Thank you all for your input. A lot has happened, but I’ll try to keep this short.

I won’t waste time and try to convince anyone to like me. If you’ve already decided I’m a true crime-obsessed neurotic helicopter parent Karen with “diaper energy” and social anxiety issues, I don’t think there’s much I can say that will change your mind.

And yes, I’ve heard of lock-ins. My son had one with his swim team last year. He’s a bit older, it happened at the pool, guardians were informed before the children were and one of the other parents chaperoned. It’s not the same thing as an unofficial sleepover at a teacher’s house.

All of that said, I never intended to risk this woman’s job, I was just worried. So I spoke to my husband, and we decided to take your advice and speak to my daughter’s teacher first.

He spoke to her while picking up our daughter last week. He said the conversation went fine, but he was bothered by her reaction when he said our daughter wouldn’t attend. He told the teacher our kid was anxious, but she replied that the sleepover would be “a great opportunity for her to come out of her shell,” and that we should try to encourage our daughter to come.

During the conversation, my husband also found out the following:

• She came up with the sleepover idea because she wanted to bond with the girls and figured it would be fun;
• She didn’t ask for another parent to act as a chaperone because her husband had offered to help her (first time she ever mentioned his existence);
• When asked about what she’d do in case of emergency, she just stated she lived about 10 minutes away from a hospital;
• She didn’t ask for the parents’ contact information because she didn’t think of it.

After he told me all this, I decided to email the dance school. I wrote that the teacher was planning a sleepover, about which the parents had not received a lot of information.

Two days later, we all got an email from the teacher, stating she was canceling the sleepover due to a complaint from the dance school. She also apologized for not being more transparent with us.

Some of the other moms are planning another sleepover at one of their houses so that the girls won’t be upset. Not sure where or when it will happen yet, but I’m trying to keep up to date.

Ultimately, even though I still don’t know what the sleepover would have been like, I don’t regret this. When it comes to my children, I’d rather be paranoid and wrong than regretful and right. If I complained and it turned out to be a completely innocent event, I’d feel embarrassed, even after apologizing, but it might be something I could laugh about someday. If I let my daughter go and something happened to her (or any of the other girls), I would never forgive myself.

I will reply to comments for the next day or so, but I won’t update again. Thank you all.