Roll your eyes at the drama!

[MondayblueFridayyellow]

Some of the parents in our children's class have very kindly organised a surprise leaving party for the year 6 children.
The 'surprise' has unfortunately been leaked by one of the children. One of the mothers has sent a message to the whatsapp group (please see below. I have changed the names)
Do you think this message is a bit over the top? I feel for whoever's child it is as they will now be picked on.

The Message:

Evening all I have some very upsetting and heartbreaking news to share with you. 😢💔

It’s come to my attention there a couple of children who have access to this and the other PARENT group chat and have spoiled the surprise. Especially one child in particular I know who the child is and feel like naming and shaming!
They have shared all the information from the day of the party, time, what’s happening there and the hoodies.
They have even shared the sizes and colours to the children and that is sensitive information.

Myself, Parent 1, Parent 2, Parent 3 have all worked incredibly hard over the past few months from calling venues, DJ’s booking things and surprises.
We also all work full time have so much going on in our personal lives and it hasn’t been easy.
To say the least I’m extremely hurt by this as we have even kept all of this away from our own children. It really feels like a kick in the stomach. It’s been so stressful and now I personally am fuming all hard work has been wasted.
Parent groups are for parents and there are other conversations on the groups that aren’t for children’s eyes or ears.
We have expressed time after time this is a surprise and that our children do not know.

The jumpers have been a nightmare amongst other things going backwards and forwards to suppliers etc.

I really really hope the person that has done this is ashamed of themselves and comes clean to the parents and apologises!

For me the excitement has gone and if this information had come out even a week ago no would have cancelled the whole thing.

The school haven’t taken on the stress of organising any of it and we stepped up if it wasn’t for us the kids would just be having that one last thing together at flip out and nothing else.

I’m sorry to rant but I hope you can all understand how hurt we are feeling.

💔💔💔

Thoughts and prayers in the face of this tragedy.

On a side note, I would totally have told my eldest all about the party.

Like many ND children, surprises are absolute hell for him, especially noisy social ones, and he’d have had a total meltdown on it being sprung on him.

He’d be unlikely to talk about it because he understood about other children and surprises. But I would definitely have spilled the beans about the party, DJ and (shock horror) coloured hoodies

Sorry OP, but it’s really, really outing already…,😬

Crikey my first thought is HOW HAVE YOU stayed sane dealing with this mentality for the last 6/7 years 🤦‍♀️Bet you can’t wait for the end of the year !!

Not sure I'm very sympathetic really ! She's probably posted it to her own Instagram anyway since she's likely doing most of it for her image

^ so with that in mind, @MondayblueFridayyellow , you could cautiously bring up inclusion if you fancied

I think she's being a bit dramatic to say "heartbroken" but tbh I think she's right to be annoyed, I'm not seeing the massive problem. It was a surprise party and whoever told their child did spoil that.

Agree with above posts this is very funny but I'd ask MN to delete because its highly likely to end up in papers online news feeds.

It's fine, this woman is being ridiculous and deserves to be shamed. At least you're not naming.

I honestly think some over invested parents lose their minds by the end of Year 6. God help them with the transition to becoming nobodies at secondary school. I think they find the transition harder than the kids.

This is the kind of thing that makes me thank my lucky stars that I no longer have to have anything to do with primary school parents!

Yes she was overlydramatic but if you had gone to the trouble of organising a surprise party and someone spoiled it you would be pissed off too.

I don't do WhatsApp groups but again if your in one for parents you don't want the kids reading it and gossiping about it at school.

Barely anyone else thinks that so don’t worry, women who are stupid enough to send messages like than deserve to be taken the p out of

It’s not about the kids is it. It’s all about her and the others who have sacrificed themselves on the altar of instagrammable events

OMG hahaha!! I am ashamed and deeply embarrassed for the parent who wrote this.

I haven't been on mumsnet in so long, brilliant!

Ugh, this is just horrible. Imagine how the parent/s of the child who "ruined the surprise" are feeling - they must be feeling awful and worried for their kid. This woman needs to get a grip!!

...it is pretty funny tho 😂

That is properly hilarious 😂

DS1's year 6 leavers party got a bit out of hand with folk falling out all over the shop, but this is something else!

And a surprise was a stupid idea in the first place

Her message is quite dramatic but to be fair I would be annoyed as well. Who adds their DC to a ‘parents only’ group??

OP I think you should post the replies, who cares if it's outing! The woman in the whatsapp group said she felt like outing an 11 year old child so they could experience the humiliation and shame of a group ostracisation and judgement, so I would say it's fair game.

Honestly. I would reply
"Thanks Sue for your part in organising the leavers party. Your efforts are truly appreciated. I'm sure the kids will have a Ball, surprise or not. Looking forward to it"!
Don't spoil it by adding "not gonna miss any of this"

Devil's advocate and all that....... yep, she's a bit over the top but so many parents just sit back and wait for everyone else to organise stuff and then have an opinion on how it should have been done.
Maybe others would like to help and step up in the future.

This is it, this sums up the whole thing!

I presume they got hold of the phone, overheard parents talking about it? Read it over the parent’s shoulder. Who knows? It was pretty ambitious expecting it to be kept from 30 kids- the whole idea was pretty flawed in that regard from the outset.

And I agree with pp that a surprise party would be pretty overwhelming for some kids. It’s better they know.

You really should.

When my year 6 dd left they created a year 6 leavers chat for the next year. I have a dd a year younger.. Before the actual leavers event there were 96 messages in the chat regarding the following event.. I left the chat. Head was battered and phone was just about smouldering.. Insanity ime.

Always the risk with surprise parties isn't it? Someone often leaks something, usually through a slip of the tongue.

The noble thing for the child/ren involved who know is to pretend they have no idea, problem solved, though more difficult with kids.

The parent/s in question need to learn to chill more, as someone said. God help them when the kids reach teenage years, and every day is a drama!