To think that ‘mum’ friends are often far more hassle than they’re worth?!

[Blargon7]

Jeez.

I’ve been dropped by my close ‘mum’ friend from the school, she’s gone from being super keen to not wanting to meet up with me. It really hurts and I don’t know why. She is however still going around with another group of mums, a couple of whom she has moaned about to me on many occasions.

Then there are the other women there. Some I say hi and have a quick chat to but sadly we don’t have much in common and don’t really click, it’s just polite how are your kids doing chat which is fine.

Then there are a lot of mums who have cliques and seem to bully and slag off a bunch of other mums to the point where some mums have stopped coming into the playground and have been reduced to tears.

I just can’t be arsed with this fucking bullshit anymore! Life is too bloody short.

What’s your experience?!

I only have a toddler so I can't comment on schools, but so far I've found it useful to distinguish "clique" from "group of people who know one another, talking". I've usually found the latter. Long may it continue.

I did actually dump a close 'mum' friend from the school gate - but that was after her ripping me off to the tune of nearly £500 and then having the gall to bitch about me to a load of mutual friends. She should be bloody lucky ALL I have done is ignore her!

It has meant though that I'm sure a lot of other Mums at the school gate have heard no end of rubbish about me (this other women is prone to depression) and I have been frosted out by a number of them. I can't even be bothered to defend my name. I'm just staying out of things from now on.

Top trick - arrive 2 mins before pick up - swoop in, collect kids and leave. It really is that easy !

I think it's me.

I've seen people fall out with each other awfully in all scenarios. Work, clubs, church, everywhere. And yes at school pick up also. Personally i'm just not feeling the difference i guess.

Laiste

Happy to answer and no offence taken at all !

My best friend lives in London, while I am in the home counties. He is a single man with no children. I am a sahm. So, our paths don't cross in day to day life. We do have very long chats on the phone, probably every other week and meet up every month or so. My other closest friends live in Ireland, Oxford, Manchester and more in London. We all met at school and university. Only two of my closest friends have children and they do not attend school yet. When they do, they will attend different schools to my children.

My friends are my friends. My children have their own friends and I like and am friendly to, but not friends with, their parents.

I personally, would not enjoy standing at the school gates every day with my closest friends. I would not enjoy hanging out with them at soft play once a week either. My friends love my children and I love theirs, but we tend to meet up for parties with everyone there, rather than at child friendly venues. My children love soft play etc, so I take them there on my own or with a friend of theirs or with my husband.

Maybe it's because i'm never rarely anywhere because i'm feeling any passion about it which would help me bond with anyone

x post.

I've seen people fall out with each other awfully in all scenarios. Work, clubs, church, everywhere. And yes at school pick up also. Personally i'm just not feeling the difference i guess.

True, but you don't see fellow club / church members twice every day and your children don't get involved in the same way they sometimes seem to when parents have fallings out at school.

I have never had a serious falling out with a colleague because I have never made bessie mates with any colleagues! If I ever disagree with a colleague, I can live with it, as we aren't friends. It also doesn't mean a thing to my children if Dominic at work is pissed off with their mum! At the school gates... I think my dc might notice.

I should probably clarify that, while I am mainly a sahm, I do some evening and weekend work, when it comes up.

I think the subject of friendship and we handle them is fascinating actually. My gut reaction to this thread is to genuinely think: everyone everywhere is the same, and i will or wont get on with the person next to me weather it's at the school gates or at the basket weaving club. (i don't go to basket weaving)

I'm very very good at making close friends. But shite at keeping in contact unless i see them often. So - brutally honestly - i'm more the type who needs to see people everyday to think about them. I'm actually very impressed by people who do friendship well!

The mums I met at playgroup were all very “wine o’clock” and although I did make friends there was a lot of drama, and I was happier and healthier once I’d moved on from that stage. I met some ok mums at the school, but I never really clicked with them, and at least part of the issue was I’m “not from round here”. (One school in particular was really bad for that.) But the mums I’ve met home educating I’ve made genuine friendships.

This is one of the few advantages of having an SEN child. DS gets picked up and dropped off by bus so I don't have to deal with all that crap.

It's the expectation that we have to be best mates and have a good old natter at the school gates. Indeed, there ARE lots of men at the school gates too, who get let off the hook

Exactly. It's entrenched so deeply in gendered bullshit people can't even see it.

Schools exist to educate children. We go in to school or the playground in order to deliver our child to the place they'll be education. There's absolutely no rhyme or reason as to why anyone should make friends with anyone else or invite them into their little circle of friends. I mean if you organically make friends at the school gates then great but if you don't don't take it is a slight against you and make up all sorts in your head about your face not fitting 🙄

Like I've said there is a "clique" in my DD's year. But they don't "exclude" me or any other parents, they just happen to have lots in common with each other and not me. Which brings me to another misogynistic side to all this - this worry that "the kids are affected" when there's cliques and concern that little Annabelle is being excluded because Lizzie and Sophie's mummies meet up but don't include Annabelle's mummy. Why must we fill all our free time doing stuff we don't want to with people we aren't friends with because of some arbitrary fear of the children feeling "left out"? Men don't have that guilt or worry. I don't know about anyone else but I see my actual friends too little without factoring a bunch of randoms in. And the kids are FINE if they don't see their schoolmates every hour of every day - their best friends will change on a daily basis anyway! Women need to stop being guilted into making sure every breath they take is "for the kids" - it's far healthier for a child to see a happy parent with healthy relationships than to never miss out on a soft play session with their mates.

I agree. It’s so cliquey. I’ve not felt like this since school.

My NCT group are very critical and competitive. There a couple of queen bees in the group and some of them meet up and deliberately don’t invite certain members of the group that don’t fall into line.

I also met a group of mums through pregnancy yoga and one of the mums similarly doesn’t like several of the other mums and deliberately excludes them.

So many toddler groups I go to there are cliques of mums who refuse to talk to you even when you try to make conversation.

I’ve had enough, I genuinely can’t be bothered with it all.

Oh, in a Venn diagram, there is very little intersection between DS's friends and my own mum friends. Whatever binds them together is not the same as me and his school/sports colleague's mums (or dads).
I'm friendly with all, but some parents I click with and others don't.

gunpowder

I totally agree with what you just posted.

To clarify, when I said I avoid making close friendships at school because I don't want my dc to be effected, I mean, I don't want them to see their mum being shouted at by some fucking weirdo other parent in the playground, because I've had some disagreement with them. I know it sounds far fetched, but it seemingly does happen.

DCs being left out because I'm NOT best friends with another mum? Well, that's frankly ridiculous and I won't engineer a aux friendship so that my dc gets invited to Sophia's party. Sounds dreadful and would no doubt backfire eventually anyway.

And you're right, have you ever heard a dad say "oh I'd better make more effort to make friends at the school gate, so Oliver gets invited to all the parties" ?

Oh NCT @Minai!! I had a pretty awful time with them! Maybe i'm starting to get it now.

The 'not from round here'. Yes, i've felt that. I've also been very looked down on in the past.

Currently it's completely the opposite. I think a lot of people expect me to be stuck up my own arse just because i happen to live in a large house.

Faux friendship*

I am also 'not from around here' and very obviously so! People rarely understand what I'm saying the first time I say it, as my Irish accent is so strong 😂.

I also had a very mixed bag with NCT. I am still in touch with a couple of mums, but most I am not. They aren't bad people, but we have no common ground since our babies grew up. And that is totally fine.

I agree that the dad's seem to stand about perfectly happily on their own. I agree also that the DCs won't suffer for lack of parental mateiness with their own mates. Time flies and they'll be in Big School before you know it, and IME you never see other parents OR the teachers

I have some lovely mum friends but they are good people and I’d be friends with them anyway if we were at work or something. I can see them being friends for life. X

Ive made good friends from all the different stages of my life. From work, school, college, school gates etc etc. I don't really see cliques, I just see a groups of people who know each other well. If they'll chat to me great, if not i move on. No offence taken. Surely its just how you perceive the world.

Because you spend so many years involved with your children's schooling and can't really avoid it, I do think it's best to be friendly but not too friendly.

This has worked for me.
The very odd coffee.

No night time socialising, drinking alcohol etc.

Funnily enough now that my boys are long out of primary school, I recently had a lovely meet up with some of the Mum's.

But we don't see each other at all now and it was completely by choice.

Being wary is a good idea in my opinion.

I also gave it a couple of years too, just to see who the drama queens were, the same with playdates, none the first year.
By the second year in school, I had a good idea of what was what.

Result. No drama at all, thankfully.

Hen people say they were "excluded" from NCT/yoga etc...what is the ideal criteria for inclusion? Does every remember of yoga and NCT have to be invited to everything forevermore or is that classed as "exclusion"? Can people really not break off and make friends with each other?!

*member not remember

I grew up in Australia, where children make their own way to school (at least they did in my day) so all of this is a bit of a shock to me. My wife works in primary education so has told me some stories about the parents. We have 2 DC, oldest will start school in 2 years, I'm not sure what to expect.

Mine is at college now and I retain one "mum" friend, who I'd have gelled with in any circumstances. I used to go through the motions with various mum groups just to benefit my kid.