Dear Dáithí: My daughter has been snubbed for two of her friends' birthday parties... what do I do? 

'Just because you invite people to your party doesn't mean it's an automatic return invite, and that in itself is a life lesson'. Picture: iStock

Dear Dáithí,

My daughter is in primary school and is celebrating her birthday over the summer. She’s into sport and the outdoors, and we booked a party for her at an adventure centre for over the school break.

She brought the invites into school before they finished up, inviting 10 kids in the class. Almost all the parents have confirmed their children can make it.

In recent days, I found out that two of these children will also be celebrating birthdays over the summer months and are having parties for their friends. The only thing is that my daughter hasn’t been invited to either of these. One of these parties is being held in the child’s family home and another at a centre with inflatables.

I know people have limits on how many guests they can afford to invite to a party or how many they can accommodate in their homes. It is something we factor in ourselves when planning parties. But I feel a bit put out that the parents of these children would agree for their daughters to attend my daughter’s party but not invite her back. I actually think it’s very rude.

My daughter is gutted that these girls haven’t invited her to their parties when they are coming to hers (it was a mutual friend going to all three parties who told her about the other celebrations).

I thought about texting the mums involved, in case there was a misunderstanding, but I’m not sure that’s the right approach.

Is there anything we can do or do we just try to get past it?

In the grand scheme of things and with all the bad stuff that’s happening in the world today, this is a very small issue but any parent who this has happened to will know that it can be the worst feeling in the world.

All we want as parents is that our child and children are part of the gang. This was one thing we thankfully passed on to the young fella, and I saw it happen in front of me one day when he invited a boy who wasn’t part of the group to join them. This was possibly my proudest moment as a dad, and I’ve had a few.

But the kind of thing you write about here happens, and it can be very hard as a parent not to jump in and sort out all of our children’s problems because that is the way we are all wired. The question is, are you doing damage if you do?

Resilience is probably the most important thing we can pass on to our children, and you really can’t just pass it on; it comes in what they see and how they see us reacting to situations, and being in situations themselves — and the advice and outlook you have as a parent is key to this.

For example, if this is a big deal for you, then it will be a big and often bigger deal for them, so we need to be careful.

This issue would often come up during the school year back in the day but it wasn’t really a problem during the summer as there were no WhatsApp groups to contact people, or smartphones for that matter. We only got a phone when I was in secondary school and, to be honest, we never hung with our school friends during the summer, and summer birthday parties were non-existent — or maybe that was just us.

I always felt bad for those who had a birthday during the holidays as they never got a ‘happy birthday’ from the whole class and all of that.

I always say in any of these situations that you can only control what is yours and nothing outside that.

What you can control here is your daughter’s birthday party, which sounds like it will be a great day out.

You should first of all concentrate on making that the best day you can, and let those people that didn’t invite your daughter see that she and the party are great fun, and don’t let the fact she is not invited to one or two parties take away from that.

The likelihood here is that it is not a mistake and sometimes it’s just down to who is getting on better in a group or class at the time and, as you know, this changes on a weekly basis.

I think you should explain this to your child by saying something like: “Do you know the way you, Sarah, Mary, and Jane have a different vibe when you’re together? Well, that’s what’s after happening here.” It’s not a big deal.

I always find once there is a valid answer to these things, the children just move on and it’s the parents that can’t shake it.

You definitely shouldn’t lie about this and tell your child not getting an invitation was a mistake or that you told the other parents that you all would be away on holiday, or something crazy like that. The truth will get back to her and then you’ll have a worse problem.

You can’t also call up one of the parents and ask why your daughter is not invited — that just brings its own crap and, again, will get back to your daughter.

You should find out if there are others in the class not going. I’d imagine that there might be a few and you can use this to say to your child: “Look, not everyone is going.”

Also, just because you invite people to your party doesn’t mean it’s an automatic return invite, and that in itself is a life lesson.

There has to be a ‘this is just life’ part in all of this episode. I know your daughter is young but it will benefit her in the long run.

Back to one thing you said, that there is a rudeness in all of this, and I’m totally with you. The other parents should have been all over this and known this would cause problems as all children speak to each other about these things. This can be a big deal to them but some people just don’t care once their own ‘prince’ or ‘princess’ are in the gang.

So concentrate on what you can make great about your daughter’s upcoming party and enjoy that day. Your daughter will get over this before you know it and you’ll have to move on from it too. I know it can be easier said than done but you must.