So over the holidays I've had a particular group of friends around. We met at baby group and now my only DD is seven, while they have gone on to have more. There's about half a dozen in the group and some I'm closer to than others, but in general we've got on well.
I live in a house with a bigger than average garden, and I used to be a childminder, so my house was always the obvious place to meet, and for a long time I didn't mind, but recently I've been feeling differently.
DD is at the age where she doesn't make so much of a mess, so we've been redecorating, buying a few nice bits for the house and garden. When my friends visit, their children just pull the place apart. Well, some are OK, there's a few in particular that are just really rough. I know small children will do that, and I childproof my house as much as possible, but if I'm honest DD certainly wasn't allowed to do it at other people's houses and they don't even attempt to get their children to stop. I've had things smashed, walls drawn on etc. These children have managed to damage my house more than all my mindees put together, so I don't think I'm being precious
So as not to drip feed, DH and I have struggled with secondary infertility, and our one shot at IVF failed just before Christmas. It has been hard, but we are moving on and I now feel very much done with babies and toddlers. Maybe that's why my patience is wearing thin. We've also had lots going on with new jobs, family illness etc, and I could have done with some support, but felt very sidelined when I tried to talk to my friends. One of the group has constant marital problems which tend to dominate.
So they visited a few days ago and I wasn't particularly looking forward to it, but I made Easter nests, organised a little egg hunt etc. Some of them didn't bring their eldest children due to other commitments, and the 6/7 year olds who did come were three boys that DD doesn't really get on with, so essentially I was entertaining a group of babies and toddlers while the older boys tore off down the garden and DD sat and played on her own. I was a bit annoyed at that to begin with. I decided I was going to be a bit firmer over the wrecking the house issue, so when one child started grinding cake into the carpet, I asked him to sit at the table to eat it. His mum is the one who dominates conversation, bit of a queen bee if I'm honest, and she got really arsey and said "he's fine where he is". I pointed out he was squashing the cake everywhere, and she said "for goodness sake, he's only two."
And, well, this is where I was probably unreasonable, but I said "ok then, I'll just leave a little packet of wipes on the table if you wouldn't mind cleaning it up when he is finished?"
She said "excuse me?" and I sort of laughed and said "the cake- it will save me hoovering it later". She didn't say a word to me after that, had a face on her like a busted boot, and soon left, without saying goodbye.
We have a group Whatsapp, and later that afternoon I was removed from the group. I texted another of the mums who I am closest to and asked why. She said cake mum had removed me because she felt unwelcome in my house, my IVF failure had made me bitter, she felt threatened, I was jealous of her baby etc.
I said that's fine and as far as I was concerned she could fuck off, and she wouldn't be welcome in my house anymore
Cue a flurry of fb and whatsapp messages from the other mums, telling me I needed to apologise to cake mum because I had been unfair and I'd forgotten how tiring it was to have small children, that sort of thing.
If I'm honest I started to think maybe they were right. I was a bit sick of them all coming round and yes it was hard at times to be surrounded by babies /pregnancy when we were struggling
At this point DH came home
I showed him the texts. He said that in his opinion they were shitting themselves because now they had nowhere to go to be fed/ignore their kids. Also that even if I made it up with them, he didn't want them to come round en mass again, because he had thought for some time that they were taking the piss out of me. Basically he put the foot down,which is something DH rarely does.
So by this point I had been readded to the whatsapp group. I told cake mum that I was sorry for anything I had said to upset her, and I hoped we could all remain friends. I then said that perhaps in future we could meet at a park or something which would be easier for all concerned.
Cake mum and some of the other mums then got arsey, said I clearly didn't want them round my house, I couldn't cope with my ivf related bitterness and