To think no one will come to 16 yo bday party

[Florence19791]

DD will be turning 16, she does have any friends but wants to invite some people from school (small class of 5) and from her dance class. We’ve had a look and one place (party boat) does 30 and we could invite the entire dance school and class and hopefully some will come or another place does 10 (trampolining) and we could invite class plus 5 dance friends but would be obvious if no one turns up. WWYD? Any other party ideas welcome. She’s young for her age but wants to fit in too

What is it about a party she would like, particularly? Maybe start from there. If she is autistic it might be an aspect of parties that you don't expect.

My daughter and her friends went out for a meal in lovely restaurants
One parent stayed whoever child's birthday it was. I didn't stay as I felt I would be cramping their style and they need to have their own private conversations. A trampoline party is very young.
They all loved it that way and they were able to feel like adults.

Look at a small restaurant where family can attend too. Or a pub with a buffét and disco etc. Somewhere you c a invite a mixture of family and her friends. This will make it less obvious if here are no shows from her peer group.

We always do a family meal for birthdays and all happy with this. Low stress all round!

Feel for you, have an ND daughter and I can anticipate might have this issue later on down the line.
long term try and encourage as many outside groups as possible, most of my daughters friends are from outside of school, having many networks helps with friendships and general resilience.
For her birthday, I think your best bet is to go for something quite desirable. A theatre show such as Six, a theme park, maybe even (if parents agree) a shopping spree with some bubble tea and an American style diner. Depends on budget though I guess…

I would speak to the dance teacher personally and ask if you can either:

Add on a birthday tea and dance inspired end to the lesson

or arrange to take them all to see a ballet immediately afterwards?
You absolutely must ask all the parents on WhatsApp before.

Otherwise ready made parties like Mamma Mia live show or cirque du soleil would be so cool for her - you could invite a few friends via parents as a surprise and if they don’t come she won’t be upset.

Many people here are suggesting that you contact the parents to invite her classmates. She's 16 years old. In my opinion it would be extremely odd if her mum contacted the parents of her daughter's classmates about a birthday party. 16 year olds are usually quite independent. It would most likely be embarrassing. You can't help her make friends by contacting them and arranging meetings. She's too old for that, she needs to do it herself.

If she really wants a party so badly, I'd arrange something at your house. That way she will at least be home if no one shows up and not on a party boat with food, music and a captain who will be confused if no one comes to the party. Can you imagine how awkward that would be for her? A whole party for 30 people on a boat with no one showing up and then being on the boat alone or with her mum for 4 hours or so. It sounds like a nightmarish scenario from a film. Even if they showed up it would be risky as you'd have 30 teenagers on a boat and someone will likely bring alcohol. A supervising nightmare. I wouldn't do the trampoline park either because many teenagers just wouldn't be up for it anymore at that age.

I would do the following:

• prepare the invites and hand them out at the dance school/school.
• the party should be directly after the dance class. Arrange for taking everyone to your house afterwards. That way they'll be at class and less likely to drop out.
• definitely invite a small number of people. If you invite the whole school, no one will show up. People will know that everyone is invited and feel like it doesn't matter if they come or not because someone will be there anyway. You're much less likely to have people come with such a generic invitation.
• Let them make their own pizzas and invite some special guest for the evening. Someone who does their nails sounds good. Then watch a movie.
• Not more than 8 or so people in total. Choose the ones who seem kind. Don't choose the ones who didn't come for the Halloween thing.

Good luck, your daughter seems lovely and she deserves a nice party!

Maybe an escape room or my daughter has gone roller skating and then a meal?

My dd is ND also, turning 14 soon, and is really struggling with friendships. She wants to go see Laufey’s concert coming out in cinema and pizza after. I think I’d suggest maybe a nice day out doing an activity that would be exciting for her and brings her so much joy that she doesn’t mind the absence of friends, does she like musicals? Would something like that be fun for her?

Make the day something that teenagers would never get to do.. to make it appealing then some would turn up! Concert tickets to a current singer or group?

Can you throw her a sweet sixteen and invite family to come? Make it less obvious if people from her school/activities don’t show?

She's autistic

Having pizza at your house might feel too pressured for dance ‘friends’ who possibly see her more of an acquaintance.

My teen DD & her friends love going to the local dessert parlour for their treats. If you have one local to the dance class that they can go to after class, it might work well.

If the parents normally pick their DDs up from the class, you could offer to treat them too. Just sit at a different table from the girls.

If she wants a party vibe and you have some fun family but not enough for the boat, maybe see if there is somewhere that has a karaoke room for a smaller number of people (if she likes that of course).

Do you have any friends with kids a similar age so it’s more of a few families or something along side her extended family?

I so so feel for you. My daughter has autism, adhd and anxiety. Relatively low on the autism spectrum, I think if you didn't know you might just think she is full of energy and bossy as she masks very well out, and then breakdown at home. We have had similar issues, she desperately wants friends and parties. We spend an absolute fortune, invite 20 people, about 10 actually show. But! Over the years we have build friendships, and now that same 8 girls (plus her and her sister) are at our parties. Church was a good place to make friends, and, similar to you at dance. She just needed help, we would go over and over good ways to start conversations, give her a fidget bracelet to try and reduce her hugging people! Once she has made the friendships, people realise she is very loyal, kind and clever, and understand her bossiness is her need for things to be right. For example, when playing barbies last week, she was worked up because one girl wanted the princess doll to go milk a cow, and my daughter was like a princess wasn't do that! And I don't have a barbie cow! The cow is a squshimellow! You can't mix them! But she's learnt if the game isn't going how she goes, she can say she needs a drink and step away for a minute, and her friends have learnt, through parents, everyone is different and Grace likes things to be right.

Personally I would try for a big party, invite loads, as long as some turn up, yes it might be wasted money, but she will be happy. Pizza straight from dance and pamper evening sounds good. Her home will be her safe space so less pressure. Pizza hut cater for every allergy going and I don't know any teenager who doesn't like it! Or, as she loves dancing, tickets to a concert definitely sound like a winner as people wouldn't just not turn up, just invite say 3 just in case 1 is genieunly ill or awful lol.

This website is helpful. Good luck.

I’m sorry but if her friends don’t tend to turn up or cancel last minute then I’d be encouraging your daughter to do something without friends… could you and a few family members, cousins etc go to the cinema then for a buffet or something? I’d be reluctant to spend money on so called friends who may not even turn up!

What reason did the three girls give for cancelling on Halloween? 15/16 can be a very hard age for making friends. For my 16th, three out of the four girls from my friendship group didn’t turn up - same thing - they initially said yes, but after the queen bee cancelled because “she had plans”, suddenly the other two cancelled because they’d forgotten they had plans too. They told me that they were going for a night out that day (clubbing), knowing that I was not allowed to go out. I asked if we could do something in the day and they said they needed to get ready lol. In reality, it was the start of them pushing me out of the group as I was “different”

I know I’ll get accused of projecting my own experiences, but depending on the reasons for them cancelling the Halloween plans you might not want to push for them to be invited to another thing that they don’t want to come to. Beware of potential bullying from the girls that have cancelled. If they don’t want to be friends with your daughter, she won’t convince them with a party (especially if they consider it babyish).

I really wish that my parents had offered to take me to a theme park or something instead for my birthday. Or if she’s desperate to go trampolining, I’d be tempted to only invite one or two and wouldn’t invite the three girls who already let her down

Some of these comments are clueless and prove some posters know nothing about neurodiversity.

Kids who are nd can typically run about 3 years behind in maturity. So anyone calling a trampoline party babyish needs to give their head a wobble.

Also small classes do not necessarily equate to special school.

Most 13 year olds would think themselves too old for a trampoline party. She's also inviting people who aren't neurodivergent and wants them to attend the party. They won't come to something that they don't think is fun as they're not friends with OP's DD and therefore don't have any reason to just attend to see her, unfortunately.

My daughter is disabled and could not attend school. She had a best friend on line who lived in Devon (we live in Sheffield). When she was 18 we invited her friend and his family. We also invited her cousins and nuts and uncles. It was great.

Totally agree.

But the issue is that while it might be suitable for dd the other kids might not turn up because they'd consider it too young. I don't know if this is true, kids at a dance school might enjoy trampolining especially if they know a few tricks they can show off - or they might hate it as they thing it's babyish. The party boat sounds like it could be a nightmare - would anyone want to go on a boat in winter?

I think the best thing for dd to do would be to chat to other kids, say her birthday is coming up and say she's not sure what to do for it and see if she can get some ideas from others. But i don't know if that is something she'd be up for doing?

I think the idea of doing something straight after dance class is a good idea if possible. Nail bar and dinner out might appeal others but dd might not be interested in getting her nails done. A show is another idea that might appeal to dd and teens at a dance group.

I would say that dd might find she gets on better with kids a little younger than her - they will have less expectation than other 15/16 year olds. They are also more likely to look up to someone a little older which can really help.

For the girl in the op it might not be babyish but for the guests? Do you genuinely think it will be popular with kids of that age?

Whoever ur going to invite send a save the date msg and try to work put from there who's coming

Totally agree with @Willyoujustbequiet. This is one of the reasons why mixing dance friends and classmates from SEMH school could be tricky. How do you balance the noise levels and activity choice so everyone is comfortable and finding it fun?

It is going to be hard enough for some school friends to pitch up at a party anyway - you have to expect a lot of "can't not won't" on the day with her autistic, severely anxious peers. If they are mixing with mainstream peers they don't know, AND DD has the pressure of making it something acceptable to the latter, it's a lot. Ditto with concert tickets - anxious friends are more likely to be no-shows due to what's going on in their heads, nothing to do with DD, and then DD will be sat next to their empty seats the whole time.

I would encourage a family day out or big ticket show instead. Something that really gives her a buzz - eg rollercoasters if she likes them, so she gets a "hit" of wow this feels amazing. Say Halloween showed that maybe her friends are not in a great place at the moment so it would be hard for them to come to a party (assuming they were school friends?). But Y11 is pretty full on and life won't always be like this. There will be other years when maybe people are in a better place and you'll be open to doing a party then.