Children Are So Irritating

[SmidgenofaPigeon]

LIGHTHEADED KLAXON

Am I sure I want one? I mean it’s a bit late because I’m three months pregnant, not by accident or anything, I did do it on purpose. I am also a nanny.

But I’m sitting in the park while one of my charges plays football. I got a coffee, and went to the cottage-garden type bit where they have hanging bird feeders. I was enjoying the lovely spring day sounds.

Within minutes lots of parents and children (ok, six children) turned up, and the let the children loose. No pigeon is safe. They are brandishing sticks. They are lobbing bits of gravel. They are shrieking. They are blundering through low-lying shrubbery. They are pushing each other over and crying. The parents occasionally whine ‘Sophia, Jacob, stop it’ intermittently but in a way you might say ‘oh it’s raining’

There is a HUGE adventure playground in this park so I don’t know why the shrubs and gravel gardens are holding so much appeal.

I’ve been a nanny for ten years and I’ve never let any children terrorise pigeons. Just why? If mine shriek for no good reason they’re told sharply to stop it. They have a freer range in actual child-dedicated play areas, obviously. They aren’t allowed to brandish sticks in each other’s faces.

I know it’s not the children’s fault really but oh it’s irritating!

braces self for cries of ‘you don’t own the park you know!’ And ‘they’re just being children! They’ve been locked up for months!

My own children irritate me daily, I work with them and they also irritate me daily, and if I see kids out and about misbehaving, they also irritate me. Kids are just generally irritating.

This is also me! I'm a teacher and have two DCs of my own. I love them dearly but I take deep breaths daily to stop myself barking at them.

A lot of parents need to learn to say no to their children.

yep I agree but in this case it's not the children it's the parents. You can raise your own to not be like this!! Don't worry

Kids are so annoying, why are we people obsessed with procreating? Get a dog!!

Everyone has got a dog already as far as I can tell.

We have a pub garden smack bang on our boundary. Screaming kids every weekend drive us insane. The parents are usually inside or otherwise oblivious while the little bastards are running round the beer garden just screaming their heads off.

Even when they’re just playing, their voices are so high pitched it’s like nails down a blackboard. That’s inside, with the windows shut.
We can’t sit in our garden at weekends for the little sods.
Lockdown has been bloody lovely for that one thing 😄

@Exhausted4ever @SmidgenofaPigeon Ah ok, yeah, wild growing, messy flowers in the woodlands where we walk, def not displays. I was going to say 🤷🏻‍♀️Stop a little toddler picking a random flower from the grass, pretty harsh!

I'm one of the annoying parents that let's their kids run into a crowd of pigeons. The pigeons keep coming back to be fair, I figure if they were bothered they would not hang around. Obviously wouldn't let them kick at them or try to hurt them. I think that's different to enjoying the thrill of them flying around you.

Letting them pick flowers that aren't daisys or dandelions is obnoxious.

I find it hard to get worked up about gravel lobbing unless it's at someone or something, sometimes you just run out of parenting juice and if they are busy with gravel and not bothering anyone I would take the opportunity to stare into the mid distance and dream of bedtime.

As with many things it's easier to be on it when your being paid and in professional mode. I would be prepared for standards to slip a bit when they are your own.

Nah, I just hate kids pigeon chasing!!! The pigeons keep coming back because that’s where they were choosing to hang out. Just let them be! And it’s hardly nice for other people going about their business and they get a startled pigeon flying into their face because a kid has scared it into flying off. I don’t get the fascination with pigeon disturbing at all

My own kids I can tolerate, but obviously I can also tell them off, so that helped. Now they're older, one is lovely and the other is getting that way.

Other people's kids and other parents generally give me rage. We've got friends we as a couple have agreed we won't hang out with til their children have left home. We like them as people but can't bear the way they (don't) parent.

Children are noisy, dirty and irritating.
And their parents aren't much better.

But even worse are other people's grandchildren!

@HotSteppa nice to hear that you let your children partake in animal cruelty for fun why stop at simply letting them run into a crowd of harmless birds? Why not let them chuck handfuls of gravel at them too? Maybe kill or seriously harm a couple of them? Seeing as you're not opposed to that either. They're only birds after all, they can't feel pain or fear like other living creatures!

Yes kids in shopping trolleys or the trolley loaded with their scooters. How does anyone think it is okay to do that !? Never trotted on a dog shit on the pavement ? There was a thread about this here and apparently this is childrens' fault because if they weren't in a trolley they would be wrecking the shop.

I also hate pigeons but what kind of a monster wants to scare other living things.

So OP, you are right about this, children and parents and actually people in general are annoying but don't worry, your baby will be different. Congratulations !

I find children so irritating when they have a lot of energy. I'm not having any as I couldn't cope, I'd be a real Trunchball.
Btw, I know parents love their children and no one elses, but YOUR children are irritating too..in fact, they are the most irritating

Oh I absolutely agree. I hate other people's bratty kids.

We were at the park the other day, and there were older children tearing around and knocking over small toddlers (on purpose). There was one child who had taken her scooter onto the climbing frame and was scooting up and down the bridges meaning the rest of the children were in danger of being mowed down/pushed off. Another child was repeatedly climbing up the only slide and refused to get off, meaning that none of the other children could use it. Another one was purposefully running in front of the swings back and forth laughing manically (a part of me did wish he would be hit by an errant swing, would have served him right, but of course everyone is too polite and just stopped their own children from swinging in case they hit him)

Where were the parents and what were they doing?! Sort out your horrible bratty children. Argh!

Ah that feels better!

Also I hate it in particular when we are at the local zoo which is dedicated to conservation and saving endangered species and the parents allow their children to scream and bang on the enclosures, or treat it like a park and allow them to run around screaming at the tops of their voices. Think of the poor animals ffs, none of them want to be subjected to that.

@scaredsadandstuck

100% agree. Can I add, parents who don't care when their little darlings pull branches off trees/pull up flowers in public spaces as though it doesn't matter because "they don't belong to anyone"

At Chester Zoo I saw a young child pulling all the bedding plants out of the recently planted borders. The parent just stood there watching and didn't say a thing. I nearly blew a gasket

I don't get it, if they don't want to tick their child off in public then they could just go and physically remove them from the self-appointed task? I can't imagine the mother watching actually thought there was nothing wrong in destroying the planted display! Surely..?

@elliemara

They're playing and exploring, you know... At the moment there's so little for children to do, if they can't even run around a park freely you'd never stop having to tell them off I'm just glad when I see my child have at least some moments of free roaming and fun in a day.

So it's ok to throw stones at birds & run around with sticks???

No it's not.

There a bloody playground there to play in.

@Dramallamabanana agreed. I have to take my nanny kids to London Zoo regularly when it’s open as they have a family pass. I’m not a massive fan of zoos anyway but that’s by the by. I told some kids off once for yelling at the macaws trying to get a response out of them. Proper bellowing. I did say something to their mums but I was the one who got an earful obviously. Because it’s A ZOO. They are there to keep the children AMUSED.

Sadly every time we go there are less and less staff around keeping an eye on things

@SmidgenofaPigeon

I have no hesitation telling them not to scare the pigeons & not to do whatever other anti social behaviour. I'd give the parents the chance first & i'd tell them nicely, but still firmly.

If the parents don't like it, tough, they should have told them before I needed to.

I won't allow them to terrorise birds etc no way.

I’m not sure how I once stopped myself from having a major go at the parents of a child who was gaily trampling all over a bed of beautiful blue scillas at Kew, while said parents fondly watched their little darling having fun and said not one word.🤬

@GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER at Kew of all places 🤦🏻‍♀️ You know, where the actual point is to appreciate lovely flowers and learn something. That’s disgusting.

Children are insanely irritating i totally agree

I agree completely about the pigeon chasing and flower picking....my DC know that God help them they pull any of that. They wouldn't see their DVD players for a week but far more annoyingly they would have to sit through repeated lectures on respecting animals etc etc they've heard the lectures when even thinking about it (because dc are rubbish at hiding their nefarious plans)

My god though can still be supremely irritating. Playing trains apparently has to include high pitched train whistles , and if I hear another 3 year long story about minecraft with footnotes, bibliography and having to restart eveey 2 minutes because he forgot to tell me something in the story that I stopped listening to an hour ago then I am going to eat even more chocolate.

I would still fight a bear for them in a heartbeat though and they are unutterably cute when they are asleep

Thing is we were all annoying children once though!

Yes they are!

The worse thing about being a parent is having to spend more time in close proximity to other people’s children (not all, of course).
Soft play shrieking nightmares are still with me although mine is now grown-up.

I agree 100% OP. It's exhausting and they are a complete pita.