What is this insane and desperate need for other school mums attention/approval etc?

[Brainded]

Just about that really? Several threads this morning on other school mums and whether the OP is liked etc? Why are people so bothered? These other mums surely have little to no relevance in your life? I drop my kids and I go to work, I pick them up and I go home. I couldn’t be bothered or interested in the other school mums! Sometimes I don’t even get out of the car! And yes I’m on the class WhatsApp and yes my children still get invited to parties and play dates. These people are just that…they are my children’s classmates parents! Surely we don’t NEED them to be approving of us. I just don’t get it. I don’t really know what my AIBU is? But surely I’m not alone in thinking this!??!

It only bothered me when it started to overspill into the kids - who would do crap like turn around to my kids and say "my mum hates your mum" and exclude DD2 (I don't know what the fuck was in the water that year but it was a hellish combination of mums and ended up with shouting matches in the playground between two particular factions).

You can dislike me all you like - don't take it out on my kid basically.

I suppose it depends whether you are a social person or not. If you are happy to go through your children's school years without engaging with the other parents, great! But most people like to have positive interactions with people they see every day, and that is not an abnormal thing to hope for. If I felt invisible or disliked (rightly or wrongly) in any social environment, I wouldn't enjoy that. I think most people can understand that?

Honestly, I think a significant proportion of Mn posters struggle with friendships, are quite isolated, and have poor social skills. The school run is one of the few times they are forced into proximity with other people, and it seems to have become the focus for insecurity and resentment about ‘cliques’ and ‘exclusion’. When you add in the widespread idea that their child’s social life depends on their interactions with other parents, it’s a flashpoint for all their own unprocessed schooldays emotions.

I’m not entirely unsympathetic as DS started school in a village school where I genuinely was unpopular through no fault of my own (foreigner and blow-in and WOHM where these things were vanishingly rare), which was isolating and rather lonely, but you know what? The other parents didn’t owe me anything. I invited children for play dates based on whether DS liked them, he had a good time, and when we moved countries, I got on like a house on fire with the majority of the parents in his class. Swings and roundabouts. Not everyone will like us, and that’s ok.

For those who are naturally more socially anxious it can be debilitating. I think there's almost some expectation (societally) that primary school brings a few mum friends and a social network as well as for the kids. When it doesn't happen, you get weird looks in the playground or just ignored, that can really trigger some people. It took me a long time to get over it and also triggered a lot of stuff from my own childhood (memories of hierarchies and being left out etc). It still does occasionally, several years on! I am so glad to be leaving that world soon when my kid leaves!

@TheYearOfSmallThings i can totally understand if you were there for hours each day I suppose. But it is minimal and for what it’s worth my interactions are positive when I do interact but that is very minimal. My dc attend a small village school and we know most people in the village…although not all of them and mostly just pleasantries but I don’t base my life around them as such. We moved there just as my dc started school so I was new as such. But I don’t get hung up on it. I don’t dislike any of them, I just don’t know them that well nor do I feel the need to. I have my friends and family and work colleagues. That’s enough.@DoNotScrapeMyDataBishes that would be very hard yes!

@murgugug i suppose I find that hard to get because at our school everyone drives to pick up/drop off so there’s no waiting in the playground. We don’t enter the playground at all so that scenario doesn’t happen

@Brainded I'm wondering how you would feel if this happened to you - kid has a playdate at your house with another kid they are pretty friendly to. While they play, you have a long good chat with the mum, cups of tea, biccies etc. The next day, the mum blanks you at the gate, barely raises a smile when you say hi and try to engage her in a chat. This happened to me and is one of a number of weird events that really triggered me. My house is normal, not messy or dirty, I was polite, our kids got on etc. Some school mums are just down right odd so no wonder people get upset.

I think this is where being a working mum comes into its own.

From memory there used to be a clique of mums who would hang around chatting for at least an hour a day after their kids went into school. Of course they were all bitching about each other in secret, spreading rumours about affairs etc. Then the same again at 3pm...

I was delighted to jump in my car and fuck off to work tbh 😁

@murgugug i would be confused I suppose yes. I would probably message her after the gate incident to check all was ok though.

So you already know everyone, and exchange pleasantries with them, and your child has probably known all the children in their class for years, and feels pretty secure.

Can you see that that is an entirely different situation from someone whose child is going to a large school in a town or city where they may not know any of the other parents, and the child may not know anyone in their class? It is as if you think everyone is in the same position as you, when actually most people are not.

Never had it, I think it's the people who do care that are the ones who pipe up about it, most of us are getting on with the school dropping off and collection and have no need to make the point.

I agree with you OP, couldn't care less about parents at the school gate, when the only thing we have in common is having children the same age. I'm always polite and will say "hello" if someone says "hello" to me, but beyond that I have no interest. It hasn't affected DS at all, he's still invited to plenty of parties/play dates and his own bday party was attended by all but one child in his class.

The difficulty is that it's a closed community that you're stuck with for 7+ years which is a long time if your face doesn't fit. It can also affect your children's friendships if the culture of the school is to socialise with the parents that you like rather than being child-led.

Many schools have drop-off/ pick up on the school playground meaning that you are in the same space as these other people x2 day, up to 5x per week for up to 7 years. That time stacks up and it's more pleasant if the other people there are polite or friendly.

Lots of people on MN are deeply weird when it comes to all matters friend or social skills related. People who don't answer the door, expect people to text in advance of a phone call, who have no friends, don't want friends, view friendship as tit-for-tat transactions - it's never ending.

There are also hundreds of threads about "mean girls" at school gates and it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. If you've already got hang ups around friendship and being excluded from groups (whether real or imagined), then when your child starts school you are going to be hyper vigilant for any perceived slight. Someone who talks to you one day and ignores you the next isn't just having a bad day or has forgotten to put her contact lenses in, she is a spiteful cliquey bitch who is deliberately going out of her way to be nasty. Three women chatting together aren't people who know each other from yoga or because they have older children, they are spiteful bitches who are going out of their way to be nasty.

You get the picture. I have had three kids go through various nurseries and schools and mixed with hundreds of parents at school gates. Never witnessed any of this but then I was never actively looking for it. I never thought of the school gates as anywhere to forge valuable, lasting friendships. It's a short period of time, twice a day, where adults are rushing off to do other things, wrangling younger siblings and only have time to acknowledge in passing people they already know rather than actively seeking out people standing alone.

Making friends with other parents in your child's class is definitely do-able, but you have to put yourself out there, attend the school events, step up and help out. It's hard work. This idea that an entire social circle should miraculously fall into place by picking your child up from school 5 times a week is just crazy.

Oh, and the people who just pitch up to school, pick up their child and leave again, and who have no friendship issues, don't have anything to start a thread about.

I said I know most people but not that well. When I say know, I mean I know their name and whereabouts they might live and who their dc are but that’s about it. I only know/talk to my dc’s best friend’s parents. One of which doesn’t even live in the village any more…and the other I only speak to sporadically I suppose. No I don’t think othered are in the same position at all, I’m quite open to others input on this. I just find it odd that others get so honed in on its importance. But then again I suppose as others say it’s just not important to me and I suppose they might find that hard to comprehend too.

I had that for four and a half years before we moved countries. No one spoke to me, and I only discovered there was an class WhatsApp when I was sitting beside another mother at a nativity play and saw her messaging on it, although I was polite and friendly, and got involved in school and community events, helped out as much as I could around work etc. I won’t lie — it was lonely and quietly grim quite often, but I didn’t take it personally, or decide the other mothers were gorgons. My face just didn’t fit. Bluntly, wasn’t the kind of person they went for. They didn’t owe me friendship, though an occasional chat in the playground would have been nice.

True 🤣 I have plenty of other things to start threads about too, but as I’m off today, this got me thinking so here I am 🫣

Totally agree. And the naming of people who’ve had the audacity to make friends as CLIQUES!!! Horrible, nasty, exclusive cliques!!

Seems people can make friends anywhere expect school, which should be some massive socialist enterprise where you must ask everyone out for coffees, and over for play dates, even if your kids aren’t friends and you have no idea who they are because they don’t involve themselves.

I have a lovely network of local friends I met through kids school, its a win win

I have made so many lovely friends of school mums, I never really had that before as worked in a male environment so all my friends were male before and they also lived further away around the city. The groups of friends I have made are all local and we regularly go for meals, drinks and even holidays.

the cliques one is hard i suppose…from an outsider it seems they are a clique but like a pp said how do you know that they weren’t already friends pre kids? That they aren’t related some how? That they go to yoga twice a week together etc etc? I wouldn’t assume that they met at the school gate on day one and said “oh let’s form a clique and not let anyone else into our magic circle and let’s give evil stares at those that come within 5ft of us”

I wasn't a massive mixer at the school gates but id be cordial and have quick chat. I used to get ignored, but cest la vie, my friend said she had heard the women with husbands were thinking i was going to steal them lol..i was single parent... considering i only spoke everyday talk to one of the dads at school gate then apparently i was a husband stealer... his wife came round and said there's rumors, stay away from my husband..i said who is your husband lol. Anyway she left my home okish when i said i wasn't interested, affairs arent my thing and ...what anyone at school gates didn't know..i had a partner! Its the cliquey school gate gossip...just say hello and move on

People don't really post on forums when they're happy - I wouldn't start a post saying "had a great school run drop off today!" Because its boring, I'm not looking to rant/ for advice and its just everyday life! I might post if I was having friendship issues/needed an outside perspective on things.

School politics can be a total minefield. I've got 4 kids and primary school was lovely with my oldest 2, made loads of good friends. My 3rd childs year was HORRIBLE, so much drama and bitchiness. Will be interesting to see what my daughters year group is like!

@Greenlittecat what do you think it is that made it horrible? Was it the parents or the children or both? Why do you think it was different? Was there a higher percentage of sahm’s or working mums? Was there more drama for other reasons that got dragged into the school gate? Genuinely interesting…