Ashley Tisdale published a long essay in The Cut this week about breaking up with her “toxic” mom group. The essay elaborated upon a post to her website a few weeks ago. It accused these moms of “mean-girl” behavior by leaving her out of group side-chats and events. She described how she left the chat after calling them “high school.”
Everyone figured out pretty quickly that she was talking about the mom group that she was in with Hilary Duff, Mandy Moore, Meghan Trainor, and several other non-famous moms. Internet sleuths put together a timeline and started speculating that Ashley fell out with the other women because she wasn’t there for her friends who were affected by the LA fires and posted a Charlie Kirk tribute. Her rep denied all of this, but Hilary Duff’s husband Matthew Koma wasn’t having it. Matthew shaded Ashley hard via Instagram Stories with a picture of her photospread from The Cut essay with his head edited onto her body. It was accompanied by an even shadier caption that called her “the most self obsessed tone deaf person on Earth.”
Hilary Duff’s husband Matthew Koma has entered the conversation surrounding Ashley Tisdale leaving her “toxic mom group.” Koma, 38, posted a photo of himself photoshopped onto Tisdale’s body. In the photo, he is seen sitting on a couch next to a houseplant, while wearing an all-black outfit paired with rose-tinted lensed sunglasses on his Instagram Story on Tuesday, Jan. 6.
Koma added The Cut’s logo and a fictional headline to the photo, which read “When You’re The Most Self Obsessed Tone Deaf Person On Earth, Other Moms Tend To Shift Focus To Their Actual Toddlers,” with a sub-headline that read, “A Mom Group Tell All Through A Father’s Eyes.”
“Read my new interview with @TheCut,” Koma captioned the Instagram Story post. The post appears to directly slam Tisdale’s recent personal essay published in The Cut on Monday, Jan. 5.
Tisdale, 40, kept the women from her former friend group anonymous in the piece, instead framing the experience as an empowering reminder that it is okay for anyone to walk away from relationships that no longer feel healthy.
“If a mom group consistently leaves you feeling hurt, drained or left out, it’s not the mom group for you,” Tisdale wrote. “Choosing to step away doesn’t make you mean or judgmental. It makes you honest with yourself. It’s also worth remembering that friendships, like all relationships, have seasons.”
She recalled in the personal essay that a series of small moments allegedly led her to step away from the group. The High School Musical alum said that when she realized she was no longer being invited to group hangouts, she initially brushed it off and made excuses for why she was left out.
“We were all busy, life was hectic. I told myself it was all in my head and it wasn’t a big deal,” Tisdale wrote. But after the third or fourth time she saw photos on social media of her friends together without her, she began to feel the exclusion was intentional.
“As I increasingly felt left out, I remembered something. Or rather, someone,” Tisdale recalled in the essay. “During the early days of the group, there was another mom who often wasn’t included. I’d picked up on hints of a weird dynamic, but at the time, I didn’t dwell on it too much. I was just so happy to have found these incredible, smart, funny women.”
She continued, “Now it seemed that this group had a pattern of leaving someone out. And that someone had become me. Why me? The truth is, I don’t know and I probably never will.”
“A Mom Group Tell All Through A Father’s Eyes.” Ashley may claim to not know why she was left out of group events, but it sure sounds like Matthew is dying to tell the world what went down from Hilary’s perspective. Oh please, no one take his phone away. Let that man go off and defend his wife. There’s so much bad sh-t going on in the world right now, and we need the distraction of this very low-stakes drama involving actresses/singers who were big in the early 2000s. Ashley’s former bestie, Vanessa Hudgens, has the opportunity to do the funniest thing right now.
Speaking of defending a wife’s honor, Ashley’s husband, Christopher French, also weighed in on Instagram. First, he reposted then deleted a graphic that read, “It’s your choice whether or not to engage.” After Matthew’s Instagram Story about Ashley went up, he reposted a different graphic that read, “Underrated Life Skill: Pausing to decide if it’s worth your energy.” Meh. That’s not as fun or petty as Matthew’s post, but I suppose someone has to be the adult in the room.
Hilary Duff’s husband, Matthew Koma, mocks Ashley Tisdale’s “Breaking Up With My Toxic Mom Group” article for The Cut magazine:
“When You’re The Most Self Obsessed Tone Deaf Person On Earth, Other Moms Tend To Shift Focus To Their Actual Toddlers” pic.twitter.com/PQeoCsxbED
— Pop Base (@PopBase) January 7, 2026
photos credit: Fayes Vision/startraksphoto.com/Cover Images