Perspective needed - I made another Mum cry yesterday.

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I need some help to decide if what I did was ok, I felt right about it in the moment but then this poor woman cried and I feel worried I did wrong. Tell me what you think.

I was at a busy playpark yesterday with lots of children. There is a tall treehouse thing which has a slide out of it. There are steps around the back to get up to it, but doing this is out of eyeline of the slide.
There was a small boy, probably nearly 3ish, at the top of the slide he wasn't coming down but wasn't letting anyone past. His mum was at the bottom of the slide cajoling him 'come down x, come on darling, ok well let the other children come down etc'. He wasn't moving, this continued for 3 or 4 minutes. During which time the queue of children waiting snaked all the way back through the tree house and down the step sections.

Not sure why, but then he turned and started to hit the other children around him. Really hitting hard, one little girl next to him in particular was getting beaten around the head and face. His mum then walked off around the back to go up and get him. Lots of parents at the foot of the slide were shouting at the little boy to stop hitting, there were 4 children crying from being attacked and he wasn't stopping. So I ran up the slide to get to him and took his hands and said 'don't hit them, it's not kind'. The mother then appears behind him and sharply tells me 'I can handle this'. She lifts him down the steps. I go back down the slide.

A few minutes later she appears beside me telling me she doesn't think I needed to intervene, that my child wasn't in danger from him. I told her that none of those children up there were my children actually, mine had changed her mind and left the queue. I calmly told her that he was hurting and scaring the children and I couldn't let him do that. She said 'he is very tired and only little' so I replied ' I totally understand that, we all have days like this, but I had to step in, he was really hurting them'. Then she burst into tears. I told her it was ok, we all have days like this. But then her friend came over, gave me an evil look and took her away.

I feel bad now that she cried, but I also feel like there were 4 children crying and scared. Did I do the wrong thing?

As for the posts saying don't touch a child, she held his hands which is appropriate here. Totally appropriate to tell off a child who's hurting another. IP sounds very calm and reasonable

I think it is sad that we live in an era where people are scared of intervening. If you see something that is unacceptable or dangerous or harmful, I think it is entirely right that a bystander intervenes. What is this "no touch" nonsense, OP held his hands to stop him hitting the other children, thank god she did, the other parents shouting at the bottom were doing nothing but creating more drama. A calm, quiet, firm approach was needed, the other mother, on reflection, may have even been grateful for the help.

If she didn't want anyone touching her child, she should have dealt with the situation herself. I would have done the same if other children were being hit. I imagine she was probably just having a bad day and embarrassed.

You knew she was heading up there, and was about to deal with it so why not leave it to her?

Secondly it didn't even concern your child, so the parents of the other children should have gone instead of you (if they felt they needed to)

And lastly how do you know for sure they didn't hurt him first?? He may have been protecting himself and out of your eye line he too could have been hurt.

I am sorry op, but you were totally out of order getting involved when you knew the mother was rushing up there to do this herself.

Nicknacky - but he was attacking their children. It’s not on, and the sooner he learns that the better. No matter what hel is feeling sweet at the time, it’s not ok to turn to the girl next to you and smash her in the face, the sooner he learns that, the better.

Don’t agree. Strangers do not get to touch you. This is what we teach children so why is it ok for OP to have done this.

I really disagree that it is okay for you to touch him, it absolutely isn't okay and not your place as a stranger (especially when his mother was making her way to him)

Sounds like a right mountain out of a molehill to be honest. Both of you over reacted a bit.

YWNBU. If he had been causing problems and stopping other children getting past and he were mine I would have been straight up there, never mind waiting until the hitting started.

Someone did need to step in and you didn't know when the mum was going to do anything.

You were sympathetic towards her. Others might have had a go at her. I wouldn't worry too much.

Strangers, the police etc DO get to touch you if you are attacking others.

It’s not like he was blowing raspberries in the corner and OP rugby tackled him through a window.

He was attacking other children. She stopped him. That’s a normal response to the situation

Other parents shouting and the mother cajoling was only exacerbating things, the situation needed to be stopped and that's what the OP did, so that's it done

doras And the mother was dealing with it. She reached him at about the same time the op did so why not just let mum deal with her own kid?

And let’s calm down with the emotive language. “Smash her in the face”??

There’s a right mountain being made out of a molehill on this thread...
You TOUCHED him!!

Wtf?

Yeah, if it’s a male hitting a female we shouldn’t use language like ‘smash her in the face.’ Would ‘expressed himself physically’ be better?

After all, he was upset, so what do the girls he hit matter?

For people saying it's not OK for op to have intervened what if one of the children who was being hit had pushed the child and the child died or something horrible would have happened then what would it still be unreasonable for someone to intervene. No harm was done by the op!

"strangers do not get to touch you"

Too right.

That includes a child, of any age, beating others up.

OP, YWNBU. She'll intervene sooner next time hopefully, as soon as she sees her child misbehaving/starting to be violent.

Why is it being suggested that the little boy has SEN? To the pp who has diagnosed him.

SEN and bad behaviour are not mutually exclusive.
I have a 15yr old with AS and he has never behaved like that but have a 7yr old without SEN who has had some almighty tantrums over the years.

SEN do not give you a hall pass to hit other children and there is no suggestion of additional needs from the op.
From experience when my ds has been hit over the years at soft play or parks etc then parents tend to apologise and IF there are additional needs then lots of parents will explain this. Appreciate some don't of course.

Just seeing too much on here of SEN being to blame for any form of bad behaviour.

I wonder if the child had special needs or the mother is at a point of suspecting that he does. I remember finding it hard to manage my DS2 with SN at that age; he wasn't violent, but he wouldn't co-operate in groups, would do things like get stuck at the top of a slide etc. It is a really difficult time if you are in that position where you are trying to include your child in things, but they don't behave like the other children and then the differences are rubbed in. You also feel very protective towards your child, if you feel that they can't understand what's going on fully. I was frequently on the verge of tears at that point.
I am not saying you did anything wrong, but just offering a possible explanation for the whole incident.

Strangers, the police etc DO get to touch you if you are attacking others.

OP is not the police. And this “it’s ok for strangers to touch you” in certain situations blurs the lines. If a man came up to me in the park and held my hand, I’d be pretty fucked off and I imagine a lot of people would be. Also the police can’t just stop and search you, they need reasonable cause so that’s completely moot point.

As I said, OP was NU except that she touched him and the Mum was already dealing with it. You undermined her.

I do like the concept of other parents having to let children hit their own children and not stop it. Seems a little enabling of violence to me.

But some people cant look past their own precious offspring and ignore the harm they are doing.

And if he was very little and tired, she should have removed him from blocking everyone else's fun earlier.

doras Now you are just being ridiculous.

Oh god, now we have a poster saying “what if he pushed someone and they died”!!!!!!

Let’s keep it in perspective.

OP, you said you saw the mum had moved to try and get him - did you intervene because you were nearer or something? I’m not sure I quite understand this bit.

Not saying you were wrong, but just that I can understand the other mum being upset if she was on her way to deal with it and she perceived it as you just being superior and getting in there first to be the hero.

Just kids though isn’t it? She’ll get over this and move on.

YANBU, if my daughter was hitting and someone was able to get to her before me then I'd be grateful they'd stopped her! And shes only just turned 2, a 3 year old hitting could be very hard its not like a small toddler.

A 3 year old certainly can hit and hurt! You did that right thing Op. "thanks for your help" would have been a more sensible response from her.