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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To have offered to held this baby?

156 replies

DontGoRihannonStay · 31/12/2016 00:53

Dh and I visited a local Italian restaurant for dinner tonight. Couple
In with a young baby (about 3/4 months I think)
Baby started crying then mum started crying, seemed embarrassed. I offered to walk about with baby an managed to get her back to sleep while parents finished their meal.
Dh said I was embarrassing and now I am worried they thought I was weird!

OP posts:

MistressMolecules · 31/12/2016 09:18

You sound lovely, and that is such a thoughtful thing to do.

CigarsofthePharoahs · 31/12/2016 09:21

I think it was a kind thing to do.
I was in a restaurant earlier this year with my not long turned 2 year old. He's been in a permanent difficult patch. We were on holiday and almost everything we tried to do ended up with screaming and tantrums. We made the mistake of ordering food for him, he refused all of it.
I tried taking him outside, had to come back in fairly quickly. It was a restaurant on the coast and there was an inlet running through the front garden which he was determined to throw himself in.
I spent the rest of the meal trying to stop him running off and bothering a large table nearby and softly singing nursery rhymes to calm him.
When the table I had been trying to keep him away from were leaving, one of the women came up to me to tell me she thought my little boy was very cute. I apologised for the disruption. She told me not to worry, she and her family liked seeing children enjoy themselves.
I will always remember the time in the supermarket when an assistant saw me and my howling baby in the trolley seat and told me not to worry. She unpacked all my shopping and bagged it too, so I could cuddle my baby. It happened more than once.
I did fill in an online thingy to say how glad I was of the extra help!

RachelRagged · 31/12/2016 09:21

Loved people like you when one of my DCs was little and I had PND

Well done OP and no its NBU at all . Quite the opposite.

wheelwithinawheel · 31/12/2016 09:22

I was in soft play the other day, sat down with my coffee when my youngest DC 2.5 decided the baby/toddler area wasn't exciting enough and he wanted to go on the main equipment. He can't quite reach the platforms and climbing areas and so usually I hover around behind him, lifting him when he needs a hand. I was trying to persuade him to wait for 5 mins while I sank my coffee when along came an older child, maybe 12 or 13 that was sat with her dad watching her younger siblings play. She spirited him away, and spent a whole hour following him around helping him climb and slide while I relaxed! It was wonderful - such a kind girl. I offered to take over but she wouldn't hear of it - told me she loved babies and she was having fun, and thought it was so cute when DC kept showering her in kisses and cuddles so touching!

raviolidreaming · 31/12/2016 09:24

What's your DH's problem? ... What's he embarrassed about exactly?

To be fair, we don't know the full picture. If OP was walking about a small restaurant, in between tables, he might have thought she was getting in the way / 'showing off' / annoying other diners. Maybe he didn't want to be sitting by himself either. (I'm just being Devil's Advocate!)

DJBaggySmalls · 31/12/2016 09:27

What a lovely thing to do.
Every time someone like you makes an act of kindness like this, it reinforces the idea that there are safe and supportive people out there. It should encourage people to offer other acts of kindness, not criticism.

I'd be pulling faces at your DH behind his back, the knob. Does he imagine your behaviour reflects badly on him somehow?

ChocolateWombat · 31/12/2016 09:28

You made a kind offer, which most people wouldn't make. The parents accepted your offer. They wouldn't have accepted if they thought it was inappropriate. They may have thought it was unusual, but probably not weird.....and I expect that's what your DH thinks too....weird isn't the right word.

With these kind of things, I think that if you feel you want to offer help you should. People are always free to say no and as long as you aren't pushy with the offer, judgemental or confrontational, even if the people receiving the offer don't like it, no harm is done.

In a world where people try not to engage with strangers and will cross over the road rather than acknowledge someone in need, it is great to hear of people offering help, but also people brave enough to receive it. Tell your DH he's lucky to have a thoughtful wife.

Ramonaramona73 · 31/12/2016 09:30

That's really lovely of you. I have been in similar situations and would have really appreciated it. Her DP pay have been getting impatient about it. My DH also makes me feel like an embarrassment for example when a woman once stoooed us to ask if a baby left outside a restaurant in the Pram by a busy Road was ours and I went into restaurant to see whose baby it was. Who does that?! He said I justb'reacted' to anyone saying anything??!!!

Ramonaramona73 · 31/12/2016 09:31

Sorry her dp may have been impatient

C4Envelope · 31/12/2016 09:32

We were at a farm park, Dsister and my DD then 6mo and Dsis kept DD at the table while I popped into the loo. As I was washing my hands a distressed looking mum came in with new born in pram in tow and looked absolutely bursting for the toilet. She started to undo the straps while literally dancing on the spot but I said let me stand with the pram while you go. She literally ran into the cubicle and I stood with her DD singing a wee tune to reassure the mum I was still there. She was so thankful she cried. Such small acts of kindness go a long way. Motherhood is hard, it takes a village and all that!

OhMrBadger · 31/12/2016 09:33

What a lovely thing to do. You allowed the parents to eat their meal and demonstrated that there are many kind-hearted sympathetic people out there.

You also showed them that you understood they needed a hand because you too have probably been there. First time parenthood can be a bloody lonely place where you think you are the only person struggling. You just showed them the light at the end of the tunnel!

Lessthanaballpark · 31/12/2016 09:34

Your DH IBU and a bit silly.

It would be nice if more people were like you.

1horatio · 31/12/2016 09:35

Ah no, you're lovely OP.

DD is still super tiny and adorable. And when DH is out with her there are apparently always a lot of women offering to help him ;)

thecatsarecrazy · 31/12/2016 09:38

Very kind of you. When my dc were small I had to get the bus alot, with a toddler and a baby and pushchair. I really struggled and I would rarely get an offer of help. People would sit their staring at me.

SuperRainbows · 31/12/2016 09:40

Show your DH these replies and he might realise how an army of mumsnetters think your gesture was really kind and thoughtful and certainly not embarrassing.

justanotherusername0 · 31/12/2016 09:42

Lovely thing to do! I would imagine that's the first time the couple have both been able to finish a meal together without juggling the baby between them! Even if they finished quickly still kind of you!
I've helped out a few local mums who have had babies - I've offered to give them a hand to get stuff back in their bag or with their toddlers etc. If people don't want help the politely decline . The people you helped would have very easily been able to say oh no don't worry she will be more upset if she leaves me etc.... So you did right

Unescorted · 31/12/2016 09:42

It is a lovely thing to do.

We (me, dh, dd & ds) spent an hour in the immigration queue last night making silly faces at all the little kids - I don't care if anybody thought we were embarrassing. It was better than having a cranky queue at midnight. There was one bloke who tutted - but he tutted at everything. Including the border control staff, I suspect he is still there answering questions. We were waved through as quick as a quick thing & wished a HNY.

Hoppinggreen · 31/12/2016 09:46

How lovely
It's sadly not a typically "British " thing though ( although given all these stories maybe it is)
We spend quite a lot of time in Spain and neither of my dc could so much as squeak without a waiter/waitress/chef/random stranger whisking them away

Only1scoop · 31/12/2016 09:49

Lovely Op, the norm in other countries but sadly not here.

WeedlesHatOfDisappointment · 31/12/2016 10:02

When ds2 was 3 weeks old, I took him and 4 year old ds to softplay, to get out the house and for ds1 to burn off some energy.
A woman with a 3 year old took charge of the 4 year old ds and played with him for an hour or so on the softplay. She said as she was going on with her dd, another one didn't matter. I was able to have some time with the baby anf enjoy a coffee. I did buy the mum one as a thank you, it was such a lovely thing for her to do.

MuseumOfCurry · 31/12/2016 10:05

It is a lovely thing to do but there is no way I'd ever offer this after reading all relevant MN threads (this is an exceptional one, I think).

I have had some people offer the same when mine were babies and I was always grateful to the bones.

BlurryFace · 31/12/2016 10:09

What a lovely thing to do OP. I'm quite shy approaching strangers so I probably wouldn't have done it, but my heart would have gone out to the mum. One time I was catching a bus with 8mo DS1 in a stupid big buggy and the wheelchair spaces were taken up with other buggies so I was in the middle of telling the bus driver I'd take the next one when a lady got off and carried DS for me and she helped me off the bus too, I was really touched.

Threesoundslikealot · 31/12/2016 10:13

I feel a bit teary reading through this thread (thanks, DD, for the lack of sleep) at the lovely stories, but also sad at how unusual it seems to be. Why is the UK a society where we feel we need to apologise for even having kids with us in public rather than one in which everyone recognises that children have good and bad days but are part of our community.

I have had plenty of experience of nasty looks when my children have behaved like, well, children, and been made to feel like crap. But just before Christmas the choir I sing in went to do carols at a local residential home, and I had to take my small children with me. They behaved pretty much like you might expect - toddler stripped the decorations off the tree, three year old raved about going 'raaaa', five year old looked a bit overwhelmed and clung to me before bossing her siblings loudly, and I was repeatedly told Not To Worry, as the staff and residents just loved seeing children being themselves. It was a really lovely hour in a warm and supportive environment and I wish there was more of that.

WutheringFrights · 31/12/2016 10:14

When DS was teeny I was attempting breakfast in M&S on my own.
A lovely elderly lady next to me offered to hold him while I ate my food as she had a new grandson the same age who she hasn't been able to see yet. I was extremely grateful and she looked utterly chuffed!

BertrandRussell · 31/12/2016 10:15

"It is a lovely thing to do but there is no way I'd ever offer this after reading all relevant MN threads (this is an exceptional one, I think)."
I think that's a very good reason to do it more!

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