Curious... it it important to you to be in the popular mom clique?

[Anonymous]

I genuinely don't know who the "popular moms" in my neighborhood would be. The invite to Bunco night or whatever goes through the NextDoor app, which literally everyone is invited to join. People often tag each other on FB events and such, but it's all to public stuff like the farmer's market or a PTA fundraiser.

Who cares?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m too poor to be in that crowd. I’ll take the awkward hot mess moms at every turn, they’re my people.

+100

[Anonymous]

It's not important to me...but it sucks to have no knowledge of what's going on!...and watching the social engineering antics of the popular moms is very annoying. It takes me back to a bad place in middle/high school when I see it in action

[Anonymous]

Biglaw. Kids have a lot of friends. I’m trying to lay as low as possible and avoid socializing with other parents beyond pleasantries. I’ll tell you what, that’s the key to being popular. You don’t want to be friends, people are constantly trying to get in your business. College and high school I was always out on the town, I’m sure I still have the fun personality I just don’t have the time or the energy with a family and insane job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, it is important to me to belong to a mom clique in my child’s class (or children). Mostly because my kids are still young so play dates are orchestrated by the parents. It’s also a way to make a community that is family oriented.

I was actually super nerdy growing up, with a small group of friends. I also learned not to GAF what anyone thinks of me as I am a female POC in white male dominated profession. I find the characterization by PPs of cliquey moms to be superficial and not very thoughtful.

I have 3 kids. I was/am definitely in the “clique” for their preschool classes. These have now turned into good group friendships with different levels of friendship with the other moms in the clique - some very close but some less so. They are a tremendous source of information and support.

I am not in the “clique” for my oldest’s kindergarten class. It seems to be populated by SAHMs and WOHMs but I’m not positive since I’m not in it. I definitely feel the difference from our preschool experience to our experience with her current class — I don’t have a clue what is going on beyond what the school send home, I don’t know any gossip, or know what the administrators are thinking about before they announce it. My child is also not part of a social group in her class, although we do host (and she is invited to) plenty of play dates (where I hear about the clique).

I’m not going crazy trying to break into this clique, but I do wish I had more connections with the other parents in her class.

Orchestrating playdates for your kids sounds one small step away from helicopter or snowplow parenting. Older kids should make their own friends and tell their parents who they want to play with, and younger kids don’t need that much peer socialization beyond preschool and playground time. There are better things you can do with your time than artificially engineer friendships for your child.

[Anonymous]

Our school has a little bit of a clique, but it’s more about organizing schools events. It’s not big enough to permeate each individual class or even grade, so the actual classroom experience doesn’t fee cliquey. I’ve become friends with one of my kid’s friend’s moms so that we could do play dates and stuff. I tried with another mom of a kid my kid likes and it didn’t work as well (though she’s accepted play dates over here), but I think mostly because this is her youngest and she’s just totally over making an effort

[Anonymous]

It's not important to me, but sometimes I do feel jealous of women who have these close mom tribes. I do know a lot of moms from our school and I do have friends among them, but I'm a single mom and the "cool" moms are all married, so I think that's a factor. The single mom thing can be foreign/ threatening to groups of married moms, I think.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, it is important to me to belong to a mom clique in my child’s class (or children). Mostly because my kids are still young so play dates are orchestrated by the parents. It’s also a way to make a community that is family oriented.

I was actually super nerdy growing up, with a small group of friends. I also learned not to GAF what anyone thinks of me as I am a female POC in white male dominated profession. I find the characterization by PPs of cliquey moms to be superficial and not very thoughtful.

I have 3 kids. I was/am definitely in the “clique” for their preschool classes. These have now turned into good group friendships with different levels of friendship with the other moms in the clique - some very close but some less so. They are a tremendous source of information and support.

I am not in the “clique” for my oldest’s kindergarten class. It seems to be populated by SAHMs and WOHMs but I’m not positive since I’m not in it. I definitely feel the difference from our preschool experience to our experience with her current class — I don’t have a clue what is going on beyond what the school send home, I don’t know any gossip, or know what the administrators are thinking about before they announce it. My child is also not part of a social group in her class, although we do host (and she is invited to) plenty of play dates (where I hear about the clique).

I’m not going crazy trying to break into this clique, but I do wish I had more connections with the other parents in her class.

Orchestrating playdates for your kids sounds one small step away from helicopter or snowplow parenting. Older kids should make their own friends and tell their parents who they want to play with, and younger kids don’t need that much peer socialization beyond preschool and playground time. There are better things you can do with your time than artificially engineer friendships for your child.

NP. What the actual hell are you talking about? How are three-year olds supposed to make a play date happen? Do your three-year olds have cell phones?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's not important to me, but sometimes I do feel jealous of women who have these close mom tribes. I do know a lot of moms from our school and I do have friends among them, but I'm a single mom and the "cool" moms are all married, so I think that's a factor. The single mom thing can be foreign/ threatening to groups of married moms, I think.

I don't know why you think that. We have a single mom in our "mom tribe" as you called it. Why do you think someone would feel threatened? Because you're going to steal their husband? That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m a biglaw attorney. I feel very frozen out of the SAHM/mommy track clique at my kids’ private. I don’t even think about it 95% of the time (I’m a younger mom and most of my friends are still childless so I have a busy social life) but I do feel the sting at school events.

Don’t worry, you are doing fine. They are envious of you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, it is important to me to belong to a mom clique in my child’s class (or children). Mostly because my kids are still young so play dates are orchestrated by the parents. It’s also a way to make a community that is family oriented.

I was actually super nerdy growing up, with a small group of friends. I also learned not to GAF what anyone thinks of me as I am a female POC in white male dominated profession. I find the characterization by PPs of cliquey moms to be superficial and not very thoughtful.

I have 3 kids. I was/am definitely in the “clique” for their preschool classes. These have now turned into good group friendships with different levels of friendship with the other moms in the clique - some very close but some less so. They are a tremendous source of information and support.

I am not in the “clique” for my oldest’s kindergarten class. It seems to be populated by SAHMs and WOHMs but I’m not positive since I’m not in it. I definitely feel the difference from our preschool experience to our experience with her current class — I don’t have a clue what is going on beyond what the school send home, I don’t know any gossip, or know what the administrators are thinking about before they announce it. My child is also not part of a social group in her class, although we do host (and she is invited to) plenty of play dates (where I hear about the clique).

I’m not going crazy trying to break into this clique, but I do wish I had more connections with the other parents in her class.

Orchestrating playdates for your kids sounds one small step away from helicopter or snowplow parenting. Older kids should make their own friends and tell their parents who they want to play with, and younger kids don’t need that much peer socialization beyond preschool and playground time. There are better things you can do with your time than artificially engineer friendships for your child.

NP. What the actual hell are you talking about? How are three-year olds supposed to make a play date happen? Do your three-year olds have cell phones?

DP, but I think the point was that three year olds don't need playdates beyond preschool/daycare/natural social opportunities at playgrounds, etc. I have three kids and tend to agree with that point. It never occurred to me to set up playdates for my kids when they were that young, unless I was already friends with the parents, i.e., I didn't seek to become part of a group for that explicit purpose. And once my kids got old enough to make their own friends, I followed their lead for whom to ask for playdates.

As an adult, I actively avoid cliques. Why would I want to hang out with people who seek them out?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’m a biglaw attorney. I feel very frozen out of the SAHM/mommy track clique at my kids’ private. I don’t even think about it 95% of the time (I’m a younger mom and most of my friends are still childless so I have a busy social life) but I do feel the sting at school events.

Not an attorney but In IT and I get frozen out at school events as well. My children have been left out of playgroups as well. It’s obnoxious.

[Anonymous]

I will say that in preschool most moms are friendly and inclusive. Once they hit regular school age something changes and it becomes VERY cliquey.

[Anonymous]

I was part of a mean girl grown up unpopular girls group. Had to say goodbye to that one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I will say that in preschool most moms are friendly and inclusive. Once they hit regular school age something changes and it becomes VERY cliquey.

In general SAHMs of toddlers and preschoolers are pretty chill, while SAHMs of school-aged kids are annoying. It’s like they need to justify their lack of working by taking over their children’s social lives.