To feel left out and upset?

[Leftoutandblue]

Hello all, feeling a bit blue tonight and wanted to see if I’m being oversensitive or not.

I live in a village and my 8 year old DD goes to the local primary. I’ve become friendly (or so I thought) with a few of the mums and we often hang out at the park and go for walks together. There is a WhatsApp group we use for arranging meet ups. However I’ve realised that they have been meeting up for walks without me and that they have another WhatsApp group without me in it. I feel so silly and I hate meeting up now knowing that I’m not part of their gang. But I see them every day at drop off/collection time.

I’m not sure how to play it. It’s making me feel very upset and no matter how hard I tell myself that it’s not a big deal, I can’t help the sinking feeling whenever they chat about doing something without me.

Am I overreacting? How can I get over this?

I had something a bit similar when my son was v young, Dd a bit older, and I was feeling v down about other things including relationship issues.

A group i thought I was friends with went on a girls holiday without me - they weren’t to know, but I could JUST have done with that at that time. One of the group who I knew less well had organised it with the other two who i was closer to.

Over time I realised i was on the fringe of the group, and so I focussed on other friendships, with male and female friends, friends from different walks of life, some child free, not living in my area etc.

I think it’s nice to have a range of friends and not just “mum” friends, to give perspective. I think I ended up rescuing some friendships that were on the brink of dwindling as a result. Also I met a wonderful group of women on line, who are based all over the country. And I ended up getting out of the awful relationship!

I was in a similar position OP. It's rubbish! The best advice I can give is to join some things that have a wider catchment. I joined some clubs for DD and met some nicer people through those. I also think it's healthy for your child to have friends away from school. I also joined something for me: the WI! I am lucky as there is a 'young' WI near me and I now have tons of friends through that.
Don't let yourself dwell on the other women, it's their loss. Concentrate on meeting some nice friends elsewhere! Good luck!

@Bluntness100, believe me I tried but there was little response as the mum was bad mouthing me and dd to all and sundry (I know this from my sister who has a child in the year above). It's all settled down now that I can meet my real friends again. We are moving dd to another, nearer and smaller school after the holidays, so fed up with that sort of relation aggression and bitchy attitude.

Hope you ok op. God women can be lousy. Thank god mine older lol

This kind of tribalism is hurtful.

I remember reading a fascinating theory (I don't recall exactly what or where) that humans, as social animals, are programmed on a deep-seated, evolutionary basis to be devastated by this, and interestingly it's a form of social punishment often enacted by women (as opposed to fighting and killing each other!) In the small, tribal, hunter-gatherer groups our ancestors must have lived in, exclusion from the main group would instantly make us vulnerable to predators, not least expose us to the very difficult process of finding food and water and surviving alone.

Thinking about it in these lines, is it any wonder people are devastated when social exclusion is enacted upon them, especially when it's used as a mechanism of flexing power and social control.

Not quite sure why I shared this, but useless facts have always appealed to me and occurred to me when reading this thread, particularly as some people are loath to admit how devastated this kind of bonding vs. exclusionary behaviour makes them feel.

It's a horrible way to behave. I'd go against the comments suggesting you challenge them on this: the only real response is to keep your dignity, hold your head up high, smile and breeze past. People who behave like this want their target to notice. If they know they are not hurting you, it takes all the fun out of the action for them. And who wants to give bullies that?

for you OP.

Look, obviously, it would be upsetting and hard not to take personally if the original WhatsApp group was four people, and the newer, smaller WhatsApp consisted of the other three minus the OP -- that would indubitably be the kind of pointed social exclusion many people on the thread are assuming it is.

However, I don't see anywhere that the OP has confirmed approximate numbers, or that she knows for certain she's the only one excluded from the newer group? Because if the original group was a loose grouping of ten or twelve people, and the smaller, new group is four members who are particularly close to one another and like to also do things together separately, that's an entirely different situation, not a pointed Mean Girls-style exclusion of the OP.

[quote YumCrum]@Bluntness100, believe me I tried but there was little response as the mum was bad mouthing me and dd to all and sundry (I know this from my sister who has a child in the year above). It's all settled down now that I can meet my real friends again. We are moving dd to another, nearer and smaller school after the holidays, so fed up with that sort of relation aggression and bitchy attitude.[/quote]
@YumCrum From experience in many schools, smaller schools are far, far, FAR worse for insular and tribal bitchiness. You make one false move, you're history. In a big school, if you fall out with someone, the school is so big that no one cares. I'd never have my child in a small school, for that reason.

I'd never have my child in a small school, for that reason.

I'd have my child in precisely the school I thought would most benefit them. Dynamics between parents - adults who are old enough to know better - should be the last consideration troubling you.

Tribalism/cliques are easily avoided: just don't go in for these silly 'friendship groups' in the first place. My life is by no means the poorer for it. I'm sympathetic to those who are targeted by this very childish form of nastiness but it does seem MN sometimes wholly loses its sense of proportion on this issue. 5 minutes a day, around 2/3 of the year, for about 7 years in total. That should be directly proportional to the amount of headspace it takes up.

I have exactly this now. My dd's friends mums meet up. I have been invited a couple of times when they've been out but not for over two years. I'm fed up of finding out that they 'went for a drink last week' etc whilst all our girls are happily playing in the yard. I've no idea why I'm left out but it is so hard to ignore and not feel hurt. They all met at the same time as me

How do I get to not care about things like this?

I dread going to the local park in case they are their with my daughters friends as a meet up. I also don't go to the local pub as I know they go there and it hurts when I find out afterward so I would cry if I saw them out together

It gets better Carrott. They're not that age forever, things change, friendships change. Focus on other people, who don't leave people out. Ime nice parents tend to have nice DC. It pays off in the long run.

I wish I could find the nice kind mums. It just feels very cliquey. My daughter is in y3 so I feel like I've missed the chance to find mum friends now

carrot, you do not need 'mum friends'. Plenty of mothers go through their children's school years with little or no involvement with other parents.

I am assuming you don't go to work, could be wrong but it sounds that way. If you did, you would not be giving fellow parents a second thought; you'd be working with other parents but not at you kids' school and with other things to talk about.

I feel your sadness but I doubt any of this is deliberate on the part of the 'mums'.

Please try to live your life independently of these people, they're not worth fretting about.

I do work. I work part time but my job isn't sociable. I do have other friends but I would like to feel more included as my daughter is good friends with the other mums so she misses out when they have meet ups with the kids

Hey OP, I am not sure if I misunderstood but you found this out because you asked aone of the mums when the next walk would be and she said she was going to organise it on the group chat. I am assuming that because you haven't had a message you think there is another group chat? It could be that she just hasn't sent the message yet?

Also, I know its hard but try not to take it personally. I have hundreds of group chats on my WhatsApp, most overlap people, tbh I have no idea who is in some of them. I get added to groups for gift ideas (excluding the recipient), Meal out arrangements, holiday planning groups. Some of them then become another normal chat and people who weren't involved then aren't included. It's not personal, it's just a weird obsession people have to create group chats for everything. It may not be that you were intentionally excluded, they might not even realise you aren't in it.

I would send a message to the group asking when the next walk is, if it falls on deaf ears, walk away.

A similar thing happened to me with a works-girl group chat. I was included but quite ignored. I wasn't able to make many of the spontaneous meet-ups because i have a son and none of them had children. But when i did make plans for my son so i could join some of the meals/drinks out i would text the group and the plans would always change. My messages wouldn't get read but others sent by other girls in the group would get answered when sent around the same time as mine. They also had private groups amongst themselves. I decided to leave the group, wasn't doing me any good. I did also distance myself from them too. I would rather have fewer decent friends i can trust than a really big group of 'fake friends.' Does your daughter have school friends with mums who aren't in the group? Could you get her involved in an activity where you'll meet a different group of parents/friends? Horrible feeling isn't it! Sorry you're going through it!

It’s a horrible feeling isn’t it op. I think an awful lot of us have an experience of this.
Do you connect better with one or two of them? Or others outside of the group?
Maybe do a bit of your own arranging with who you want to walk with.
If you can, one on one meet ups are better in order to form more solid relationships and not be seen as just one of a gang.
Try not to let this knock your confidence.
This is not a reflection on you.
It’s why I don’t knock around in groups any more - I just do my own thing with other like minded people.

Living in a village with school age kids, is hell

I second this. I'm so happy my dc are secondary age now and I don't have to deal with that shit any longer.

Yes. I've ended up on anti depression tablets from this behaviour in what I thought was my group of friends. Another friend overheard them making plans and deliberately excluding me. When I asked about our annual Christmas meal, I was told it wasn't happening that year, but it was. Two more birthdays when I was the only one left out, I cracked up. I have low self esteem and I still don't know why I was suddenly excluded. I really feel for you OP.

I have left three groups (toddler group and school mum group for my DD and DS). While it was nice at the time, it was all about DCs and felt competitive. I get on better with my 3 longterm friends who I don't see often but we message each other.

OP, if you don't ask about walks do they tell you about them? If no, then I would pull back and just be civil as they aren't bothered to think about you.

I've had a bumpy ride over the years. It certainly gets easier as the kids get older and they start to develop friendships in school and clubs independent of adult friendships. And @carrottopper it does feel all consuming at the time and that you've let your child down .

Looking back, lots of the intense mum friendships burnt themselves out, sometimes quite explosively. There's a 11year long feud between two sets of parents who live 50m apart but there lads have a magnetic attraction still.
One over indulged girl with anxiety was badly let down by her parents, she's had a rough few years but blamed everyone else. The adult friendship group has fallen apart.

I held firm with 'true, kind & necessary' talking to my kids and if they were ever in earshot about other people. They have grown up and are both in lovely teen groups where I also have got to know (and trade insider knowledge) their parents.

The kids with the most excluding, game playing parents have not been so lucky! Stay strong.