# When Your Child Has No School Friends \[R\]

An episode of [Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1082244480), 13 Apr 2026, 16 min.

Audio: https://mgln.ai/e/187/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/fa326977-3de5-4283-9b8b-af3500c58607/b69b2795-5503-4de1-ac91-af460017906e/447be1a9-934a-482d-bd91-b41900abc5cf/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=a05f1702-0c0e-4b0f-8014-af460017907c

When your child says they hate school and have no friends, what really works? Discover why building friendships takes 200 hours of intentional time, and learn practical strategies from hosting craft days to finding 'third spaces'. Plus, understand the two key relationships that create true school belonging and why sometimes the best friendships might not be with peers at all. Quote of the Episode: "Friends don't usually land in our lap—they require intention and time." Key Insights: • Close friendships require 200+ hours of intentional time • School belonging needs two key relationships • Third spaces beyond home and school are crucial • Adult friendships can be valuable for children • Structured activities help build new friendships • Medical and psychological checks may be needed • School relationships often need parental facilitation • Quality family time remains foundational Resources Mentioned: • Jeffrey Hall's friendship research from the University of Kansas • School belonging research • Happy Families Action Steps for Parents: • Facilitate Intentional Friend Time • Organise structured activities • Create regular playdates • Use third spaces effectively • Work with Schools • Identify potential friend matches • Build teacher relationships • Focus on school belonging • Consider Broader Solutions • Explore adult mentoring • Check medical factors • Strengthen family connections See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:06] Speaker 1: I hate school, don't want to do it anymore. I
[0:08] Speaker 1: don't like it. I've got no friends, no one's nice
[0:11] Speaker 1: to me. Doesn't make sense. I want to stay home.
[0:14] Speaker 1: School anxiety, school refusal or emotion based school avoidance. So
[0:18] Speaker 1: many families are struggling with it. The numbers are rising
[0:21] Speaker 1: as they have been for the last couple of years.
[0:23] Speaker 1: Today on the Happy Families podcast, what to Do when
[0:27] Speaker 1: your child doesn't want to go to School? Hello and welcome.
[0:33] Speaker 1: We're so glad to have you. Along with the Happy
[0:34] Speaker 1: Families podcast Real Parenting Solutions every day on Australia's most
[0:39] Speaker 1: downloaded parenting podcast, we are Justin and Kylie Colson, and
[0:44] Speaker 1: every Tuesday on the pod we answer your tricky questions.
[0:47] Speaker 1: They don't come much trickier than this one. If you'd
[0:49] Speaker 1: like to submit a tricky question, we've got a super
[0:52] Speaker 1: simple system at Happyfamilies dot com dot Au. Just scroll
[0:56] Speaker 1: down to podcasts, click the record button and start talking.
[0:59] Speaker 1: You can send us a voice memo, or you do
[1:01] Speaker 1: is open up the voice record app on your phone,
[1:04] Speaker 1: talk to that and then send it to podcasts with
[1:07] Speaker 1: an s Podcasts at Happyfamilies dot com dot Au. Kylie,
[1:12] Speaker 1: here's today's message.
[1:14] Speaker 2: I'm using AI as I'd like to remain anonymous and
[1:17] Speaker 2: not have my voice on the podcast. Our eleven years
[1:20] Speaker 2: old is so anxious about going to school as she
[1:23] Speaker 2: has no friends. She's cried so many times the last
[1:28] Speaker 2: two weeks over having to attend school and is flat
[1:31] Speaker 2: out refusing to go. She doesn't do any extra curricular activities,
[1:36] Speaker 2: hate sports. We've tried multiple things, and she doesn't last
[1:41] Speaker 2: past a few lessons if she doesn't find someone she
[1:44] Speaker 2: measures with, or if she doesn't like the coach or teacher.
[1:48] Speaker 2: We also don't have the spare funds at the moment,
[1:51] Speaker 2: even if she wanted to do anything. We aren't religious,
[1:54] Speaker 2: so any sort of youth group is out too. Her
[1:58] Speaker 2: social anxiety is through therth. She refuses to do any
[2:02] Speaker 2: new activities, so this makes it hard to introduce her
[2:05] Speaker 2: to new things. I'm just at such a loss as
[2:09] Speaker 2: to how to help her, short of intensive therapy, which
[2:12] Speaker 2: again we can't afford. Anyway in which I feel we
[2:16] Speaker 2: can help her involve spending stupid amounts of money. How
[2:20] Speaker 2: do you get your child help when funds are minimal
[2:22] Speaker 2: or none.
[2:24] Speaker 3: This is so tricky for parents across the country. Across
[2:27] Speaker 3: the world. We struggle seeing our kids challenged, and we
[2:31] Speaker 3: struggle seeing them in a hard place, so hard, and
[2:34] Speaker 3: the friendship challenges that our children experience especially tug at
[2:40] Speaker 3: the heart strings because I think all of us, at
[2:42] Speaker 3: some point in our lives have experienced that feeling of loneliness,
[2:47] Speaker 3: that feeling of being isolated or excluded, and we don't
[2:52] Speaker 3: want our kids to experience that.
[2:54] Speaker 1: Data shows that loneliness is increasing, and you know who's
[2:56] Speaker 1: most affected by it, our youngest people. Like it's the
[2:59] Speaker 1: most hyper connect hyper connected time in the history of
[3:04] Speaker 1: the world, and yet so many kids are feeling so
[3:06] Speaker 1: so lonely. We've been there, We've experienced the whole school refusal,
[3:10] Speaker 1: school avoidance, emotion based school avoidance is the technical term
[3:14] Speaker 1: for it. It's so hard. There's another element to this
[3:18] Speaker 1: in addition to the heartbreak, and that is having a
[3:22] Speaker 1: lack of resources and thinking, if we had some more money,
[3:25] Speaker 1: maybe we could try this, Maybe we could take them there,
[3:27] Speaker 1: maybe we could have this assessment done. Maybe we could.
[3:29] Speaker 1: And because of the cost of living challenges that so
[3:32] Speaker 1: many people, almost everybody struggling with right now, it just
[3:35] Speaker 1: adds another layer of complexity and a layer of feeling helpless,
[3:39] Speaker 1: feeling like you're out of control. So for our anonymous
[3:42] Speaker 1: listener who has sent this through, we feel your pain.
[3:46] Speaker 1: We have some suggestions and some ideas that could be helpful. Kylie,
[3:50] Speaker 1: I've got a couple of things. I know you've got
[3:51] Speaker 1: a couple of things. Why don't you kick it off first,
[3:54] Speaker 1: and then I'll add some ideas around that.
[3:57] Speaker 3: I think the harsh reality for all of us, whether
[3:59] Speaker 3: we are eleven, twenty two or in our fifties, friends
[4:04] Speaker 3: don't usually land in our lap. No, they actually require
[4:10] Speaker 3: a whole heap of intention and time.
[4:14] Speaker 1: Yeah, and we should highlight here we don't know what
[4:17] Speaker 1: has happened in this family, Like there might be a
[4:18] Speaker 1: lot of time, effort, and intention going into building friendships
[4:21] Speaker 1: and it's just not working. We don't know, but they
[4:24] Speaker 1: do take work. You can't just have a friendship land
[4:27] Speaker 1: in your lap.
[4:27] Speaker 3: And research which support that it takes more than two
[4:31] Speaker 3: hundred hours of intentional time. It's not we're hanging out
[4:35] Speaker 3: in class together, or we're in a group with fifteen
[4:39] Speaker 3: other kids. It's two hundred hours of personal interaction with
[4:45] Speaker 3: somebody before you would consider them a close friend.
[4:48] Speaker 1: I feel like you've taken my job as the doctor.
[4:50] Speaker 1: You're talking about the science. The research that you're referring
[4:54] Speaker 1: to is something that you and I have talked about
[4:55] Speaker 1: a number of times. Because adult friendships are tricky as well.
[4:58] Speaker 1: And there was a there's a university professor at the
[5:02] Speaker 1: University of Kansas. His name's Jeffrey Hall, and he published
[5:05] Speaker 1: a report a couple of years ago now that showed
[5:07] Speaker 1: that it takes roughly fifty hours of time together to
[5:11] Speaker 1: move from being a mere acquaintance to a casual friend.
[5:16] Speaker 1: Fifty hours to say, oh, yeah, we're friends. But it
[5:19] Speaker 1: takes to go from that basic friend status to being
[5:23] Speaker 1: a genuine close friend, like you said, two hundred hours.
[5:28] Speaker 1: And that's not two hundred hours of sitting next to
[5:30] Speaker 1: summoning class. That's two hundred hours of intentional activity and
[5:35] Speaker 1: side by side time time face to face, side by side,
[5:38] Speaker 1: going camping, or you're spending time on the weekend having
[5:40] Speaker 1: a picnic or playing in the park or whatever. Like
[5:43] Speaker 1: it's genuine time together building your relationship, not just being
[5:47] Speaker 1: near each other.
[5:49] Speaker 3: So when you look at the friendships that are flourishing
[5:52] Speaker 3: in the school playground, I would suggest nine times out
[5:56] Speaker 3: of ten those friendships exist outside of the playground. Well,
[6:00] Speaker 3: they're being fostered by families who are coming together on
[6:04] Speaker 3: the weekends after school for play dates, and they're actually
[6:08] Speaker 3: spending intentional time together outside of the flurry and activity
[6:13] Speaker 3: of the school, classroom and playground. So I know that
[6:18] Speaker 3: it sounds like this all lands in mum's lap. It
[6:23] Speaker 3: kind of does. That's the sucky thing about this.
[6:25] Speaker 1: It actually does, especially if you've have a child who's
[6:27] Speaker 1: really struggling to make it work without that parental invention.
[6:32] Speaker 1: It's just too hard. You've got to get kids into
[6:34] Speaker 1: your backyard or into your living room or at the
[6:36] Speaker 1: park down the street with some parents supervising and being
[6:38] Speaker 1: around while the kids play.
[6:40] Speaker 3: But the amazing part of this acknowledgment is it doesn't
[6:44] Speaker 3: cost a cent. It doesn't cost a cent to be
[6:48] Speaker 3: intentional about making opportunities for your children to have experiences
[6:55] Speaker 3: with other kids.
[6:57] Speaker 1: Okay, let's get really concrete about it. What specific things
[7:00] Speaker 1: can parents do in that situation. You've done this a
[7:03] Speaker 1: lot more than me. What have you done?
[7:05] Speaker 3: So? I would suggest that your child has a handful
[7:08] Speaker 3: of kids that they would love to be friends with
[7:11] Speaker 3: they usually.
[7:11] Speaker 1: Do, and that they may have some level of acquaintance.
[7:15] Speaker 3: But if they can't give you any clarity talking to
[7:17] Speaker 3: the classroom teacher about the children that she spends time
[7:21] Speaker 3: with in the classroom or the children that they feel
[7:23] Speaker 3: she's more suited towards. Because sometimes we're inclined to want
[7:28] Speaker 3: to go to the popular kids because they're larger than
[7:32] Speaker 3: life and that's where we see the party at. But
[7:35] Speaker 3: the reality is they're not our people. We don't fit
[7:39] Speaker 3: into that space. But there are other kids over here
[7:42] Speaker 3: that we've missed because there's so much flurry over here.
[7:45] Speaker 1: I want to put an exclamation mark on what you've
[7:46] Speaker 1: just said there. We do need to get to the break.
[7:48] Speaker 1: But this is so important. Having watched our six daughters
[7:51] Speaker 1: go through various iterations of school over the last twenty
[7:55] Speaker 1: years or thereabouts, there are so many kids who's sit
[7:58] Speaker 1: in class and who are at a practical level. They're
[8:01] Speaker 1: almost invisible because they're not the popular kids, and they're
[8:04] Speaker 1: also not the unpopular kids. They're just kids who are
[8:08] Speaker 1: in class who people almost don't notice. They're everywhere. There
[8:13] Speaker 1: are so many of them. This little girl may be
[8:16] Speaker 1: one of those kids. Finding another one or two kids
[8:20] Speaker 1: like that could be the answer, because they don't need
[8:23] Speaker 1: heaps of friends, no, just one.
[8:26] Speaker 3: And so once you've got an idea of the children
[8:29] Speaker 3: that your child would be best suited with, then the
[8:32] Speaker 3: next step is reaching out to the parents. So it
[8:37] Speaker 3: may be just as easy as sending a little note
[8:39] Speaker 3: off to the teacher with some invites for a couple
[8:43] Speaker 3: of friends and inviting them over for afternoon tea.
[8:46] Speaker 1: Or do what we've done and say here's our email address,
[8:48] Speaker 1: here's our phone number. Can you just give this out
[8:50] Speaker 1: to all the parents, because there's obviously privacy laws and
[8:53] Speaker 1: we can't ask for theirs, And you literally just include
[8:56] Speaker 1: a note and say, I've got a girl in the
[8:58] Speaker 1: class who really would like to be friend with your kids.
[9:01] Speaker 1: We thought we might do a little play date. Would
[9:02] Speaker 1: you be up for it? If your child would be
[9:04] Speaker 1: happy to do it, can we please play?
[9:07] Speaker 3: And one of the other things that I really love doing,
[9:08] Speaker 3: especially in the holidays, creating a little craft day or
[9:11] Speaker 3: something the kids really enjoyed having a handful of friends
[9:15] Speaker 3: over and doing some kind of structured activity. Because for
[9:18] Speaker 3: new kids coming together, they actually need some structure around
[9:22] Speaker 3: their friendship.
[9:23] Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be the whole time, but if
[9:24] Speaker 1: they get together and do an hour of craft and
[9:26] Speaker 1: then they have another hour of playtime, it ticks every box.
[9:30] Speaker 3: So we've done lots of different things over the years.
[9:33] Speaker 3: We've had little cooking classes where the kids have been
[9:35] Speaker 3: able to bake some cookies and then decorate them once
[9:37] Speaker 3: they've cooled down, which gives them time in between to
[9:40] Speaker 3: have some play date. We've done painting days. We've just
[9:42] Speaker 3: had a pool, you know, hangout and they've played a
[9:45] Speaker 3: whole heap of games in the pool. And we've also
[9:47] Speaker 3: done Easter days or you know, things like that where
[9:50] Speaker 3: you can actually kind of theme it and yeah, tie.
[9:53] Speaker 1: A calendary calendar date or something like that after the
[9:56] Speaker 1: break a handful of other ideas that my work. If
[9:58] Speaker 1: those things aren't quite resonating for you on the Happy
[10:01] Speaker 1: Families podcast, Okay, Kylie, my response to this is a
[10:12] Speaker 1: little bit different to yours. You've taken the approach, let's
[10:14] Speaker 1: see if we can build friendships. Maybe we've tried before,
[10:17] Speaker 1: but if we go with these angles, we might be
[10:19] Speaker 1: able to get some kids over or spend some time
[10:21] Speaker 1: at the local park, but we can get the kids
[10:23] Speaker 1: face to face, side by side, doing activities, building the relationship,
[10:26] Speaker 1: maybe something could work. My approach is slightly different. The
[10:30] Speaker 1: first thing that I'm going to suggest is to the
[10:32] Speaker 1: degree that you can, recognizing that funds are limited, I
[10:35] Speaker 1: think that it's worth going in getting things checked out medically.
[10:38] Speaker 1: When a child is struggling that much, it's worth just
[10:41] Speaker 1: checking is there anything going on with neurodivergent challenges? Is
[10:46] Speaker 1: there anything happening from a psychological point of view that
[10:49] Speaker 1: we're not aware of? Getting in to see the GP
[10:52] Speaker 1: and just exploring that initially can give you some direction.
[10:56] Speaker 1: The second thing that I want to emphasize is just
[10:59] Speaker 1: how how important this thing called school belonging is and
[11:04] Speaker 1: working with the school on it. What do I mean
[11:06] Speaker 1: by this, Well, there are two relationships that really matter
[11:10] Speaker 1: at school. The first one and I've talked about this
[11:11] Speaker 1: in the podcast quite a lot as school has commenced
[11:14] Speaker 1: this year, but I'm going to emphasize it again real quick.
[11:16] Speaker 1: The first one is there one kid at school who
[11:19] Speaker 1: when your child enters the school gates sees them and says, hey,
[11:23] Speaker 1: come sit with us. That's what it means to belong
[11:26] Speaker 1: And working with the teacher with that specific goal in mind,
[11:31] Speaker 1: or the school guidance counselor or the school chaplain, whatever,
[11:34] Speaker 1: that welfare person is, that wellbeing person is in the
[11:37] Speaker 1: school working with them to identify one child who is
[11:41] Speaker 1: open to taking on the responsibility and finding the joy
[11:45] Speaker 1: in seeing your child and saying, hey, come sit with us.
[11:48] Speaker 1: Children who have that are happy to be at school.
[11:51] Speaker 1: They look forward to being at school because they know
[11:52] Speaker 1: that they're being noticed, they know that they belong. But
[11:55] Speaker 1: they also need one other thing in terms of relationship,
[11:58] Speaker 1: and that is an adult who notices them, who calls
[12:01] Speaker 1: them by name, and who was able to have a
[12:04] Speaker 1: quick chat with them about something that's going on in
[12:05] Speaker 1: their life. It might be something in the classroom. It
[12:07] Speaker 1: could be the cross country the other day? How'd you go?
[12:10] Speaker 1: It might be Hey, I heard that this thing's happening,
[12:12] Speaker 1: and I know you're interested in it. Are you're going
[12:14] Speaker 1: to try out for? It doesn't really matter so long
[12:17] Speaker 1: as there's an adult, usually the school teacher, who says, hey, Kylie,
[12:20] Speaker 1: it's so good to see ye. Hey, what happened the
[12:22] Speaker 1: other day with that audition you were trying out for?
[12:26] Speaker 1: Or how did you go the other day at the
[12:28] Speaker 1: swimming carnival? I know that was something that you were
[12:30] Speaker 1: really really hoping to do well in I didn't get
[12:31] Speaker 1: to see your races. That interaction with an adult combined
[12:36] Speaker 1: with a child who says, hey, come sit with us.
[12:39] Speaker 1: What a difference that makes. So I'd be working with
[12:42] Speaker 1: the school directly and asking what can we do to
[12:44] Speaker 1: support my child to build these two relationships. The last
[12:48] Speaker 1: thing I'm going to mention is the importance of third spaces.
[12:51] Speaker 1: So you've got home, you've got school, and this is
[12:55] Speaker 1: where that whole question of money comes in. We've tried
[12:57] Speaker 1: extra correcter activities, but she won't do them. We've tried
[13:00] Speaker 1: extracurrecter activities. I can't even say the word anymore, but
[13:05] Speaker 1: we don't have any money anymore. In our experience, our children,
[13:08] Speaker 1: when they do extracurricular activities, they don't tend to say, oh,
[13:13] Speaker 1: I've got friends and I want to spend more like
[13:15] Speaker 1: two hundred hours with them. They just do that activity
[13:18] Speaker 1: and that's often all there is. So finding a third space,
[13:22] Speaker 1: which is usually going to be the neighborhood, or maybe
[13:25] Speaker 1: the park down the road, or if you live near
[13:27] Speaker 1: the beach, it could be that finding a place where
[13:31] Speaker 1: the kids can hang out with other kids and enjoy
[13:34] Speaker 1: each other. The third space is so valuable.
[13:37] Speaker 3: You mentioned a couple of weeks ago about a guy
[13:40] Speaker 3: that you had been listening to in your feed who
[13:44] Speaker 3: suggested that when his kids came home from school, he
[13:47] Speaker 3: wasn't concerned about whether or not they spent time with
[13:50] Speaker 3: other peers. He actually wanted to foster relationships with other adults,
[13:55] Speaker 3: people that they could glean from and learn from. They
[13:58] Speaker 3: could have mature conversations.
[13:59] Speaker 1: Where mentors and models.
[14:01] Speaker 3: Yeah, and so in this situation, maybe there's a grandparent,
[14:06] Speaker 3: maybe there's an auntie that maybe there's a friend down
[14:08] Speaker 3: the road who has a little bit of extra time
[14:12] Speaker 3: on their hands that they could spend with your daughter
[14:15] Speaker 3: as well. I know that sometimes that seems a little
[14:18] Speaker 3: bit left field, But for me growing up, the people
[14:22] Speaker 3: that I loved spending time with most were the people
[14:25] Speaker 3: who lit up when they saw me walk into the room.
[14:28] Speaker 1: I want to because you had some friends, but not
[14:33] Speaker 1: heaps of friends, But you used to spend a whole
[14:35] Speaker 1: lot of time with Donna, who lived two doors down,
[14:37] Speaker 1: and you spend a whole lot of time with Jill,
[14:40] Speaker 1: who was the mum of one of your friends, And
[14:43] Speaker 1: they were really your best friends. Right, that's who you
[14:46] Speaker 1: look forward to hanging out with after school, and.
[14:50] Speaker 3: Because like I said, they lit up when when our
[14:54] Speaker 3: kids were a little bit younger, they had a piano teacher, Carol,
[14:58] Speaker 3: and as soon as she walked in to the room,
[15:01] Speaker 3: no matter what we were doing, her whole face like
[15:05] Speaker 3: she's her whole face Sean into my house and she
[15:09] Speaker 3: just elevated us because we felt like we were literally
[15:14] Speaker 3: the most important people in her world in that moment.
[15:17] Speaker 1: There's a lot of a lot of content, a lot
[15:19] Speaker 1: of answers that we've given here, building friendships, bringing adults
[15:22] Speaker 1: in as friends, creating space as third spaces for kids
[15:26] Speaker 1: to develop those relationships, checking out additional needs, looking at school, belonging,
[15:31] Speaker 1: and the one that we haven't mentioned, it's just more
[15:33] Speaker 1: time with family so valuable because that's the relationship that
[15:37] Speaker 1: matters more than any other. It is a tricky question.
[15:40] Speaker 1: We definitely can't be comprehensive in the time that we've gotten.
[15:42] Speaker 1: We will have to wrap it up there because we've
[15:43] Speaker 1: gone well over time. But we hope that that's been
[15:46] Speaker 1: a useful suggestion for people who are struggling with school
[15:50] Speaker 1: refusal around relationship issues. If you'd like to submit a
[15:53] Speaker 1: tricky question, please send us a voice memo to podcasts
[15:58] Speaker 1: at happy families dot com dot au, or visit us
[16:02] Speaker 1: at happy families dot com dot au to submit your
[16:04] Speaker 1: questions there. The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin
[16:08] Speaker 1: Roland from Bridge Media. More information and more resources are
[16:11] Speaker 1: available at happy families dot com dot au

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