DD wants to uninvite a girl from her party

[howtohabdle]

DD aged 8 is in a lovely little friendship group of 4 girls. One girl in the group has never invited DD to her party despite them being best friends. I just assumed she doesn’t have one. We invite her every year just for context. One of the girls from the class had a party today and DD came back excited saying “it’s X’s birthday next weekend am I going?” I told her we haven’t had an invite. She got upset and said all the girls from class are going. I re-assured her that sometimes there’s no space for all children. DD now wants to uninvite her which I discouraged but quite honestly I understand how she feels! I have invited her every year and to find out now she doesn’t invite my child. How nasty of the mum. Why accept our invite every year and not reciprocate.

how would you handle it? I’m thinking from next year not to invite her again. Funny thing is she is so warm when I see her at school events. I just assumed as she works full time in a highly stressful job and I never see her at drop offs and pick ups that she just doesn’t do parties.

I think I’d be a bit more direct, referencing your own invitations

’Hi X’s mum, I’m dropping you a text as my DD has learned she’s not included in Suzy’s birthday invitation. DD has always considered Suzy to be a very close friend, and has included her in invites to her own birthday, along with A and B, as they get on so well together. If we’ve got that wrong and Suzy doesn’t see it that way, could you let me know so I can manage expectations at this end?’

Honestly, I would send a message to the mother stating that you hate to disappoint children - it seems a cruel thing to exclude exclude friends, but you have to cut numbers. My reasoning is that she MUST know and she’s allowing it. (I’m also petty due to having been bullied as a kid.)

O

Change the date to the same date as her party if the other children aren't going to the other party.

I like this one

It’s a tough lesson that your DD needs to learn and it’s that some people don’t like you the way you like them. Explain it’s really hard to take and that adults even feel sad about it if it happens to them. Then plan a nice day out on the same day.

It’s your job to show your child how to grow into a decent adult, it isn’t your job to make everyone like her or to make everyone who doesn’t like her feel crap about it.

They probably weren't intending to attend. I do think it's cruel to invite everyone but one child. You have to be a special kind of evil to do that.

Love that. Non-confrontational, but slightly pointed… you should say this or similar.

OP I wouldn't uninvite. That could easily be seen as a really dick move if other mum spins it that way. I would do some gentle but direct probing here to find out what the issue is.

Firstly is there any chance that this is a clerical error eg she's got the wrong number for you?

Secondly is it the other child or the other mum that's stopping her being invited? I'm going to guess it's the child as if it was mum that didn't want her child hanging out with somebody not in her clique she presumably would also decline any invites to your dd's parties too. If you feel that it's mum then I'd just carry on nurturing the girl's friendship and explaining to dd that it's her mum not her friend who's being difficult. If it's the child then I'd have the conversation that not all friendships are mutual and fully support her in no longer inviting her to her parties/social events.

Stay gracious OP and remember your daughter is watching

When I turned 11, I had a small slumber party.
I left one girl off my invitation list. I didn’t know her well at all and I felt justified in my decision.
Her family moved shortly after.
Now it’s 57 years later and I still have a guilty conscience over it.
Isn’t that the silliest thing you ever heard?
If I ever see her again by god I’m going to apologise.
She’d probably laugh in my face.
She surely wouldn’t even know who I am, even if I introduced myself.
I carry around a 10 stone bag of guilt, inherited from my mother.

Please send a message feigning ignorance. Say your daughter came home all excited about the party, but no invitation has arrived. Is there some misunderstanding? If she confirms that there is no invitation then you can rescind yours on the grounds that the lack of reciprocity has caused hurt feelings.

Yep, you don't uninvite children from parties, any more than you uninvite an adult from a party just because they haven't invited you to something they're hosting. And in this case it might not even have been the other girls decision.

You sympathise with your daughter, you plan with her what might happen next year (but bear in mind that friendships change) and your DD comes out of the other side knowing that her mum understands how she feels, and also what is proper behaviour in a disappointing scenario.

Of course you can't uninvited a child!! Based on your own young child's perceptions... Don't invite next year if it turns out to be true.

I think I’d have to prioritise DD’s feelings over this and would message the mum asking if the DDs had had a falling out that you were unaware of, seeing as she is the only girl in the class not invited to her daughter’s party. And your DD is upset because she felt they were close friends.
And if that is in fact the case perhaps it would be better if her daughter did not attend your daughter’s party, to avoid any unpleasantness.
(But I can’t bear any shilly-shallying around and like to know where we stand. ) i know this approach isn’t for everyone!

You sound like a very sweet and kind person actually.

You could go for something like

'Daphne has told me that she's not invited to Phyllis's party and she's worried that she has done something to upset her. I've explained that not everyone can be invited to everything but I just wanted to check that I'm not glossing over anything as if she is actually being a ratbag at school! '

I just told my own mother about this. She is 84 and remembered calling a mother to say “I’ve just never heard of someone doing this to a child.” We kept talking and she couldn’t remember which child was not invited. Or which lady in our small town. Then she said, “actually it wasn’t one of you, it was someone else’s child.”

Which I thought was really funny as I had just written here that I didn’t think mom would be upset if she was left out of something so probably wouldn’t be too bothered if we were either. But she sure didn’t fail to speak up when she saw it happening to someone else. I think that’s lovely and hope someone else will do the same for your daughter.

@howtohabdle

I think it’s best to brush it off. I think any texts will feed into relationships at school.
I think it could blow up into a much bigger issue in DD’s head.
Your DD is doing the kind thing, the right thing by considering the feelings of all her friends.
Continue with current invitation, explain that sometimes other people forget or are not aware.
I don’t think it’s right to give her the message that she’s been excluded (there may well be another reason) - or a ‘tit for tat’ exclusion back.

If you brush off and treat with resilience, and think this will teach DD to be strong with other knocks in life. Keep doing the right thing, don’t let others get you down and don’t spend energy on crap decisions made by others.

Be the bigger person, I know it’ll stick in your craw for now, and make no changes. Next year if there is to be a party, consider the guests with this year in mind.

Some mums are so flipping mean, the bs I’ve seen over the years. We wonder where mean little girls come from…

I hate all the politics around kid’s birthday parties. It’s definitely the mums. I invited the whole class in my DD’s first year at school then all the girls the second year. The same girls never turned up both years and my DD considers them friends and was quite upset.
I have some of the mums on social media and seen that they were shopping locally on the day of her birthday, so not exactly busy! My DD attended some of their parties but has been left out previously as well, even though she’s friendly with the girls in school.

There is a very cliquey vibe with a lot of the mums and I think the kids get punished because of it. It’s quite sickening.

This year we just told my DD to do something with her closest friends rather than inviting the same people who don’t show up.

Cancel your party then rearrange it with just the other girls. Just message the mums with, ‘Hi, something has come up so we’re going to have to postpone Suzy’s party.’

And then message the other two mums and say ‘Hi, we’re having a sleepover/day out [the next day], would xxx like to come?’

tough.no point guessing wht if any logic applies. Wee girl unlikely be calling the (invite)shots. Its shite but...its tough.

Yes I second this. There is usually a way to get your point0 across or just express your concerns without creating more drama or sounding pushy. And i think for young girls especially, its good to.set an.example of getting your feelings heard.
There are some good examples here of text messages to write.

Gosh I remember being a kid and my group of friends was invited to a girl’s birthday. All of them were invited to the sleepover bit but I was the only one who was only invited for the dinner and would then have to go home. I was upset so Mum said I didn’t have to go at all if I didn’t want to, and told the other mum that the way I’d been invited had made me feel left out so I wouldn’t be going. They changed the invite and said I could go to the whole thing. The other girls were vile to me all night and I really wish I hadn’t gone at all.

Sometimes it’s best to let sleeping dogs lie. I would definitely let the mum know that I knew and thought it was shitty, but I wouldn’t let my daughter go to a party where they didn’t really want her there. I don’t think I’d text but next time I saw the mum I’d say something about it - just something like, “Such a shame X wasn’t invited to Y’s birthday - I hope Y had a nice time but I’ll make sure X doesn’t continue to impose on you by inviting Y to any of X’s events again.”