Au pair yelled at ds

[bummymummythefirst]

We're on holiday in a beach resort type place

Hanging out at the resort playground today. Ds (4) has been playing with a couple of kids (one 6 a girl, 5 a boy and his sister 2) for a couple of hours.

All being adorably sweet and playing some nice game involving being Octonaughts.

The 5 year old and 2 year old are being watched by an au pair/nanny type of girl. She looks about 15/16. Parents are down the beach a little.

The boy suddenly really smacks his head. Starts bawling and the au pair is trying to comfort him.

Ds walks over and tries to stroke the kid's back like the au pair was doing.

The girl screams 'get away from him, just go away!' and gives ds a little push.

Ds comes back a little miffed and hurt but not lastingly bothered.

I was about to go and tell her she was totally out of order. And tell the parents what she'd done too.

Dh stopped me and told me I shouldn't.

So I didn't but now I'm cross with myself. Yes she was only young, and I wouldn't have kicked off, rather told her it's not ok to speak to people like that at all or lay hands on them even if they had done anything wrong. Which ds hadn't, he was trying to be helpful.

(Obviously my instant reaction was to shove her face in to the sand and go all 'Hand that Rocks The Cradle' on her. )

I should have pulled her up on it no? I feel like a failed ds a bit today.

Wow that's some back story there! She was just a horrible girl. No excuses. A little kindness doesn't hurt anyone.

She is a child herself looking after a child which overreacted.

All you needed to do was walk yourself over to the scene and make your presence felt by going to your ds to see if he is ok and walking up to her to ask if your ds was causing a problem (of course he was not but again, this is about making your presence felt) and looking her in the eye calmly with a small tight smile.

It does not matter what she says, but the implied message is clear that you will intervene the next time she does that. And leave it at that.

I will bloody kill anybody who hurts my dc

OP, you have had some harsh responses here. Whatever age the girl was, she was completely wrong. Your child was trying to be helpful and got pushed and yelled at. I think you would be right to say something to her.

I also think it's obvious that you were watching your own child. That's how you saw everything that was going on!

15 is way too young to be an aupair. I would never hire a 15 year old aupair. Never seen any on aupairworld website. She must have been related to the family in some way.

bummymummy you can't police the world. YOu were A nanny, you aren't everyone's nanny.

An 'adult' was unpleasant to your kid. from your description, she was having a very stressful time and didn't need the interference of someone else's four year old. It feels awful but he was completely unharmed and involving yourself at that stage would have helped nobody at all, it just would have made you feel righteous.

No-one said it is ok to shout at people. They said "let it go".

And if your child was screaming with a possible head injury would you take time out from dealing with what might be an emergency to engage in conversation with a random child whose parents should have been keeping him away - or even offering adult help - rather than enjoying the drama and allowing their own DS to be "sweet"

YABU
I hope the little boy was ok - you seem not to have been bothered by that

Seems an overreaction to shout at your DS like that. It's not explicit from your post how the child came to hurt himself. Was your DS involved, were they getting silly and boisterous? The fact that you describe yourself as furious about this incident, yet use the phrase "little push" instead of "shoved" or similar makes me think that the push wasn't particularly inappropriate and you're more upset about the "screaming". Maybe your son was getting too close and it would have been better for you to call him over, or ask if you could help.

It's also not clear why you're certain she was being paid to look after the children.

I agree with the chorus of let it go.
She is a kid herself and was obviously stressed and upset - the little boy was hurt and upset - that would clearly have been the wrong time to go and give her a lecture about speaking nicely to smaller children.
Next time just try to stay a bit closer to your own children so you are able to intervene quickly.

Perhaps she also didnt appreciate having an extra 2 children to deal with whilst both sets of parents sat on their arses.

Has the op buggered off ?

Perhaps she also didnt appreciate having an extra 2 children to deal with whilst both sets of parents sat on their arses.

This sort of situation can look really, really different depending on which "side" you're on as well. I was sitting with my little DD waiting while her sister was doing a club. I thought I'd use the time to do my little DD's reading homework with her. All fine. Little DD is sitting nicely, reading her book to me. Another child (who we know, but usually comes with her gran) came over and stood right next to me. I said, nicely, "Little DD is just doing her homework". Mother engrossed in her phone. I carry on reading and child then tries to turn the pages before I'm ready. I said, a bit more firmly, "Little DD is just doing her homework and can play with you when she's finished". Mother looks in briefly - and goes back to her phone.

Now - had she taken the book out of my hand? At that point, I think I'd have got cross.....while the phone watching mother would no doubt have said "Oh, she was just being sweet and interested in the book". Whereas that would have been a situation that had been building over a period of time, to which she was utterly oblivious. When really she shouldn't have been.

Could this have happened here? You thought your DS was playing nicely and you didn't need to be involved, whereas the other child's career was irritated by him?

Also given the woman's age of about 16, she is likely to have felt put upon by any extra children.

One of the children is only 2 and the op remarks her ds had been playing with them for 2 hours.

Long time to leave a 16 year old in charge of 4 children, one of them only 2 years old.

How do you know she was an au pair? At 15/16 she was most cousin/sister. You get blamed a lot when they get hurt. Trust me I was always "in charge" of the little ones cause I was the oldest. She shouldn't have pushed your child tho. Sounds like she was frightened of getting blamed tbh

I'm going to have to give the OP a for this. So a 15 year old was looking after 2 small children for 2 hours. She then has to cope with one of them hurting themselves - was probably really worried and frightened. And OP is tormenting herself that at this moment of crisis she didn't butt in, not to offer to help, but to tell the poor girl off and, not content with that, to criticise her to her employers. Because under the stress of the moment she gave your child a little push (not an assault, a little push - try complaining about that to the police and see how they react). I'm a middle aged experienced mum and can imagine behaving just as this poor young mother's help did.
Scarily inhumane and obsessive about your child / your rights / you you you.

My own 4 year old is a caring little thing... Often going over to anyone who falls/cries/bumps etc at park. It's her nature.

I wouldn't stand for someone shouting at her over that - let alone pushing her away. I don't care how stressed a carer was. Having said that I would have gone over to ask if everything was ok with hurt chid, make sure mine wasn't in any way responsible....

*The girl screams 'get away from him, just go away!' and gives ds a little push.

Ds comes back a little miffed and hurt but not lastingly bothered.

I was about to go and tell her she was totally out of order.*

Rereading this, I'm getting - girl shouts, DS a bit miffed. She shouldn't have shouted, he shouldn't have been able to interfere. She wasn't very kind, but she wasn't "totally out of order". She just wasn't very nice.

Might help if OP returned to clarify how old this girl actually was.

Wow so now if our kids play with other children we are being lazy irresponsible parents by not helicopter- ing around them! Crazy.

I especially dislike that OP didn't just want to say something to the young girl (never mind that she was trying to deal with a hurt child - let's get our priorities right and interrupt that to complain about the "little push" to OP's own child, who is much more important). She wanted to go beyond that and complain to the employers/parents. Not that the girl's "little push" is really anything to do with them. Just to make things as difficult for the girl as possible. And she is tormenting herself about not having carried out these actions, a day later! Grim.

It’s ok for them to play, but in a situation where the carer for one of the other kids is having to deal with a real smacked head and the child in hysterics screaming you get the fuck up, go the fuck over, and keep your not-much-more-than-a-toddler the fuck out of the way until it’s all sorted. Because “helpful” they aren’t in that situation.

Ds walks over and tries to stroke the kid's back like the au pair was doing.

The nanny was wrong to push your DS but I think you should have stopped him walking over to the upset child. It can be really annoying when the child your looking after is hurt/upset and someone else’s DC is interfering. She was probably trying to comfort him or check he wasn’t badly hurt and the last thing she needed is someone else’s DC who she doesn’t know possibly making things worse/more stressful for her (as sweet as your DS sounds wanting to check the child was ok, it was your place to tell him to leave him be for a minute).

Could it have been that she had been getting annoyed/irritated by your DS for a while and this was the final straw and she snapped? Obviously she was still wrong to push him.

Of course I don't know EXACTLY how old she was. I would take a guess at 15 at the very youngest to 18 at the very oldest.

I'm pretty sure she was paid by them to look after the kids. I'd seen the family at breakfast without her, then seen them all in the playground together. They were polite to each other but not like a family would act. She also would be a lot more smiley and animated when the parents were watching, then pretty grumpy and gruff when they weren't.

Working in childcare in London for years you can spot who's family and who's paid quite well usually.

I was parenting ds. I didn't take my eyes off him the whole time we were there. I intervene when needed. I can be a little helicopters and suffer from anxiety occasionally so make a concerted effort to back off of him a little and let him play alone. I definitely wasn't leaving someone else to watch him, not sure how some of you have made that assumption.

The parents were there but sunbathing with their backs to the the playground. I can't believe they wouldn't have heard the screaming to be honest.

How exactly could I have 'helped out'? There were people around, including the boy's parents. We were right next to the first aid office.

And as to not telling the parents, I get that she was under pressure, but as someone else said, she's just as able to do this to one of the kids in her care. I would absolutely want to know if anyone who was watching ds had done this. She'll need more self control if she's watching young kids.

Thanks for telling me I need a grip. I'm not sat here crying, just thinking for a few reasons I wish I'd said something at the time. Thinking over actions we've made to make them better in the future is human nature no?

I can't believe some of you are saying a four year old being kind and trying to be helpful warrants getting yelled at and shoved by anyone.

Grim?

I'm hardly torturing myself.

Just wasn't very nice? If someone had shouted at and pushed an adult the responses would be very different.

It's pretty shit and sad that's it's not that bad to push a four year old for some reason.

Sounds like the poor girl was really stressed, did you offer to help (considering you are so experienced) when the boy hurt himself?