Kid left out of party - why?!

[Partypooper101]

DD9 is in a small very boy heavy class. A girl in the class who she considers a friend, not a bestie, but definitely a friend, is having a party and has invited all the girls in the class bar DD and one other girl. Before everyone comes for me, yes of course I know nobody is obligated to invite anyone to their party, and no there have 100% not been any fallouts etc. There’s definitely no issues between them, DD was surprised not to be invited and although she’s not said anything about it at school, at home she’s admitted to me she’s hurt at being left out and doesn’t understand “what she’s done wrong to be left out”. The parents of the girl whose party it is are known to be wealthy; it’s not a money issue of having to be strict on numbers, and it’s being held at their massive house so not a space issue either! DD has invited this girl to every party she’s ever had (& we’re definitely not wealthy! 😂)
I know I’m probably being pathetic but it stings. DD is lovely. I’m not saying that blindly either, she really is. Why’s she been left out?! ☹️

OP if it’s a class of 30, then having invited 6 friends and none of the others doesn’t feel like having only left out one or two. It genuinely may not have occurred to the other mother that she’s invited all but 2 of the girls as there’s so many of the class they’ve not invited.

I would also say encouraging friendship groups and parties at this age to be “all boys” or “all girls” when there’s so few girls is doing your dd a disservice. Make a point at your next thing of inviting some boys too.

Did they invite you last year? Did you rsvp? And did you go? You didn’t pull out at the last minute or forget and not go?

At our school this is the most common reason for leaving kids off the invites if, for example, the parents have paid £20 for a kid for bowling the previous year and then they’ve flaked out at the last minute.

I’m reluctant to bore pps or derail, but it was a case of a couple of friends deciding she wasn’t interested in their more teenage interests and excluding her. Two of these girls were ringleaders and basically told others that if they played with her or included her, they themselves would be ostracised. All extremely upsetting and we are still seeing the effects of this cruelty even now.

She was/is genuinely a kind, gentle soul, but probably not exciting to pre-pubescent peers. She has since suspected and been diagnosed with autism, and this has helped her to understand and rationalise her ‘square peg in a round hole’ experience at school. If you met her you wouldn’t guess this - I know you’re not supposed to say ‘mild autism’ nowadays but really, it manifests very subtly but was clearly a contributing factor to her friendship troubles.

She would come home and ask why Kate or Eleanor had given everyone else a party invitation but not her. This went on for over a year. Yes, of course you say the usual stuff (they can’t invite everyone etc), but that line wears thin after 10 or so parties. She was a bright girl and she saw through my rather desperate excuses! Agonising to watch.i feel miserable again just typing this!

Ok, thanks for that.
A few thoughts:

• telling others not to include her, or play with her, is most likely bullying and utterly horrible too (I say most likely because there will be a small percentage of time when someone is actually genuinely trying to protect their friends from something/someone really unpleasant).
• does she actually have similar interests? People do end to navigate towards those they have stuff in common with, which is hard for folk with different interests than typical for that and (that was and still is me).
• it is true that people can invite who they like, sadly, but that doesn't make it less hard if you're routinely never invited.
• I can relate to the subtleness, definitely, 'been there, done that', 'still there, still doing that' to some extent.

I'm sorry it's brought back pain for you, you sound like a great mum though and I'm sure she's a very interesting and cool young lady too.

And that would have been an opportunity to teach your child that being considerate of how that might hurt the excluded child/ren. How absolutely batshit to pander to the whim of such a ridiculous reason

Thanks - yes, she’s a wonderful person but still suffers from the damage to her self-esteem from those times.

Not being invited isn't being excluded, because a party is never open to everyone.
Consider parent's attitudes may also feature in reasons not to invite a child, if numbers are limited.

I see you've not creally addressed the questions I posed regarding the other children, fair enough, but it's relevant.

Unless it's a class party open to everyone, some children are always going to be ''excluded''.

It’s quite normal, she had been to parties like that and it was even mentioned in an episode of Bluey, so not sure why you would get so angry at that. V weird.

Out of her class of 30 she does not play with every child, and has come home and told us she did not go to so and so’s party because they only were allowed to invite a few children. I would not expect her to get invited to every party, she has had class parties before, why would she or I invite children she does not play with?! Its not really exclusion when three quarters of the class are not invited (or less than half the girls).

6 friends because you’re 6 is a legitimate reason in my opinion- if you’re in a class of 30 that means 23 are not invited so no one is being left out.

My son is 8. He goes to some parties and some he doesn’t get invited to and that is fine. For his birthday he invites who he wants because it’s his day. If he invited 29/30 I would intervene but picking 6-8 friends is fine.

Maybe they don't HAVE to be strict on numbers, but they are anyway? Some people are weird like that. Do you know the dad? Could be he's a controlling scary guy who said "you can invite six friends max" and won't budge (just an example).

Nothing you can do, sadly; you can't try to manage / force kids' friendships.

Or maybe they want to be strict with numbers- considering it’s a party they’re hosting. They haven’t invited many children at all- most of the class are not going so they haven’t just excluded a couple.

My daughter had a 'numbers restricted' party and she is friends with a lot of boys in her class so some girls were 'left out' for that reason, especially as she wanted to invite children from her out of school activities too.
Best policy with parties is don't question it - there will always be a reason.

I mean they are inviting 6 children, 7 including their own child, possibly 8 if the birthday girl has a sibling or a cousin who will be joining in, is this just a “we have 8 dining chairs and they are doing an activity at the table” issue?!

I would tell dd its ok to be hurt.
Some people just aren't the friends they thought they are.

It’s a strong message to only invite 6 out of 8 children. Yes ok it is more understandable if it was 6 out of 30 but leaving 2 children out of a group of 8 is at best crass and at worst intentionally unkind

The exact same thing happened when my DD was in year 5. All the girls except mine and 1 other were invited. There was no "beef" between the girls. It was just incomprehensible at the time. I was furious on her behalf and never spoke to the parents again. I really wanted to ask them why they had done it but I didn't have the guts. I only started to move on with my feelings once they had all left primary school. I feel for you OP.

It's not a given that everybody gets invited. They may have had to limit numbers or the girls may not get on. Life isn't about fairness, even at school. Move on.

Sorry to hear.
My neighbour held a quite big party for her daughter who was turning 3. She is 1 month apart/prior to my son. We were hanging out lot, kids were friends since before they were 1. So we were meeting up, talking about the party, she was telling me about looking for a place, getting a bouncy castle... She didn't invite my son!!! I felt sad, but like a year prior, we bought her a gift and left it at her doors earlier in the morning on her birthday which was the same day as the party. Few hours later (they normally wake up late), she called me saying, sorry I wasn't sure how many children I can invite, but would XXX come to the party? (plus my husband and myself). I felt bad, cause everyone know that was a pity invite and I really wanted to decline, but both my son and me love her daughter and he was so excited, so I agreed. Regardless I never got rid of that pity feeling. So not being invited or being invited last minute - both of them are not nice.

If you're not wealthy... aspirational parents?

It stinks if so. They will get their comeuppance if the exclusion is due to social or wealth factors.

Sorry - to answer:

• it was indeed bullying and eventually I was called in by the class teacher who was concerned for her. She had observed the behaviour of the 2 very powerful girls who were leading things. The matter wasn’t satisfactorily resolved (my daughter flatly refused to change schools and was in denial about the situation). As a teacher I had many situations where children and parents came to me, upset about being excluded from parties. All very difficult and painful. In only one case I knew this to be because the boy was a very difficult character (clearly troubled and violent to the point of causing actual injury to other children and damage to property).
• No, she didn’t have similar interests by this stage (Year 5). The popular pair were becoming mini-teenagers (enjoying Saturday shopping trips, makeup and fashion) while my daughter was into animals and physical activity. But I didn’t think that was excuse enough to leave her out of parties when they’d been close until that point. They might have drifted apart day-to-day, but would it have killed them to invite her with the rest of the girls in the class?

I'll keep it short. 😬
First point - definitely sounds horrible.
Second point - I wouldn't force people with vastly different interests to include each other, though of course they shouldn't make fun either.

I’m not suggesting people should have to invite everyone, or people the don’t like. But a few simple rules would be tactful. If you’re inviting the whole class, or say, all the girls in a class , please don’t leave one or two out. If you want a smaller party with special friends, keep it small. - not 10, leaving out a very few.

Some might say there aren’t any rules, which of course there aren’t. It’s just that being a bit thoughtful might save some children being hurt. Parties when they’re older are much less contentious and older kids understand more - they’ll know why they haven’t been invited. But it’s a sad sight seeing younger children baffled and upset that everyone but them has got an invitation or is talking about a party they went to on the previous Sat!

It could be anything, firstly, I'm guessing it's more themed around girls' interest/activity. Could be some kind of event/activity in their area. Maybe those particular kids have known each other/been friends for longer, or their parents might be close with each other etc.

Just don't let it bother you - accept it, let anyone invite anyone. And I'd personally add: for God's sake don't try and raise the issue with their parents/the kids themselves, as it could easily grow into a conflict which goes on for God knows how long.