This couple in A&E.

[JustDontWantToSay]

I am sitting in A&E. There is a couple here with a child about a year old. It has been very good but about an hour ago started crying and rubbing her eyes, obviously exhausted.

The father is playing on his phone, the mother is eating a packet of crisps and both are totally ignoring the child, leaving her to sit in a chair, on her own and cry. The child is clearly used to being ignored and every so often the mother glances over and says "Oh the drama" with accompanying eye roll.

AIBU to offer to cuddle the child to sleep myself????? ð???ð???ð???ð??¡

No YWNBU.

This post has made me sad :(

I doubt that'll help.. Most babies don't take kindly to strangers cuddling them.

Yabu. The child could have been running riot and driving them mad before you got there. Don't judge on a snapshot!

Not really. Yanbu but you know that already. Poor kid :(

Yeah I'm not sure there's anything practically you can actually do to help but I would be having a good old guilt-free judge if I were in your position.

I hate seeing distressed children being ignored.

"oh the drama" is a very weird thing to say whilst sat in A&E. Little girl is obviously poorly/hurting enough that she needs medical help otherwise they wouldn't be there?!
I would want to give her a cuddle too, poor thing

I'd be tempted to say 'would you like me to sit with her for a while to give you a break?'

Yes, 'the break' bit might be a bit false but if they say yes then the child gets some comfort and it doesn't really matter how you offer it.

What a terrible mother eating some crisps. Call childline now.

The father may be messaging family to update them or the babysitter for another child of theirs.

You just don't know OP. I'm not saddened by a post saying a child is tired.

YABU for being so judgey.

The nursing staff usually notice this sort of thing. Poor mite

The mother can't have been eating a packet of crisps for an hour, surely!

Who do you guess they are there for? I'm presuming it's not the baby....

Most babies don't want to be cuddled to sleep by someone they've never met...wouldn't stop me raising my eyebrows, though.

At my local A&E the nursing staff don't have time to notice what's going on in the waiting room!

Leaving a child crying for an hour anywhere without trying to comfort them is awful. In an A and E situation where people are feeling stressed and in pain its even worse and unfair on others.

Is the child the patient or one of the parents? if the latter the really the parents should either be finding someone else to come and look after the duaghter or the unijured one taking her out for a walk or whatever to calm her

How can you decide a child is used to being ignored from observing one hour in the long hot wait at an A&E department?

Of all the places to judge parenting.

I would imagine that all concerned are severely stressed and tired and probably not quite at the top of their game.

If you want to help, offer to do so, sincerely, but one of my DS's hated being cuddled to sleep - the only way was to let him moan himself to sleep. Mother's remarks are probably because she's embarrassed but if she doesn't have a pushchair etc to put her in and take her to sleep outside, what else can she do?

In this heat the baby is possibly best not being held but if you want to offer a cuddle do.

I don't think you have enough information to judge. My dn will cry at the littlest thing all the time so everyone has started to ignore the crying.

my 18 month old cried for almost 45 minutes because i refused to allow him to cuddle the bleach (caught him wrapping his arms around it) thanks to my teen who had left it where he could get it FORTY FIVE DAMM MINUTES i rolled my eyes a few times too

Sorry - to be clear - I wouldn't actually have offered. That would have been inappropriate. It would have been better to say aibu to WANT to cuddle the child to sleep myself.

Judging - yes. But it was solely motivated by seeing this poor little crying girl, rubbing her eyes, absolutely exhausted and the parents doing absolutely nothing. There wasn't even a pushchair or anything for her to sleep in.

They were there for the father - an ankle injury that didn't stop him walking around outside to smoke (yes, judging, but it's called accident and emergency for a reason). If the mother had looked stressed or whatever then maybe I wouldn't have found it so upsetting but any child of mine in that place at night would have been in a pushchair being rocked to sleep.

She was also left to crawl around on the filthy floor. Every so often the mother glanced over and said "Get up! Get up off the floor! No? All right, 1...2....3..." to a child who was clearly far too young to understand discipline like that.

I suspected that the child was used to being ignored because she didn't try and continue her attempts at attention - she just sat there and cried alone.

And yes, of course I don't know the exact circumstances but I am only commenting on one tiny bit of today. I'm sure they are probably examples to us all the rest of the time.

Yanbu

Poor baby

There are some shitty parents around. Poor child.

Yanbu

That would make me sad

I wonder at what point it will become unusual to excuse piss-poor parenting on here while hiding behind "just a snapshot".

YANBU.

I agree with Glitter.

Yanbu, totally horrible. How on earth does this sound like "severely stressed" parents? They sound vile, poor kid.