Party pooper - How to respond?

[Secondchoice2]

My son has ASD and struggles to make friends. He is a cheerful 10 year old and is nice to everyone but rarely clicks with people. He has two good friends and I am grateful for that. I have been planning a small birthday party for him for months. He needed 8 guests to run the activity.

I planned it with the mum of one of his two good friends. Let’s call her Cowbag. She has helped me plan, understands the difficulty I have in getting people to attend and I even changed the activity to something her daughter would like. One week to go before the party and she has now withdrawn her acceptance of the invite saying that she accidentally double booked. she sent this by text. My son is devastated.

However, I have now found out that Cowbag’s daughter is now going to the party of another girl on the same day. This girl only gave out invites two days ago.

I spend a lot of time with this woman and I do not know how to respond. I am so upset.

She's putting her own DD before yours, that's all.

It hurts, I know, but she clearly sees it differently and feels her DD should be allowed to go to whichever party she wants to.

What I couldn't get over is the lie. She didn't double book, she just doesn't have the balls to tell you the truth. Add to that the fact that you changed the venue for her DD and, well, it would mean a serious decline in the friendship for me.

Mates don't treat each other that way, OP.

That's a crazy assumption that you've made purely based on your individual life experience.

In all fairness, she did say 'here's my guess'.

We all bring our life experiences to our commentary.

That was a very..wild guess.

Then DON'T. Send her a text telling her you know her DD chose another party and had only had the invite a few days back and tell her you feel awfully let down and upset that she lied about it.

We don't have to just put up with other people's shit and carry on as if nothing happened.

Send her a text and concentrate on sorting the party.

I think you can, you just need to give yourself some time so when you do speak to her you can confront the issues without anger.

Fingers crossed the kids will continue to be good friends and play together, which will force the issue to come to a head between the two of you, really.

You don't need to lay into her, you just need to let her know that her actions, lies and flakiness hurt, but the kids are friends and it's your role as Mothers to help them maintain that so you are willing to move past this but you would really appreciate it if she didn't make promises she can't keep in future.

Guess being the operative word.

I think if you do want to say something op, ( and personally I might not bother unless she asked me/ tried to minimise it when seeing me. I’d keep ominous and lofty silence) this sort of approach is best: “I feel hurt and let down because you knew the effort I had put into organising it and that it was important to me and ds.” No name-calling, no slights, no tears.

I think this is much better than saying how long he will take to recover etc ( which sounds like a him problem ) or offering party bags etc ( which seems either lame and full of pathos in the circumstances or passive aggressive - and possibly both).

This is straightforward, factual, no games. Gets it said. Then move on. You’ve told her what you think. She won’t forget. I think when trying to make people feel bad/ guilty, people often make the mistake of leaning into emotion, be it anger, tears of sadness etc. Just say it as it is. I think in the end it’s more powerful. People unfortunately don’t often feel genuinely bad if they have done what they want ( look at some on this thread) and they just then brand your emotion as manipulation/ your lack of control/ overreaction etc. If you stay unemotional and factual it’s pretty hard for them not to grasp you have the measure of them. She’ll know who has ended up wearing the T-shirt of shame. And you have not been nasty or unkind, just said what you felt and why.

The middle ground is your best bet, OP.

Be honest about your disappointment but don't fall into aggression or emotion and make it clear that the kids' friendship is the most important thing here.

That’s sad :( I hate it when people mess up kids party’s

Exactly.

These aren’t people of integrity, OP.

You and your son can do better. Don’t settle for mediocrity.

Agreed. Hope all goes well on the school run today @Secondchoice2

Did you see cowbag on the school run?

I think you’re being unfair. Presumably there was a budget? Could it be that an additional £50 (I find most parties are c.£25 / head) wasn’t achievable? The line has to be drawn somewhere.

I didn’t do the school run today. DH went. I cannot avoid it tomorrow though ☹️.

Good luck, you’ve got the high moral ground!

Come on! This is OP doing what she can to make her child’s party more appealing for one of us few friends. OP is not in the wrong here.

Teaching your child that their wants trump everyone else’s feelings. It’s a really import lesson for kids that if they commit to something they commit and can’t just opt out because something better comes along.

They invited kids from outside of school, not a money issue.

It’s the way it’s done. If arranging a party is going to leave out just 1 or 2 out of an established friendship group then just don’t plan it that way?

She also ‘announced’ that not everyone could be included completely unnecessarily on a school WhatsApp. Leaving everyone wondering if one of their kids was one of the chosen few. Again, that’s an active choice. She could have messaged privately, she could have not said anything. It was pathetic dick swinging.

I think the WhatsApp thing is obnoxious and unnecessary. The fact that kids came from out of school doesn’t change the fact that there might have been a limit on numbers (for whatever reason)

edited to say this is replying to Montestory

Call her out for it. People like cowbag only do it because people don’t question it.

I think Cowbag was probably between a rock and a hard place. Her daughter isn't your DSs friend and her daughter probably would rather be with her actual friends, and i can understand that.

It was let you, her adult friend or let down her 10 year old daughter who would have to miss out on something with her friends to give your son a good bday.

Do you really need 8 people? As long as you're paying 8 people? If so could you not ask a cousin? Someone else to bring a cousin or friend?

I feel bad for you, but i also can see why she made the decision she did.

Thinking of you that must be incredibly stressful :(

I'm feeling for you OP, I think you should prepare what you want to say (if anything), and get it over with. The more you avoid her, the bigger it will feel.

Wow who crawled up your arse!

there is no need for such a response, whose standing on their high horse, Im certainly not, I was very honest, in this particular situation I’m not sure what I’d do that is best for my child, because it’s only my child that’s my priority at the end of the day. I’d love to be whole holier than though about commitments and priorities but every situation is different, which is clearly what I was saying!