Breaking up with my toxic mom group (Ashley Tisdale essay)

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

It’s because PP is one of those Queen bees and this is striking a nerve.

No, it's not, and I responded to the above question. I am not a queen bee, I've never planned an event in front of someone who wasn't invited, I don't use social media, I don't invite 9 out of 10 moms to an outing, etc. I'm just a 46-year old who has never encountered behavior like what is being described and it all sounds ridiculous to me. I imagine the truth lies somewhere in between.

Wow. You just have a limited imagination and limited amount of experience to draw on. Ask yourself why it’s so hard to see that people get treated badly by other women sometimes. It should tell you something that other women are chiming in with their own experiences but for some odd reason you’re ignoring and discrediting them. Because you’ve never seen it.

Pot, meet kettle. You can't imagine someone not being in the situation you found yourself. Funny how that works.

Are you the one from above telling the poster that she basically is incredibly stupid for not realizing something as soon as you would?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

Really? A world of possibilities? Putting pen to paper, or typing out feelings, seems to be a pretty obvious possibility. But somehow it hurt your sensibilities to read it, I guess.

I think everyone involved in this is a bit much, but my feelings certainly aren't hurt. (And if they were, I might type it out, but I would not submit it for publication as an essay in a widely-read magazine!)

Why not? Because nobody would read it? Is it shameful?

Of course it's not shameful, it's just no one's business. And if you want to make friends who aren't like this in the future, using your friend drama to help your career sure isn't going to help with that.

So, you spend your time on a relationship forum but it offends you to talk about relationship issues. What are you here?

Why are you writing here anonymously if you think it's totally normal and cool to put your name on all of your personal relationship stuff?

Spare was a bestseller. I guess you think Harry had no right to publish such a book and air his grievances?

I am not the quoted PP but I believe that it was a huge mistake to publish that book and many other people do too. Sure he had the right to, but it is not a great idea.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

Really? A world of possibilities? Putting pen to paper, or typing out feelings, seems to be a pretty obvious possibility. But somehow it hurt your sensibilities to read it, I guess.

I think everyone involved in this is a bit much, but my feelings certainly aren't hurt. (And if they were, I might type it out, but I would not submit it for publication as an essay in a widely-read magazine!)

Why not? Because nobody would read it? Is it shameful?

Of course it's not shameful, it's just no one's business. And if you want to make friends who aren't like this in the future, using your friend drama to help your career sure isn't going to help with that.

So, you spend your time on a relationship forum but it offends you to talk about relationship issues. What are you here?

Why are you writing here anonymously if you think it's totally normal and cool to put your name on all of your personal relationship stuff?

Spare was a bestseller. I guess you think Harry had no right to publish such a book and air his grievances?

I am not the quoted PP but I believe that it was a huge mistake to publish that book and many other people do too. Sure he had the right to, but it is not a great idea.

There's a market for these types of books and discussions. It's not for everyone, but here you are telling everyone how wrong they are for wanting to talk about relationships.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Tisdale’s article appeared on my newsfeed today right next to the headlines about Tatiana schlossberg’s funeral and untimely death from aggressive cancer. A stark contrast and a reminder of how completely asinine and unimportant this entire topic is. It’s pedantic that cliques exist amongst grown adults and attention and validation seeking that tisdale would write an article about it. People lack perspective on what’s important in life.

Of course it seems unimportant compared to someone dying at a young age from cancer. 99% of this website is unimportant compared to that.

But friendships, finding support as a mom, and just generally having community are actually very important.

Which you can do without the friend “group” angle. Your own mom, or other women who have raised kids and share their wisdom and advice, coworkers, one-on-one friends. There’s so many ways to have the support and community, without the “group” part of it.

Many, many women find themselves in Mom groups. They want to know other moms in the neighborhood with babies the same age. This isn't remotely weird or odd.

The “group” idea is odd. Most people find 1-2 people they like in a group.

In a class of people you find 1-2 friends.
On a sports team you find 1-2 friends.
At work you find 1-2 friends.

The idea you will find a group where every single person is close friends is not real life.

Ok? But in that group are people pointedly excluding you, being weird and sitting you far away from the rest of the group, making plans in front of you? We don't all have to be friends but some of these women went out of their way to be jerks. It's not that hard to be nice at a kid's birthday party and not you know, invite all the other girlies for something like a brunch the next day in front of the hostess and not include her.

In a class we break into groups and yes I’m not part of every group. In school at lunch the lunch tables are harder to join than sororities. I’m not invited to every study group. In sports I’m not always invited to get food after practice, I don’t sit with certain people at pre-game dinners.

I go to birthday parties and don’t talk to every parent.

Your taking this not talk about something too far. It reminds me of the movie Booksmart where nobody’s allowed to talk about what school they got into because it might hurt somebody’s feelings.

Here’s the reality people are doing things without you. Some people have more money than you. Some people go on vacation vacations with friends and you’re not invited. You’re not invited to every brunch.

Find your one or two friends and do something with them.

Oh please. This is about what Ashley wrote. If you want to talk about your own personal groups do that elsewhere. What she described sucks.

We are in the relationship forum not the entertainment forum. This is talking about women groups in general.

Ashley, just needs to relax. People are mean I could write 20 articles about mean women I’ve met in the DC area.

Really? It’s not new. It’s not interesting.

You're not required to be here if it's not interesting. You've totally discounted what she said and think women should suck it up. Pretty obvious you're one of the mean girls.

You sound like a control freak. I can discuss women dynamics in general with respect to her situation if I want and if you don't like it don't respond to my posts.

She needs to learn, there are mean girls... it's not about you. You can't be part of every group, BFD, find your own group.

It's not hard to learn to deal with people who are mean. They are in your family, they are at work, they were in school, they are neighbors, you can't get rid of them, you can only learn to not let them affect you.

She's allowed to call out the mean girls. Sorry you feel triggered that not everyone is up for your BS.

Sure she can but by doing that she becomes one of them. She went from pick me girl to I can get you back. It's not healthy but that's show business.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Tisdale’s article appeared on my newsfeed today right next to the headlines about Tatiana schlossberg’s funeral and untimely death from aggressive cancer. A stark contrast and a reminder of how completely asinine and unimportant this entire topic is. It’s pedantic that cliques exist amongst grown adults and attention and validation seeking that tisdale would write an article about it. People lack perspective on what’s important in life.

Of course it seems unimportant compared to someone dying at a young age from cancer. 99% of this website is unimportant compared to that.

But friendships, finding support as a mom, and just generally having community are actually very important.

Which you can do without the friend “group” angle. Your own mom, or other women who have raised kids and share their wisdom and advice, coworkers, one-on-one friends. There’s so many ways to have the support and community, without the “group” part of it.

Many, many women find themselves in Mom groups. They want to know other moms in the neighborhood with babies the same age. This isn't remotely weird or odd.

The “group” idea is odd. Most people find 1-2 people they like in a group.

In a class of people you find 1-2 friends.
On a sports team you find 1-2 friends.
At work you find 1-2 friends.

The idea you will find a group where every single person is close friends is not real life.

Ok? But in that group are people pointedly excluding you, being weird and sitting you far away from the rest of the group, making plans in front of you? We don't all have to be friends but some of these women went out of their way to be jerks. It's not that hard to be nice at a kid's birthday party and not you know, invite all the other girlies for something like a brunch the next day in front of the hostess and not include her.

In a class we break into groups and yes I’m not part of every group. In school at lunch the lunch tables are harder to join than sororities. I’m not invited to every study group. In sports I’m not always invited to get food after practice, I don’t sit with certain people at pre-game dinners.

I go to birthday parties and don’t talk to every parent.

Your taking this not talk about something too far. It reminds me of the movie Booksmart where nobody’s allowed to talk about what school they got into because it might hurt somebody’s feelings.

Here’s the reality people are doing things without you. Some people have more money than you. Some people go on vacation vacations with friends and you’re not invited. You’re not invited to every brunch.

Find your one or two friends and do something with them.

Oh please. This is about what Ashley wrote. If you want to talk about your own personal groups do that elsewhere. What she described sucks.

We are in the relationship forum not the entertainment forum. This is talking about women groups in general.

Ashley, just needs to relax. People are mean I could write 20 articles about mean women I’ve met in the DC area.

Really? It’s not new. It’s not interesting.

You're not required to be here if it's not interesting. You've totally discounted what she said and think women should suck it up. Pretty obvious you're one of the mean girls.

You sound like a control freak. I can discuss women dynamics in general with respect to her situation if I want and if you don't like it don't respond to my posts.

She needs to learn, there are mean girls... it's not about you. You can't be part of every group, BFD, find your own group.

It's not hard to learn to deal with people who are mean. They are in your family, they are at work, they were in school, they are neighbors, you can't get rid of them, you can only learn to not let them affect you.

DP from the person you are going back and forth with.

I disagree it's "not hard" to deal with people who are mean. Especially people who are mean in passive aggressive ways that may make it hard to deal with in a straightforward way. Also people are different. I really struggle with people like this. I especially struggle with this particular sort of meanness, where it's like this social undermining. I'm not built for it and I really work to handle it well and, as you say, not let it affect me. I've been working at it for 20 years. It's still really hard. I've had to go to therapy to deal with it and my therapist says she has so many clients who struggle with these issues.

To me I just come back to this: I cannot for the life of me understand why women engage in what they refer to as "friendships" with people they treat like this. It baffles me. I have known women who will say to my face that they *love* me, will compliment me and make a big show of how important I am to them (call me one of their best friends, talk me up to others, etc.) and then will just absolutely trash me behind my back, tell lies or exaggerations to make me look bad, etc. I had a friend like this once who started dating a guy I was good friends with and suddenly started making these little "jokes" about me making fun of my appearance, my education, my job. I was direct with her and told her the jokes hurt my feelings and made me not want to be around her, and this just made her meaner. But then she'd claim to other people that I was a "dear friend" and she was devastated to lose my friendship. In the end I concluded she's just manipulative and not a genuine person, but it wasn't easy and extracting myself from her friendship wasn't easy either.

So yes people want to talk about this stuff, commiserate, try to help one another. Why is that bad? If anything I share can help someone not go through what I have, I am very happy to have helped. And when others talk about these experiences, it makes me feel less alone and that helps me feel more resilient in dealing with people like this who, again, I just don't understand. It's such a weird, dysfunctional approach to human relationships. I'll never get it.

I'm glad you are working with a therapist to find ways to not attach yourself to toxic people then eventually be hurt.

I'm not saying "it's not hard... don't have feeling" what I am saying is "life is hard, you will have these feelings, it's normal". It's a normal part of life. See you struggle because you think a therapist is going to teach you how to not feel bad when someone is mean, You won't ever do that. You need a therapist to say... you feel bad... okay that's normal they suck. Move ON!!!!

Your "friend" is talking mean behind your back.. OUCH that hurts... bye Felicia. ... that hurts there is a mourning period.

AND THAT IS A NORMAL PART OF LIFE.

You think your therapist is going to teach you how to make it never happen again.. not gonna happen. There are mean people everywhere.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

It's an abuse pattern. It's the same reason someone will stay in a relationship with an abuser. The abuser makes you feel dependent on them emotionally. The tactics are pretty well known. "Lovebombing" is a common one and very prevalent one and you can see how it's especially effective with women in new motherhood, which can be a time when you just feel unsure of yourself. Then when they are mean you don't trust your own judgment. Are they actually being mean or are you being too sensitive? They'll tell you you're being too sensitive, even if you just have this nagging issue where whenever you are around these women, you don't feel good. This is gaslighting. If you try to separate, they'll gossip about you. Since these are friend groups and not just one person, trying to get away from the one or two women who are the instigators doesn't work because if you try to hang out with others in the group, you will be accused of being exclusive. This is DARVO. And so on. That's why people linger in these toxic friend groups for years, just feeling vaguely bad but also feeling like if they leave, they'll lose all their friends and be alone. It's emotional abuse. It is really not dissimilar to an emotionally abusive romantic relationship.

TL;DR: People don't leave because they have been convinced that their value is dependent on being part of the group. That's why it happens most often when women are in life transitions where they are likely to feel insecure, like new motherhood. It's vulnerable people falling into abusive patterns with people who are narcissistic and manipulative, not unlike people who wind up in emotionally abusive romantic relationships.

You and I are saying the same thing... this is an abuse pattern, you will never stop abuse, you need to learn how to cut and run fast.

When there is abuse you need to learn to think... wow what happened to them that they suck so bad, instead of what was it in me that they wanted to abuse me.

The problem isn't that there are toxic people, there are, the problem is when women will put up with abuse because they question themselves or stay because they can't give up the good parts. Work on yourself ... you can't stop them.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

DP and yes but also publishing an essay about it gives women who have struggled with the same thing a chance to feel seen and understood. It sounds like she was actually encouraged to write the essay by other women she spoke to after going through it who identified with her experience and liked what she had to say about it.

The essay is also well written, so there is that.

I agree that writing something like this is good for others to read to see "it's not just me"... but it's better to write it... 1) if it's not for revenge 2) after you have done to work to understand why you stayed in abuse for a longer time than you should have 3) you can show how you don't let yourself be a victim again

But she did a hit piece and a poor me piece. It's fine because it's good, in 5 years she will read it and think dang I was so immature.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

Really? A world of possibilities? Putting pen to paper, or typing out feelings, seems to be a pretty obvious possibility. But somehow it hurt your sensibilities to read it, I guess.

I think everyone involved in this is a bit much, but my feelings certainly aren't hurt. (And if they were, I might type it out, but I would not submit it for publication as an essay in a widely-read magazine!)

Why not? Because nobody would read it? Is it shameful?

Of course it's not shameful, it's just no one's business. And if you want to make friends who aren't like this in the future, using your friend drama to help your career sure isn't going to help with that.

So, you spend your time on a relationship forum but it offends you to talk about relationship issues. What are you here?

Why are you writing here anonymously if you think it's totally normal and cool to put your name on all of your personal relationship stuff?

Spare was a bestseller. I guess you think Harry had no right to publish such a book and air his grievances?

I am not the quoted PP but I believe that it was a huge mistake to publish that book and many other people do too. Sure he had the right to, but it is not a great idea.

There's a market for these types of books and discussions. It's not for everyone, but here you are telling everyone how wrong they are for wanting to talk about relationships.

The book is queen bee moms and king pin dads.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

DP and yes but also publishing an essay about it gives women who have struggled with the same thing a chance to feel seen and understood. It sounds like she was actually encouraged to write the essay by other women she spoke to after going through it who identified with her experience and liked what she had to say about it.

The essay is also well written, so there is that.

I agree that writing something like this is good for others to read to see "it's not just me"... but it's better to write it... 1) if it's not for revenge 2) after you have done to work to understand why you stayed in abuse for a longer time than you should have 3) you can show how you don't let yourself be a victim again

But she did a hit piece and a poor me piece. It's fine because it's good, in 5 years she will read it and think dang I was so immature.

A lot of people here don't care if it was by Ashley Tisdale. I barely know who she is. But she brings up an issue others have seen or dealt with and find worthy of discussion. Some of you are caught up in Ashley Tisdale and can't get past it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What I got from that is that social media caused all the toxicity. Without Instagram she would have no idea who was hanging with who and that she wasn't invited. And basically all the anxiety I have with other women also stems from some variation of this: "there they are, all hanging out and didn't invite me. What did I do wrong?"
I hate it so much. Currently dreading logging onto Facebook to post family pictures my mother keep hounding me about because I know I'll see something like this.

Text the photos to mom and leave Facebook. For real.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

It's an abuse pattern. It's the same reason someone will stay in a relationship with an abuser. The abuser makes you feel dependent on them emotionally. The tactics are pretty well known. "Lovebombing" is a common one and very prevalent one and you can see how it's especially effective with women in new motherhood, which can be a time when you just feel unsure of yourself. Then when they are mean you don't trust your own judgment. Are they actually being mean or are you being too sensitive? They'll tell you you're being too sensitive, even if you just have this nagging issue where whenever you are around these women, you don't feel good. This is gaslighting. If you try to separate, they'll gossip about you. Since these are friend groups and not just one person, trying to get away from the one or two women who are the instigators doesn't work because if you try to hang out with others in the group, you will be accused of being exclusive. This is DARVO. And so on. That's why people linger in these toxic friend groups for years, just feeling vaguely bad but also feeling like if they leave, they'll lose all their friends and be alone. It's emotional abuse. It is really not dissimilar to an emotionally abusive romantic relationship.

TL;DR: People don't leave because they have been convinced that their value is dependent on being part of the group. That's why it happens most often when women are in life transitions where they are likely to feel insecure, like new motherhood. It's vulnerable people falling into abusive patterns with people who are narcissistic and manipulative, not unlike people who wind up in emotionally abusive romantic relationships.

You and I are saying the same thing... this is an abuse pattern, you will never stop abuse, you need to learn how to cut and run fast.

When there is abuse you need to learn to think... wow what happened to them that they suck so bad, instead of what was it in me that they wanted to abuse me.

The problem isn't that there are toxic people, there are, the problem is when women will put up with abuse because they question themselves or stay because they can't give up the good parts. Work on yourself ... you can't stop them.

No, the problem is actually the abusive people and their abusive behavior.

The *solution* is for people to learn to recognize and not get drawn into these patterns, to build up self esteem and learn to recognize what a healthy friendship looks like and to set boundaries and all that.

Often people who are susceptible to abusive friendships grew up in homes with similar dynamics, which is why it's hard for people to learn to that the reason they often feel bad in their relationships and don't feel like they have power or agency is that they are recreating formative relationships with other abusive people. So maybe have some empathy for the fact that people can't do that overnight.

But also: Tisdale and the people who are commiserating with her on this thread are literally in the process of recognizing those abusive patterns and extracting themselves, and refusing to play the role that keeps that dysfunctional dynamic going. That's... good? Bizarre to be critical of it or view these people as the problem because they were not able to instantaneously spot and avoid an abusive person whose whole personality is designed to suck you in and manipulate you.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

DP and yes but also publishing an essay about it gives women who have struggled with the same thing a chance to feel seen and understood. It sounds like she was actually encouraged to write the essay by other women she spoke to after going through it who identified with her experience and liked what she had to say about it.

The essay is also well written, so there is that.

I agree that writing something like this is good for others to read to see "it's not just me"... but it's better to write it... 1) if it's not for revenge 2) after you have done to work to understand why you stayed in abuse for a longer time than you should have 3) you can show how you don't let yourself be a victim again

But she did a hit piece and a poor me piece. It's fine because it's good, in 5 years she will read it and think dang I was so immature.

A lot of people here don't care if it was by Ashley Tisdale. I barely know who she is. But she brings up an issue others have seen or dealt with and find worthy of discussion. Some of you are caught up in Ashley Tisdale and can't get past it.

+1 I don't think I've ever even seen anything with Ashley Tisdale in it and am only vaguely aware that she is from that generation of Disney stars like Selena Gomez. I really don't care about her either way. But I do relate to having been in (and then gotten out of) a friend group like this and appreciate that she's talking about it because it's a real dynamic. And I agree it's very "high school" and pretty wild and sad that the behavior seems to resurge in our 30s and 40s, and especially that moms seem to engage in it, thus setting really awful examples for kids and creating the same crappy dynamics for another generation. Sigh.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

DP and yes but also publishing an essay about it gives women who have struggled with the same thing a chance to feel seen and understood. It sounds like she was actually encouraged to write the essay by other women she spoke to after going through it who identified with her experience and liked what she had to say about it.

The essay is also well written, so there is that.

I agree that writing something like this is good for others to read to see "it's not just me"... but it's better to write it... 1) if it's not for revenge 2) after you have done to work to understand why you stayed in abuse for a longer time than you should have 3) you can show how you don't let yourself be a victim again

But she did a hit piece and a poor me piece. It's fine because it's good, in 5 years she will read it and think dang I was so immature.

A lot of people here don't care if it was by Ashley Tisdale. I barely know who she is. But she brings up an issue others have seen or dealt with and find worthy of discussion. Some of you are caught up in Ashley Tisdale and can't get past it.

I mildly know who she is and I don’t really care about her certain situation. What I’m saying is if you internalize this type of action and try to avenge it, you have not done enough therapy.

It could be that you plan a party and purposely not invite certain people or you think there’s something wrong with you and that’s why you’re being treated this way. If you do any of those things seek therapy.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I don't know one womens group that doesn’t eventually break up or splinter, for various reasons.

Even if they get together on occasion they are one big happy organism feeding positively off each other. They are many groups of 2 or 3 loosely connected to others.

Also friendship wax and wane that is life.

How do you get past 25 years old and not understand this.

Yeah. I kind of thought she really shot herself in the foot here by breaking off with every member of the group. She should have just spent more time with the people she got along with and less time with the larger group.

It’s weird to be half in and half out with a group. Better to have a clean break.

No group does everything together. We have a large friend group in our neighborhood and not a single event has everyone at it because people do have other things going on in their lives. I can also do things with some of the members of the group if I want. It's not a monolith.

This isn't really that deep. The other women were just not good enough friends to want to tolerate any BS. If she felt slighted or ostracized she doesn't owe friendship to one or two of the women who were basically acquaintances or randomly sent her flowers then ignored her. This was not a lifelong friendship. It has run its course.

That's fine. I just think it's dramatic to say you have to break away from the entire group because some people don't like you. Just don't hang out with them then.

If your "friends" are planning a group outing at your kids birthday right in front of you, not including you, they aren't very good friends. These people suck and the posters bending over backwards to explain it away or blame the people who don't stand for poor treatment sounds a little nutty. It's ok to move on and make new friends, these people sound pretty awful.

It's fine if you want to read the more dramatic version of events. The way she wrote it she didn't explain how she "knew" they planned the other event while at her daughter's birthday party. I think she was being overly sensitive (which I get, she had a young child/children at the time and that's exhausting/draining). That doesn't mean she has to be friends with these people. If you don't want to spend time with them, then don't. I just think she, and many of the posters here, are being very dramatic.

I have seen people plan events right in front of me. I am not deaf and I doubt Ashley is either. I didn't expect to be included because I didn't know the group that well but they were literally planning it so I got up and walked away. People are so wrapped up in themselves they do things like this. Why are you cutting the friends slack but not Ashely? She has to explain how she "knew" vs just taking her at face value? Why are you finding it so hard to just take her word for it?

She said in the article that she was seated at a party all the way down at the end of the table. Do you think the table sat 30, there were 20 people in attendance, 29 of them sat at one end, then they had 10 empty chairs, and then Ashley was at the other end all by herself? Or do you think she was mad that she wasn't seated near whoever she deemed to be the most important/famous at the head of the table? If the table seats 12 and there were 12 people in attendance, someone had to sit at the end of the table - why did she take that as a slight? Things like that are why I have a hard time taking her seriously, among other reasons.

That’s not her daughter’s birthday party that she was talking about. Maybe read it again because you’re seeing what you want to see. This was happening more than once so she noticed a pattern. But somehow you’re desperate to see her as the bad person.

I couldn't care less about Ashley Tisdale. I've never even seen High School Musical or anything else she's been on. I'm not desperate to see her as a bad person. That's weird.

Here is what she said, cut and pasted from her article:

Another time, at one of the mom’s dinner parties, I realized where I sat with her — which was at the end of the table, far from the rest of the women.

The person asked why I am having a hard time taking her word for it. The above is why. Do you really think she was seated from from everyone else? Or was she just not seated close to the hostess, in which case she felt slighted. Someone has to sit at the end of the table, and it's obnoxious behavior on her part to be so wounded that it was her. Would she have been worried about the feelings of whoever was seated down there had it not been her?

DP. I interpreted that part of the essay to mean she was at a seated dinner party with a few members of this mom group and a bunch of other people, and the host seated the other members of the group near herself, but sat Ashley at the other end of the table next to other people who were not members of the group. I did not interpret it to mean that Ashley was seated at the end of a table with a. bunch of empty seats in between, which makes no sense.

If that happened to me I also would have assumed that the host of the party viewed those other members of our group as close friends but perhaps didn't like me or didn't want me to be part of the group. Also if I hosted a party and this happened accidentally, I actually would say something to the friend who wound up far away like "I'm so sorry, I hope you found people to talk to -- I didn't realize until we sat down how far away you were" or something like that. Because I think the dynamic would be obviously a little hurtful.

But they were all invited to the party! If I host a dinner and I invite my friends from work, my friends from college, and my friends from the neighborhood, I can't sit next to all of them. But you think the friends who sit down at the other end of the table from me should be upset? If she's the one seeing the lines of this "group" so closely that it means others are excluded from it, then she is part of the problem. And that's my issue.

Let’s say you were hosting several groups and when you were planning the seating, you sat all of your mom friends together except for Ashley, who you stuck between your college friends and your work friends. It doesn’t matter where you sit. What Ashley cares about is that she’s the only one sandwiched between people she doesn’t know.

No, if you read what she wrote, she was complaining about being seated far from the queen bee.

Yes, part of a growing pattern of being excluded, ostracized, and left out. She also tried to explain it away as you're doing here but it became obvious. Not sure why you're so dismissive of her experience.

It was a growing pattern but she kept going back for more exclusion... why? just recognize these people are different values than you and move on.

Wow so mad and bitter that she put her thoughts out there about her experience. Why can't she just suffer in silence?

There's a world of possibilities between suffering in silence and publishing an essay about it!

DP and yes but also publishing an essay about it gives women who have struggled with the same thing a chance to feel seen and understood. It sounds like she was actually encouraged to write the essay by other women she spoke to after going through it who identified with her experience and liked what she had to say about it.

The essay is also well written, so there is that.

I agree that writing something like this is good for others to read to see "it's not just me"... but it's better to write it... 1) if it's not for revenge 2) after you have done to work to understand why you stayed in abuse for a longer time than you should have 3) you can show how you don't let yourself be a victim again

But she did a hit piece and a poor me piece. It's fine because it's good, in 5 years she will read it and think dang I was so immature.

A lot of people here don't care if it was by Ashley Tisdale. I barely know who she is. But she brings up an issue others have seen or dealt with and find worthy of discussion. Some of you are caught up in Ashley Tisdale and can't get past it.

I mildly know who she is and I don’t really care about her certain situation. What I’m saying is if you internalize this type of action and try to avenge it, you have not done enough therapy.

It could be that you plan a party and purposely not invite certain people or you think there’s something wrong with you and that’s why you’re being treated this way. If you do any of those things seek therapy.

Jesus lady, we’re just talking about it. Nobody is seeking vengeance. You’re taking yourself way too seriously and give out shit advice.

[Anonymous]

I had to look up who she was and it seems she's done some cool things. I do feel kind of bad for her. Maternal hormones can be CRA-CRA + motherhood is tiring + isolating. I cut her some slack, but think maybe she should have avoid publicly blasting the situation.