To ask this mum why ds was not invited...

[Bookeatingboy]

My ds (nearly 8) has ASD. He is in ms school and has been friends with a group of around 7 boys since pre school.

He and his dtb have a birthday soon and I'm doing a party. I'm sat writing invites when I quickly go to one of his friends parents FB page to check the spelling of his name (not FB friends with her BTW) and I see a picture of this boys party from a couple of months ago. Every single one of the group were there... ds was not invited. This boy along with the others have always been to ds's parties and ds has been invited to others parties too... or so I thought.

I'm sat here in tears (which is really not like me) as it's the first time it's hit me that he has being excluded because he has ASD. Now clearly I don't know this for sure but why else would he be the only one of this group not invited.

I want to ask her directly why ds did not get an invite which I know makes me appear like a loon but I'm so fucking angry at the mum right now.

It sucks OP, I wouldn't put it down to SN though.

DS is friends with a boy in his class, it can be a little on/off sometimes but mist kids are the same. Last year he was having a smaller, low key birthday. He told DS and 2 other boys he was going to invite them, more than once. I told DS we need to wait for official invite. It never came. I saw that the only ones who were invited were 2 kids who the mum is very good friends with thekr mums and the mums push the 3 of them together, despite birthday boy often heard complaining he doesn't want them there or to do something with them.

Twice I have overheard him asking his mum for DS to come to his house (he has been before and never had an issue with his behaviour, he is very polite and we'll behaved at other houses) and I have heard the mum fob her DS off. I know that invite isn't going to come. She doesn't like DS, it's bloody obvious and it really pisses me off as any issues between them have been usual playground stuff. DS was adamant he wanted to invite this boy to his party though. I admit I was not particularly happy about it but I relented. I saw the joy on this boys face when DS handed him the invitation.

Sometimes mums are fuckwits for no reason. You have my sympathy as I'd feel very much the same as you. I won't confront this mum either (who is actually supposed to be a friend of mine ) but it still rankles and I've taken a big step back.

I feel your pain. My DS with ASD and ADHD is now in year 9 and hasn't been invited to a party, play date or anything since Reception class - even when whole class parties were the thing, he would be excluded. So I stopped hosting parties as I resented it so much - and we concentrated on creating family traditions for birthdays instead.
It's so hard as the parent - you feel the hurt for them.

If it was me I'd Ask her. But try and ask in a calm way - just say has somethings happened you are not aware of between the kids? A pp suggested it might not have been his bday party so don't go in all hubs blazing. Perhaps they weren't getting on at the time of the party and its as simple as that. If you don't approach her about it, it will become a wedge between you it will drive you mad and kill your friendship. You are protective of your son and hurt at what you see as his exclusion. Explain that. If she's a friend she'll understand your feelings and you'll probably find out there is a straightforward explanation. Resolve to speak to her so you can put it out of your mind. Write out what you want to say and like I said don't attack her about it, be calm and honest. Good luck xxx

Just seen your last post - glad you are feeling a bit better. Listen to your instincts - you will decide the right thing to do xx

Agree with Jellie

I strongly disagree with most people here. I would ask (politely).

Because the story as you've stated it makes no sense.

Your son has 7 good friends who do everything together. He has no behavioral issues and the parents have spent the last 4 or so years being supportive of this friendship. You have all been to each other's parties and events before. I assume you've been to all the prior birthday parties for these kids?

Suddenly you found out that months ago his near best friend had a birthday, which you were completely unaware of, despite this being one of his closest friends. He had a party in which all of his friends except your son was invited to. You were completely unaware of this. Despite the fact that most 8 year olds cannot keep a secret of any kind, apparently all seven of them kept this secret for months from your son and you. It was never brought up even in passing to your son who has no idea that his best friend in school had this party. Your son's birthday is coming up right now but even though all his friends are seven, and none of them are sophisticated liars, apparently not one of them has brought up the last birthday party they attended, which didn't include your son.

This just doesn't make sense to me. Either they are not as close as you think, like AT ALL, or something has gone on that you don't know anything about. I would politely ask the parents what is really going on.

Not asking makes no sense to me. Most of the SN parents telling you not to ask just seem really bitter. I'd rather ask and risk looking silly than "save face" and be bitter. How do you know if other parents are as terrible as you like to assume if you won't give them a chance to explain?

Applepaltrow
Totally agree with you.

Are all the other mums friends with each other in Facebook but not you?

I just thought it was odd to look for the spelling of one of your child's friends on Facebook who you're not 'friends' with?

It's really horrible and tells you more about your friends than your son . When this happened to me ( my son wasn't invited back to a party by the son of some friends of ours and I read what the posts said ( like - it's up to them , the children choose ) and then made up my own mind . That was to de friend the parents . I take great pleasure from knowing that they know why I defriended them and when they carefully excluded my son they took a calculated risk that I wouldn't mind and that i would let them nice me up in other ways - well I didn't . My son also had it out with the boy in question - who replied "my mum said she'd ask you all over for lunch and that you wouldn't mind ." So enough of being Linda liberal - stand up for yourself

Yes, stand up for yourself, OP. Go girl!

I did this once when dd wasn't invited to a friend's party. Normally I'd do exactly what some people are suggesting: I'd normally be very reasonable in front of dd but seething inside but this time, NO! This particular child was not popular with the other girls and I'd gone out of my way to include her in the past, so I took umbrage on behalf of dd for once and politely told the parent that her darling, pita dd would not be welcome at ours in future.

Yes, I'm probably a loon, but it was a cathartic experience nonetheless.

I'm so glad those years are over.

My dd changed school mid year, two and a half years on we still waiting for first party invite, children can be shits when they choose and parents heartless, u just have to accept it. We now planning a party for her, she gets to invite 10 so choices will have to be made so we may be about to be heartless too. Can't say I want to invite any of them! But am hoping this will boost self esteem.

I really feel for you op, a situation like this is really hard. I've been reading this thread and now changed my mind. I think you should ask the mum, but in a nice, non- confrontational "really sorry to put you in this position but just wondered whether there's anything I need to know about our children's relationship" kind of way.

If the relationship has been as tight as you say it is, something is going on and you probably need to be aware and be prepared for the answer. I'd be really surprised if if it was due to your child's ASD though from what you have described. As parents I think our perceptions of situations involving our children are often incorrect as we're not there all the time. The nature of children's friendships change all the time. Perhaps your child has been mean to the party boy, perhaps the relationship has cooled, I don't know. Just trying to offer explanations but I think you probably need to ask for your own piece of mind, but don't jump to conclusions just because he has ASD. Good luck, really difficult situation.

I totally agree Mill46, some of the school gate mummies can be absolutely awful, worse than kids. If your face don't fit, then forget it! I feel sad as I invited a couple of children to ds party, and he did not get an invite. It is gracious and kind if you go to a child's party, to include them in your party. If they are not your friend, or don't like them enough to invite them to your party, don't accept the invite.

If she invites the other boy and he doesn’t come, that’s the time to wonder if anything is going on between the boys.

Even at that age, parents can have a hand in it, as I said if you or your ds face don't fit, well. Over the years, I have read party threads on year, the shocking behaviour of some of the mums is disgusting. No wonder their offspring ends up growing to be vile self centred adults, with examples like that.

Surely, if the boy had wanted to invite your child and had been excited about his party, he would have talked about it to your ds and his other friends? How could he manage to keep your ds in the dark about it, if they are inseparable at school? It seems odd to me that two children so close could not be aware of the other's parties? Do you know what the children did at the party? Maybe it was something your ds had told the boy he didn't want to do?? If they were not such close friends, I could see the mother being able to interfere, but it seems quite bizarre to be able to do this to such a close friend without the close friend being aware of it himself.

Bit of a long shot - was it a swimming party? You've said you go to.an sn swimming club, is that for ds? If so, it might have made the other mum feel she wouldn't be able to manage his needs?

You don't know it's because of his SN. This happens to kids all the time, SN or no SN. It's very harsh but it's just a part of life. Let it go.

Mabey the child was sworn to secrecy, by the mother, yes it can happen.

My experiences as a parent of dc with ASD have not left me bitter. I do think that perspective is lost when it comes to the issues of party invites though. I understand feeling angry at a perceived slight, and wanting an explanation. I haven't experience of dd being part of a close group of friends because she never has been so maybe that changes things. But I know that in a case of a party that has already happened there is little that can be gained either they deliberately excluded in which case they are not worth your time or they didn't and a mistake was made in which case they will be inviting ds to future events. As a parent you have to make judgement calls about how involved you get in your children's social lives and over involvement is always a mistake imo. Having seen the fall out from Facebook arguments about their kids parents rarely respond well to being questioned on their decisions and it rarely results in harmony. But that is my experience so other approaches may well be more appropriate, depends on circumstances. Good luck.

The OP herself said 'I'll look like a loon' jellybelly confused. People in real life routinely use the word loon to mean a bit silly/OTT

Unfortunately.

I forgot to add, my ten year old ds is part of a friendship group of four. Every year he's invited all these friend to his parties. This year one of them didn't have a party at all but the other two had parties but only invited the other two boys! I'm biased but ds is a well behaved pleasant popular boy who is friends with most of his class. No behavioural issues at all (in fact the other boys get in trouble far more often than ds), no friendship fall outs etc. I was furious and very hurt on ds's behalf. However, what could I say? Ds still wanted to invite them both to his party, so I did and put on fake smiles with the mothers while inwardly seething.

Because the story as you've stated it makes no sense.

It may not make sense to you but I guess you don’t have a DC with an ASC and you don’t have to ask your DC’s brother to find out how he’s getting on socially. Much as he loved parties my DS never talked about them. He’d just hand over the invitation if he got one. For some kids that’s part of what the ASC is - my DS could bang on endlessly to me about sums and Pokemon but parties and friendships weren’t a topic, not at all, not ever. Though he loved parties and had good friends.

And unfortunately when your kid has a social SN you sometimes have to be extra cautious. It's not about feeling silly, but you don’t want to put other parents in an awkward position if you don’t have to, that’s not good for the kids.

Most of the SN parents telling you not to ask just seem really bitter.

If you can’t spot the difference between noisy sympathy and bitterness then I guess that’s another reason for the OP not to take the risk.

I think you have jumped to the assumption that your child was excluded due to SN but you say yourself this has never happened before. I have twins who are 8. This year the has been a definite shift in party invites to smaller groups. You don't actually know that your child wasn't invited even, invite could have got lost en route. This has twice happened to me, found after the event my child was invited to a party I didn't know about. So you have assumed:

• child not invited
• because he has SN

That's a whole lot of assumptions. I wouldn't be getting in a pickle about this as you dint know the facts. Enjoy your child's party.

he could equally have not been invited because they could only have a certain number of children and he comes as part of a pair being a twin. Or it could simply be the other child no longer plays with him.

my kids are 6 and 8 and we have had children in the past that i have assumed they will always be friends with and now a year or so later they aren't invited to parties, it isn't personal it is just that they have moved on to playing with other people. All perfectly normal.

Personally I think you are being oversensitive assuming that is the reason and what is the mother supposed to say if you DO ask her? either she will say no because it was another reason or she will most likely lie as she wouldn't want to upset you or get into an argument or she might even say yes but whatever the reason does it make any difference? I can understand you being sensitive about it but the other child can't be made to want to invite someone if he doesn't want to.