To think you shouldn't accept a party invite if you aren't going to invite child back?

[Partypooper12345]

I've name changed for this as aware I sound like a loon.

My child is gorgeous and lovely and bright and ever so slightly quirky but brings us huge joy. However she is never at the top of anyone's party invite list and regularly misses out on parties which have limited numbers. Came home and told me today that she isn't invited to X's party because she wasn't on the list but X will get her mum to arrange a play. They'd obviously been talking at school today. My child said this quite factually, she is not upset at all. Thank god 6/7 year olds are very accepting. She didn't see the trail of kids leaving together today for the party but I did. Made me want to cry for her. I know this is completely irrational and is more about me than her, but I'm being honest about how I feel. I don't communicate any of this to my child and am bright, breezy and sensible in response to any issues along these lines. She does not yet have my insecurities in that regard and I hope to keep it that way.

However, aibu to think that if you aren't going to invite a child to your child's party, year on year, because of numbers or whatever, then you should decline the invite to the other (uninvited) child's birthday party? Isn't it rude not to invite people whose parties you have attended and continue to attend?

Braced for a pasting, I know I'm being unreasonable to be upset on behalf of my child, and would never articulate it in RL apart from to partner, but unsure if I'm being unreasonable to expect them to decline our invites iyswim.

That's why, even though I hated them with a vengance, whole class parties were very good for dc2. At least he was invited to a few parties in the year (otherwise, I'm well aware that it wouldn't have happened).

I've also relied on the 'if my dc has been invited to your dc's party, then I ougth to invite him back' effect you are talking about to 'encourage' or hope that he would still get some invites.

In reality though, I don't think it made any difference. The ones who did invite him back weren't a good fit personality wise and in the long run, he would have been better looking for other 'friends' than those children. By inviting them and being invited, we created this idea that they were friends/close when actually they weren't really. Which didn't help dc2.

All that to say that I wouldn't worry too much. She will find her friends and it might well be that they aren't the ones she is saying are 'her friends' now.
And yes it does hurt when you see your child not invited and 'unpopular' and in some ways friendless. But you can't force other children to be friend with her.

I sympathise OP. We had a 'whole class' party for DD's fourth. Almost everyone accepted (25 kids). First big party that we'd done and I got ridiculously stressed as we were also about to move house so it was rather busy. Anyway, two days before the party, invites went out for another child's party due to take place in a few weeks. DD didn't receive an invite. The same thing happened the next day with another child's party. The mums were handing out invites at the school gates and DD didn't get invited to either. She noticed with one and asked why she hadn't been invited. Both these children had accepted her invite. Like you, I was breezy but inwardly gutted. The following day, DD's party was lovely but secretly I was pissed off at those mums, especially the one who randomly brought her other child without having asked first. Obviously I didn't show that it had upset me. I sort of knew that I was being unreasonable. But it's hard to be reasonable if you feel that your child is being left out. The whole party etiquette thing has been a real eye opener.

Thanks for all your comments. I know I'm projecting my own insecurities and said so at the the outset. You all make some pretty good points - about full class parties not always being possible, about the logistics of not accepting invites months in advance of own child's bday and also those of you who have many more interesting things to keep you occupied (don't think anything you said was remotely offensive oohlook but you make a good point that the busier the life, the less this stuff is in any way relevant). Life isn't fair i guess and they have to learn it sometime.

Luckily my daughter is less eggshell than her mother and will be more secure in herself as a result of what we are able to reassure her of at home - that we love her and think she's amazing and that's the most important thing.

Thanks guys. Changing name back

I can see where you are coming from op. I do my best not to worry about dd and party invites but I struggle.

I think it's good form to invite the kids whose birthday parties they have attended. Obviously this isn't always possible but it's nice to include kids.

ima that is awful, there is only so much thick skin you can have, and only so many times you can brush it off. It does hurt, and it is not very nice.

I have the same with DD this year. Last year in reception she had party after party. This year she has been invited to one and has talked about parties that she is not invited to. It totally brings back my childhood insecurities, I so want a happier friend filled childhood for her. Not sure what I can do except encourage her to be a good friend.

ima

Ima I think what you have to remember is different families handle the party thing differently. We have never done big parties for a lot of reasons, and always ask the DDs who they would like to invite. Yes they're only young but it's their party, not ours. We don't know half the kids in their classes, I honestly wouldn't know most of them by name. The ones I do know are the ones we have play dates with/see at extra curricular activities. When the DDs tell me who they want at their party I don't check who has invited them earlier in the year. My six year old has 20 kids in her class, 3 cousins, and does gym, figure skating and a language class outside of school. I couldn't invite back all of them to her party even if I wanted to.

I thought I was going to get flamed for posting that. Thanks for the flowers! I missed out that I went back to the car and cried for DD after dropping her at nursery and noticing the second birthday non invite. I felt pathetic for caring so much. But it's so hard to be objective when it's your precious, sparky and yes, gorgeous (in every way ) child who has been excluded. Thankfully like your DD, OP, my DD is pretty resilient and hasn't dwelled on the logistics of birthday parties that she has or hasn't been invited to. And I've resolved to pull on my big girl pants when it comes to these sorts of situations.

And you are right moonlight I tried to be reasonable and sensible and figured that not everyone can do big parties (we spent far too much!) I think it was just that both other parties were so close to DD's and they readily accepted our hospitality. But it was a lovely party and they all had fun, especially DD.

Ima - glad I'm not alone! I think both our girls will be fine. I'm pulling on my big girl pants too. My hubby has also said, very gently, that I'm being over sensitive, that she's happy, healthy and loved and far more secure than me! And he's right, children are far more resilient than we give them credit for.

I agree other than if the child has a serious issue with the other child or their is a strict restriction on numbers I think the courteous thing is to where possible is to invite to your child's party any child whose party they have been invited to. Yes it's the child's choice etc and not everyone can afford parties but in a general sense if possible I think this is right and proper . Find the idea of offering a second prize of a play date slightly strange but perhaps that's just me

Do take strength from the fact that your daughter sounds an amazingly mature girl you have so much to be proud of - it's a fact of life we can't be included in everything and that not everybody is nice - it's so very impressive of her to just move on - l love it that she can do that - now mummy has to toughen up!!!

I can only say that Parties are weird - we had one for our DC recently and invited lots of kids including another DC whose bday was around similar date - his parents declined the invite - fine - later found out he was having a party same w/e (but not same day) to which his parents invited several other kids from class to - but not my DC - which was very odd as this child often sought out my DC to play with after school whenever I picked DC up - whole thing very bizarre - not saying that they have to attend my DC party or invite him to their DC but it was just weird to me that they didn't just say sorry it's X birthday and we are having X's party /celebration that w/e type so he won't be able to attend - just think parties create difficult situations and can bring out the worst or sneakiness in some people and then paranoia in others😀. Although it's a bit irrational it did put me off the boys parents and those of the clique they hung around with all which also declined. But truthfully My DC party was well attended and was lots of fun and reality was he missed non of these non attenders so really who cares? I think it was an issue for me not him and you just have to chalk it down to experience - people can make the choices they like -

Eldest DC will be 6 next year so time for a smaller party😀

Thank you OP. I didn't mean to imply, however inadvertently that being busier with other stuff is somehow more important, or that my child's friends are unimportant ... It is a source of constant mild regret that I can't be more involved in school life.

It was intended more as a gentle reminder that some of us are chronically disorganised, it takes me LOTS of effort to be organised enough to cope with real life so I have to be really selective about what matters to us as a family and me as a person.

This sort of thing just drops off the end and I do worry what I might have managed to offend people with . :)

It is worth pointing out that as someone who was never invited to anything in high school, if my DDs didn't get invited to a decent number of parties I would probably be stressing about it too! I do think though that the majority of parents aren't doing it deliberately, just for whatever reason they aren't really paying attention to the whole invite thing. I really would try not to take it personally.

Op, your DD sounds fab and you are a lovely mummy. I think it's normal to stress especially if you are a bit insecure yourself (I am too). There's no rule book is there? We're all just muddling along, trying to do our best. This thread has been really helpful for me actually and has made me get a bit of perspective. Thanks for posting it.

ImaI'm glad I posted about it too. Sometimes just airing views can help you put them into perspective. I genuinely feel better after being told I am being unreasonable - who knew?!
And thanks for those lovely words too, genuinely appreciated

Our ds's have summer birthdays. When the round of birthday parties begin each year in September, our ds's have no idea what type of party they would like to have in 11 months time and therefore I have no idea of the cost or how many we will be able to invite based upon that cost.

There is no way that I would limit the amount of parties that they attend each school year in case we do not reciprocate. I see it that they are invited as the child whose birthday it is would like them to be there.

The children that we do invite to the parties that we host are chosen by ds, not by me and it makes no difference to me whether or not ds has attended (or been invited to attend) the parties of those that we do invite.

I cannot see any other way of doing it but please correct me if I'm wrong.

YABU we often have class parties, they don't get invited back by everyone in the class because some children have smaller parties. Quite often they will go to a party when they haven't invited the child to their parties and quite often we will have children to my DC's parties and they don't get invited back. This is fine by me.

Ywnbu. For me it is reciprocal. If you don't
Like someone enough to invite them to your party, then you don't like them enough to go to their party.

But alltheworld, how is a 6 year old meant to know in January if they'll like X enough in August to invite them to their party out of the 8 kids mean mommy says they can have maximum?

Because fair minded mummy makes a note of parties dd has gone to and ensures that all accepted invites are reciprocated. So if a lot, hire church hall. If not then can have something smaller.

Not everyone can afford to hire a church hall. We really struggle with having lots of kids over for a lot of reasons, I would limit it more if I could but it doesn't seem fair on the DDs. Their friends at the end of the year are rarely their friends by the end, so by that logic they should have kids they no longer play with at their party to make it fair, rather than the friends they do by their birthdays

When DD1 first started at school she spoke neither of the languages used in the classroom. I was worried no one would come to her party to the point that we nearly didn't do one. She didn't have any invites herself but all the invited kids turned up for her party. I was quite happy with that. Much better for kids never to have to experience the hardly anyone coming thing even if they're not being invited back all the time, as other posters have said.

At the beginning. Then at the end. Its been a long day.

I remember when DS has just started school and wasn't invited to a party, I had no idea about it until I walked into the soft play and there was s table full of other mums. I sat on my own and fought back tears, DS was unfazed.

That was s whole host of years ago and I'm much thicker skinned now. I wouldn't have a clue who did parties and who didn't, they're just a blur of running kids. DS is now 14 and has a much better social life than me!

So "fair minded mummy" equals someone who has enough time to note all the birthday party invites accepted by her children and deep enough pockets to be able to pay for all those children, plus probably others, to attend their child's party?