I (32) am a single mom to my dear son, 14 years old.
Background: We moved to a new town (230 miles away) because of my job's demands. Life has been very difficult, but we managed. We have been living here for 1.5 years now. More than a year ago, we found this church. My son and I are happy to find a community, though we miss our old church dearly.
But we love this new church. People have been kind, always praying for us etc.
My son has been very active, playing the guitar for the music team and would always show up at every practice even for when he is not playing (he plays once a month). We also attend every Sunday.
Our friends Friend A and Friend B, (I don't know now if I can still call them that) from church who are in their 50s invited us to their child's 9th birthday party. My car is at the garage and they know it. I would think they'd offer a lift because they offered everyone else and there is a lot of room in their cars, but they told me and my son to walk and even said "it's not that far" when it's a 40 minute walk away (it's a small town with no taxi, no Uber and there's no bus going there because it's in a very secluded area, so it is only accessed by driving).
Now, they expect us to be at the party at 1PM and we all know how hot it has been. And they expect us to walk in the scorching heat for 40 minutes?
So I said, okay, we will just walk, and we did!
We survived, we managed and we made it, even while carrying the gift for their child.
At the party, everyone was already there, everyone from church. I was already in a bad mood because I felt upset about what happened.
Now, I did not have any energy to say hi to people. And I noticed how only a few acknowledged me and my son's presence. A lot of them who would normally say hi, ignored us. They walked past me. Then it hit me. That I was always the one going out of my way to say hello to everyone. But when it's my turn, people treated us like we're invisible.
Of course my son did not notice, but I was hurting inside.
Then I realized something.
We have been going to this church for a year now and the youth there (there's around eleven kids age 14-24) have never spoken a single word to me.
One time I walked past one of them, his name is E. He is the son of a good friend of mine there.
I said, "Hi E." He just ignored me.
He is 17 years old.
I said, "Oh maybe he's just shy." Etc but it's been a year now. I don't mean no harm by being at least civil.
This happens all the time. For example, every Friday whenever we have Bible study, this is the scenario, I would be sitting on the couch with the other moms (ages 40+, I am the youngest) and the kids (age 14-24) would walk in, greet all the other moms and ALWAYS skip me, not talk to me, no eye contact like I didn't exist. And this has been going on for a year.
When I got home I actually cried. I just realized how little I mattered to these people when I saw them as family. It's not like I am requiring them to acknowledge me. Maybe even just a civil because I am tired of every interaction being awkward.
I asked my son about it and he said he does not mind, he says he likes hanging out more with the adults anyway.
But I did not reveal to him how I felt.
I am just glad he does not take it to heart because I do.