WIBU - woman taking dd's hand

[wheresthel1ght]

To start out I don't think I was being unreasonable and if anything I think I should have done more but would appreciate some outside input as I have an anxiety disorder and not sure that I wasn't seeing this situation as more than it was.

Pulled into the car park at our local Home Bargains store and was getting dd out the car. She is massively independent but still only 2.10 so I insist on her holding my hand as she has little road sense as with most kids her age. She was refusing and was holding her hands together saying she was being friends I could bloody murder Justin fletcher. Next thing I know some random woman is saying to dd "come and hold my hand" dd obliged and the woman started to walk dd towards the shop.

I grabbed dd's hand and said something along the lines of "this way darling we need to get a trolley" and pulled her away from the woman. I then tried to tell dd that we don't talk to strangers and we never hold hands with them because not all stranger are nice people. The woman must have heard me and as I walked past her in the shop she told me I was rude and unkind and she was only trying to help.

Wibu? I never said anything to her but I wanted to tell her to get her hands off my dd.

[ElspethFlashman]

I'm still none the wiser as to what you thought the lady was actually trying to do.....

[Gardencentregroupie]

Seen it all now. You're told you're overreacting for not wanting some stranger to take your toddlers hand and walk them away from you. Incredible. OP the woman was wildly inappropriate in my opinion and I wouldn't have been happy at all.

[quasibex]

YANBU unless my child is in immediate danger then anyone coming near them without good cause and then taking them by the hand is going to get an earful from me.

I've corralled random kids in the past when their adult isn't immediately visible by blocking their path to somewhere dangerous and talking nonsense with them but I've never physically held on to them. It's just not acceptable unless you know the child/adult.

As for safe strangers, my children know the rules and what the safest way to get help is and taking the hand of a complete stranger and walking off is definitely not one of them.

[ChocolateButton15]

Would any of the people saying yabu do what the woman did? I know I would never just take a random child's hand and walk them into a shop even if they was refusing to hold their mums hand.

[wheresthel1ght]

I must be being exceptionally thick. I genuinely don't understand why the majority of you think this is ok!

I accept that she may have only been trying to help and I should have apologised when she accosted me in the shop. But I can't believe how many of you would be ok with someone taking the hand of a toddler and wandering off with them.

[AnotherOddSock]

Well I for one thing YANBU. That seems like a very strange thing to do and I would never dream of taking a child's hand that I do not know. She should have kept out of it. I also don't think you're wrong to teach your child about stranger danger because you would not want your child to just walk off with someone or get in their car. Your DD needs to be taught common sense, ie, if she's lost, approach someone like a shop assistant or police officer, lollipop man/lady, not just a random person on the street.

[GarlicStake]

I don't understand why she walked away with your child. That was very odd and YANBU.

For what it's worth, I might have offered my hand - and I'd also be saying "Let's wait for Mummy!"

[wheresthel1ght]

Anotheroddsock that is exactly what I am trying to teach her. Or to stand still and go no where and I will find her which is always what I was taught growing up in London.

[GipsyDanger]

Some stranger tries to lead my child away from me? Damn right, I would go loco. You are totally in the right op, and very controlled I might add

[wheresthel1ght]

Hod I suggest you read my OP where I said she started walking off towards the shop with my dd. I am not spinning anything!

[ErnesttheBavarian]

YABU.

And please reconsider teaching stranger danger! Over 93% of assaults etc on children are by people they know. (I read recently, can't produce source)

Yesterday I went to my dd sports club which is held in the local secondary school. There was a little girl outside bawling her eyes out. She had been dropped off by dad early and no one was there. She was scared and alone and didn't know what to do. She (reluctantly ) told me this much. I tried to reassure her that I was a mummy and my dd was in her club and offered to help her look, or call her parents etc but she was clearly also terrified of talking to me and wouldn't accept any help. Luckily the other girls started to arrive and she went in, but I felt it was a real shame she had clearly been taught not to talk to strangers so wasn't able to get any help.

[SquinkiesRule]

I don't think your were overreacting OP. I'm have probably panicked if someone had taken my childs hand and led her away from me.
You were right to tell your child not to go with strangers.
I always drummed into my kids that if they lost me, to go to the tills/customer service desk and tell them, or ask a Mum or Dad with lots of kids, for help to find me.
Two teens recently lured another child away too I'm sure I saw that on the news a little while back.

[littleprincesssara]

YANBU. It's super creepy to randomly grab a strange child and try to make them come with you. If it was a man I doubt anyone would disagree.

Unfortunately there are disturbed people in the world. It's not unheard of for pedophiles to have female partners who actively help procure children for them. There was a thread here recently about severely mentally ill women who steal babies out of delusion they are pregnant. Both these are extremely rare, but they do happen.

Besides how did the OP do anything wrong? She didn't call the police. She didn't shout at the woman. She didn't do anything except make her child stay with her which at age 2 surely you'd do anyway?

[mugginsalert]

I would feel sensitive if someone did this for my child, I would see it as them implying that I couldn't cope with my own child. Then I would try and have a word with myself that a) they're only being helpful and b) it's ok not to be supermum. But in the heat of the moment, I might well have reacted as you did.

And no, I would never do that for someone's else's child unless the mum had agreed first. Some kids really don't like being 'helped' by random strangers.

[sofato5miles]

Strangers aren't the problem usually. You over reacted.

[APlaceOnTheCouch]

YWBU. You were with your DD and the woman tried to help. She didn't try to lead an unattended child away (although arguably if a small child was unattended, you'd be relying on the kindness of strangers to lead them to safety).

So not only do you need to teach your DD when it actually is ok to speak to strangers but you also need to teach her that sometimes as an adult you will talk to strangers and they will talk to her.

I feel sorry for the woman.

[wheresthel1ght]

Thank you littleprincess

[GarlicStake]

She had been dropped off by dad early ... Luckily the other girls started to arrive and she went in

Well, of course the other girls arrived. She was early for her activity. It would have been more sensible just to wait with her, rather than inviting her to enter a building with a stranger.

Stranger danger happens when a child GOES WITH the stranger.

[ImSoVeryTired]

I think that the woman really overstepped a line. It's one thing for a friend or relative to do that but not someone you don't know. Maybe you were a bit strong with the lecture afterwards. I'd be pretty appalled if someone did that to my son.

[LadyRataxes]

I'm with you and I'm not paranoid about strangers at all.
I just think its weird. If a mother is struggling to get her child to do something you don't interfere generally. In this case she wasn't trying to help you get your daughter to hold your hand but get her to hold hers- how is that teaching her anything? the only time she could legitimately have grabbed your DD is if she had got away from you in the carpark- but that doesn't seem to be the case.
I would say its a bit passive aggressive to say something like that that could be overheard - you could have just said something directly like "i appreciate that you are trying to help but i want her to learn to do what she's told and to hold my hand (and not to do what strangers ask)"

[CoraPirbright]

OP I am with you. If she had said to you with a smile "oh dear - shall we see if she would like to hold my hand and we can all go in together?" then you probably would have said oh how lovely thank you/thank you but please don't worry/oh no, we fine but thank you very much. To just rock up and grab some child's hand is not on! You know when people talk about smacking and say "you can't hit an adult - its assault - so its no different for children and actually much worse"? I think this is a similar sort of thing - you wouldn't go up to an adult and randomly lay your hands on them so shouldn't with someone else's child, unless you get the parents ok.

[GarlicStake]

Eh? Are quotes disappearing?

Test

[SirChenjin]

I don't think YABU at all.

Getting involved in something that the parent is trying to deal with is totally inappropriate - there's the village helping to raise a child and then there's sticking your beak in unnecessarily. As for teaching a child that if a stranger asks you to give you their hand then you should - idiotic in the extreme.

You can address the issue of inappropriate behaviour and touching by people they know separately - the 2 are not mutually exclusive.

[ErnesttheBavarian]

I offered to call her parents. I had to go into the building to see my own dd.

And given that she was bawling her eyes out, for her there was no 'of course' about it, and nor for me, because it had been cancelled the previous session, so I could quite well believe it had been cancelled again.