To vet a 6 year olds birthday guest list??

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DS has been friends with a boy (XY) since nursery. XY has caused a lot of trouble over the years—swearing, encouraging mean-spirited behavior, telling DS he hates him, yet DS still seems drawn to him. Unfortunately a lot of the time XY has used DS as a puppet to carry out bad behaviour and DS has gone along with it. So for a long time it seemed like they were as bad as eachother really and both giving as good as they got. We’ve focussed on teaching DS to think for himself, bought books and had chats about what makes a good friend and how to be a good friend, what happens or what it can feel like when a friendship isn't so positive but XY remains a big influence. Other parents have voiced similar concerns about XY, unprompted by me. I've tried really hard to see it as a phase, and recognise that behaviour at 3, 4, 5, 6 years old does not necessarily reflect who you will become in later years. We tried to keep an open communication with the parents, even suggesting regular playdates etc to see if perhaps that helped things to improve. Until...

Last academic year, things escalated when XYs parents formally accused DS of bullying, and suggested he be moved classes. The school found no basis and reassured us they disagreed with the complaint, but now that it had been made they had to take certain measures. Ultimately they concluded that at school the boys are no worse than other children and my son, whilst easily led, is not a bully. It was labelled an outside school issue and the parents were told that any further complaints should be taken to us directly rather than the school acting as a mediator. Which is what we'd been trying to do. The complaint totally blindsided me. I think I wrote a thread about it at the time. Since then, we’ve kept some distance, and DS finally started to recognise the issues himself. He has made some really incredible decisions about how to conduct himself around this group of kids. XY and another tried at one point to get DS to do something really quite mean to another child and DS refused, told a teacher and instead played with the kid they'd been planning to trick who is something of an outcast. Recently, though, XY and DS have reconnected (though not enough for us to make XY's birthday invite cut, thankfully!!), and DS now wants him at his birthday party, which has a limited guest list and quite a high price per head (feels relevant as we are not a high income family, so spending money on someone for whom I have a lot of negative feelings really bites!!)

I’d prefer not to invite this boy after all the drama, but I also don’t want to interfere with DS’s choices. If I were to interfere, i have no idea how to decline without it being 'my mum says you're not allowed at my party' or lying to DS (IE I did invite them and they can't come) which I don't want to do. Would only come out anyway and then I'd look even worse.

Is there a way to kindly avoid it, or do I just bite the bullet? AIBU for even wishing that this kid wasn't on the requested list?! Who knew 6 year olds could have such drama around them. Feel like we're only at the tip of the iceberg!!

You are the adult: you get to decide! And if ds tells the kid that his mom won’t allow XY at the party it’s not going to be very surprising to XY’s parents.

No it's fine at this age to oversee the guest list. It's not like you've invited the whole class and he'll be the only one left out.

He is six. He doesn't get the final say.

If you want to frame it better, say you can see XY is trying to be nicer, so he can be invited next year, but you can only have a small amount of children there this year and there is no room.

Blimey, you're really piling all the blame for everything onto your son's friend?

Your son is friends with him because like most friends, they'll be alike.

I'd stop them from being friends at all quite frankly, as they seem to be a bad influence on each other whether you accept that or not.

You'd think but they've recently asked me to my face if I am avoiding playdates, ('busy again! Should we be taking this personally?!') I kinda bluffed through it (I'm shit at confrontation but did actually have a legit excuse that day which helped) and she said something along the lines of 'because that behaviour wouldn't be providing a very good example to the children' and 'children change so fast at this age' and 'it's not like we can keep them apart until they're adults as they're likely to be at school together till they hit 18!'

Also feel there's a potential for her to twist it into bullying again?!

Well, you already have the guest list. There's no room for more. Tell DS that.

I'd be doing the same"not this year but if you are still getting on well and staying out of trouble then next year".

God I'd run for the hills from this one. Can you talk to your DS about what makes a good friend, and maybe use examples from XY's behaviour to make him able to come to his own conclusion that XY isn't, on the balance of things, a good friend? I had to extricate DS from a friendship once but luckily (compared to your situation) the friend was very reliable in his poor behaviour and the day we called it quits, he'd been throwing cars at DS's head, so when we talked about it, DS realised straight away that this wasn't good.

I think setting a good example for children includes holding very firm on boundaries around toxic people and this woman is completely toxic. Also why would they be together until age 18?! She's clearly prone to exaggerating everything! They'll probably never see each other again after age 11 unless they somehow end up in the same sets in the same stream at the same high school.

Yes, I would say there's a limited number because it's expensive so if he wants XY to come then who would he get rid off the list? I would extol the virtues of those on the list who are REALLY good friends or kind children or hoping to become good friends, or even invited ds to their birthday. I would remind him XY didn't invite him. Hopefully there's no one he'd kick off. It could even be XY manipulating DS to get an invite.

DS has also made some poor choices and for the longest time I saw it that they were as bad as eachother and tried to make the best of it/help them through it until this complaint hit and at that point I went for distance instead. If I'm coming at this like 'theyre as bad as eachother' and the other parents are 'no, our son isnt at all to blame it is ALL you' then it kinda feels like I've put myself on the backfoot. It was horrible to get a call from the school basically saying they didn't think it was my DS at all when me as his mother had been holding him 50% accountable. They were 4&5 years old, honestly was shocked to get the call from the school and I felt shit that I hadn't been in DS's corner championing him but instead holding him to account and having all these chats about behaviour and how he could be a better friend..

As for banning.. they share a classroom, it's totally out of my hands between 9&3 if they socialise. I can guide DS but ultimately it's not possible to ban them from seeing eachother when they're in a class of 24 kids!

Also getting DS into an extracurricular that XY doesn't do (but others at his school do) might help him find stronger friendships with children he has some more things in common with?

No way. I wouldn't invite him.

Ps. The parent sounds as bad as the child. "Apple doesn't fall far from the tree" and all that... Keep the distance going if I were you.

Ugh that sounds brutal. Well done to your DS working it out!

It's actually really likely they'd end up in the same secondary. But I hadn't thought about sets and streams and stuff. We're only in year 1, secondary feels aeons away!! Not on my mental radar.

Will definitely keep reiterating what makes a good friend, and possibly name drop with some examples of positive friendship traits. See it that sways things. I honestly was not prepared for this level of manipulation in motherhood. It's not my strong suit!!! I'm usually painfully honest, but with small kids and no filters I'm trying to tread gently.

He knows there are 4 spaces though and he's chosen 4 names.

But she asked for the school to move your child to a different class!

She is being totally unreasonable. I would say to her "since you wanted my child moved out of the class I assumed you didn't want to encourage the friendship".

They tried to have their son moved to another class to get away from your child, and now they’re badgering you for play dates??

Actually it was my son they wanted to move. Didn't want to move their DS as it would be disruptive to his education.

But yes, I also struggle to follow the logic. The best I have is that it was the boys asking for playdates and she doesn't want to say no, so she's painting me as somehow avoiding them?! Feels like stuff that people I have long since bid adieu to would have done so they'd be labelled the one to sympathise with. 'XY would so love a playdate with ... But they're always busy! It's so sad!'. I'm clutching at straws. Really not in my nature to bend my brain this way, would rather either be nice or just not speak to you 😅

I shall have to remember that one in case there's a next time!!

I’ve taught children this age for years. I’ve seen so many children drawn to friends who are dreadful to them. You see how one friend is dominant and leads the other to make bad choices. How one doesn’t treat the other fairly through things like always having more goes or the like. The dominated child always ends up complaining about the other but then always goes back to them.

If you can see this is a toxic friendship then put an end to it.

Gosh that's so sad it's a repeating pattern :( thanks for sharing your experienced insight.

I'm a teacher and I completely agree with the other teacher pp.

Once parents get involved with making complaints to school it's very rare that friendships get back on track.
The fact that this family actively accused your son of bullying at five years old and asked for him to be removed from their son's class would not give me any confidence that things will go well in the future between you. There's way too much history here already at just six years old.

Tell your son it's too late to invite XY, keep on doing all the good things you've listed to help him form healthy relationships..and keep your distance from the mother.