Mum Blamed for Being Too Harsh for Turning Away Uninvited Child From Birthday Party

When planning a kid’s birthday party it’s always hard to get a clear idea of how many kids are coming. Especially when not everyone bothers to RSVP. One mum took matters into her own hands recently and turned away a child who hadn’t been invited to her kid’s birthday party. Now she’s wondering if she took things too far. What do you think?

The mother wrote in to discussion forum Reddit to ask if she was at fault for saying no to the extra child joining her child’s birthday party.

It’s not the kid’s fault indeed! She then went on to explain in a lengthy post that the reason she had to say no to the child was because the party was being held at an arts and craft venue. Because of this, she’d already paid for the amount of kids she knew were coming so that they all received their own individual craft packs. If any other children showed up unannounced they would have no materials to use.

Read her post below and decide for yourself:

I’ve made no secret about my distaste for such behaviour when in the parent circle at parties. It’s an overall miserable situation for the sibling with no friend and usually out of their age group, and the hosting parent is left to try include an budgeted for kid.

Any emergency would at least come with an explanation and those parents I’m far more understanding towards. It’s the parent who has no regard for arrangements that gets to me.

Now for my daughter (10) we decided to keep things very small and private due to covid. We thought to take the kids to a craft party where each child gets a pre chosen crafting pack to work with for the event. This worked out as the kids could have fun while social distancing. This event is a per child prepaid event so any extra children would be unpaid for and would not have their own crafting kit. This fact was heavily emphasised to the parents and not a word of discontent was uttered.

Inevitably on the day parent A wants to drop of child A who was invited as well as child B who was not. Excuses of but they can share a craft pack and it’s not fair to child B were stated aggressively. When asked why child B couldn’t stay with parent A I was not given a reason other than child B was upset they couldn’t go.

I stuck to it and firmly told parent that child B could not come. I still stuck to my decision when child B threw the biggest tantrum, parent made no move to calm but instead blamed me for saying no and “all the other parents always let both children attend”

Now had this been a small at home event then sure I probably wouldn’t have made the fuss, grit my teeth and dealt with my private feelings on the matter. But this was a paid per child event and it’s hardly fair to child A or B that they would have to share a craft pack.

Parent A ended up taking both children home and I grit my teeth on my feelings about a child we had now paid for that wouldn’t be attending. I was half expecting it the moment parent A was told no.

Parent B who had seen the whole thing said I should have just taken the child because as stated above who says no to a child.

But I feel teaching my children the value of your word and sticking to it is more important that sparing the feelings of a child and parent who should know better.

So AITA for not letting child B come?

Most Reddit commenters sided with the mum saying she did the right thing and that if the party was held at home then it would totally be a different story. However, the fact that it was at an external venue changes everything.

While one person bought up the fact that numbers were all about safety and distancing too. “The crafting place could have had everything set up so that the children could be distanced and completely safe which isn’t easy when you’re dealing with 10-year-olds,” the person wrote. “All it would take is two or three extra kids and then there’s a much higher chance of someone getting infected.”

There were commenters though that thought she was indeed the A**hole for not letting the kid stay. Especially considering the second child would miss out on staying also.

“So far you emphasise that it was pay per child and that child would have to share and that’s just not gonna fly,” one person noted. “You could have let them share which they’re probably used to but you had to put your foot down and now neither child could attend.” 

“I’m curious about the details of the two children, were they close in age? What are the details around it,” the person continued. “The only person really effected by [extra kid] staying was [invited kid] and they didn’t object to sharing. You should research the differences between ethics and morals.”

What do you think? What would you have done in the mum’s situation?

Images: Pixabay