Can anyone help me understand this social situation not sure what to do!

[Alysskea]

Honestly I feel like I’m in high school all over again trying to navigate the world of other toddler mums. Just wondering if anyone can help me work out what the heck is going on and if I’m the problem.

I take my 2yo to a sports session every week on my day off. She absolutely loves it. Afterwards the mums all go to a cafe and we’ve been tagging along because a) they invited us the first week and then said oh we come here every week b) she really enjoys going with the other kids and c) saves me having to try and feed her when we get home.

My issue is, these mums seem to go out of their way to exclude not only me but my child as well. Of course they all know each other better than they know me and I’m not asking for them to go out of their way to be overly friendly or anything, but we usually sit there for an hour and a half and they’ll talk to each other and ignore me completely. Don’t think they’ve ever asked me a question about my life. Fine, whatever. They also exclude my child! Last week one of them took out colouring pages and pens and handed them to each child except mine, and that’s just one example!

I am not sure what to make of it tbh. I have a few working theories

• they never actually wanted me there and asked me along to be polite. But this seems weird as I don’t know why they’d do this or how our presence takes away from their enjoyment of the experience
• they look down on me as I’m slightly less middle class than them. Honestly I’m highly educated and have the same job as one of them but I’m not quite on their level finance wise. You can tell that by looking at me. This makes me sound class obsessed but honestly I’m grasping at straws here.
• they for some reason don’t like me or my child’s personality. But again, I don’t understand why especially as they’ve never spoken to us!
• they’re just really cliquey and treat everyone this way. But I can’t understand how a grown ass woman would do that. It’s just nice to include people who YOU have invited out with you.

Honestly I find it quite upsetting taking my child along and seeing her excluded. She’s so good natured and describes them all as her ‘friends’ when they basically don’t interact with her because their parents have given them all toys and activities to do and not her. But she’d also be really sad if I said we couldn’t go eat with her friends anymore. It would make her even sadder if we didn’t go to her class anymore.

i am sure I’ll get crap for this post and get called paranoid and entitled, but I honestly just feel kind of puzzled and saddened by the whole thing. I am neurodivergent (I have ‘severe’ ADHD that is not medicated currently). But I generally get on well with people and have a broad group of friends including neurotypical middle class mums who seem to think we’re not beneath them lol. This just comes across to me as plain rudeness and seems kind of deranged 🤷🏼‍♀️.

This is so so lame. I can't believe these women act like toddlers. Their lives must be very limited.

None of us know any of the people involved here. The op might be super weird. God knows I’ve met some weird parents in my toddler place time. I mean sitting there every week without speaking at all - for 3 months - it’s pretty odd behaviour. I’d be freaked out too

Go to the activity but not the after thing. I honestly don't know where people like this are - I've never encountered "invited you out of politeness" thing, isn't that how we all make friends, by chatting with people we don't know. They're not worth a further thought, clearly not nice people. Greggs is your friend in this scenario! 😂

That's ridiculous. A two year old will have not the slightest interest in whether strange adults are engaging with her or not. And as far as these people are concerned, the OP is simply mystifyingly arriving weekly at the same cafe as them, so why would they be giving her child colouring pencils or whatever? They're clearly trying to discourage her from coming to the same place. Giving her child playthings would be a total crossed signal to what they seem to have been trying to convey for two or three months! And given the OP's thick-skinnedness/inability to read social signals, she'd probably think that was some kind of encouragement to keep coming.

It wouldn't have happened if the OP wasn't being so ridiculously stubborn about following a group of friends along to a cafe every week because she doesn't want to make lunch. She shouldn't be putting her daughter in this situation.

Whatever the reason for their behaviour, it is stupid and childish and you can do without these people in your life!

However close the group might have been in the past, ignoring you and your child is pathetic behaviour. Any normal person would have been welcoming and asking about you and your child and taking the trouble to include you.

These are not the sort of people I would like to mix with.

Exactly, I’m sure we’ve all met people in our lives that we just didn’t click with, it doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with either party, it’s just one of those things.

@Alysskea

I strongly suspect I would receive a classification of ND, but prefer not to label myself.

I - 100% - have been there, but I decided it’s not me that’s ‘wrong’ in some way. I wouldn’t treat other people like that. So I will find my tribe who have similar values to me. Believe me, they are out there. It would be me, sitting on the edge looking bewildered. Come and sit with me instead.

My second experience at primary, I’ve not tried to fit in, and slowly, gradually the play dates and good friendships have built up. With people who are like me.

If your child enjoys the activity, go. Don’t make an effort to interact with them, take a book or play with your DC or sit away from them. A polite hello, and then find your own space.

But I don't think anyone is suggesting she not take her daughter to the actual activity, which the child loves -- everyone thinks she should still do the activity.

They're just saying it's pretty weird to go to the same cafe as a group of the other parents for two or three months, having possibly misunderstood an invitation, and despite the others visibly not wanting to engage over months, and then start an internet thread being cross with them for not giving her daughter colouring pencils!

It's not you, it's how English mum and school gate operates....get ready because ot can hurt your feelings, my daughter had similar, until I came and took over school runs and showed the rude pitches we don't need their approval and even have more money

Fucking hate this. Why invite you if they didn't want you to come. Ditch them, they are not friends and have made it perfectly clear you are not part of their clique. Sorry that your daughter has to suffer the rudeness of these women.

No, the two year old won’t. But that doesn’t mean that their behaviour isn’t gross. Not giving a two year old colouring even though they blatantly knew they were going to be there is wanky. I’ve already said OP is part responsible but in my eyes, this ain’t excusable. I don’t care how they feel about OP

As I have already said. But I still think it’s nasty behaviour on their part. You don’t take out your feelings towards an adult on a child, let alone a toddler.

And some people wonder why the other mums don’t want to hang with them eh?!

Sorry this has happened to you OP. Look around for another parent with a child at the sports group and suggest you go on to a cafe afterwards. Possibly not the one the clique go to. They are telling you, very rudely, that you are not welcome.

I have a small group of tried and trusted friends: we meet every few weeks for a coffee and a chat. We understand each other, we're interested in similar things, some of us go back years. At various times others have wanted to come along with us and while no one wants to excluded the newcomers, we've had feedback that people have felt excluded because we all know each other so well. I think as we've got older we're less and less interested in asking all the standard getting-to-know-you questions and being polite and welcoming when we have limited time together and want to focus on catching up with each other. Women have joined the group. They tend to be the women who don't sit and wait to be asked about themselves or expect to be looked after. They also tend to be the ones who are on our wavelength and throw themselves into conversation.

Good luck with forming your own clique.

I can see why you thought you were being invited in future, but it seems that the invitation was a one-off. Don't go again but try to find something nice for you and DD to do at this time of the week, maybe with one of her friend's mums.

I just think that in the circumstances they don't want to do anything to give the OP the impression they are OK with her presence, or now consider her and her toddler part of the gang. That giving a two year old colouring materials would risk cementing the OP's delusion forever!

At various times others have wanted to come along with us and while no one wants to excluded the newcomers, we've had feedback that people have felt excluded because we all know each other so well. I think as we've got older we're less and less interested in asking all the standard getting-to-know-you questions and being polite and welcoming when we have limited time together and want to focus on catching up with each other. Women have joined the group. They tend to be the women who don't sit and wait to be asked about themselves or expect to be looked after. They also tend to be the ones who are on our wavelength and throw themselves into conversation.

I think this is good advice from @Pluvia if you're someone who wants to join a long-established group. There are a lot of posts on Mn from people who are invited to something by a longstanding group of friends and clearly spend the entire time festering because they don't feel they were paid enough individual attention.

If my child enjoyed the cafe, I'd take some toys/drawing stuff as a PP said and just be in the area and enjoy my coffee. They don't own the bloody cafe! Honestly eff those women OP. Do what you and your daughter want to do, other nicer mums might even join you!

I still think it’s wrong. Due to various circumstances, I know a couple who are racist. I cannot stand them and won’t engage with them. I still treat their 3 year old in the same way as the other three year olds. Is not her fault, you don’t exclude kids based on adult behaviour

ETA - our kids attend something together which is how I know them, before people ask me why I don’t dump them. But I do ignore them but never their child.

Cheers. Joining an existing group is an art. It might have helped if, for example, the OP had brought colouring books and pencils for all the children on her second visit, to indicate that she's actively thought about the group and how to enhance the children's experience.

To join an existing group you kind of need to serve your apprenticeship, prove yourself useful or interesting and build bonds slowly. Opportunities to shine and take your space will arise. I sometimes wonder if the women who've wanted to join the group of friends I mentioned expect to be part of the group instantly. It's not like that.

Yeah I think it’s this

Op, how do you behave when there, do you join in, ask them questions about themselves, participate in the conversations?

Yes, again, good advice. I think people who are confident socially or make friends comparatively easily know this stuff almost automatically, but it may be genuinely useful for people who don't to have it spelled out.

Like those frequent posts on here from people who see the school playground as a gauntlet of 'cliques', side-eyeing and 'exclusion', and who appear to imagine that people just getting on with their day or talking to their friends, should be hyper-vigilant at all times for 'anyone who looks left out' and be making considerable efforts to 'include' them. But an existing group of friends almost certainly doesn't need you, so if you want to join it, you make the running, rather than stay on the other side of the playground, nand resenting the 'clique' for not seeing that your avoidance of eye-contact means you are secretly dying to talk to them.

You and your little one don’t want to hang around with people like this. They’re like the popular bullies you get in school. Don’t give them a second thought as their opinion doesn’t matter. Use this time after to have a lunch date with your daughter somewhere else.