Been “Mean Girlsed”

[justilou1]

I’m climbing the hill towards 50 and it hurts as much as it did when I was a teenager - maybe more because this time it also includes my youngest daughter as well! I’ve known this woman for about 20 years. She’s oldest child’s godmother. I’ve had the worst few years of my life, and I wouldn’t normally describe myself as being a needy sort, but this year I’ve not been pretending everything’s fucking fabulous either. She knows what I’ve been going through, and I’ve been removed from the group message thing for coffee mornings. (I’m a bit of an introvert - haven’t done anything outrageous) My younger daughter has been excluded from social activities that she would have been previously included in (and will be devastated when she finds out when school goes back.) She’s the sort who’s on every committee at school and is the first to make a lasagna for a “family in need” for the church or the school, but when a friend is going through shit, you don’t see her for dust. My own daughters have mentioned that there is a fair bit of competitive parenting happening from her side. I’m only just seeing this now.... We have other mutual friends, so at some stage I will have to see her. (In fact I blew her off today because she wanted to drop something in for DD1’s Bday, but I might have said something regrettable today...) Advice please.... do I say something or not?

Some people are just useless when things are not plain sailing while others come into their own in a crisis. But are you saying there's a group involved in your exclusion, or just this one person.

If just one, I think in your shoes I would mentally move her into the file marked 'acquaintance' but not specifically discuss with her. I would say that I seemed to have been inadvertently removed from the coffee morning group chat (if I enjoyed coffee mornings with the group) and instruct that I be added again. Matter-of-factly. If more than one, it's likely that others are feeling uncomfortable, so I might seek to speak to the one you feel most kindly disposed towards.

But it's important to keep a sense of perspective, for you and for your younger daughter too. If she has plenty of other fun stuff going on, then there's no need for her to be devastated.

It’s more about the fallout when school goes back and she realizes what she’s missed. Having spoken to my older (and more socially astute) daughter, I think there is more at play here.... I think it’s best that I stay away and keep her at arm’s length. Have been hearing about how she likes to speak about people and I don’t want to be further fodder. She can go to hell.

God I hate this!
Poor you! It's always the ones baking for the 5000 who are proper bitches. I've been mean girlsed so many times since having a kid I've lost count. Before I had a kid I was either friends with people or I wasn't. But these last few years....Why do women always leave other women out of things? Suddenly you're dropped, not invited, not included And there's never a reason. My advice - just name it, calmly and in a friendly as possible manner just say what happened. 'I notice I've been removed from the group.' Then they can't kid themselves.
I think 'mean girls'/middle aged women tend to go for the ones who are least likely to say something. Then they can build a myth around it, like the other person (who they dropped!) being off-ish or something.
Also I think this woman sounds possibly narc, she obviously just doesn't have much emotional capacity and doesn't want to acknowledge that so you get dropped.
Sorry and best of luck with it all!

The other part of that is that she’s trying to “play nice” while it’s school holidays and drop in a present for her god daughter (minimum effort/duty done/box ticked/apprearances kept, etc). I live near her parents, so it would be “Can’t stay...”. I don’t want to make it that easy for her.