Friend wants to report couple at soft play?

[HavenforHaggis]

I'm actually bewildered by it all but would like some opinions. A friend I met at a baby group a few months ago became quite close to me and since we have DC of the same age we take them to a local soft play. It was packed so we asked a couple who had a DS of around 2 if we could share the sofa/table near the toddler pit that they occupied, they agreed with no problem. When snack time came about the boy's father picked him up and sat him on a high chair to feed him, the boy refused the food a few times so the father held the boy's face to get him to try the food which distressed him a bit. My friend commented that the boy seemed upset which caused his mum to explain to us that he had autism and quite a few sensory processing disorders so getting him to eat new textures is a challenge. She went on to say that he would happily live off his bottles of cows milk and has to be 'forced' to try our type of food as he does eat it after a few tries. I told her I understood as my own DD has autism.

I felt a bit bad for the mum as she felt the need to explain this to us but I thought that was the end of it until friend and I left. She commented that the father seemed to be 'domineering' his son and forcing him to eat like that while he was distressed was borderline abusive and that she has half a mind to report him. We're sitting in a cafe and she's still going on about it. I have no clue what to reply to this and it's making me
uncomfortable. Is she BU? How to I respond to this? 😳

Well said MSqueen. Unless you are a parent of a child with special needs you really have no idea what it's like or how to manage that child - your friend needs to mind her own business!

As you can probably tell, I am the parent of a child with severe and complex needs, including autism. Our lives are hard enough without other people passing judgement.

Potato, I attempted to explain to her the situation the parents might be in but she refused to listen. She told me she wanted to get to know the mum in order to report her.

I don't have children with autism but i do have them with allergies and severe eczema. I get looked at, they get looked at and we get comments and 'advice'from people all the time in the supermarket and where ever else we go. Sometimes my son looks awful, he scratches and bleeds.
Sometimes i have to battle with him to get his cream on, I've also had to battle with my daughter and son to take their asthma medication - This is a real chore as it means literally holding them down at times. (the nurses and Drs taught me!!)
So- please, You friend needs to think twice. She has no idea.

Haven - It sounds like your friend has made up her mind - which is a shame. If the father, as you said, had forced the first one or two tastes, and then the child ate happily, then that is miles away from forcing a child to eat. I wonder what else you could do, other than give her another side? I suppose if you saw them again together, you could even say 'my friend doesn't understand about the feeding, is it quite an issue for you?' To try and open a discussion rather than feeling very uneasy.

It is a shame because there are probably other instances where we should be keeping an eye on other kids. I've intervened if I thought that kids were being mean or bullying each other for example, even if I was wrong I'd rather kids know that adults do look out for them.

If you think your friend is being unreasonable then I think you should warn the other mum, as uncomfortable as that would be. Just have a quiet word.

Your friend sounds a bit too invested in this, it's a bit strange and I feel really sorry for the other mum who, presumably already faces challenges, and is now going to find out that someone she thought was becoming a friend was pretending so that she could report her for child abuse. How horrendous!

I wouldn't have liked to see that either!and I do have 2DC that are autistic and our son that is autistic would only eat 3 items for a whole year.But I never force fed him and I never would!
My Parents force fed me,that was one of the reasons I became anorexic.
I've worked with many children that are asd as well over the years and thankfully I've never witnessed anyone doing that.

That poor little boy,anyone who knows anything about autism knows that making a big deal and force causes so much anxiety for a child that is autistic.They going to be causing him and themselves so many more problems for the future.

Children need to learn to eat solids as it affects the development of their mouth /tongue and thus speech.
You'll gather I'm no expert on this but it was something I learned recently, that you just can't let them stay on bottles of milk.

Its tough on parents these days as soon as you're child enters primary school they are being weighed. Then you receive a letter telling you whether you're child is average or over weight or too thin. They ask you what are you going to do about you're over weight or under weight child. People these days are constantly watching and criticising and they never give you an answer. You know what their problem is they never figured it out themselves so they can't give you an answer. Thats why you're friend wants to cause trouble make herself feel better. Op I wonder what happened to community spirit and people helping each other. Rant over.

I agree with previous posters that if I felt like someone was judging a snap shot of my life id be very upset, especially as if I was tired and dealing with issues other parents will never need to comprehend.
I really hope this woman doesn't sneakily befriend to report them as that is sly and dishonest and I hope OP that you feel able to challenge your friend