A mum has been branded "nasty" after being "annoyed" at her friend who refused to help her organise the school's summer fayre.
The mum, who is a member of the Parent Teacher Association, organised the annual festivities alongside a handful of other members who all ran themselves "ragged" for the event. The mum has five fellow school mum friends, and their children attend the school together.
She has come under fire for criticising one of the other mums for "point blank refusing to contribute" to the occasion. The mum believes her friend could have "managed a few hours" for her when she knew the PTA was "struggling", but has been slammed for thinking this way.
Taking to Mumsnet's popular Am I Being Unreasonable (AIBU) thread with a post titled '[AIBU] Annoyed she didn't help out - is that fair?', the mum provided background information then penned: "I have five really close friends, all of our children attend the school. Two of them are on the PTA too. One more put in hours of time to help out. One was on holiday and one point blank refused to contribute. Not with the organisation, set up or actual day.
"The thing is the one that wouldn't help literally volunteers for everything. Her and her husband do loads for our town and are helpers with a number of groups and charities locally. She knew we were struggling. She's said before she won't join the PTA as she feels she does enough, fair enough. But I was organising this and thought they could at least manage a few hours for me.
"She turned up at the fair with one of her children yesterday, walked around for 45 minutes and then just left! Our other friends are divided, some have changed their opinion of her and think it's shocking she didn't help. Others think it's her choice and she showed support by turning up. I'm just really upset that she couldn't step up for me. Aibu?"
The mum's post was met with hundreds of responses from fellow Mumsnet users, keen to share their thoughts. One said: "I think if she does other stuff she knows fine well it wouldn't end with the summer fair. It would be “just” an hour here and there and that would build up. She's been very clear she's not joining the PTA so you're being very unfair thinking just because she's your friend she should have helped. She's no more let you down than all the other parents who didn't help."
Another said: "You're being massively [unreasonable]. She told you she had too many other commitments and didn't want to add the PTA to it and it's not her fault you ran yourself ragged – you chose to step up for it, she didn't. And now you've gone behind her back slagging off her lack of help to other parents. Some friend you are."
A third commented: "YABU [you are being unreasonable]. She's allowed to choose how she spends her spare time and it does sound like she already has a lot on. Good for her for having the ability to not be a doormat and say no when something is too much of an ask for her."
Another Mumsnet user said: "Wow. You're no friend to her at all. She does other stuff voluntarily and you're sagging her off? Nasty."
And another added: "YABU. She does enough. She's drawn a perfectly reasonable boundary and explained her rationale. From the sounds of it you have not only been offended by her perfectly reasonable behaviour but have gone around b****ing to everyone else about it and gathering opinions to take sides against her. With friends like you, who needs b****y playground mums/enemies?"
At the time of writing, 98% of Mumsnet users voted she was being unreasonable to be annoyed at her friend.
Get the top stories straight to your inbox by signing up to one of our free newsletters
READ NEXT:
- South Liverpool restaurant crowned Independent Business of the Year
- Woman cut food shopping spend by £82 after downloading a free app
- 'Fantastic' Liverpool restaurant to open second city centre venue
- LIVE: The best Amazon Prime Day 2022 deals as massive summer sale begins
- Morrisons new £2 treat shoppers 'desperately need' for the heatwave
