A Case of Cyberbullying

 

Photo by Loving Sister    A Workshop and Exhibition by the Chinese Family Services of Ontario

 

Cici, 12, is a Chinese female adolescent. Her parents immigrated to Canada recently and had two children, Cici and her sister, 13.  The family is upper-middle class with his father working in an auto-parts company and his mother working in real estate.  Cici can understand some Cantonese and Mandarin.  Cici attends high school full-time and says that she enjoys time with her friends, working on her computer, and drawing.  In fact, some of her art had been chosen by the school to be put on display. 

 

The family reported that the past year had been particularly difficult.  While her parents experienced a great deal of marital discord, Cici tries to avoid seeing parents arguing all the time and she spent almost 40 hours a week in the internet and facebook. She stays and eats in her own bedroom all the time. She had received some harassment message and cybersex photos and video. She did not know how to deal with that and she asked some of her friends and her friends then spread over that Cici is afraid of the sex video and photos. She all in sudden was well known that she was a coward. She cried all the time and could not sleep and had very poor academic performance in the school. The teacher also noticed that she looks pale and thin. The teacher then asked her parents to come for more details, however, the parents failed to come twice. The teacher then reported to the Children Aids Society to follow-up because the teacher suspected that it might be a child abuse case. The Children Aids Society interviewed and home visited the family and referred the family to receive counselling services.

 

The whole family receives counselling services including the marital issues, parent-child communication problems and parenting issues. Cici also joined the youth group and received individual counselling services on the cyber bullying issues.

 

In the last session, the family left saying they felt they had improved their marital relationship and learned a number of skills that they would try to implement into their daily lives.  Cici had more confidence to deal with the cyber bullying and went back to school and reduced her time in the internet, instead, spent more time in drawing.

 

(Source: Chinese Family Services of Ontario)