Why aren't any of the school mums ' normal ' ??

[ohmyine]

They all seem fine on the surface, but after getting to know a few of them a bit more, there are so many red flags.

I know my title is a bit dickish, what does ' normal ' mean anyway?

But basically I'm finding things tricky. I'm friendly and outgoing and make connections quickly.

I keep meeting moms daily and thinking that they seem really lovely and then after a while I realise they're really not ok actually and then it becomes tricky as I obviously need to continue being somewhat friendly. I can't work out if I'm missing some sort of radar, but I genuinely can't really tell at first who's going to not the best person to hang around with.

Case and point I've been super friendly with one mom and I've got to know her better and she's just so mean about other people. Completely slating others for literally no real reason. She seemed so sweet and nice and then we went for a coffee and she let rip and I couldn't believe the stuff she said.

Another one was also super nice for months and months, then I got to know her better and she kept telling me what I was doing wrong with my kids. ' oh you shouldn't say this or that ' and just being generally super condescending.

There are a few moms I've got to know that haven't tuned out like this, thankfully,

But how can you tell ? Everyone seems so nice at first.

I think you've all misunderstood me.
i meant the mums that clearly look down their nose at you and act like their child is better for no reason than they either have money, their kid excells at something or theres a group of them that endorse this behaviour we even get this at the nursery. But what do i know this website is mostly full of posh toffs and people who want to complain about their child that is my age like they're 5 and dont have autonomy have a nice day :)

You sound like exactly the sort of person OP would befriend on the school run.

Do you suffer from rejection sensitive dysphoria by any chance? I can assure you that most people are going about their day just doing their own thing and not paying other random people at nursery pick-up much attention, let alone looking down their nose at them. You seem to be over projecting about what people think of you, when they probably aren't thinking about you at all..

@Mynameispaige

But what do i know this website is mostly full of posh toffs and people who want to complain about their child that is my age like they're 5 and dont have autonomy have a nice day :)

OK then…. Back in the real world most people don’t have time to tie themselves up in paranoid knots worrying about the imaginary opinions of people they barely know.

This website is overwhelmingly lower-middle class, and you say yourself that your child isn’t even school age, so you have no personal experience of the ‘mummy mafia’, just the weirdly intense projections of someone with a lot of internalised hostility.

Op I experienced this too. People who seem genuine and nice who end up surprising you in a bad way. One mum admitted to me she never saw the point of reading a bedtime story. Like ever. One mum was shagging a teacher and started a rumour about me to divert attention. One mum (a queen bee) dented my car and tried to blame me. Then burst into tears and told the other mums I was cruel to her. One mum volunteered to help with the reading and went through my daughter’s books to see how she was doing. I know this because she told me. All of these women regularly still ask me for social events. I’ve become more selective about who I let in. But for those years they are a part of every day. It’s crazy to think back, now mine don’t need dropping to school.

I'm normal!
But yeah, I do know what you mean. Had a few who were friendly at first and then ignore me completely, one that asked my child to a play date but never actually invited him through me and when I invited her child just stopped responding/ blanked me (my child felt very let down), one that hadn't heard of adhd and another one who explained it to her like it's some unmanageable mental illness for the first one then to wonder why the children with adhd are allowed in our school, many of them gossiping and talking behind each others back, one that always had terrible things to say about the school staff on the WhatsApp group (even though we have mums who also work at the school in the group), one that yelled at some teenagers in the playground for splashing water (likely by accident), the smoker with a newborn...

Thank God my children are in high school now. I absolutely detested the mum circles at primary school. I suddenly felt I had been transported back to my old school days, where groups would form of bitchy girls that really were awful. I just kept away from them all, I would turn up at school just as they were coming out so I wasn't stood around waiting that long. I know I couldn't do thus again, just driving past there old school now makes my stomach turn.

Such misogyny on this thread and using the term school mums like it's an insult or some strange species.
They're all people, just because some are different to you doesn't mean there's anything wrong with them, by definition if you have a kid in that school you also are a school mum.
Every one of them will have their own issues and anxieties just like in all areas of life, no one ever knows what's going on behind closed doors.
What's perceived as cliques may also just be people who are familiar with each other and are passing the time, older children in same class or whatever

I think I'm not "normal" (ADHD and autistic) and I find school mums the hardest to get on with and it increased my social anxiety. I've got a few good friends from these mums groups, but it was definitely a case of finding the right people, and focus more on finding friends from shared activities and interests instead