No-one wants to come to 10yo's birthday

[MyChildHasNoFriends]

Just venting really. There's nothing I can really do about it.

DS is turning 10 in a few weeks. He's excited and wants a party. Unfortunately, not one of his 'friends' hitherto wants to come. None of them has invited him to their parties this year.

The ones I know well (because they all attend an activity that I run) have all invited one another, except DS, to birthdays, family gatherings and playdates. Their parents try to shush them but it's pretty obvious what they're talking about - and it comes out when the parents aren't around. The parents have all made vague excuses about being "busy" in mid November - when we have traditionally invited them all over to our house for the activity, followed by afternoon tea for DS' birthday. It's kind of worked the last 4 years, but it's obvious this year that the other kids in the activity (aged 11, 11, 12, 12, 13 and 14) have outgrown DS and find him annoying. They still do the activity sessions, because their parents make them: it helps them with their studies and I run it all for nothing.

Similarly the two families we know from other stuff have gone out of their way to be too busy to meet any time soon. It's also been obvious this year, during meetups that I've organised and paid for, that their kids close to DS's age find DS annoying and boring and that the only one who likes him is the 16 year old.

Family are all overseas. Similarly utterly uninterested cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents.

I guess DS needs new friends, and something interesting to happen on his birthday that distracts him from the idea of a party.

It's hard. My son is in the same position. He's 8 and has never been invited to a birthday party apart from family. We just bring him away for his birthdays.

In lots of ways your DS sounds like mine at a similar age, in our case it was singing and dance rather than instruments. DS was pretty unhappy through secondary school with few friends, however, once he went to 6th form college he found his tribe, did a-levels, a BTEC and is now happy at university.

Don’t lose hope

Are there really ‘not many’ classical music-loving, adult-oriented children who aren’t autistic? Afaik I’m completely NT, but I was one of those children who just loved reading, learning things, got on much better with adults etc. I struggled to find friends my own age. I was forced to be a loner (and often lonely).

In adulthood I ended up working in the classical music industry and it turned out there were many, many other people just like me (including my eventual DH). We just didn’t fit into the prevailing ‘popular culture’ world, which if anything is so much stronger now.

@MyChildHasNoFriends your DS sounds lovely and I think he will grow into himself, but this is a bit of a bumpy period for him to go through. Hang on in there.

Skip the party. If you can afford it take him away for a weekend in the UK or abroad.

Children at that age can be particularly mean.

Are you happy with his current school? Hopefully he finds his people soon. Secondary school may be better for him. Personally, I much preferred it in terms of friendships and could escape the cliques and drama.

It sounds like he may enjoy debate club, or clubs that have a focus on politics, and theatre as others have suggested. I would seek outside interests other than the orchestra.

My son is autistic which I think was why he didn’t fit at primary school, he wasn’t sporty at all so wasn’t included by the footballing group, which meant as a single form entry primary school left him with the girls and a couple of boys to mix with but they didn’t really include him either.
As I said above he found his group at secondary, they are all funny, kind and slightly off the wall so neurodivergence probably has made them seek each other out. My son’s black/white views of the world, strong moral code and love of cooking isn’t seen by them as odd, they are an interesting and accepting group.
Hope your son has a lovely birthday whatever he ends up doing!

Great advice
@MyChildHasNoFriends

I mean this kindly but I think you need to back off and allow your son to find his own friendships
Essentially you run an activity for kids with the expectation that the parents and kids will be friends with your son
Its a mismatch of expectations

They think its a free activity
You see it as a transaction, activity= friends/ parents as friends
Im a bit 😬 at the birthday tea after

Clearly they are backing off and thats fine
Up until 10/11 kids usually play happily with others then it becomes a bit more about specific friendships
Your son is who he is and he will find his friends eventually

My kids are both autistic and have found social life hard at times - I can recommend the following:

Social skills to be a great friend book

socially speaking skills for kids book

socially speaking board game

watching tv shows about groups of friends together and (fake casually!) chatting about what we saw and who was behaving nicely/who was rude etc.

And I would speak to school - a ten year old with no real friends is definitely in need of help and support developing those skills. They may have a group or club they can suggest he joins, or they may be able to point you towards who he gets on with so you try to facilitate friendships.

honestly ask yourself what he still gets out of this activity you run when the others are so much older. That’s a really tricky age divide - up until now it was ok, and in a few years it will be ok again, but right now they are all secondary age and starting puberty, they won’t want to hang out with a little kid. Could you invite some new younger kids to join the activity and explain to the families of older kids that you’re re-focusing the age requirements so their kids are now too old?

I agree with this.

Take him to the theatre or something equivalent. You've got the excuse then that it's too expensive to take others. A day trip or weekend away would also work.

Longer term, what do you think the main issue is? Is the school environment wrong? Is he perhaps nerodiverse? What help has he had if any with social skills?

The Natural History Museum does sleepovers, would that be exciting enough to him to make up for the lack of party?

He sounds brilliant!
He also clearly doesn't lack social skills, just his peers don't relate to him currently.

Your son sounds awesome OP. That's all I have.

I grew up with classical music and went through the youth music system (in Kent).

I am now a school teacher and live in an outer London borough with very strong youth music provision.

But I would say that classical music is increasingly becoming a) niche and b) dominated by certain types of middle class parents (who need to be well off because the subsidy going into it has massively reduced).

You definitely can make friends through classical music and singing, and I did, but it is very female dominated and I think it can be quite difficult for someone with social skills challenges. Music theatre seems a bit more inclusive butagain is extremely female dominated.

It can be well worth travelling further for the right group with inclusive leaders.

This could also be true!

Op whats the activity your running in the house?
Is there no younger kids who'd want to come along to that?
If their isn't i think I'd try to wind it down, it can't be nice for DS to have the house full of people who don't like him.

I’m surprised the girls are being like that, I did ballet for many years and the one boy in there never had an issue. Or my one (very obviously gay) friend in my small rural town also never had an issue befriending the girls in class, he’s still a close friend to this day. I think you’ve just been unfortunate.

I’d definitely try to find some middle ground where he can make friends with kids his age asap tho, as someone who also grew up primarily around adults - I think it’s tricky and can set you up for a number of issues later on.

at that age I would have gone to be kind 🤷‍♀️

He's not 'not autistic enough' for social skills classes. Depending on the make up of the class. If he finds it hard, he might benefit from it. Even simple things like conversation skills. They don't come naturally to everyone.

I'd shut down the group, if I were you. Your son has plenty going on and you're making the social effort for him without it being a satisfying result. That time is better used elsewhere, I suspect.

I didn't have many friends at primary school. I loved theatre so around this age it became family tradition to see a West End show once a year for my birthday instead of a party. Tbh I preferred that to a party anyway as I always found them quite awkward.

The tradition continued for about 20 years! Maybe worth considering something like that?

Perhaps find him a club or some such that involves drama. You don’t say what activity it is you run, but if he likes classical music is he learning to play? Could he join a group to learn ?
If someone is interested in something, then find likeminded souls, whatever age. Hopefully there is something fairly near to you.

I think at this age you could pick a fun activity that school peers would also be interested in. If he doesn’t want to invite them I’d go down the growing out of parties route. Maybe it’s worth looking into other out of school clubs where he may find his people.

He sounds very bright and mature. Do you feel he is possibly gifted? Children with high learning potential often have trouble making friends with same age peers. You could reach out to Potential Plus UK if so, they put on social type events. Meeting just one or two friends who are similar to him, even if they don’t live in your immediate area, could make a big difference to him.

Agreed for this birthday you should cancel any type of party and just do something fun for the day. He seems lovely and interesting so I’m sure there are lots of interesting things he might want to do! He will find his tribe, you might just need to look a bit further a field or in new places.

Oh I'm so sorry OP. That must be tough for you all 💐 Yes I would plan something along the lines that you suggest...in order to distract from the idea of a party.....plus that would be a super lovely treat for him x

Also to add, if he’s able to engage in reciprocal small talk with adults about a range of topics I’m not sure he’d particularly benefit from a social skills group just so that he can learn to feign interest in Pokemon or K Pop. I think you might be best off focussing on finding other kids he can genuinely connect with about shared interests. They are out there, just harder to find, but would be worth it so he can find genuine connection.

OP, your son sounds so similar to my friend's son at that age in terms of interests and being mainly friends with girls at primary - but as you describe, those friendships become harder to maintain in the latter years of primary. The other boys (small school so not that many) were all into sports and football. Like your son he enjoyed friendships with adults and started a music related hobby around that age where he was the youngest by about 20 years and the majority of the others were pensioners. So he was probably perceived as unusual/boring by his peers.

He's now 16 with several friends his age - boys and girls. He really found his tribe at secondary. And he still does his music hobby with the pensioners!

So I hope your son has a wonderful birthday doing something that brings him joy and continues to be his own person. He sounds very cool to me.

Also, I chose a secondary school out of area for my AuDHD girl at this age. It has worked out really well. She's kept the friends from primary she liked and has got a whole new peer group too. Definitely worth a strong focus on getting the secondary transition right.