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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

4yr olds in pushchairs

383 replies

SEH23 · 17/11/2014 15:55

aaaaahhh!!! i made my annual trip into the town shopping centre for christmas shopping today with my 5 month old DD.

LIFTS!! wow i hate them more than ever. waiting alongside 4 other pushchairs and then the mom with her 3-4yr old in pushchair pushes infront of me... WHAT?!?

a) wait your fucking turn
b) do you really need a buggy for children that old?

i hate my pushchair and can't wait for my DD to start walking so i can leave it behind. absolutely acknowledge shopping centres are busy etc but this child looked miserable, had a dummy stuck in his mouth and could be on reigns? surely?

OP posts:
socially · 17/11/2014 16:55

YABU for taking a 5 month old Xmas shopping.

Are you nuts? Smile

MiddletonPink · 17/11/2014 16:56

Was just about to say what MrsDevere said so I won't bother.

Bulbasaur · 17/11/2014 16:57

Is the child being quiet and not screaming his head off, causing a headache to the rest of the shoppers?

No?

Then she's doing this parenting thing correctly. :)

UncleSue · 17/11/2014 16:58

Far too old, ridiculous. I agree with you. I took great joy in disposing of the pushchairs when dc were 2.

raltheraffe · 17/11/2014 16:59

Also how can you know a child with a dummy in looks miserable? You cannot exactly see a frown due to the dummy.

fuckwitteryhasform · 17/11/2014 17:01

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Sirzy · 17/11/2014 17:01

I took great joy in disposing of the pushchairs when dc were 2.

Well aren't you lucky to have 'perfect' children then

MrsDeVere · 17/11/2014 17:05

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

fuckwitteryhasform · 17/11/2014 17:06

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

zazzie · 17/11/2014 17:07

How do you know that your child won't need a buggy when they are 4? Or older than that.

Hakluyt · 17/11/2014 17:09

I hung on to pushchairs as long as I could possibly persuade y children to get in them. Easy to get places quickly if we needed to, a refuge and safe place for a tired or worried child and somewhere to put the shopping. What's not to like?

fairylightsintheloft · 17/11/2014 17:09

what every one else has said. DD is 3.5 and we go for months without the buggy, and then she'll go through a little phase of wanting to be in it and I love it - I whizz in and out of shops, can hang bags off it, am not herding her, carrying her when she tires. After a week the novelty wears off and it goes back in the garage. She uses it more in the cold so I suspect it'll be ditched after this winter but til then, meh.

RandallFloyd · 17/11/2014 17:10

ForeverDepressed and UncleSue, have you read any of the thread at all?

Bulbasaur · 17/11/2014 17:10

Barring abuse, I don't see why any method of keeping a child calm and quiet on a long shopping trip would be frowned upon.

It's like you some of you guys would rather see these children run amok in the stores touching everything and getting in the way for the sake of no longer being in a buggy.

Letting the child lead his own milestones isn't exactly lazy parenting, it's letting the child develop at his own pace, as he should.

flack · 17/11/2014 17:11

i have a 2.7yr old and as haven't used her pushchair for about a year now. but i also don't take her shopping in the city as i don't see it fun for her at all.

But if you HAD to use the pushchair to get your shopping done, plus lots of other walking errands on a daily basis, don't you think maybe it might be nice to make your life easier & bring a pushchair?

I'll confess to being very Envy that you don't have to take the 2yo with you on shopping trips. And everywhere else. Like doctor or friends or post office. Presumably you don't drive either because after all what else is a car but a giant motorised pushchair for everybody so I know you can't approve of cars for adults either. How the Hell do you Swing leaving the 2yo behind all the time?

usualsuspect333 · 17/11/2014 17:11

Me too, Hak.

I encouraged mine to use the buggy if I was going into town, even when they were 3 ,shock horror.

NellysKnickers · 17/11/2014 17:12

Sorry replied before reading whole thread as mobile site playing up and now see you have a 2 year old too. Wait until she's bigger and you take her shopping without a pushchair, do come back and let us know how it goes

Kellie1991 · 17/11/2014 17:13

I want to know how u determined the age of the child!?

My son is very tall for his age he is only 2 and a half but the size of many four or five year old children! Because of his age he cant walk if we are out all day... Not only that but if we are in a busy shopping centre there is no way I would have him walking incase he went missing he is so young he would just dander off if I had my head turned for 30 secs!

And I am totally fed up of people looking at me in disgust with him in his pram yet when I look down they have a child that looks the same age as him only not as tall in a flipping pram!

Also what if the child has additional needs and cannot walk or cannot walk long distances?

I don't think you can judge these situations just by looking at a child in a pram!

I encourage my son to walk and we have reins which we use if we are out for a walk or if we are just doing a short distance into town but there's no way he would walk to the bus stop, around a shopping centre all day and then home again from the bus stop... He still takes a little nap in the pram if we are out for long walks!

PepsiTwirl · 17/11/2014 17:13

The child may have some special need??

Ever think about that???

GinGenie · 17/11/2014 17:15

My dd is nearly 1 and will never walk. She has legs, they just dont work. Cant wait for this judgy horse shit when shes getting too big for the pushchair. You know, before she has her wheelchair. Yipee.

Wind your neck in OP.

IgnoreMeEveryOtherReindeerDoes · 17/11/2014 17:17

must leave the thread and bite my tongue very hard

pumpkinsweetie · 17/11/2014 17:17

Imo most people that complain about 3-4 yo being in buggies, normally have cars they ferry their children about in or had/have perfectly behaved/and/or not disabled or Sn children.

A:If you have a car, you do not truly know what carrying a screaming child 2 miles home is like!
B:If you have perfectly behaved children:good for you, but don't judge as one day no2 might not be so gracious! !
C:If you have never had a disabled child, don't judge.
D:If you have never had an sn child, don't judge what you don't know!

It isn't lazy parenting in most cases, it's about getting from A to B without meltdowns or because a child's little legs will not make a 4 mile round trip or simply because the child has a disability.

I don't drive and most of my 5 dc were out of the pushchair by 3 yo, but when it come to dd3 I had no choice as we had further to walk and she had meltdowns which meant either putting her in the buggy or carry a screaming heavy child, with shopping over my shoulder whilst people gawped at us! So she stayed in the buggy until reception

PepsiTwirl · 17/11/2014 17:18

I had a 5 year old in a pushchair once.
It wasn't his, it belonged to his 2 year old brother who was walking.
The 5 year old wasn't very well but we had to go out to the walk in clinic so had to use a bus. Some of the looks....

Take your judgey pants off

DixieNormas · 17/11/2014 17:19

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

PepsiTwirl · 17/11/2014 17:20

My niece, around 10 at the time.
Broke her leg, got tired very easily, and we and was using a pushchair as we couldn't get a wheelchair.

People stopped us in the street to tell us that we shouldn't have a big child in the pushchair... Like Angry Angry Angry Angry Angry Angry