Excluded from bday party - aibu to text the parent?

[RealReginaPhalange]

Reception. Its Feb so kids know each other well enough. Bday party tomorrow, idk how many not invited and how many invited but my son has been excluded. They do play together at school but i dont know the mum. They had chats today about party tmrw, my DS feels he is invited and he is fully aware of the party. Apparently invitations went out by whatsapp directly. I am on whatsapp group so it is not an error. Fine not to invite everyone but in reception? They dont have own little circles of friends yet. Invite everyone or no one at that age. And then talks at school and some kids end up upset. I am so so angry now and will need to have a chat with ds. should i text the mom it is hurtful or should i leave it?

just to add. I dont really know parents there and not sure if she is well known, i am worried i will be a gossip no 1 afterward and it would lead to my ds being excluded more.

aibu - dont text
not aibu - text

it sounds like there is no exclusion. We had this when my daughter had a party. One girl (year 3) wasn’t being nice to her and out of a class of 20 dd invited 8 of her choice the one not included, I wouldn’t have thought anything of it with those numbers. Then the question was asked on WhatsApp to all parents, even though this mum must have known exactly whose party it was. She said her daughter was most upset, and after trying to be discreet all along, I had to say yes it’s my dd party but we couldn’t afford whole class. We would be sending in sweets, sorry she’s upset. Had no reply. I was quite annoyed because there had never been an invite for my daughter and any party that she had with my dd I’d say not to worry about invites. It’s a learning curve, parties are expensive and we can’t be invited to everything 🤷🏻‍♀️ She’d accept it and carry on playing. I have to say the following year I asked dd who she wanted and regardless of how this girl has been to her (and my insides screaming please don’t invite her) she put her on the list, so invited she was. She came to the party, with her mum and sat far away from us having a coffee, then lunch. Joined in activities then left.

It doesn't matter if it was a small party or the whole class was invited except for your DS.

Not everyone can go to every party. Don't message this mum, just move on and don't sweat it. Your son will be invited to plenty of other parties

Just make some fun plans to do with your sun instead. Also, you could try sending a friendly message like "Hi, your son mentioned his bday party to my son, who thinks he might be invited. I just wanted to check in case we accidently missed the invite or my son might have misunderstood? " This way you make it like no big deal if not invited, but opens the door if the mom might want to extend an invite. Or maybe she ment to but forgot etc. Any case, if your ds was left out then of course no need to invite the other dc.

Just reflect on what you are saying.
The child who's birthday it is shouldn't get to have a party unless he/she invites the whole class, so that other children don't feel excluded.
You're setting your son up for lack of resilience here.
We don't get invited to everything. It can be disappointing but it's life.
Put your energy into teaching your child how to handle disappointment, rather than planning to be spiteful.

Sometimes we had whole class parties, but we couldn't afford it usually and our house is too small to host it.

We did outdoor in the park sometimes but it's winter so not always doable.

Other times they picked 2 friends each to go to a more expensive place or something.

Other times 5/6 people to the house.

We don't go to every party we're invited to
We're not invited to every party

I hate this tit for tat shit. Have a party if you want don't if you don't.

It's different if it's the whole class EXCEPT one child.

That is excluding

But then....we had a classmate who was very rough and aggressive, and physically hurts other kids, and because of his behaviour couldn't have a whole class party at all as kids very understandably did not want him there.

Don't text. My little one is in preschool and we would never invite the whole class to a party. With our other family friends and cousins etc it just wouldn't be feasible so we pick the people she plays with the most and talks about at home, sometimes that overlaps with children that she has been on playdates with or parents I already know. We will do the same at reception and through primary school. 30 kids at a party is just too many!

I wouldn’t text but you haven’t been clear - has all the class been invited barring your son (in which case I do think you ought to politely try and find out why somehow for your son’s sake) or has maybe 10 people been invited?

i was on the receiving end of an angry mum text. We invited ‘just the friendship group’ to a cinema party then back to ours for a sleepover. I was told by my dear eldest that one of the kids ‘will do the party part but won’t do sleepovers due to nightmares’. Fine.
Come the day, this one kid who admittedly did get picked up in the early hours from other sleepovers, claims to have been left out. I was very ‘of course you’re invited, I’ll get you a duvet’ but the mother was LIVID to be excluded.

I wasn't aware that whole class parties are even a thing? They must cost an absolute fortune.

Think of it as a blessing. Honestly you will get to a point where you won't want him invited when the invites are coming left, right and centre! I wouldn't overthink it. I haven't done a party for my youngest and I don't think anyone is keeping a tally of who does what.

I have a 6 year old and 13 year old so been to many many parties. Usually around 15 kids invited, have never known a whole class to be invited. Parents ask their kids who they play with most and invite those kids

On P2, the OP conceded that (from what she could work out) around 1/5 of the class (of 22) has been invited.

Her ds hasn't "been excluded" at all. He just wasn't one of the 4 children who have been invited to celebrate this particular child's birthday with him this time.

So you are “discouraging” a current friendship because you know a child is moving even though your child has few friends currently, but are angry that your child hasn’t been invited to a party for a child who, by your own admission you know nothing about!

You clearly need to help your child to develop some social skills, but it might help if you develop your own first.

I would try talk to the mom for a casual chat, like at the school gates. You could say something like 'oh, I hear it's x birthday. Happy birthday to him'. Are ye going the play centre route or are being brave and having it at home. It'll start a chat about it anyway. If you get the sense she's being guarded, id just leave it and tell her you're going away at the weekend or something. You could try talk to another parent too, to try get a sense of how many is invited and how the invitation was worded. It could have been an accident too

OP, this won't be the last time it happens, so its well worth getting into the habit of saying that no one gets invited to everything, everytime.

It helps them get used to this a reality.

Exactly, and besides it doesn't even matter if DS was the only child in the class NOT invited, the party invitations are up to the birthday boy and his parents. Sometimes it does work out that way

I once invited the whole reception class to DD3's party when she was 5 except for one boy who was, quite frankly, a little shit
DD wanted the whole class to come to her party but didn't like him, so that's what we did. The boy's mother gave me the stinkeye in the playground for the rest of the year but she was rough as nails anyway I had no intention of ever making friends with her

Glad you came to the decision to not say anything because you would have looked like an absolute idiot and probably loose your son future invites if word got out.

OP, you need to grasp the concept of not being included vs actively excluded and your life will be so much calmer as your child goes through school.

Under no circumstances should you contact the mum!! It will come across as needy and weird.

He hasn't been excluded, he's just not been invited!

This is all just part of the normal tyranny of being the parent of a primary school child.

Just as bad is sending out a load of invites and hearing nothing back from most of them until the last minute, wondering all the while if they are going to just turn up on the day or should you chase them or what.

Just tell your child that not everyone can go to every party, when his turn comes he won't be inviting the whole class, say you'll do something nice yourselves on the day in question and think no more about it.

Mine is now in year 1 and we won’t be doing a whole class party this year and we didn’t last year either.
Last year the activity he wanted to do for his birthday was capped to 16 children including the birthday boy by the company doing it.
I privately whatsapped the other parents and purposely didn’t do paper invites because then no one would really know who was going or been left out.
I also didn’t tell my child who I had invited, just that I had invited some of his friends.
This year he has pretty much stuck with the same friends despite the classes being muddled, this year the activity he wants to do is for 20 children, i will again send out private messages to all the parents I can through a private message and not have paper invites so it’s not obvious, this seems to be the norm for most of the parties we’ve been to since starting school, no one seem to do whole class ones anymore.
You can’t message the other parent but in your shoes I would make sure I did something extra fun tomorrow.

You’re being really weird about this!

I had a whole class party for our 5 year old in a local hall. All the kids plus a few from other years were invited.

Tomorrow she’s off to a party for 10 kids at a trampoline park which would be far more expensive than mine.

In between there’s probably been 4 or 5 parties. Some she was invited to, some she wasn’t.

They absolutely do have their friend preferences at this age!

Everyone or no one? Yeah you need to cool it with being the party police (and I mean this kindly) or primary school will be tougher for you as a parent than it needs to be! You don’t get to dictate that the kids of people who can’t afford whole class don’t get a party!!

• not all kids get on
• not all kids go to every party
• this isn’t about you

You've done well to come on here - it’s fine to feel it’s a slight but it’s most likely NOT personal and to send a text would be absolute social suicide.

Whole class parties are not always the done thing. Never happened in my kids school. You have absolutely no idea how many others aren't invited so would look very foolish messaging demanding an invite if only 5-8 friends have been invited.
I work in KS1 and often have the task of handing out invites. No one this year has handed out any to the whole class, most have been 8 children across two classes.
You might want to do a whole class party which is entirely up to you, but you can't expect everyone else to also do this.

Unless it’s a whole class party or every boy in the class party then you’ve got no business texting the mum. She can invite who she wants.

So kids who have hard up parents shouldn’t have parties as they can’t afford all the kids. Ooooook.

Do not text the parent. Maybe they can’t afford a whole class/year party, they are expensive! My youngest is in year 2 now and was upset not to be invited to the party of a kid in the other class as in year R and 1 it was mainly full year group parties. We still invited that kid to my kid’s party. Everyone’s circumstances are different. Just do what is right for you and your family when it comes to arranging your own child’s party, without keeping a score of who did and didn’t invite them. Rise above and be kind. It will come back to you.