Parents with social anxiety: does it get easier?
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Anonymous
Is it really so bad to be an "outsider" parent? What is happening behind the scenes at an elementary school that you need to be in the know for? A functional school will be letting parents know (via admin or the PTA) about anything truly important. You should not actually have to make connections in the school or be an "insider" in order to learn important details relevant to your child's education. It's up to the organization to be transparent. And then if people want to create friendships, they are more than welcome to. I feel like your describing a dysfunctional school community based on cliques and info hoarding. |
Anonymous
| Once your youngest hits 2nd grade, you shouldn't have to interact with parents except in passing. No need to stick around at birthday parties or playdates. At school events, nobody is making you talk to other parents. I don't. |
Anonymous
I'm an outsider parent and I just watch for PTA and board meeting agendas and if I have time watch the Zoom meetings anonymously. |
Anonymous
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It does get easier because you don’t have to stay at birthday parties or school pickup or practice.
If your child sticks with the same extracurricular activities, it becomes a bit easier because the other parents become more familiar. You may not move beyond the idle chit chat phase with many of them, but at least you have something in common. I do find it more difficult when my middle school age child tries something new and I’m faced with a whole new set of parents who know each other and I’m the outsider. |
Anonymous
This is me. Also my perception of the insider parents is that the stuff they know/share is stuff I don't actually care to know. For instance my kid has a friend whose mom is on the pta board and very "insider" and she's always telling us who the "best" teacher assignments are and trying to get our kids assigned to the same class. I dislike that approach to parenting and want no part. If being an insider means socially engineering your kids life or pulling strings for favorable treatment, no thank you. Happy to be an outsider. |
Anonymous
| I would say it gets easier. You continue to practice and the interactions become less fraught. You practice with situations that might be slightly weird and with vastly different personalities. And you figure out how to not take it so seriously. Just like you’re teaching your kids. |
Anonymous
I've noticed this too! The insider parents want their kids together with other insiders, and all of them want to be the best at "treating" the teachers and becoming chummy with them. I don't care about that stuff. I actually DO want to know who the best teachers are (although to be honest, what the insiders consider best didn't always align with what I thought) and I do want to show appreciation for all teachers, but I don't need to get involved in placements, engineering groups and friendships, and striving to be a teacher's pet. But I do read all the agendas to see what people care about, what issues the school is choosing to focus on, and big changes coming, like enrollment issues, curricular changes, and staff changes. I did volunteer a lot at school, but took "quieter" assignments where I didn't get named at PTA meetings, never chaired Commitees, etc., but I was able to see how things work at school and see the kids at school, which was all I wanted. |
Anonymous
PP here. Yes, this is my experience as well. Part of what I want my kid to learn is how to adapt to situations that are not ideal. I'm okay with her getting the "not favorite" teacher, maybe the one who is stricter or not as popular with the kids, and figuring out how to navigate that situation. I want her in classes and activities where she doesn't have a "best friends" so that she learns how to develop friendships with other kids and deals with her own social anxiety that can come with being in a new group. As others in the thread have said, that only gets easier if you keep doing it, so I don't see what benefit it would give my kid to prevent her from experiencing it now. I'm happy to volunteer, donate to the school, provide teachers with both needed resources and my appreciation, etc. But I do it as an "outsider" and that's okay. I already have a job and friends outside of my kid's school. It's a bigger part of her life than it is of mine, and I'm okay being a bit more on the periphery in that sphere. Obviously I'm at the center of her home life. That is enough. |
Anonymous
| I have experienced this to a much milder degree, but I am grateful that I kept trying and eventually got better at this. I wouldn’t say I’ve made friends who I hang out with outside of kids, but these people who I made idle chitchat with for years really stepped up when I needed them to. When my mom had cancer last year and I was out of town a lot, these other moms and dads helped my husband by driving my kids all over. When my 8 year old was hospitalized, people sent over videos, gifts and cards that put a smile on her face during a tough time. And we do the same for other families, helping to make things work where we can. I am a major introvert, but I am grateful for the community that eventually developed from these little interactions. |
Anonymous
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If you live in DC or a place where the kids can take public transportation, there's very little required parent-to-parent interactions starting in middle school. I miss it actually.
My friend in the burbs are often coordinating carpools, it seems like every day or the week, so they seem more keyed in to a parent community, for better or for worse |
Anonymous
That's really great your community came through for you when your family needed it. I have to admit that has not been my experience. We do the idle chitchat and whatever and I also put effort into things like learning people's names, volunteering for things, inviting for playdates, and being friendly during drop off/pick up so that it feels like community. But on the rare occasion when we're in a bind (like when my DH was out of town for 3 weeks helping his mom post-surgery) people mostly don't offer help and seem to take the attitude that you have to figure it out yourself. We did, but it it was hard. I do wind up thinking about that now when we're being asked to help out with school events or when I'm in social situations with parents. I find myself bowing out of things earlier or, yes, putting my nose in my phone or a book to avoid having to talk. My perception is that people don't really think of the broader school community as *their* community. They have their friends within it, and those are their people. I'm an extra. And that's fine. But extras don't have speaking roles so I'm going to do my own thing then. |
Anonymous
| I think it gets MUCH easier when they are older. There aren't a zillion elementary school events. You don't interact as much when dropping off kids at play dates and certainly never stay. If your kid does a sport, you get to know the other families, which makes things easier. And so on. |
Anonymous
Sometimes school friends like to join the same sports teams or summer camps, so that can be useful information. If stuff like that isn’t beneficial to you or your kids, then yeah, don’t become friends with the other moms. |
Anonymous
That's not at all what I'm describing. The community extends beyond the school walls and beyond the school day . . . not for cliques and gossip, but so that you can communicate and connect with other parents to: learn the things going on behind the scenes that your kids can't (or won't) tell you; find support when you or your child need it; and provide support when others need it. You can choose not to take part in that because you're above it or whatever, but it may end up being to your family's detriment. |
Anonymous
| I'm also an introvert with social anxiety and, honestly, I miss those days. Now I have to work to set up social interactions, and I have some executive function challenges, so there are days when I don't talk to anyone outside my family. |