First sleepover ends in vicious neighborhood gossip, daughter banned from seeing friend again. AITA? + UPDATE
"AITA for not walking my daughter’s friend home?"
My daughter, Rowan (11), recently hosted her very first sleepover. She invited her best friend, Amanda (almost 11), who lives just across the street and two houses down from us.
They did all the classic sleepover activities: pizza, popcorn, a movie, face masks, and nail polish. Everything was going perfectly—until around 11 p.m. when Rowan came into our bedroom to let me know Amanda was homesick and wanted to go home.
I went to check on Amanda, and while she assured me she was having fun, she really wanted her mom. Fair enough. I texted her mom, Susan, to let her know what was happening, and she said it was fine for Amanda to come home.
So Amanda packed up her things, and I walked her to the porch. From there, I watched her walk the short distance to her house and go inside safely before heading back inside myself.
The next day, I ran into Susan while she was out walking in the neighborhood. I asked how Amanda was doing, and… well, Susan was furious. Apparently, Amanda had been upset about leaving early.
But what really got Susan’s blood boiling was that I didn’t walk her to the door. She berated me for letting her child “walk home alone, at night, in the cold, with the potential of God-knows-what happening to her”.
For context, we live in a quiet cul-de-sac in a safe neighborhood. I stood on the porch the entire time and watched Amanda walk into her house before going inside. Amanda didn’t seem scared or hesitant, and she never asked me to walk with her.
To be honest, it didn’t even occur to me that this would be an issue—when I was a kid, I would walk all over by myself. Sure, I know times have changed, but I genuinely thought this was fine.
Susan didn’t see it that way. She’s still furious and has been telling neighbors I put Amanda in danger. Despite my apologies to both her and Amanda, she’s banned the girls from playing together. Now I’m left wondering—was I wrong not to walk Amanda to her front door? AITA?
The OP returned later that day to provide more context.
That night, it was just Amanda staying over—no other friends. I’m married, and my husband was home. Susan is also married, but her husband travels often and happened to be out of town that night.
She has another child, Matthew (5M). She told me that if I had let her know I wasn’t planning to walk Amanda home, she would’ve woken Matthew up and come to get her herself.
One of the neighbors siding with Susan mentioned that I should have known how protective she is of her kids, especially since Amanda is typically a shy and fearful child.
I’ll admit, I did know this about Amanda, but my own kids are the total opposite, so it wasn’t even on my radar to walk her all the way home. Maybe it should have been. If Amanda had asked me to walk her home I absolutely would have.
I can understand (to an extent) Susan being upset if she truly felt I put her child in a “dangerous situation”. I thought this would blow over after a couple of days, but this happened at the beginning of December.
Here were the top rated comments from readers in response to the OP's post:
NTA Susan is having a hard time letting her daughter become independent, and that's probably why Amanda "got homesick" and wanted to leave early in the first place. Susan's overblown reaction to the walk home is just one more way of her telling herself and her daughter that the world is not safe for her daughter without her in it, aka making herself, the parent feel like the indispensable savior.
This narrative needs a villain and you have become that villain. The thing to do now is let it blow over and hopefully she'll relax or someone else will tell her she's overreacting and she'll eventually be able to hear it. it sucks most for the girls' friendship and for Amanda in life more generally.
Yeah, and most likely Susan expressed all of her feelings to Amanda. "No one walked you home?! You poor thing, you must have been so scared, ANYTHING could have happened to you!" And bingo bango, now Amanda is afraid to leave the house after dark.
If mom was that concerned...why didn't she come get her kid? Why is it okay for you to leave a houseful of children alone? SHE put her daughter in danger by not saying, I'll be right over. NTA.
NTA. She was supervised, you watched her. Does Susan stay 3 feet away from her at the park? Or does she watch from a safe distance? This woman is nuts!
NTA. It probably took her 30 seconds, she was in a very familiar area, and you were there watching her. If her mom was that concerned why didn't she come over to walk her home?
NTA. Trust me - the neighbors are probably all rolling their eyes about this. I wouldn’t worry about that. I live in a very similar neighborhood and my son has a good friend who lives just about as far as Amanda does.
It’s RIDICULOUS to expect you to walk her to her door and any rational person will see that. There is a generation of kids who aren’t going to be able to function in society with parents like this.
NTA as others have said you literally watched her get to her house. Not only that but you called the mom to let her know. She herself could have easily walked over to grab her that’s not your responsibility. I can’t remember a single time I had a homesick friend that didn’t have their own parent pick them up.
Why didn’t the mother come pick her up? You were watching from the porch, so I think that’s enough. That’s what my mom used to do with my best friends mom, when we were like 6.
I see you said the child was upset she had to leave. I almost wonder if the mom somehow convinced her it would be scary and it made the child want to leave? I also wonder if the mother is overreacting as a means to baby her child, because the mother isn’t ready for her to be growing up and becoming independent.
Cutting off the children’s friendship would effectively slow the child’s independence - at least in the mother’s skewed view. You did nothing wrong. If the mom was so concerned, she should have come and got her kid. NTA.