Random child hit my baby

[bluehatbaby]

Name changed. Don't usually post this kind of thing. Really angry. I was waiting in the queue at shopping centre toilets. My 8 month old son was crying and I was (still am) super stressed out as was bursting for a wee and had hysterical child to contend with. Woman stood next to me with child I would say was about 5. She kept saying 'naughty baby naughty baby' - I ignored. Thought she was quite cute. She then turned and smacked my son on the top of his head, hard, at which point he screamed the fucking place down. The woman grabbed her daughter's arm and said nothing to her. I in all fairness went a bit nuts and told her to control her child. She snapped at me 'she's fucking autistic you stupid cow' and dragged her daughter by her hood out of the toilets.

I literally don't know how to feel about it. Pissed off. Ds has now cried himself to sleep and has a red mark on his head.

AIBU to ask mn for some words of wisdom as I'm not very calm and just want to cry.

There we go - now you know Op, the prejudice the people with non visible disabilities get all day every day. Disgraceful isn't it?

Disgraceful that a mother cannot stop her child attacking a baby. Autism or not, she should've been mortified that her child did this and should've bloody apologised to OP.

Don't worry OP you did exactly the right thing, I would've gone bloody nuts at the mother too.

Hope your little one is ok 💐

I don't blame the child at all. I'm not angry at the child. I was just upset at the lack of any sort of apology. My son is fine though and am feeling calmer now.

Being autistic does NOT mean you can assault babies. The woman was horrible. Maybe the child wasn't even autistic. What a nasty nasty person. I pity her daughter for having such a horrible mother, I hope your baby is OK.

My child has ASD and at 5 had the understanding of approximately a 2 year old. It’s all very well saying “autism is no excuse, the child shouldn’t have hit the baby” but honestly, it’s not always that straightforward.

For the record, I’ve been apologising to strangers for years for my child’s actions- what he says rather than violence of any sort. He’s very... blunt. And impulsive. We (me and my child) work very hard on his manners but things slip out and I am very quick to say sorry for any offence caused.

However sometimes I am exhausted, fed up with the staring and judgement and people saying things like “can’t you control that kid?” When he’s in meltdown mode or whatever and I snap. Doesn’t happen often and I’m never too proud to say I’m sorry. I hope your baby is ok OP, I really do but I have much empathy with that mum.

I'm picking fence splinters out of my arse, tbh.
Unjust things will happen to your child. Just a fact of life.
Your child will be ok, no real harm done.
5yo should not have hit your child of course.

But mother of 5yo has a pile of shit on her plate. Shut her kid away the kid never learns anything about social interaction. Yelling at her kid probably doesn't work even if it made OP feel better. Profusely having to apologise (to strangers) every time you go out is soul-destroying. Maybe mother-of-5yo feels like it's her fault already that her kid turned out weird & you reminded her to be ashamed of herself. Esp. if the mother is herself autistic or has social problems.

Nobody coming out golden in this picture.

So according to some people on here you should accept a 5 year old hitting your 8 month old as she was autistic. Looks like you were actually in the wrong for not offering the little girl another go.
Fuck me. My blood is boiling reading this, I would've been a lot worse than you! Regardless of the autism or not you apologise, I hope she's sat at home ashamed of her herself for not doing so. You have done nothing wrong whatsoever, and god help her if she'd sworn at me. She's the stupid cow.

The mother of the child was really crap. Even if she has only recently had a diagnosis of autism for her dd she should be aware of how much of an effect noises such as a baby crying would have on her child. After all she has had her for 5 years and should be aware of triggers and have some idea of how to cope.

The mother should have apologised but she didn’t. Nothing you can do about it now but just give your baby lots of cuddles.

Autism or not, her child cannot go round hitting babies and she def should have apologised, anyway she should have deflated the situation by telling her daughter to stop saying naughty baby

"when I told her to control her child"

Correction. That's not what I said, i think it was that she needed to keep a closer eye on him.

I hope when the next baby pisses this girl off she's not holding a heavy object in her hand.

Being autistic doesn’t excuse the mother not managing the situation when the girl was showing warning signs.

Thank goodness your ds is fine.

according to some people on here you should accept a 5 year old hitting your 8 month old as she was autistic.

Said no one, ever

can you rouse DS. (I know it’s not fun doing that to a sleeping baby, but letting him sleep after being whacked on the head isn’t great tbh)

I’ll put money on the child not actually being autistic.

She sounds like an ignorant gobby cow who just said that to try to back foot you

If her DD is autistic I’d expect her to be more aware of what her DD might do and she gave fair warning with her ‘naughty baby’ comments

It’s not easy with children with SEN, but if her DD IS actually autistic she needs to be more aware of her warnings that she’s about to ‘reprimand another child she perceives not to be behaving properly

Have a nice cup of tea (or glass of wine) and cuddle DS. Try to let it go, there’s nothing you can do now except check DS is ok (and I’m sure he will be given many babies have older siblings and get regularly accidentally bashed on the head with toys or exuberant affection and that’s without the bashing babies do themselves!)

How are you a stupid cow?? Was the child wearing a badge to say she's autistic?? Exactly what ameri Ann says.

If it’s any consolation to those who have said what the mum should have done, she’s probably been thinking it too.

My son's autistic and can't cope with crying babies. It's a visible rise in stress for him.

Thst is why I'm on that shit immediately as soon as I hear the crying myself. Even though he's 12 and can self regulate a lot better and won't lash out he might shout shut up.

Autism isn't an excuse for the mother's behaviour. She should have headed that off at the start.

Being autistic doesn’t excuse the mother not managing the situation when the girl was showing warning signs.

This. It's unreasonable to expect an autistic child to regulate their own behaviour. It's wholly reasonable to expect their parent to recognise triggers and warning signs and act on them to keep everybody (the autistic child included) safe.

Autism is a reason for behaviours, it's not a fucking get out of jail free card and that shit just makes life harder for autistic people and the shitty stereotypes that make our lives harder!

I work with autistic adults, we do go out into the community, we do go to busy places and we do take our service users to try new experiences. But we risk assess first, as parents should too.

My son has Autism and I would have fucking apologised profusely if he did that to a little baby! The mum didn’t do that though! And I would have stood him away from the baby if the noise was getting too much for him. FFS.

YANBU to feel that the woman should've apologised and told her child not to do this. Autism isnt relevant here.

It does sound like you were two stressed mums having a bad day, though. Just let it go and treat yourself to something nice, relax for a bit if you can. Tomorrow is another day.

My son when younger would hard-hug, or flap, at other kids. He was only 18 months old at that point, but still, I never let him be near another child just in case. She was terrible.to call you that. Maybe she's stressed, but her child hit a baby and instead of apologising She was abusive.

If her daughter has form for hitting in this situation she should have kept her out of hitting range. It is possible she hasn't done it before.
It was understandable that your were upset and angry. She shouldn't have reacted in the way she did.
I have 14 year old who I wouldn't 100% trust not to hit out in this situation ( although it is far far more likely he would hit me) so I avoid situations of close proximity to noisy babies and toddlers but when your child is 5 you can still be learning.

Parents of children with autism are ime likely to say they have autism not that they are autistic.
Parents of children who have been little shits are likely to say they are autistic as a defence mechanism for shitty parenting.
In my experience.

I have dc’s with ASD, I would never use it as an excuse for them hitting another child and I would punish them the same as I would any child if they did that. Seriously this is what is wrong with some people, they see ASD as an excuse for bad behaviour, in 20 years time when her child is arrested for GBH she won’t be able to stand in court and say “but he has ASD”?

I say my children are autistic, and that I'm autistic.

My work uses autistic as after a survey of service users they discovered that it was the preferred term among autistic people.

I know I'll probably get flamed for saying this but autism is not an excuse for letting your child go around whacking young babies! If the mother had any sense,she would have been forewarned by the fact the child was saying 'naughty baby naughty boy'.