to be annoyed by people who let their kids run round supermarkets 'playing'

[ProperLavs]

Actually screaming and running into people.
I had an interesting 'conversation' with a woman when i muttered for someone to stop them screaming and running around. This woman, who didn't actually have anything to do with the kids, who were roughly 4 and 2, told me they were only playing.

I told her it was a very busy supermarket and they shouldn't be playing here
She then muttered about some people having to take their children shopping. I told her I had had to take all of mine (6 under 8) and no they were't ever allowed to run round screaming whilst I ignored them.
Wtf is wrong with people?

wilbur I agree completely. Decent parents always give a shit and always try their best even if their best on any particular day isn't as good as it could be.
There are more an more kids coming into my school who are clearly indulged and enabled in their bad behaviour. They have parents who bang on about their rights but have no regard for how their kids affect other people at all. They on't care. They want to o what they want to do. They have no idea how to discipline effectively , to set firm boundaries or to install a sense of community responsibility into their children.

@ProperLavs I agree with every word of your last post, it's very accurate. The word that stands out for me is 'indulged'.

I was round at a friend's house a couple of weeks ago and she mentioned that the child next door goes to my school. He's 11 years old and I could hear him through the wall having a full on tantrum at midnight because he was told to put his X box off. He was screaming and shouting at his parents while they tried to bargain with him. It was embarrassing and, to me, explained much of his behaviour in school.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many excuses being made for badly behaved children. Madness

wilbur that's awful, but I suspect very common

I need a new keyboard !

And who in their right mind would let them scoot around indoors? Do you let them scoot around your living room? Other people’s?

her son being asked to stop kicking the seat in front on a flight

I had a seat kicker behind me. His mother was in the seat beside him.
After the third time of asking nicely for him to stop kicking, I told the mother I'd be swapping seats with her and she could have her kid kicking her seat for the rest of the journey. The kicking stopped.

@BlankTimes I reached round and grabbed a seat kicker's foot once. That stopped it too, funnily enough 😀
@GreatDuckCookery will be reporting me to Social Services now...........

I appreciate unruly children can disrupt other people's day, but unless you see a parent actively parenting badly can we assume to know everything about that individual family^^ and what they've got going on?

Sure, there will be some mums who are just feeling a bit lazy that day, but the moment you assume that will be the moment you roll your eyes and tut at some poor frazzled woman who could be really struggling and she'll go home and cry in the pantry because someone in the supermarket made her feel like poo.

I'd rather just move on without judgement than take the risk of kicking someone while they're down.

@lola212121 - I didn't notice you having any empathy whatsoever for @auditqueen's dad, who was knocked over by an out-of-control kid on a scooter in a supermarket, and is now in hospital recovering from surgery on his hip, and who has lost some of his confidence as a result.

I used to be a nurse, and during my training, I worked on a female orthopaedic trauma ward, which was full of elderly ladies who had fallen and fractured their hips/neck of femur. It is a common fracture in elderly people who fall, because their bones can be more fragile. Sadly they are also much less well equipped, physically or mentally, to recover from the surgery they need, to mend the fracture.

Far too many of them never recovered their previous mobility and independence. Many ended up having to go to care homes, instead of back to their own homes. Some developed dementia, as a result of the trauma of the fall and the surgery. Some died.

This injury in the elderly can EASILY be, and usually was, the result of a simple fall, not a road accident or assault - just a trip and fall - or someone being knocked over by a kid on a scooter.

When an elderly person is in somewhere like a supermarket, that is NOT intended to be a children's playground, they have every right to expect to be able to shop in safety, without having to dodge children who are rioting around on - or off - scooters.

I save my empathy for the people injured by these out-of-control darlings, and none for them or their ineffective parents!!

I've never seen behaviour like this either, because I live in a small community in rural France where I'm always amazed at the incredible politeness of the children. A small child stepped backwards onto my foot the other day, turned round and apologised and called me Madame. No prompting from his mother, obviously she didn't need to. It's the same in restaurants - the children behave well. I often think it's because they're treated as part of the company, spoken to and engaged with, not ignored while parents are glued to their phones.

People who speak out and confront the sort of bad parenting described (ie allowing children to annoy/endanger others) are absolutely correct and if more people (and retail staff) did the same then maybe things might change.

Amy so what we ignore and let more people end up in hospital due to parents allowing bad behaviour?

This thread has shown some parents will make all sorts of excuses for their inability to keep their children safe!

I have DD2 who tends to be a seat kicker (it's part of her SN that she fidgets and squirms and is on the move constantly). I try desperately to stop it, to minimise the fidgeting if she's in a confined space where she might be knocking someone else's seat because of it - I'd be annoyed if I got angry comments and looks from someone when it's clearly obvious that I'm trying desperately to minimise it and stop it... but I don't think that's the kind of instance being talked about here - it's the repeated doing it and giving a gobful of abuse if someone dares even look behind at the culprit type parenting that people get annoyed about.

"Please don't tell me how to parent my kids"

We wouldn't have to, if you actually did parent them, @cookiesandchocolate.

Use straps to secure the 2-year-old into the trolley, and a backpack with reins to keep the 4-year-old with you. Put effective consequences in place for bad behaviour, and enforce them. Keep on doing so, even if the children tantrum. Or run the risk of raising children who have no idea how to behave, how to do as they are told, and find school and life in general much harder than it needed to be - and their struggles will be your fault.

I am not a perfect parent - I know I have not always dealt with the boys' behaviour in the best way - I remember once, when ds1 was having an epic 45 minute tantrum, before 9am, having had an even more epic 90 minute one the day before, and I was on the phone in tears to dh, when it went quiet - and on investigation, I found him at the bin, eating the leftover tortilla chips dh and I had thrown away the night before - and I let him carry on eating them, because I couldn't FACE a third tantrum in less than 12 hours - but I learned how to deal with tantrums, and I did discipline my boys.

They have grown up to be pretty decent human beings - good people to know, hard working, successful, popular and pretty law-abiding. They aren't perfect, nor am I. But I tried, damn hard, to be the best I could be, as a parent, because they deserved nothing less.

@Mummymummums - like you, I worry about my elderly, frail mother's safety in supermarkets, if parents think it is OK for their children to run riot or scoot around. Mum has a degenerative spinal condition which causes her severe pain, and spent 7 weeks in hospital over Christmas and New year, with a bad infection in her knee joint that has severely impacted her mobility and balance - and I dread to think what damage could be done if she were knocked over like @auditqueen's dad.

@5000KallaxHoles - if I were sitting in front of your dd, I'm sure it would be obvious that you were doing your best to stop her fidgeting/seat kicking, and I would admire the effort you were putting in, even though I would not be enjoying having my seat kicked.

It isn't the parents like you, who are doing their best, that people are criticising here - it is the ones who aren't parenting at all.

@SDTGisAnEvilWolefGenius empathy is not one sided , you need to take a look at both sides ... you clearly have none

People here need to stop assuming they are allowing children to run around supermarkets . There needs to be a no -children running around policy in supermarkets if it's causing so many accidents . I know there is a no scooter policy at our local supermarkets and rightly so.

GDT very well said- all of it. So far I am enjoying a trip into town where all kiddies have so far been well behaved.

There shouldn’t need to be a “no running in supermarkets” policy because common sense should say it! Do we really need policy on everything rather than people just engaging brain?

I find it hard to empathise with someone letting their child engage in dangerous behaviour your right! Why would anyone think that was ok?

There needs to be a no -children running around policy in supermarkets

Really Do parents actually need to be told that?

If parents go home feeling rubbish after hearing people tutting etc then maybe it's the wake up call they need to start parenting properly and teaching chidren how to behave in public. No child is perfect but it does take much to teach them how to behave in public.

@FrancisCrawford

If you're stressed/frazzled/planning a funeral, all the more reason to pay little attention to unruly children and their parents. Getting narky at strangers in the supermarket is not going to help you. Deep breath, move on and worry about your own worries

@Sirzy

If a child endangered me or another shopper I would speak directly to the child in that moment about how their behaviour is dangerous. I've never ever seen that happen though. I certainly wouldn't assume that snapshot moment means I'm looking at bad parenting and it's certainly worth me getting sanctimonious about the general state of parenting.

If an actual event in the supermarket affected me, I'd try to be helpful, not annoyed.

*certainly NOT worth

To all those posters complaining about the lack of empathy and people being judgemental, please just stop for a moment and think about AuditQueen's 80 year old father who is in hospital having been mown down by a badly behaved child in a supermarket. Think about his pain and suffering NOT your own self esteem.

Very good point, and while I admit I've been reading this thread utterly on the side of OP, I do catch myself and remind myself that yes, everyone has bad days, and kids sometimes just don't listen, people want to get through their shopping trip and get home etc... of course! We are all human. But my empathies are far more with the people whose lives, well-being, confidence and quality of life are impacted by behaviour like this.

Huge sympathies for the relatives and professionals in this thread who have shared their stories of people (usually but not exclusively elderly) who have been hurt by this. I am both a nurse who has seen the very sad impact from clashes with kids/trollies and scooters (a slight bash that leads to a severe leg ulcer that will never heal and the associated complications, fractured neck of femur which causes immense pain, will not always be recovered from, and can lead to huge anxiety if recovery is possible etc.) I am also a grandaughter whose beloved Grandma was knocked down by a kid whose parents were 'indulging' her in scooting around in the local corner shop; fractured NOF, never recovered, died in hospital. Sometimes the potential consequences are not hysteria and just 'what-ifs'. There are real world devastating outcomes.