Weird interaction with another mum?

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Had a slightly weird interaction with another mum yesterday, but don’t know if I am missing something

In the park, my son (8) threw a stone, which hit a boy (maybe around 4) on the leg. I didn’t see this happen I was in front of my son, but as soon as it happened he came and told me what he did and what happened. I look at the family and their son is in tears, obviously hurt, and they are looking furiously at me. Which is totally understandable.

So after telling my son off, I say to him we need to go over there and you need to apologise for what you did.

So we go over,
My son - sorry
Her - nothing
Me - we’re sorry, my son did a really naughty thing
Her - what am I supposed to do with that?

Is that a weird reaction? I said - well nothing, it’s an apology, but there’s nothing more we can do to make the situation better. And I told her that my son had to own it and apologise.

She then was just going on about how he threw a stone, was showing me the stone. I was saying I know, hence we’re apologising.

So this just kept happening and we ended up just walking off.

Is that all a bit weird? I suppose was expecting her to be cross, to tell us off, but the whole dismissal of the apology really threw me off! What else should we have done? I left feeling really confused and wound up by the whole thing!

You reprimanded your son, and apologised to the mother, as well as your son doing so. I do not see what else there was to do. Move on.

Yeah thanks. I mean, I thought so too. I guess I'm a little confused by her reaction. I'm not sure what else we could have done either.

At first, when she said "What am I supposed to do with that" I thought, does she want money? 😂 It really threw me

I wouldn’t know what to say to “sorry” either other than say “that’s okay” - which wouldn’t be true if my child was upset.

I suppose you could sternly say “Thankyou for apologising, he’s very hurt and throwing stones is wrong!” but it would feel like having to parent another child in front of their mother, which would also be uncomfortable.

Your son could have said it directly to the boy when he felt better and came back to play.

I think she was maybe just furious and she felt that saying I’m sorry was inadequate.
maybe she felt you didn’t tell your son off sharply enough. Throwing a stone is very dangerous and could result in a serious injury. Maybe you should’ve said to him, “you can absolutely never do that, you could’ve seriously injured a small child, we’re going home right now” etc. I think it’s not just that it’s naughty, it’s just absolutely not on, and you need to clearly communicate that to your son in no uncertain terms. Maybe she felt that you were too soft about it?
having said that some people are also pretty harsh. I remember once opening my car door and very gently touching another car with the door . It didn’t scratch but could have so I went “oh I’m sorry!” tk the driver standing next to her car and all she did was give me the evil eye, just stared at me angrily. Didn’t respond at all.
Really depends on why your son threw the stone, did he mean to hit the other kid, was he being playful and it was an accident, or was he trying to hurt him?

slightly weird. I’d expect her to be cross, and /or comforting her child.

If I was the mum, I would probably acknowledge that you had come to apologise and realise it was an accident. I may even thank you for making the effort to apologise!

Yeah I did think this might be it. My son knew it was really bad, hence telling me (I wouldn't even have known he'd done it if not). And he was really upset about it. And I told him how dangerous it could have been. I was really cross with him.

But afterwards, I did wonder if it looked like A - I wasn't paying enough attention to him, which allowed it to happen. Which is fair. And B - She didn't think I was taking it seriously enough.

And she was really cross about it, and really upset. So I guess she thought the apology wasn't enough.

I was then wondering, what else I could have done. So maybe I should have laboured the point about how dangerous it was etc.

Yeah if your son had come up to us and apologised I'd have said thank you for that apology. I wouldn't have been expecting it TBH.

The end.

Your son is 8 and did a silly thing. He will have learned a lot by the outcome & probably won't do it again. It took some courage to apologise to strangers & you took appropriate action as a parent.

Mum was being weird. As you say, what more could be done?

Of course not! He was holding it and then just chucked it away. I think it bounced on the floor and then hit him. But I don't know, as I didn't see it. My son was really upset, it wasn't on purpose.

No he didn't, but not I'm wondering if that's what she thought.

Children who don't belong to you become really difficult to like when they do unlikeable things. I maybe wouldn't have been very graceful either even though you did a good thing but as long as I had taken my HRT I would try hard not to let the kid see I didn't like him, he's just a kid. But in private it's a good idea to teach him that as he gets older, people simply walk away from people who behave like idiots.

She sounds like a twat, she obviously never learnt graciously accept an apology. I doubt anything you did would be good enough. Some people really seem to love being enraged at others, I suspect boosts their rock bottom self esteem in some way.

I'm wondering if she was really angry, furious with me. So didn't want to accept the apology. I dunno.

Anyway, really good to hear everyone's opinions anyway. And like most people, I would have taken the apology, maybe told the other child he'd hurt mine etc etc. But yeah, who knows.

Out of interest did she have a newborn with her?

First outing with my new DC2 an older kid accidentally kicked my DC1 over and I went mildly nuts (to be fair he was way too big for the equipment he was on but I normally wouldn't have said anything).

My hormones were fried and I cried for an hour (after apologising for over reacting) afterwards.

Probably a bit specific for this scenario 😂

I’d have probably told you your DS needs to see a therapist tbh.

A therapist? For throwing a stone? What is a therapist supposed to do about that?

No, but that's a good point. She was with what looked like a lot of family members, but I think he was only kid amongst them. I did also wonder, maybe she's got loads of other shit going on her life and this pushed her over the edge!

She's a twunt.

Your ds is 8yo. Did a stupid thing without thinking through any consequences (even unintentional ones) and then was honest enough to own it and approach the person to apologise.

No one is suggesting she says "oh that's ok".

But a simple thankyou for acknowledging and apologising wouldn't have been amiss.

And I'm assuming it wasn't a boulder he lobbed directly at his shin - so I doubt he's that injured!

I grew up adjacent to a pebbly beach and survived a childhood of being hit by wayward pebbles 😂

She was fuming and was trying to keep it inside, rather than give your 8 year old a mouthful I expect.

People deal with anger differently 🤷‍♀️

Yeah I reckon this might be it. Especially if she thought he'd done it on purpose

Blimey, accidents happen in playgrounds.
All the time
Across the land

I’d have probably told you your DS needs to see a therapist tbh.

This is a joke yeah?

Otherwise an adult who reacts to an 8 yr old for chucking a stone and it accidentally hitting another child's leg like this needs the therapy, not the 8 year old.

It was an accident. He didn't mean to hurt the little boy, he apologised.
There things happen. The mother was behaving in an odd way I wouldn't worry about it.

Edited to say I didn't mean to include that quote which isn't relevant to my comment.

I think what you did was fine and can see that the interaction felt awkward for you, but maybe it did to her too and she wasn't sure how to respond. A slightly different situation, but it reminds me of a time when there was a knock on my door and a mother and her son (7ish) were there. The mother then proceeded to make her son apologise for the fact that he'd thrown gravel into my front garden. I had been inside and didn't know (or particularly care) and it felt very odd being coerced into joining in with disciplining her child (which is what it did feel like, she clearly wanted me to back her up). I think I just shrugged and said not to worry or something, which doubtless annoyed her, but I really felt put on the spot, and quite sorry for the child who was clearly mortified by the whole thing.