To feel disappointed DS was left out at his nan’s b’day party by his cousin?

[BoldMaker73]

We went to a family gathering today at my brother’s/SIL’s house for my mum’s 80th birthday with mostly older relatives (50+) and a handful of children there too, his cousin, 11, and his neighbours (about 10-13ish). We were outside on the lawn at first then most of us came inside as it got a bit chilly but the children were outside playing games and running around together.

My DS, 19, is an only child and ended up sitting on his own or next to me for most of the afternoon. The children were all playing together outside and didn’t really include him or ask him to join in, and he didn’t want to force himself into their space either, so he just stayed sitting alone. My mum and dad as well as DH and his parents were mixing with the family friends and distant relatives so he couldn’t even speak to his grandparents that much.

I know he’s technically an adult, but he’s a lot closer in age to them than to us in our 50s-80s and I felt a sad for him as when I asked him about it he said he felt rejected and excluded by his cousin considering last summer when it was my brother’s 50th, his cousin and these neighbourhood friends invited him to play with them in the garden and on the green behind their house and he was excluded today.

AIBU for feeling slightly disappointed with my nephew for ignoring DS at this event or is it just one of those things? I remember being that girl picked last in PE every time so I know how it feels to feel rejected.

I was brought up by my parents and grandfather I've always loved old people they have amazing stories are funny, kind often brutally blunt. the fact that a 19 year old can't find any common ground with adults of any age means as a parent you're failing. The fact that you think it's impossible for a 19 year old to find common ground with someone in their 50s is very sad.

Neither of my 19-year-olds who by the way are now in their 40s would've been at all bothered about spending a party like that they would have played with the kids or they would have sat and chatted to the adults, adults who would have asked them lots of questions about what they were doing whether they're going what they wanted. They would have discussed their hopes and dreams theur achievements and they would have asked questions.

Your job is a parent is to teach children to grow, and to teach teenagers to cope with adult hood a 19 year old who's parent is upset that an 11 year old doesn't involve them and who thinks it's impossible for them to talk to older grown ups is failing that poor boy.

Yes I do agree with that side if it. I said it's not for the kids to 'include' him. I just don't think that necessarily makes him a Michael Jackson like figure like some have suggested! In fact thinking about it, if he's picked up that some people may have suspicions about adults that play with kids, that would probably make it more difficult for him to be the one who approached them to play rather than waiting for them to come home him.

And plenty of 40 year olds find that kind of social situation (ie a family members party where you neither know nor have much in common with half the guests) hard or socially awkward, so not sure why a 19 year old has such high expectations from Mumsnet.

If a 19 year old man can’t sit and make conversation with other adults for a few hours at a family gathering, something has gone very wrong somewhere.

YABU - you can’t expect an 11 year old child to invite a 19 year old man to play their game! Extremely odd take on this situation

I was the one who made the Michael Jackson comparison. I didn't say there was anything untowards just a grown man, waiting to be asked to be play with a group of 10-13 year olds and then feeling rejected when they don't ask you is far beyond the realms of normal. And yes there's nothing wrong with playing with younger children or enjoying their company but it's a world away from seeing them as your peers.

And yes we'll go through life with social awkward situations. But that's life. However at 19, if the answer to this is to stayed glued to your mum like a limpet all night, upset at not being asked to play hide and seek with the young kids and have no ability whatsoever to even have small talk or conversations with people older than you than there's something gone very wrong (additional needs aside).

My grandsons had part time jobs from the age of 16 and have had to interact with adults of all ages. It is a skill that has to be acquired from early teens if not before. We don't have a large extended family but they have been able to talk to older relatives for a long time.

I also made a comparison with Michael Jackson but said it didn't necessarily mean he was a danger to children just that it might sound like it.

I agree ops son needs to work on things. The fact that he isn't working or studying also indicates that. And op isn't doing him any favours.

But I do think talking to adults in a workplace, where you naturally have a starting point and purpose for conversation, is very different from socially. And you mention older relatives, but as far as I can tell from op he'd have been fine talking to the relatives, it all the neighbours and friends that were an issue. The relatives were busy with them. And it's especially tricky making small talk when you don't have much going on at the moment, as they are bound to ask him about jobs/ study/ career plans and that's probably a sensitive issue at the moment, hence his mention of them being nosey. I guess I just identify with feeling socially awkward more than some on here do! And I always had part time jobs etc successfully. Didn't mean I knew what to say to people I'd never met at parties! Totally different situation.

I don’t agree with you. Our role as parents is to teach our children to talk to people they don’t know and to make polite conversation. I would be mortified if my kids couldn’t do that. O

I'm not also buying this argument that somehow a 19 year old is not able to make conversation with someone 30 or 50 years older than than them purely because it's an awkward social situation.

Life is going to be full of meeting people you don't know, are different ages to you or have nothing in common with. Part of being a parent is to help your child build good social skills to equip them with this. Your average 19 year old would have not spent the last 19 years locked up inside with no social contact. Certainly by 19, I had older relatives, my parents friends, friends parents and family members, neighbours, teachers, lecturers and people from college and uni, people from my work and people I met in the pub etc that I'd met and talked to and I would say even now this is a fairly typical situation.

There's something quite amiss if we're now saying that at 19, they shouldn't have the skills to make small talk with older people whatever the situation and need to spend a whole family gathering glued to their mums side.

I do think that in any social situation where there is a mix of well integrated people and obvious outsiders it's nice if some of the integrated people reach out and take the lead with the outsiders socially. I think that the OPs son was wrong to feel hard done by the 11 year old but this was still an awkward situation for him and I don't think I'd have done much better as a 19 year old.

It's tricky when you're at a low point in life without a job, study, peers etc. because it makes it even harder to do social small talk. It's why I'm always cynical when people like this get told to "put yourself out there" because "out there" is a miserable experience when you have nothing to say. I think you just get lonelier until you can build a life for yourself but then that's even harder when you're socially isolated.

@Simplelobsterhat the difference is your dd presumably doesn’t just say by your side and get upset when her 11 yr old cousin doesn’t come to ask her to play. Nothing wrong with playing with younger cousins but a 16 or 18 yr old isn’t a peer they’ll naturally organise things - do you fancy playing a game and have boundaries eg your dd wouldn’t talk to them like a peer telling them age inappropriate things.
I’d expect a 19 year old to be able to hold a conversation with adults of any age. They will be expected to at work, volunteering or networking events (from yr1 age 18 uni students will attend employment and careers events)
I suspect the ds finds it hard as he’s never practiced and has very limited opportunities as he’s stuck in his bedroom most of time.
He probably does find the small talk discomforting but he should. He doesn’t need to be at uni but being asked what are you up to these days is a normal conversation opener. If he can’t think of anything to say as he’s doing nothing then that’s the crux of the issue.

But you're never going to build a life for yourself or have anything to say or meet people if you don't put yourself "out there".

I can empathise with social anxiety but I'm not sure I agree the best treatment for it is to stay at home, by yourself and not interacting with anyone and making yourself even more isolated and lonely. The only way to overcome this is to actually get out there, in unfamiliar situations and to start speaking to people. Yes it's daunting and yes for some people it needs small steps. But what's the alternative. To just never socialise?

I don’t think expectations of a 19 yo are too much - he’s old enough to vote, to drink, to have a life of his own - he’s a grown ass man

You expect an 11 year old child, presumably in your 6 at primary school, to be responsible for "including" a 19 year old?

Unless your son, a grown man, has significant learning difficulties, he should be able to speak to other adults no matter what the age gap.

How on earth was a primary school kid excluding an adult?

How is it his role to entertain your son and not on you to make your young man more comfortable by including him in conversations?

He's an adult, he cant expect others to decide who he should be with. Yabu

You don’t suddenly develop social skills though. You learn by practice. A family party is a good safe space to start.
You develop strategies eg small talk about football, holidays or local events.
Strategies like helping eg he could have gone and checked if any of the 80 yr old guests wanted a drink or some food bring over - smile, would you like a drink it’s no trouble.
Yes adults do ask yp what up to, he can say I’ve just finished college course in x and am volunteering but I’m looking for a job.

I can’t believe I’m reading this. A 19 year old is an adult man. I find it very odd that he says he prefers children.

OP I’m interested as to whether you and your partner were socialising/integrating with the other guests at the party, or if you were all just sat alone as a threesome?

For me when I kept trying to "put myself out there" it just got worse and worse rather than better. In fact it wasn't until my DP and I were able to club together and afford to move out and live somewhere different that I was able to hack this sort of socialising. I think that people can treat those with a "basement dweller" life very differently.

I think that the best thing OPs son can do is lean into the volunteering and job hunting so he has got more of an identity. This will make it easier to socialise.

I'm not very good at small talk at parties either although I've managed perfectly well in the workplace etc. but the OP's son apparently cant be left at home because he'd have nothing to do and expected children to involve him in their play. This is really not normal. Getting a job would get him out of his comfort zone and make him have to talk to people. It's a bit late now but he needs to start somewhere or he'll end up a recluse who wants to play with children and people will think the worst of him (I'm not suggesting he is doing anything wrong btw).

This.

Like any skill, it is something you should have developed over time, and part of our job as parents is to facilitate and encourage those skills to develop. This man hasn't suddenly appeared as a 19 year old, he should have been developing these skills over the last 8 years or so (at least).

However, are people really surprised at a 19yo not having much in common with the adults at an 80th birthday? I work with, and have, teenagers, and think loads of 19 year old would struggle to talk to the guests outside their immediate family. Especially as he presumably doesn't know most of them (and it sounds like the close family guests were busy hosting the other guests).

I think it is pretty likely that a good number of them would have been family - Aunts, Uncles, maybe other cousins, that he will have known for 19 years, a lot longer than he has known his 11 yr old cousin. But, quite frankly, even if they were all strangers, he should have developed the skills of being able to make light chit chat long before this.
Significant SEN aside, I would be embarrassed if my young adults couldn't hold conversations with people they didn't know for a couple of hours. I would feel I'd failed in my parenting.

I agree. There's seems to be a lot of emphasis on him being 19 and it being a socially awkward situation. But if it's a family party then surely he's around people that he knows and at 19 has met on more than one occasion.

And part of life is experiencing socially awkward situations and I get some people struggle more than others. But do people really just sit at family parties with people they have met more than once and not say anything? Just sit mute in a corner, on your own or glued to your parent. You can still find situations awkward and still attempt small talk. It isn't an all or nothing situation.

He hasn't just emerged as a 19 year old. I struggle to believe he hasn't had some practice over the 19 years at having conversations with people his own age, far less family members.

I totally agree with this. My 14 year old DGD sometimes has sleep over at my house, 4 or 5 girls.

It is so noticeable the girls that happily say Hello to me and my DH when they arrive. Can have conversations when we do all sit together for a meal and are just relaxed around adults that are not their parents. We are hands off during these sleepovers but there is obvious interaction.
When some of them leave they are polite and say thank you.

Some of them on the other hand, it’s eyes down, they don’t say hello or bye and seem quite uncomfortable just walking past us.

I do get that teenagers can be like this but we do need to teach them social skills. The fact that we all don’t for a wide range of reasons is why this thread is even a thing.

It’s fine to not socialise if that is the choice you make.

It isn’t fine to feel hurt because a primary age child won’t include an adult in their playing.

Also apparently he said children are less judgemental - maybe very small ones but by 10/11 they judge plenty!