.
to:
I wanted something from you.
You didn’t give it to me.
Therefore, you have wronged me.
And, more concerning still:
I am entitled to get what I want anyway.
This is where another person’s ‘no’ can begin to be treated not as an answer to respect, but as an obstacle to overcome. Persuasion can become pressure. Anger can become intimidation. And, at its most serious, a person may begin to justify coercion or violence because they believe they were entitled to something another person did not choose to give.
And from there, we sometimes hear the language that shifts responsibility back onto the person whose boundary was ignored:
“They led them on.”
“They shouldn’t have changed their mind.”
“They were asking for it.”
They weren’t.
No one deserves harm because they gave somebody an answer they didn’t want.
Feeling rejected does not justify retaliation.
Being angry does not remove another person’s right to safety.
Disappointment does not create entitlement.
And importantly, the aim here isn’t to frighten ourselves about who our children might become.
We are not looking at a disappointed five-year-old on the playground and imagining some terrible future.
We are recognising how many ordinary opportunities we have, while our children are growing, to help shape how they understand themselves in relationship with other people.
We are not teaching our five-year-old how to respond to sexual rejection.
We are helping them begin to understand something they will need throughout their life:
Another person is allowed to want something different from me.
Their ‘no’ does not make them responsible for my disappointment.
And my feelings, however strong they may be, do not give me the right to pressure, frighten, control or diminish them.
That is respectful relationships education.
It is empathy.
It is self-awareness.
It is consent.
What Matters Most
An important part of consent education is helping our children understand that consent means respecting the answer we receive, even when it isn’t the answer we wanted.
Sometimes we compromise.
Sometimes we negotiate.
Sometimes we find another option.
And sometimes the answer is simply no.
No is not a mean word when it’s said with kindness and respect.
Long before our children navigate dating or intimate relationships, we can help them practise:
I can feel hurt without hurting you.
I can feel rejected without diminishing you.
I can be angry without frightening or controlling you.
I can hear no without believing I am entitled to turn it into yes.
And when they get this wrong, as they sometimes will, we keep teaching within the safety of our relationship.
You are loved. You belong. And we are going to keep learning how to treat ourselves and other people with dignity and respect.
Because ultimately:
I am allowed to want what I want.
You are allowed to want what you want.
And neither of us becomes less worthy of dignity and respect because those things don’t match.
Let's Talk About Body Boundaries, Consent and Respect
Let's Talk About Body Boundaries, Consent and Respect was written by Jayneen Sanders for kids aged 4 to 10. As a mother and primary school educator, the author advocates for body safety and prevention education as seen in the books she writes for Educate2Empower.
Can I Give You a Squish
Kai just loves giving everyone around him squishes! A big hugger, this little merman eventually realises that not everyone likes being squished. The perfect book for small kids, this is a useful tool for parents who want to lay down the groundwork on what consent is about.
Welcome to Consent
The book is a gender inclusive straightforward and funny guide that explains what consent is all about in a relatable way
I'm the Boss of My Body
Parents, carers and educators may think that they have all the tools they need to keep the kids around them safe. But the truth is, kids can be at risk no matter where they are and who they’re with. Through this book, adults can empower their kids to help protect themselves from these dangers.
