Why does this mum keep doing this?!

[Allthesesayingsidontunderstand]

Mum from school, my dd adores her dd and vice versa. Live very close by, she’s said about three/four times previously for my dd to come to play at their house. She initiates this, very enthusiastically, says the day time loosely, in the past she’d say she’d text, never did, ok, bit annoying, but not too bad, Dd bit disappointed.
They dropped by to our house the other day, kids played for a bit. Mum made invite for later on today at set time, went on and on about it, she told all the girls, got them all excited, she said to text.
I planned my day around it, sent a quick text this morning to check it was still ok at X oclock, she’s seen it-no reply 🤷🏻‍♀️
Told dd now it’s not happening, but maybe another day and we’ve made plans to go to a Christmas village later. Dd very disappointed thos time.
Why do she do this? What is the point, my friends and I only cancel if def need to. The thing I dont get is why be the one to initiate it so enthusiastically each time? She’s not being orompted to, I don’t do that.
She’s extremely outgoing and confident and lives in a beautiful house, so no issues with shyness or worrying about her house etc
I just find the big song and dance about it all a bit weird now with no follow through and I feel saf for dd now,

She’s also not been on WhatsApp since seeing it, so god knows
I’m not going to just turn up after specifically checking and asking her if it’s still ok for later and not replying

Turn up at the agreed time. If she isn’t home then message her not to make anymore plans in front of your daughter again as she has let her down once too many times.

I would never send a "do you still want to play?" message to anyone. I would confirm details with a question if relevant but otherwise would only (at a push) send an affirmative message such as "looking forward to X". The onus should always be on the person cancelling to get in touch and articulate that. You're setting this all up to get cancelled on. I highly doubt men send these kinds of messages.

This

If she hasn't explicitly cancelled I would still go (unless it's far away).
There are a million reasons she might behave like this and you won't happen to guess the right one. I would only invite her in the futue if you have another reliable guest at the same time, so that your daughter isn't disappointed, and I'd tell her so, kindly but clearly. It's not like she doesn't know she's been cancelling.

So what's your solution.

You keep having this issue and are surprised its happened again.

Just say no your busy every time she suggests it from now on

I do this a lot and everything comes up to stop play dates, need to collect someone/ help someone/ something comes up in work/ dh says but you have to do x y or z. I look so flaky but it’s never me deciding not to have them over it’s everything conspiring against me. I always hope against hope to not let the kids down but it always happens

I knew someone similar (we weren't either party). Boths girls were great friends but one mother wasn't keen on relationship developing but didn't want to upset her child. Made all the right noises when kids were in earshot but tried to cool it afterwards - being flakey, cancelling, forgetting. The other DM got hint after a while.

The reason I texted was she said to text before to double check.
She just replied 10 minutes ago, half an hour before play date to say sorry she couldn’t do as had to do/go to X…I knew it, but why bother

We had exactly the same thing happen to us when DS was at primary school! The mum & dad of one of his friends would repeatedly invite my DS for a play date at their house in front of the boys, and then complete radio silence until the next time we bumped into them in the playground when it would start all over again. It was very tiresome. DS would get excited and then disappointed over & over until eventually he realised the invites were never going to result in an actual play date.

DH & I were totally mystified by the whole thing, and then we twigged that both mum & dad were probably just asking as their son wanted them to & they had no good reason to say no, but had no real intention of ever having our DS over.

She was a massive snob & I don’t think we were really their sort of people - wrong car / address / jobs you name it.😁

It was a pretty shitty thing to do to two little boys though & really annoyed me at the time.

I remember reading about this woman when you posted last time. I think you may need to be a bit more assertive. When it comes to the day of an arrangement you could instead of saying 'checking we're still on" just say "We will be there at 2pm unless we hear otherwise - DD is looking forward to it!"

and turn up.

So you're not reliant on a reply that is not coming and the onus is on her to be there or be definite about it not happening.

@BySunnyOtter 😂No, not a sahm
I don’t initiate anything and am really not arsed either way, but my Dd is and she adores these sisters, i’m just really curious now about what the reason is, especially as she’s ok to pop round to mine, its really odd

I don't think there's a concrete "reason" beyond her being a bit crap and a bit of an asshole

Be polite but definitely put an an end to this nonsense.

"No worries. Playdates have fallen through a few times, undersrand these things happen but please dont mention any in front of my dd in future."

Either she gets a better offer or her husband says no.

@BySunnyOtter Next time?

Could be anxiety on her or maybe her daughter's part?

My daughter would politely make the right noises about playdates with certain people and then have a massive strop about them coming round or going to their house when it came to it.

I quickly learned not to ever commit on her behalf. She's sociable when people are around but as soon as they leave she's a complete introvert, still an issue now she's a teen but thankfully I'm no longer involved in her social life.

This sounds like slightly obsessive behavior. I think you may come off that way in real life and she finds it a bit intense, is that possible?

@AspirationalTallskinnylatte Don’t think so, they were nearly crying when they had to leave our house as they really do all get on so well
Mum is very loud and outgoing, of course you never know, but doesn’t seem the type to be anxious
All I can think is she doesn’t want us to come around, but does a big pretence that she does

Giant flake.
and disrespectful.

id say to your daughter something like, ah Molly, I’m sorry it’s not worked out, I know you really like lolly and she loves you too! For now, it’s best that we don’t make any arrangements with them as they seem to forget and you get so upset, I hate to see you disappointed. Factual and to the point.

I cannot be arsed to cover for flaky individuals anymore as I’m old and grumpy :)