to take my child out in the cold

[tantrumingcoldchild]

Name changed for this!

I was trying to get my 3 year old daughter to nursery by 8 am for breakfast and so that I can get on with a big work project. She had a massive strop because she wanted to have Coco Pops at home. The general tantruming lasted almost an hour.

I finally forced her into her buggy (not something I normally do), but she ripped off her sweatshirt in the process and she was only in her vest. I attempted to put her coat on over her backwards but she angrily flung it off.

Knowing that she would quickly tire of the cold, I started the 7 minute walk to nursery. There was some very light snowy rain, just a few drops here and there. A woman saw me leaving my building with my daughter flailing around and screaming in her vest, and glared at me. She had a child with her.

When I was halfway down the block, the woman came back and asked me angrily if I had seen the weather and what my child was wearing. I explained that she was having a temper tantrum and I needed to work. I said that I was going to put her coat on her when she calmed down.

The woman insisted that this wasn't good enough and continued to berate me, saying it was horrible not to dress my child. I explained that my daughter had taken her clothes off and showed her the sweatshirt and coat which were ready and waiting.

She shouted at me some more and called me a crazy bitch. I asked her what she would do if she were going to get sacked for being late (this is theoretical, as I am not going to get sacked but I do need to work and I want my daughter to understand that there are boundaries and consequences. I let her make me late way too often). She told me that she would rather lose her job than take her child out in the cold and then yelled at me some more. I lost my temper and shouted back at her and she eventually left.

My daughter was quite upset. She asked if the lady was not nice to me. I explained that the woman was angry with me for not making my daughter wear her clothes in the cold. Then my original plan came to fruition: my daughter agreed to put her top and coat on, I hugged her and said I loved her, and we walked to nursery together.

So, was I unreasonable to take my daughter out in a vest when she was having a horrible temper tantrum?

Different people have different body temperatures. There's a family near me who are quite active and sporty. The dad and the sons always seem to be wearing shorts in all weathers! The mum almost wears it as a badge of pride. Says her sons don't feel the cold and won't wear trousers to school . In contrast, you couldn't get my ds into a pair of school shorts on the hottest day of the year! There's also another man who lives near me who always wears shorts.

@AlphaJura 10 yo DD has not worn trousers or anything covering her legs since last April. It's not a badge of honour she just likes wearing shorts. MIL is constantly lecturing her telling her she'll get ill however she appears to understand virus transfer better than the adults on that side of the family and rightly points out she's one of the healthiest people we know. They expect me to force her and are constantly trying to talk her in to wearing trousers but it's her legs 🤷🏼‍♀️

I’m a year round short wearer, my son couldn’t join in at rugby tots today (broken arm ) so we went to the park instead. We’ve been here about an hour, as he’s active he’s down to just wearing a t-shirt and leggings. I’ve been mainly sat on a bench, I’m in sweat shorts and thin hoody.

I hate trousers, I wear them for work, but apart from that I wear shorts most of the time.

Dd2 always strips her jacket and usually her jumper too within a few minutes of running around. She also freaks out of her bath is any more than luke warm.