AIBU??? WhatsApp chat drama!

[PuffPastry84]

Right, apologies in advance because this is going to be long but I need some perspective because my head is spinning and I genuinely can't work out whether I'm being unreasonable and overly sensitive. With school tomorrow I can't even begin to describe how nervous I feel.

DS is in year 3 and I get on fine with most of the mums. In our playground we have the four mums who are always front and centre of organising things. The leader of them is a nice enough lady but she does have a mean streak in her which occasionally comes out.

Last week there was a Mum's Night Out planned for the Friday night. It was meant to be tapas followed by drinks. It had been mentioned in the playground that week but I wasn't really interested. Nothing came of it on the class group chat, so I assumed it was just an idea in passing. However it happened but it seems only a select chosen few went. It's not my business and adults can choose who to socialise with, but if anything it would have been the four main mums but it turned out to be a group of 12. So, it was hardly an intimate gathering amongst friends. The morning after the night out I went into the group chat to double-check something, and I saw a load of messages saying "hope everyone got home okay last night!" and loads of photos of those who went. I put a comment saying "looks like a great night!" but then my friend (whose DS is in the same class as mine) says "nice that you included everyone". That message got ignored but apparently at football practice this morning two of the dads were laughing about "group chat soap operas" which means that the situation has escalated somewhat.

Has anyone else had a situation like this? I'm dreading the playground tomorrow because obviously my friend has made that comment which has started all of this.

My oldest dcs year had a group of parents like this. Initially they were quite a nice bunch of mums but over time got super clique and bitchy. They slowly started excluding other mums or other mums started backing away and pulling their kids away.

The nights out they used to invite the rest of the mums to just became smaller and smaller numbers then exclusively them. They would sit and bitch about everyone else kids.

They ended up a fairly isolated group and causing mayhem by the last primary years as they thought they were queen bees. There antics did leave the rest of us laughing at them or rolling our eyes a lot.

Yes it is drama or will be soon. I highly suggest you step back from it. Mum clique groups are more hassle than they are worth.

You are majorly overthinking this. People went out and you weren't interested. You said looks like a great night (that's fine).

The other mum making a passive aggressive comment is nothing to do with you.

Just forget about it.

Ahh got it yeah 😂. I mean that’s not very nice but hopefully friend doesn’t see this thread.

Haha got you now 😂

It's amazing that parents for decades survived without these chats. My kids are year 2&3 and I have never joined one. Study bugs has the info for non uniform days lost uniform etc. anything else I do not need to know or care about. If it isn't directly from the school I do not care. You're saying it's only so you don't miss things but then you're crying about the fact this might impact your child's school leaver thing in a few years. Get a grip

You are overthinking this. You have a friend, that's enough. Under no circumstances put anything further on group chat throwing your mate under the bus. Next time the group post something that you have not been invited to, don't comment.
It won't take too long before they start falling out with each other.

It sounds like a fuss over nothing. Ignore it.

Then read and don't comment.

Sounds like the exact bunch of mums that I knew... and oddly enough a couple of them have since turned on each other 🤦🏻‍♀️

O mate, my daughters school was a clicky nightmare, so glad its over! Literally felt like a weight lifted off my shoulders when she left

Are you sure she's your friend? Cause of hate to see how you speak about people you don't like in this cAse.

Pandering to others at the expense of a 'friend'. Awful behaviour.

PLEASE tell us more...!

You don’t want them thinking you're a bitch by being a bitch to your friend? Strange.

Oh no don't do this op!

@PuffPastry84 you’re definitely over worrying and overthinking. just ignore it.
DEFINITELY dont throw your friend under the bus.
just move on, ignore all, smile and wave 😂

Reading this thread as a mum with a 4 year old thinking is this what’s to come as he starts primary school 🫠🫠 he’s in school nursery atm and already had class WhatsApp messages about a collection for the teachers for Christmas presents, that was a flat out no from me 😂 ohhhhh the joys.

I can't say much as it would be outing.
But it involved secret filming of parent teacher meetings, slander and malicious communications, a huge playground row, someone getting banned from the school grounds, all parents banned from bringing devices onto school property, deletion of facebook page and ban on class whatsapp groups.
I wasn't involved btw, but it certainly made me wary of the whatsapp groups!! They can be vicious!!

So you want to undermine your friend publicly in order to stay in with the mean girls even though you are not in their inner circle. Got it.

Everything, even the smallest non event is a bloody drama on here now.
Life for so many peeps is described as stressful but take a lot of the trival shite out of it and life would be a lot better for so many.
Even the thread title Whatsapp drama! is making a bigger thing out of nothing, how do some people cope with life on top of kids, work relationships if they think this stuff is important?

Just returned from school drop off, everything seemed relatively normal but will keep everyone updated

I say this kindly, but the situation sounds like teenage drama. This isn’t how adults behave, and from what you’ve written, it doesn’t seem like your friend actually did anything wrong. If anything, it was a bit immature of those women to exclude others in the first place.

I get that you’re worried about your child not being invited to things, but calling out your friend over this is unnecessary and if she was that good a friend you wouldn’t. If you stay neutral, you and your child shouldn’t have a problem. The whole thing just feels far more dramatic than it needs to be.

sounds like your friend wanted to go to the event but wasn’t included. Good for her for speaking up, maybe have her back than be worried about what the others think

Just to give another perspective.....I was one of the mum organisers in my youngest DS's year. I was never aware of any drama and it just happened a group of 4 of us knew each already, had an older child at school so knew the drill around sports days & christmas fair etc plus were all very sociable and either not working or working PT so had the time to sort stuff.

In the example you gave,, very common would be one of us suggesting a mums night and asking the few people we happen to see that day. If there was interest, we'd put a shout out on the Whatsapp group to catch those that didn't do the school run and then organise something and run a 2nd chat to save 40+people getting updates about an event they're not involved in. If anyone else wanted to join I would assume they'd either turn up or ask about it. In a class of 30 kids with lots of parents and all of us having a million WA groups yes some might miss it or we accidently miss someone but I certainly wouldn't be chasing or double checking - if you want to join something speak up. Obviously if you don't know about it then worth saying but why not be grown up about it and say I didn't know about this one but would love to come next time so please keep me in the loop rather assuming there is some conspiracy or power trip going on.

I realise some playgroups do have some nasty people trying to lord it up but whenever I se these type of posts I do wonder whether it's just people assuming the group of friends who are sociable and organise shit are actually just that - sociable and happy to organise shit and would welcome more offers to help or a request to join a night out - more the merrier in both situations IMO

They genuinely won’t be giving this any energy

It's normal because most will have seen it for what is is...absolutely nothing. The majority have far more important things to think about than a few tame WhatsApp messages; it wasn't even an argument.
I'm a massive over thinker, so I do get your worry and imagining that the worst will happen, but this is such a non event. You are not even involved.