'They stayed for 5 hours and didn't take the hint'

"There should be a 90-120 minute hard stop on playdates," the p*ssed-off mum wrote after enduring a seemingly never-ending day from hell. 

Many mums have a complicated relationship with playdates, swinging between love and hate. 

However, this mum is veering more towards the 'hate' side after enduring a particularly nightmarish experience recently.

Taking to an advice forum on Mumsnet, she explained how she invited her friend and his three-year-old over for 'morning tea', but they "grossly overstayed their welcome" and didn't leave until well into the afternoon.

Want to join the family? Sign up to our Kidspot newsletter for more stories like this. 

Image: IStock

RELATED: ‘I’m trying to unspoil my kids’

"There should be a 90-120 minute hard stop on playdates"

"I invited them over at 10 a.m. They arrived at 10:30 a.m. and stayed until 3 p.m.," she explains in her post. "I have a baby and two preschoolers. My preschoolers are adorable playmates for around two hours. Then they get feral."

Each hour that passed, it became clear her guests showed no signs of leaving. "The three kids running around repeatedly woke up my baby," the mum said. "My friend passively observed that this was occurring but made no move to go."

She also gave "multiple hints," the largest of which was not serving lunch. But this was also ignored, and everyone was "famished" by the time they finally left.

Introducing our new podcast: Mum Club! Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts so you never miss an episode.

"One of my other hints for them to leave was to ask, 'So, what else do you have on for today?'" the OP wrote, "to which my friend said he was hoping for a nap as he'd managed to keep his kid out all day and allow his wife to relax!!!"

"I am exhausted - up all night with a baby. I would love a f**king nap," the p*ssed-off mum lamented. 

"My husband and I always subscribed to there being a 90-120 minute hard stop on playdates. Did we just make that up? Or is that the socially acceptable limit?" she concluded.

RELATED: Unlikely way I stopped relying on ‘Mummy wine time’

"Of course your friend is a man"

The comments were filled with empathy and lots of advice for the mum to avoid this from happening again.

"Meet in a park or soft play in the future as some people just can’t take a hint," advised one mum.

"I'd have picked up on that hint even if I hadn’t realised I was outstaying at that point!" said another, adding, "I think maybe you need a more direct way of saying it next time, though. Maybe - ‘Ooh, I think [my child] is getting a bit over-excited now and needs some quiet time. This has been fun! Let’s do this again' and get a date in the diary!"

"I agree with the two hours and off you go idea," wrote a third. "I would hate to feel I’d outstayed my welcome. A good idea if this crops up again would be to say, 'Come from 10-12. I’m meeting X at 12:30, but it would be nice to see you'. Just give an end date of some kind and a reason to be leaving the house shortly after that end time."

"Of course your friend is a man," a fourth pointed out. "His wife asked him to take the kids out, so he thought he’d outsource the parenting to another woman."

Originally published as 'They stayed for 5 hours and didn't take the hint'