5yo only child not invited to party

[5adhdparty]

I have posted about a similar thing before but nc'd for this one. I know you can invite who you like to parties, but I'm just feeling so upset at the moment. My 5yo has adhd and he is seen as 'naughty' due to this by some of the children at school. There is a distinct difference between when he is struggling to focus and when he is actually choosing to be naughty which helps myself and school manage the behaviour. Most parents are aware of this but haven't had any issues, they're nice, we have a chat at the gate, some more than others. When it was nursery/pre school I tried to not let myself be bothered when he wasn't invited to things, after all you perhaps just choose a few people or don't know everyone. I've just found out that 2 of the children from his class (which he has moved up with from nursery and reception, so all very settled together now) have had a joint birthday party today and every child was invited except my son. They plastered pictures all over Facebook and I'm 100% that every child in the class was there except my son, plus younger and older siblings and presumably some other friends. I have spoken to these 2 mums more than most, 1 in particular as she works in the area I am currently studying to work in so she has helped me to find a placement (she offered so no CFy!). We chat about all sorts of things. I feel she will still be breezy with me as if nothing has happened. This hurts more. She has deliberately excluded him because I know if I hadn't returned a missed invite she would have asked me recently or texted me today to ask where we were if she'd assumed we were going. No confusion as to would I have stayed (this was mentioned in the last thread I made which was similar a while back), I always stay. My son doesn't know about the party. He will know tomorrow when they all talk about it at school (this has happened before and he has gotten himself very upset and also blamed me for not taking him there). I'm not sure what my AIBU is.. like I said, I know you can invite who you want. This just seems cruel and I'm so so sad for him. These children are the ones he comes home and talks about saying they are his best friends and he can't wait to see them and can they come for tea etc. I guess it's AIBU to feel this way? Should I say something or leave it? These people aren't my friends as such but I thought they were nice and understood a bit about how he isn't really naughty. Sorry for the rant... I just feel crap, like I've been punched in the chest!

How sad for your son. I know as a child there was a disruptive boy in my class, perhaps he had similar issues, if so I was unaware and I hope he had support. Anyway I didn’t want to invite him, so I was told I could only invite 20 of the class of 32 to my party. My mum was a teacher and that was the option - everyone or a max of 20. I think it’s very unfair to leave one child out, even if they are disruptive. I agree with the teacher PP they shouldn’t have to be invited if the birthday child really doesn’t want them to be, but if that’s the case then it shouldn’t be a whole class party.

This is all very thought provoking.

You say he gets bored as the class work isn’t challenging him.
Do raise this with his teacher as that needs addressing. Maybe he would thrive in the class above, for instance.

If your DS is as you describe OP, then I agree this not okay i.e. if he wanders around and shouts out in class.
If a child is verbally or physically abusive then I do think that is different.

I wonder though if the mums thought they simply could not manage your child at a busy party? Parties of 5 year olds tend to be very hectic affairs that are hard to manage anyway and a child who can not sit still and shouts out a lot would be very difficult to manage in a hectic party environment.

@AlmostAJillSandwich what a disgusting attitude. I’m very sorry that a child’s disability makes you “uncomfortable”, how awful that must be for you
OP, I’m so sorry you and your child were treated this way. My child has been excluded from a party due to a disability and it hurts. So unfair. I would absolutely raise this with the parents, I wouldn’t be able to help myself. They should feel ashamed of themselves.

I’m really sorry this happened to you and your son. Anyone would be crushed if this happened to them or their child

Moving forward, to deal with it can you come up with something really exciting for next weekend or after school tomorrow that would be a real treat for your son and tell him now so he has something to look forward to?
If you think it will impact upon how he behaves at school tomorrow I’d write a note for the teacher and pass it to her at drop off and ask her to read it before school starts to give her the opportunity to manage the situation.

Unfortunately this is the way things often go when we have kids with ASD/ADHD. My DS tries his hardest to fit in at school but I have noticed that he is invited to less parties as the years go on.
Make the most of the parties that your DC does get invited to, as they will remember those times most of all.

I'm saddened by some of the responses- it's as if adhd children are all incredibly disruptive and take up every last minute of teacher time. As hotchoc said - if you know one child with adhd, you know one child with adhd ; they are all as different as the next child.

My DS has ADHD and he, like the OPs son, can be excluded, with children saying no to playing with him in the playground/ bullying him for being different. The school are excellent and his teachers have great support in place for him: like the OPs son he is bright but finds it hard to focus but they cope well with him.

He doesn't get invited to a lot of things but was at a whole class party yesterday and completely loved it. I stayed and he only needed minimal contact from me. His little face was a picture, please think of this when you next make a decision about a child with additional needs.

This is so sad and unfair. I dread this happening to my LO when he's older. Can you take him for a fun treat somewhere or get his favourite dinner in to soften it a bit?

To exclude him like that is incredibly cruel. You must feel terrible and it’s completely understandable. I think I would have to ask the mother why this happened and why he wasn’t invited

** party

• child

Sorry, I'm falling asleep!*

It doesn't take much imagination to understand how horrible it is to find your child has been left out. If you're not interested scroll on by.

@HotChocWithCream as a teacher, you should have avoided adding your opinion here if that is what your opinion is. Your job as a teacher is to help ALL the children in your class accept differences within each other. Would you say the same if the child had a visible disability that affected other children - say a child who limped so was slow and slowed the whole class down on field trips - should we leave them out?

Or do you reserve those feelings for children with invisible neurological disabilities?

A birthday party is an environment where many ADHD children can slip under the radar as a lot of the kids are already on sugar rushes and running stupid anyway.

I suggest that you as a teacher should look more in to the reasons a child with ADHD can be noisy and fidgeting - in brief it is because the child is driven by the brains need to try and produce more endorphins that the brain needs to function correctly - the energetic outbursts trigger endorphins being made.

OP - I think that leaving any single child out is cruel, no matter who they are. I do wonder if it was somehow an oversight though as you speak to these Mum's regularly. I would just casually ask if they had had any issues with your child and lead in to asking if that could be why he was left out. If they did leave him out then while it will sting a lot I think it's best to know why so you can try and fix it.

Maybe they were worried he would disrupt the party in some way.To call this bullying is ridiculous, sometimes a parent just isn't comfortable hosting a child with a disability.

Either of those rationals are fine - worrying about disruption or uncomfortable about hosting a child with a disability (pretty sad that for the adult who can't cope though - how lame is that).

But what you don't do is invite the entire rest of the class and leave out the one disruptive or disabled child. You invite a smaller group from the class.

So sad that this needs to be explained to adults who have children. really awful.

OP I'm sorry this is happening to you. My DS (now 9, happy) kept hearing (NOT from the teachers, but from the other children, aged 5-6) that he was a 'bad boy' who was 'being naughty' and it broke his heart. He even said "I'm a bad kid" and "people don't like me because I'm bad" - I know that you can imagine what that feels like.
In an ideal world we'd have a private 1:1 teacher for him, in a forest school, and he'd make his own way while moving constantly - but we live in this world, and instead, we got right up to the edge of school refusal, and then thankfully broke up for the summer.
That was the point we decided to try ADHD medication, and he now takes medicine every school day. At that point (basically when the medicine helped him sit still, listen, and complete basic tasks) everyone noticed what we already knew, which is that he's very clever. And he now has a few friends, and is top of the class in everything, and it's much, much easier. He's also high functioning autistic, so it's not plain-sailing, but without the ADHD medicine we'd have never got the autism diagnosis, because he's SO hyperactive that he couldn't be interviewed or complete tasks or talk to the diagnosing people.
Getting the medicine for him was not difficult but I lived in America at the time, and I do not know what it's like for you. I was terrified, would there be side effects, would it stunt his growth, etc etc - and it has been fine. The main side effect is that it kills his appetite, and he tends not to eat lunch, but have two suppers.
Over holidays and weekends we don't use it, and he eats tons and grows tons.
I am not saying "drug your child so people will like him" but if it's as bad as it was for my son, it could be the answer. As well as disrupting other children's learning (which I know he was, even with a 1:1 aid) he was barely learning anything himself because he just couldn't sit still long enough to hear, see, or do any activity.
He describes the medicine now as 'turning down the lightening in my head, so I can hear other things' or 'just making the noise easier.'

I was so worried about giving him medicine, but if he needed (say) glasses or a leg brace, I'd get them without a moment's concern. He needs this medicine in a similar way, to do the tasks a modern school asks him to do.

Are you sure there isn't more to this? I'm not saying this is the case buy we had a boy in my youngest daughter's class who we excluded as he was frankly evil to my daughter. The rest of the class were invited but whether a child or not and whether he had s reason or not there is no way I would have invited him to her parties. It's her party and her feelings come first.

For context there was a child in my youngest class who we hurt my daughter numerous times at school over two years he has bitten her, hit her, kicked her and the last time he cut her hair. I and my husband spoke to the parents and I don't think they believed us, just muttered things about him being this or that. We spoke to the school and they hadn't seen anything happen so just said they would keep them separate.

As a result of the cutting of her hair his parents were given notice at the school. However this was the only time he was caught and that was 2 years after she first told me he had done something to her. I am 100 percent sure he was doing all the things my daughter said but the school and parents were unaware.

I'm not sure many parents don't invite one child to a class party as frankly it's the same effort to invite them all so perhaps it's worth trying to find out why.

I can see both sides to this. My best friend's 5YO displays challenging behaviour the majority of the time due to an invisible neurological difference.

That doesn't stop us from spending time with them, but I see how it affects them, his sister who lives with it every day, his grandparents who do their best, etc.

It is hard. I imagine it's equally hard for his teacher and classmates. Why wouldn't it be?

Having said that, to breezily invite the whole class, minus one is completely unacceptable.

It just is. And anyone who tries to argue otherwise is a complete arsehole.

Either invite fewer people (how hard is this?!), or suck it up for a few hours.

If you genuinely can't suck it up for a few hours, then consider how your actions might make the child - and their parents feel - and consider whether you'd be OK with your child (repeatedly) being on the receiving end of that.

Marchirectmummy - do you really think your scenario is similar to the OP's? The OP is friendly with the party child's mum, and the OP's child considers their child to be a very good friend.

Parent and Y1 teacher here and I think excluding him is appalling. Was it a party where parents stayed? I’ve had children with additional needs at parties before and parents generally stay and are brilliant at supporting them if they need it. There is simply no way I could live with myself if I invited 29 out of 30 children

I’m really sorry OP but I just would not invite a child who was perceived as “naughty” (your own description) to a child’s party I was hosting. Hosting a kid’s party is difficult enough without also having to deal with, and be responsible for someone else’s child who is already known to be badly behaved already. There is no way I’d do it. But at the same time I wouldn’t invite everyone except him regardless of behaviour, that’s pretty mean.

At that age who is “best” friends also pretty fluid and sometimes one child will perceive another as best friends but other child doesn’t think so. If your son thought these other kids were his best friends then I’d encourage him to branch out a bit and play with others too. Just try and be casual about the lack of party and try and make it seem not very important or interesting to have missed, your attitude towards him missing it will either make him feel a bit better or worse. And also harsh as it is, kids do need to develop resilience, to know if they are hurt or unhappy about something they are still ok in the long run. If this is how he feel, emphasise with him without going overboard on sympathy etc.

@StoppinBy

Once again my posts have been misinterpreted. My comments were intended to ENLIGHTEN posters to the possible perspective of the parents involved in this situation. The first paragraph of @finn1020 's post illustrates that what I expressed as possible thinking on the parts of these parents is clearly valid.

I, at NO POINT, stated that I agreed with this situation. How dare you make assumptions that I treat my pupils differently based on any neurological/physical disabilities and imply that I lack knowledge/awareness of children with ADHD. You do not know me or have have any experience as a parent in my class.

I have taught for over ten years AND am a parent of a child with ASN. I did not expect to be attacked on here for attempting to get posters to appreciate other points of view that are not necessarily my own.

I hope other posters appreciate that my posts as they were intended - to shed light on the possible motivations of these parents.

There's a boy in my son's class who is similar. The boy will shove though, has thrown chairs, spits, has hit the teacher and her TA...the other kids are scared of him. He's been invited to parties, but gets left there by his mother- he's thrown ride on items at bouncy castle parties, threw and broke my son's new water pistol at his party (I didn't want to leave the boy out so made my son invite him) before chucking cake around, and so on. Is it disabilist that now no one really invites him to parties, because the poor kid has no one to stop/correct his behaviour?

And also harsh as it is, kids do need to develop resilience

Yeah, I think kids with additional needs get way more than their fair share of chances to 'develop resilience'!

I really do feel for your son though. I can understand why people might not want him there, but it is very cruel to leave one child out on purpose. That happened to me as a child many times (I'm aspergic), so I can fully remember the pain.

When DD1 was little she had whole class parties in reception and Y1. One boy in her class had autism, and I would never have thought to exclude him for a moment. His mum emailed me and said that actually she thought the party would be too much for him, but she was so happy that we had included him as several others hadn't.

What I would say though is that parents should stay around and not drop and run if their child is likely to have a social or behavioural issue at the party.

OP are you really sure all the children were there? Because we have never had a full house at any party I have run or kids been too. Some always cant make it as they have football / grannies / dance etc etc. I dont know how from photos you could know it was 29/30 invited and not 20/30. If it was as you describe of course its really mean and unfair, I dont think you can do much about it other than continuing to support your ds in making friends - eventually those friends will want him there. Definitely where we are it is all the class or half or fewer.

This happened to my dd in kindergarten. Everyone in the class was invited except my dd and one other child. The weird thing was that my dd and the birthday girl were best friends and the bday girl had drawings all over the classroom saying how much she like my dd. The mum had apparently taken a dislike to me...I have absolutely no idea why...and decided to exclude my dd. I gave her an earful about what a nasty thing that was to do to my dd AND hers.