No party invite and DD upset shall I text mum?

[helpMeWritethis]

I’m a little upset and wondering if I should say something to this mum or just leave it as I usually do. I have never had any confrontations with any of the mums ever so it’s a new territory for me to even think about texting this mum!

my daughter is friends with another little girl they both in year 4. My daughter came home upset Friday saying all the girls in class have been invited to a party on Saturday and “Emma’s” mum will call me later to give details as Emma will ask mum if my daughter can come. She kept asking me every few minutes on Friday evening and Saturday morning if she’s called. It must so heartbreaking. I’m socially awkward but my daughter is complete opposite and loves going to parties but never gets invited. She really thought “Emma” would invite her.

I’m thinking of texting the mum with a heads up that my DD might ask her tomorrow and maybe we can arrange a playdate something along those lines.

just for context my DD having birthday next month and I’m inviting the entire class.

I am. Because you can have empathy for people without burdening yourself with their problems.

So being sad their not invited to a party is a them problem. You can understand why they are sad. Empathise with them, yea that does suck.

And still not change the behaviour. Because there is nothing wrong with it.

So sad for your DD ☹️ unfortunately the same happened with my little girl (7) twice and I was heartbroken too. She was at a school with 8 girls in the class, DD included and was excluded from a sleepover party, I’m good friends with the mom and when she found out DD was upset from her own daughter she messaged me saying how sorry she was and how she knew what this was like as her own son was often excluded due to his sensory issues, later found out that all the girls apart from mine had been invited, some to just spend the day there and go home and some to stay over, I was a little miffed and couldn’t understand why my girl had been excluded but left it at that, I personally would invite all or none at all, couldn’t bare to think of any other children feeling how mine did, especially as she’d always been invited to every birthday party to every child in the past. Another occasion was a little girl with not the nicest mom, often falling out with moms on the playground if their children had had a disagreement, unfortunately it was my turn this time and her daughter handed out the invites infront of mine and then turned to her and said ‘you’re not invited’ this broke her heart, I spoke to her teacher about this as I felt it was bullying. She is in a new school now and the girls seem much nicer.

What is this obsession with single gender parties on this thread? Dont kids mix any more? The broad message here seems to be if they had six girls and four boys from their class because they were their friends it is ok, but ten girls is not? What on earth does genitalia have to do with any of this?

This happened to me and my friend when we were in a small class, we just weren’t popular enough. My mum decided to invite the whole of my year and my brother’s year minus the two horrid girls who left me and my friend out to the most awesome Halloween party. We were legends. The girls came to apologise as their mums hadn’t realised they’d left us out - never any harm in a little taste of one’s own medicine!

That’s the thing. Sometimes it is just parents point scoring/settling old scores/trying to keep their child as a ‘popular one’.

That’s where I think some schools have made rules - they’ve seen enough of this behaviour and the effect it has on dynamics. It runs counter to the vibe the school is trying to promote

What on earth does ‘stay in your lane’ even mean when we are talking about an eight year olds party??!!

The responses are interesting, and I think show the "inner child" in a lot of people.

I grew up in a competitive, very well to do and bitchy (both students and parents) area... But as an adult, I've grown out of this insecure "scarcity mindset" myth, where there has to be an out-group for there to be an in-group. I now know inclusion actually feels pretty nice.

Yes logistics exist, but if you HAVE to exclude just ONE child for Precious Little Timmy to have his Sherpa Guided Volcanic Everest adventure... Is it more about proving something? Some inner insecurity or wound that was never fixed in childhood?

Parents who exclude just 1 or 2 children may not necessarily take pleasure in it, but they definitely still have this scarcity mindset, whether in terms of belonging or £ ("it's my money I'm spending, therefore it's my tool of exclusion").

Above not with reference to OP's post though which seems more of a mix up.

Absolutely this

Yes I'd text her.

Stay in your lane

It means nothing much when your child is ‘winning’ like my DC2 did on popularity stakes from the outset.

It means something a whole lot more painful in a school year like I had with DC1 when they were being bullied (bad enough), but class teacher was endorsing it and a fair few parents got on board.

Our choices shouldn't affect others

dear Lord how astoundingly childish. Of course our choices affect others whether we like it or not- we live in a society.

This

I don’t even know where to start with a reply to your post.

Your child is not ‘winning’ anything by having friends, particularly if you have engineered that outcome by being unkind and excluding others. Teaching your child to be a mean girl - popular - or not is not cool. You are teaching her to stand on other people. Not cool or clever because you won’t be able to instil compassion , kindness and the ability to get on with others later on, there is a window of opportunity to influence our children’s values and ethics and then it closes for good.

If you have raised your children to only care about themselves, then you can hardly be surprised when they run into issues. No one wants to be friends with selfish, self absorbed children.

Raise inclusive emotionally intelligent children - they will have skills for life, and they will have an easier ride too, if you can’t do it for altruistic reasons do it for yourself. After all you are going to have to deal with them as teenagers and adults! They will be bloody insufferable by then 🤣

I honestly don't know what is wrong with some of ypu or your kids.
If others choices that are nothing to do with you, isn't coming our of your pocket and is in fact someone else's birthday! Organised by their family to celebrate just their birthday is really effecting you this badly!

I was bullied horrifically and not popular at all and even I managed to rub my two dyslexic brain cells together and work out that's not my business because their birthday is about them.

My 3 kids all of different ages are MN unicorns in that they're pretty bog standard, not geniuses and not special in every way have had the wobble over not getting to another's party
I just told them they are a school friend and that's the way it goes.

You don't get invited to everything and it's not about you and that applies to your kids.
I'm having to plan 3 parties back to back. With all the stress involved,
I can promise you I could not care less if some kids have feelings about it.

It's not about being invited to everything. The issue is being the one person not invited in a group.

1. Says a child. Other well known phrases "everyone's mum is letting them go to the party"

1. Who is everyone? The entire class? The year?

1. It's not her birthday. So that's the way it goes. She may just be a school friend.

Schools force friendships. Parents don't. So while school may make them think they're friends outside school birthday girl may not want to socialise.

If you text her now for a play date it’s going to look dead petty in my opinion it’s a little too well timed,

also I’ve had to have conversations with my children about the fact that sometimes there are only a certain number of places/invites/guests allowed at outings and events, yes it’s disappointing but it’s one of life’s lessons; I was lucky enough to find a venue that allowed the whole class but the first venue I was going to use for one of my kids parties this year only allowed max of 12 children and is the popular party place in our area so the people that constantly use that venue must always have to be very selective so maybe it’s similar

When my son was 6 he came home telling me about a party but I looked in his bag and no invite. I distracted him whenever he started talking about it. We had to go into Parents Evening a couple of weeks later. His Teacher gave us our sons tray and said we could look through his books. Before she spoke with us. Under his books was the party invite. The parent must have thought we were very rude as of course we'd not replied. Son had missed the party.

I’d say it’s more common than not, from about yr 3, for friendships/parties/play dates etc to become single sex. Not always, but very often. I think it’s disingenuous to suggest that you don’t understand the difference between not being included in a mixed group making up a minority of the class, and being the only girl out of all the girls, or boy out of all the boys not to get an invitation. It would be akin to one child being missed out of a whole class party.

I am quite shocked by the sense of entitlement on this thread, and the notion that everyone can afford massive parties and should ensure they never leave anyone out ever. I was more shocked when one parent did invite the whole class to their son’s birthday. There was a huge sense of gratitude from all of the parents and no expectation whatsoever. We all felt a little embarrassed that his parents had gone to such lengths to be so inclusive. It must have cost a fortune.

Children need to learn that they will not be invited to everything. It is a fact of life and we would be setting them up for a world of disappointment, not to mention teaching them questionable values, if they grow up with the expectation that they should be invited to absolutely everything. While it is important to be kind, children can do that in other ways than just parties, and that kindness doesn’t always have to
come in the form of material gifts. Playdates, sleepovers etc. are just as valid when it comes to being inclusive, without breaking the bank. I’d rather my kids valued party invitations as a special treat, as opposed to just expecting them. I’m so glad we are past this stage.

There are soaps with less drama than kids parties it seems, far out parents have a lot of time on their hands if they put this much effort into dramatising kids parties

Everyone had stopped doing whole class parties long before the children turned eight at any of the schools DS has attended — whole class parties were only a thing in Reception and maybe Year 1, before the children had developed friendships. Maybe a minority still did them in Year 2.

Honestly, I think all this extreme sensitivity about ‘exclusion’ from parties on here is largely from parental insecurity, from the significant proportion of Mn posters who are socially anxious, struggle with friendships and see ‘cliques’ and ‘exclusion’ everywhere. Parents who are themselves socially well-adjusted will just say ‘Oh, no one’s invited to everything!’, rather than obsessing about how many other classmates were invited. It’s important to to model healthy friendships for children.

@Tiredalwaystired I'm not obsessed, that's just how parties have been at my kids schools from age 5 upwards, all girls or all boys, so that's my experience.
Mixed always preferable but that's not how it's been.

Your child deserves better than chasing somebody who obviously does not want to be her friend
She will find real friends, parents can not create this so please do not try