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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Met her in the line at preschool and things were budding and fine between us until first grade. Now everything feels to me like a competition, or nose-rubbing event with her. I may have experienced the last straw.

I first noticed it around early 1st grade. Her daughter came out nose in a book, reading a pretty advanced, Harry Potter-level chapter book and I remarked about it and she replied something like, “Yep! Why, isn’t Larla reading chapter books yet?” It made me question everything. Ever since then it’s been much of the same: If it’s not comments about academics and how advanced her kids are, it’s about how they overachieve in other areas. I’m sick of it.

Today I was shamed for still folding and putting away my 8yo clothes. Of course, she doesn’t do that for her kids. [/quote]

Wait, maybe I'm competitive but I don't see why her response wasn't valid? I was telling my friend that both of my kids were reading chapter books by 1st grade.  Maybe it was the last straw for you though. In general I think the realtionships are natured that way bc everyone is in the same swim lane. It's not taht it is a competition but what else can you talk about and share/compare. I haven't figured this out yet, maybe some are better than others on how to communicate without inciting competition. [/quote]

NP - you really haven’t figured out how to have conversations with friends that don’t revolve around comparison?  Really?  That sounds like a nightmare.

The non-competitive response the OP’s friend could have given would be something like, “yeah, she loves to read. [insert topic change]”

My oldest was an early, advanced reader like this kid.  Because I knew that, and because I don’t like to compete with my friends, I gave some variation of that response often.  It’s possible this woman literally has no clue what typical reading development looks like, but based on what the OP has said, she’s probably just extremely competitive.  [/quote]

All of this.

I wish people would learn that this is not the only way to have a conversation with a friend:

Person A: Shares info about specific aspect of their life (child, work, family, etc.)
Person B: Shares detail about same specific aspect of life, sometimes as a direct comparison, sometimes as "maybe you should do this"

Some people do this instinctively, with everything. Like I'll say "yeah, my sister and I haven't been getting along well lately, it's really frustrating." And they'll respond "really, my sister and I never have arguments like that." Like... okay? It's not really relevant is it? You aren't having an issue with your sister, so it's really not necessary to discuss it. You asked what was going on in my life and this thing with my sister has been weighing on me. You can just listen, you don't have to compare.

And yes, it gets so much worse with kids. I'll say "we've been having issues with the school -- they never do outdoor recess in the winter, even on nice days, and it's frustrating because the kids need time outside." And I'll get "huh our school always does outdoor recess, that's never been an issue." Like, okay, I get that me talking about recess made you think immediately of your own experience. But it's okay not to say the first thing that pops into your brain. You can keep that to yourself and say "wow, that sounds frustrating -- I totally agree about kids needing outside time." It doesn't have to be a comparative conversation at all.

But I think a lot of people don't practice choosing not to share the first (and usually more self-centered) thing that pops into their head and instead focus the conversation on the actual subject. So a lot of conversations with fellow parents just wind up being an exchange of details about identical subjects. There's no actual conversing happening. This is why so many playground conversations are draining, folks. People are just speaking without thinking, and they are focusing on themselves and never taking a moment to focus on the person they are speaking to. This is why so often it feels like a competition. So much of our interactions are just thoughtless and transactional, with no real effort to understand each other or connect on an emotional level.[/quote]

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