The Brass Neck of It. CF

[Nayyercheekyfeckers]

So, I volunteer for a local football team for kids. Last night the leader asked if anyone could pick up a new boy who was joining the club. He lives a short walk (less than ten mins) from the pitch. It's a few minutes out of my way, but apparently his mother is heavily pregnant and therefore unable to take him. I've never met him or his family before. I foolishly make the assumption that she is very heavily pregnant, doesn't drive and that she either lives alone or her husband works away. I have some sympathy because my husband works abroad so I am currently doing all the childcare, as well as working and volunteering. As a grass roots local club, inclusion is important, so I agree.

I am slightly surprised to show up at a large house with 2 cars on the drive. She confirms that I am ok to drop him back home again and I agree as I can see that she is pregnant, so I assume struggling. Upon enquiring she says that she is due in November, so not for another 2-3 months.
So imagine my surprise, upon returning their son, to find his dad stood on the drive polishing his top of the range Ferrari, having just unloaded his golf clubs!!
The mother answers the door, thanks me but says that she just wants to confirm that I will be continuing to do the lifts from now on.
I declined the offer to be their free taxi service. She was disappointed but said that she would have to contact the leader to see what he could do!

Honestly, I just don't understand. What goes on in some people's heads?? Why would anyone be happy for their young child to go off with someone they had never met before? Why couldn't she walk him there and her husband pick him up? Why couldn't she drive him there? Why couldn't her husband do the lifts? Why couldn't she arrange a lift share? There are a few other boys from the same school and class who attend and live in the same village close by. Why not pay for some wrap around care if you can afford multiple top of the range cars? Why arrange for your child to join a club, sign them up and buy new kit, without knowing how they are going to get there? The mind boggles at this level of cheeky fuckery! The more that I've thought about it, the more audacious it seems and I just needed to vent!

Come share your stories of cheeky fuckery with me.

Over the school holidays my son was invited on a play date to a friend’s house. On the day of the play date shortly before the arranged time I get a text saying ‘it would be easier if we had the play date at your house’ 👀 I was at work and my partner was sleeping off a night shift (our son was with his child minder). Blows my mind how entitled some people are.

Good for you.....

We had this when son played football. Parents prioritised church over taking / collecting their son to football matches.

Weekly, without fail they woul ask in the Whatsap group for a lift for him. His parents never witnessed him score. Poor kid

She's pregnant not dying and jumping in the car to drop him off and pick him up is hardly a labour intensive task ! I've had very high risk pregnancys and managed to take my kids where they need to go she is a CF indeed

There was a mum at primary who spent her whole life trying to get someone else to take her DD. She was a single parent so I know some people felt sorry for her (including my DH for a while).
Anyone who had a car was a particular target to drive her DD places. She did an activity after school with another child and kept making excuses why she couldn’t go - gas man, delivery, illness- to make my friend take her with her DC. Then she tried to get them to pick up dinner for her DD and then pay her fees for her and she would pay them back ‘sometime’. Friend put her foot down and stopped it all.
She used to ring me at work to drive her places or pick up her DD from school, always shocked that I was at work and wasn’t doing that anyway.
She was annoyed when she heard my DD was going to a different secondary as she would have sent hers there too as then I could have driven them both apparently!

The mum might have a high risk pregnancy. You can't tell from looking at her, or knowing when she is due. So I think your judgment of her, specifically is unfair.

However, if she has a husband who can't be bothered to take their kid somewhere because he's polishing his golf balls or similar, then there's a problem here with entitlement.

If it is that much of a chore for him, they should hire a nanny.

@BeltaLodaLife
My kids were in scouts and the swim club I volunteer at. If I am going to a gala or scouting event as a parent rather than in a volunteer role I can bring other kids with me. Otherwise I don’t. It’s that simple.
Does your child’s chess coach have a DBS check at the very least. I think he is taking a risk doing what he is doing to be honest with you.

Really not. Plenty of people involved in clubs drive kids along. From the last decade of my parenting kids in several different clubs, that’s totally normal. It’s really just mumsnet where safeguarding is constantly yelled out.

It’s not just Mumsnet.
Any organisation or club that takes child safeguarding seriously will have rules in place. I

What about the band leader? What about the music tutor they had when they were younger who drove them to competitions and grading? Or the rugby coaches who managed to get the team to most games between just their cars so parents didn’t have to go every time? I can keep listing.

I have learned that the reason a lot of people are loaded is because they have freeloaded off others for years.

Well done for saying no to their gracious offer of you getting to give their DC a lift.

Hope another adult is with you, otherwise it's an open invitation for an accusation of abuse.

There was a mother at my kids primary school who was prime CF. Our sons and then our daughters were in the same class so I've witnessed years of her crap.

She doesn't drive and was always pestering other parents to take her rude, badly behaved children here there and everywhere. Three years running she asked me to give her daughter a lift to and from my own child's party. First time I agreed as we were going to an activity centre. The other two times I said no because I was already busy setting up and clearing up the party that I was actually hosting! Both times she was all "oh what am I going to doooo? I don't driiiive?" I suggested her husband gave child a lift, and her response was "oh no haha he likes to relax at the weekend not run the kids about". But thought it fine for other parents to spend their weekends running her kids around.

I wondered if they just didn't have the money for her to learn how to drive. That theory was blown out of the water when their son reached 17 and was promptly given driving lessons and his own car. Apparently it's important for men to be able to drive but "ladies should be driven". FFS.

What about them? Organisations have introduced child welfare and safeguarding policies because of horrific abuse.
Any organisation or club which doesn’t have a policy that it implements with rigour is not one I would get involved with.

She doesn’t mention her own child?
My other leader got asked which was her dd and the mum looked very perplexed when she said I’m child free. My dc is an adult now. Some people do just volunteer.
I wouldn’t be in a 1-1 situation with a child.

Stories like these are why myself and my DH gave up volunteering and have no plans to take it up again now that our kids are grown. It's a shame, because it can be good fun and provides a lot of social enrichment for everyone involved but too many people try to take advantage or simply do not appreciate that activities only run because people are kind enough to give up their time. When did we become so entitled as a society?

Akela lives just round the corner from us. Known her for years.

We had long term guests from abroad. Their eldest child joined cubs.

Unknown to us Mum had asked if Akela could bring eldest home on several occasions.

Cubs is less than 10 min walk away.

Eventually Akela had a chat with me and said it put her in an awkward position - not allowed to, safeguarding, sometimes went home via shops etc etc. She would in dire emergency but not just when it was inconvenient for Mum to go out.

So we had to have a word, explain what 'not allowed' means, how safeguarding works. That what might happen in other places doesn't here.

Without us having to explain it'd still be going on now - and not just bringing back, taking too.

All sorted happily.

We got so tired of same ones bumming lifts (twins) the mam would ask in app. Silence. Nobody replied as was never a one off. I help anyone but tired of cfs lol

And transporting kids is very much part of a lot of organisations, which all have codes of conduct and DBS and all the rest of it.

For goodness sake, my kids get a taxi to school every day. Let me guess, you wouldn’t get involved with that taxi company?

On the other side of this (sort of) I volunteered a few times at my youngest children's very m/c, lentil weaving primary school
They were always asking for volunteers for school fetes and discos, so I thought I'd give it a go.
Sadly, I clearly wasn't Quite Their Class and they just ignored me every single time tinkly laughing amongst themselves and occasionally giving me something to do...sod that
At least I tried!

Doesn't surprise me at all.

I encountered one particularly cheeky CF when I was a Scout Leader years ago. I blocked her number eventually after repeated requests to take her son home after Scouts (to his perfectly-able grandparents!). Her excuse was that she had a toddler to put to bed, well so did I at the time (and no grandparents to help out). She eventually found other people to do her running-around. Now I know a bit more about her, I believe she drinks - a lot.

Can't stand people like it. My youngest son was regularly taken to pick up the older from his activities in cute little sleepsuits.

Well done for volunteering for the FC. My boys both played with the local team from age 4-16. Forever grateful to the volunteers who give up their time and are such good role models.

I agree. It reminds of Shania Twain's 'That don't impress me much' when she sings that he likes to shine his machine 😂

So, polishing the Ferrari is more important that collecting their child from an activity? Mmmm.

I do wonder if the mother isn't getting much support from her partner & is struggling? I mean, what man with children has a car like a Ferrari which can't accommodate children as a vanity? What a Dick! I feel for his poor partner who has to deal with him as I'm sure she has a man-child.

However, not your problem.

I used to love collecting my DCs from their activities as I had the opportunity to talk to them about what they'd done, how they felt about it & share in their successes &, sometimes, failures.

Having said that, thank you for reminding me - just remembered I need to check car's tyre pressures as I have a warning notice telling me that they are low. I know from experience this means that one tyre is about 3 points lower than it should be, but can't take the risk. DH can't do it as he's collecting GDs from Brownies & bringing them back to our's for their tea as their parents are both working. I've had a bolognaise sauce in the slow cooker all day - can't wait. 😋

They may well be CF's, bit can I just add a different perspective?
I got totally pissed off ( many years ago) taking a young girl along to a drama group with my son. My son knew her vaguely, and she asked me if she could come with us in future, as her mum couldn't bring her any longer.
To cut a VERY long story short, dad objected to the petrol use. He also would not let them use heating in the winter, their house was like a fridge, he would not allow any lunches/coffees .
It was horrible, no matter what anyone said, or did, mum did what he said.
All I could do was take the daughter to all rehearsals/meetups.

Daughter is now a jobbing 'part' actor. I get a wobble every time I see her on screen 😆
I don't know about mum, but know she is still with the knob, so assume she freezes in winter and starves in summer.

I would always, even now in my dotage, ignore the (fucking useless) parents, and help the child.

Well done for declining to do the parents' job for them.

You could have had fun by agreeing to do it and then not showing up.

Then when CFMomma cried about it, you could deny her crazy request and say you never agreed to jack shit! 😂

Actually perhaps "polishing one's car" would be even better.