How do you respond to being ignored?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m really sorry, OP. In my child’s grade we’ve had 3 moms become widowed since the kids started Kindergarten. I wish you were here because the first mom worked really hard to put resources and processes in place at school to support her kids, and it benefited the entire school community.

One of the moms is someone I didn’t know at all but my kid always admired their kid even though they’re the opposite gender and didn’t really know each other. I knew one of her other kids did an intense sport far away on nights that I happened to be free, so I said “I know this is weird, but I can drive Larla on x night if that would help her keep getting to practice.” The mom said yes. Maybe she felt weird about it and maybe the kid did too, but over time we all got to be good family friends. Now my little girl and her older girl do a different sport together…and I’m still driving once a week.

Do you have an acquaintance in the community who can just start a signup genius or something else for you? In our grade there’s one outspoken, extrovert mom who took on this role and stepped in when a family really needed help. It only took a tiny hint from the mom who lost her DH and then the extrovert mom ran with it and half the school received the signup genius with things listed like “Tuesday soccer dropoff”, “Wednesday school pickup”, “Thursday freezer meal”, etc. It filled quickly because people who wanted to help but were frozen in place felt the nudge and stepped up.

We need to find you an assistant/advocate/spokesperson. If that isn’t a friend or fellow parent, is there a guidance counselor or school administrator or PTA volunteer who might help?

This is a really good point. The people who receive the most help in a crisis are often people who are friends with these helper types and don't seem too independent.

OP, can you reach out to one of these helper types to see if they can coordinate some temporary help for you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wish I knew. There is a mom I have to see frequently who does this to me a few times a year. I can’t wait until our kids aren’t on the same team and I can say bye biatch.

There is a Chevy Chase lawyer father that does this to me and does it to a few other parents at our school that he deems not important enough. If we are talking to someone he wants to shmooze with for his law firm, he interrupts our conversation and puts his back to us. Happens all of the time so it is clearly not a mistake and not just to me. Have not figured out how to deal with him yet but some day I will just tell him how rude he is in front of others and he will be so embarrassed he will think twice about doing it again.

It sucks that other people let this happen. I've had people try to ice out the person I'm speaking to, but I maintain eye contact with the first person and don't let it happen.

I would jump in front of him with your back to him and half jokingly say "Good lord Steve, what are you doing?" Make a joke out of how rude he's being. It lets everyone laugh it off, but he'll get the point.

[Anonymous]

I get angry, but I would just continue to remind them they were asked on such and such a date and I would act put out that I am sitting around wondering what the answer is because they still have not responded.