Public tantrum - comments

This boils my pee. Why should a child who is engrossed in what they are doing have to stop and share because some unruly brat decided they want what you son had. I utterly hate it when children have to ' give up what they are doing ' under the guise of sharing . We as adults don't take things from other adults. Sharing is very overated.

You can't always avoid them, unfortunately. I guess with mine I always took them out of the venue to calm down, because it sometimes helps with "out of sight, out of mind". But it's a play area for preschoolers, what do they expect?

Toddlers gonna toddler. They do dumb stuff, naughty stuff, test boundaries, upset each other, cry, then they get over it. A lot of parents take it all far too seriously these days and get offended over tiny wee bairns just doing what they do. You can't control those types of parents, only how you react to them.

DGD has ADHD (we think) and used to have epic meltdowns at that age. In the scenario you mention she would probably have run after the other kid, grabbed the blocks back again and whacked them over the head with them for good measure (with me in hot pursuit!) all whilst screaming the place down. So I don't think what you or your DS did was bad at all OP. I would guess the member of staff either didn't have DC or was suffering from selective memory loss.

YES! I often remind the preschoolers I work with that sharing doesn't mean having to let both use the toy at the same time, but rather allowing others to have a turn.

Blocks! They are an unending cause of conflict in these play places. My grandchildren have been both victims and perpetrators. However it does take a split second for havoc to ensue. Much more than with normal toy tussles.

I'd be inclined to enter a complaint in that case. She's blatantly in the wrong job if she thinks a crying child in a venue like that is in any way unusual.

I’m surprised any adult would be shocked at a toddler having a tantrum to be honest😂

The only thing I’d have done differently is intervene to stop the other child from snatching/taking it in the first place. I try really hard to teach my toddler to share/take turns etc, if another parent isn’t prepared to do that then okay BUT I’m not going to let their child snatch/take from mine.

I don’t blame him for being upset, if he was building his tower and another kid took it.

The parent should have intervened. And INO it’s ok to say to another kid ‘Ds is playing with that would you like this / wait for him to finish?’

We expect our children just to ‘share’ without upset. Adults aren’t expected to just have a library book taken off them if they are reading in the library, or headphones snatched if listening to the commentary in a museum.

Anyway, you did nothing wrong, Just get on with being the best parent you can on any given moment, with confidence.

This sounds like normal toddler times.
sorry a judgey a-hole did that to you

I’d have told her to fuck off

Oh don't worry about mad old bats judging. I have 3 DC. One of them once bolted in a busy shopping centre. I had to run after him and tackle him to the ground while he wailed loudly and struggled to get free. There was really nothing to do except to sort of scoot out of the main path of people and hold him until he calmed down and stopped screaming. An older woman decided it would be helpful to stop nearby, shake her head, tut, and say "Unbelievable!" Luckily I wasn't upset by this as I knew that I was already handling it in the best way and I assume that she probably thought I ought to have smacked him or something, which I wasn't prepared to do and obviously didn't need to do, as he did calm down after a few more minutes.

He is now 7 and no longer has tantrums in shopping centres or at least he hasn't for a while. He has ADHD and possibly autism so he does still have tantrums (well, meltdowns) but much less often now.

My approach to public judgement these days is to make the assumption that whatever they think I should be doing probably isn't something I'd consider very good advice anyway, this makes it much easier for it not to bother you so much. And most people are kind or at the very least they are simply thinking it's none of their business. I try to give a kind word if I pass a parent dealing with a stressful moment. Another thing that can help with perspective is that often people don't have the full context, e.g. sometimes if somebody doesn't have children themselves, they don't know necessarily what is realistic or appropriate. So they might comment that your child is loud but realistically, what can you do to stop them being loud? They don't come with a volume control. But if someone doesn't have children, they might not know that children are sometimes loud and you can't do anything about it. Or with my DS they might look at him and think he's too old to be throwing a tantrum, but not realise that he's actually overwhelmed and is having a meltdown.

Don't stress. As long as you're happy with the way you're handling things, you can't please everybody else in the world.

This. Three year olds scrap with each other, throw massive tantrums, embarrass their parents, and are a nightmare. 😂

It passes.

Well maybe that’s why it’s hit a nerve this time. Shy isn’t perceived as a bad thing usually, being loud/tantrums are perceived as naughty by some people. Let it roll off your back, he’s a normal three year old with normal behaviour, the woman doesn’t know what she’s talking about.

If it makes you feel better once some old woman made a comment about DD throwing a wobbly and I told her to “fuck off and bite me if you still have any teeth”. I was running on fumes and it definitely wasn’t my best moment but now I look back and it’s petty funny.

I dont know how to deal with this and who is right or wrong. The toys in these areas don’t “belong” to anyone. However it is annoying when your child is playing happily and another child takes the toy and the parent ignores, pretends they didn’t see or bangs on about sharing. The building blocks issue is worse as not only do they “take” the blocks but they seem to be a magnet for other kids to kick over often devastatingly little builder. The whole sharing thing bemuses me. Say some stranger walked up and took your phone to play with, food from your plate or a book you were reading would you accept as it’s good to learn to share? Is the sharing only with communal stuff so it would be ok if someone took a book you were browsing in the library?
As for saying child too noisy how absurd. Children can be ear splitting when upset and it’s common in okay areas.

One of my DCs was a particularly loud screamer - he seemed to find an especially painful pitch and would escalate fast. I learned to scoop him up and take him outside - often the cooler air would snap him out of his tantrum and it meant I didn’t have to deal with people looking (or subject them to his screaming). It helped me stay calmer too.

sounds as if you handled it perfectly. Staff member was a knob. My kids are adults now but I used to hate taking them to soft play etc because of the lack of supervision some parents gave to their pre school children, and the unacceptable behaviour that ensued from some of said children which went uncorrected/unchallenged because useless parent was too busy having a coffee with their friends and ignoring their very small children 😡

It’d be a very unusual toddler who’s never had a tantrum in public!

They’re full of big emotions that they’re still learning how to handle, and it’s normal for them to have tantrums sometimes when they’re upset or overwhelmed. Mine certainly did. I imagine that most of the other parents were just glad that it wasn’t their child.

There’s not a lot you can do in the moment other than ride it out, and it sounds like you did a good job calming him down.
Easier said than done, but try to ignore the judgy staff member. Clearly she doesn’t have much experience with small children to be talking like that.

Just to add yes the woman’s comment was unnecessary and not helpful, but why are you taking it so personally. It’s a reflection on her attitude not your parenting. You handled the situation fine at the time, stop overthinking it.

Honestly op you need to toughen up. You’re hugely overreacting to a total non issue. Your kid doesn’t sound a “sensitive little soul” more than any other 3 year old. Kids throw tantrums, it won’t be his last. You’re even being sensitive to the teeeeniest bit of perceived criticism on here. Try and get a thicker skin, you’ve got a long few years of raising your kid ahead of you and overreacting to minor situations won’t help.

I don't think you should feel judged because I don't think she was judging you, she just commented on the noise.

Don't sweat it, OP. The other parent was a bit shit. I have four kids and dgaf anymore and would have taken the blocks back from the other kid who was snatching if the parent wasn't going to do anything.

Woman who made comments is frankly bizarre. Kids make noise. That's where she works - surely she's used to it?! I can only think she had a headache or was having a bad day for some other reason - it's no reflection on you.