Was I wrong to touch her child?

[WhatDoYouDo1234]

At a famous London attraction today with my 4 year old. She was playing on one of the interactive exhibits. There was a long queue behind us. Another little girl about 3 kept running up and putting her hands on what my daughter was doing. Think an interactive drawing, so each time she touched it the screen cleared and my daughter’s drawing was lost. There was no parent anywhere near. First time I said gently “No, it’s not your turn, it’s this girl’s turn, you have to wait.” Or something to that effect. By the fifth or sixth time my daughter was getting increasingly cross, no matter how much I told her to be patient and try again, or how I tried to ask the other little girl to stop, and the kids behind us were getting cross too. I’m trying to prevent my daughter from loosing her cool. So I actually removed the girl’s hands and gently lifted her back saying “It’s not your turn. You have to wait.” A mum then came storming up shouting at me “Not to effing touch my child again!” To which I said something like “Well maybe if you were watching her you could have sorted it.” So my question is not if I was unreasonable, I probably was, but what do you do in that situation? With hindsight I’m thinking I should have called out for someone to come and get their child? But it was all quite quick! What would you do?!

*Correction. then no more.

I once caught a child as it fell out of a pushchair, they would have gone head first on a concrete floor. The parent barely grunted a response at me let alone a thank you!

You were in the wrong.
You should never touch another child, especially as they were unknown to you unless they were in danger or hurt.
If your child is only 4, can you not remember what a younger child is like ?
Not only that, all children develop in their own time and way.
The other parent obviously was aware or she would not have challenged you touching her child.
She isn't here to justify her actions.
You could, however have removed your child on to the next attraction and gone back to that one as a 3year old doesn't always understand the concept of 'my turn, your turn and is only just developing this idea - you also don't know anything about the other child.
You could also have engaged your child with the other child and used it as a teaching aim in sharing with younger children, teaching patience and when that no longer worked then move away.

To be honest i probably would have just let my daughter push her away. In reality one of her siblings probably would have rugby tackled the little girl to the ground and sat on her then the mother really would have had something to complain about, i then would have defended my children!

My children are taught never to start something but that i will 100% support them if they stand up for themselves after trying other options. I wouldnt have minded you moving mine out of the way but then i wouldnt have been letting them run riot and would have been very apologetic.

@Elisi

No. You do not touch another child. You should have acted as an ADULT, and either have stood between your child and the screen or accepted that this wasn't going well and moved on, enquiring where the person responsible for this wretched child was hiding themself. And if you were worried about your daughter losing her cool and whacking another child then you really need to look at your own parenting skills tbh

How is it not acting as an adult to gently move a child's hands and lift her carefully? Jesus wept, some people.

You could also have engaged your child with the other child and used it as a teaching aim in sharing with younger children, teaching patience and when that no longer worked then move away.
A) I think we've covered 'why moving away wasn't a good option' and B) the OP was not on a teaching job.

I sympathise, it can be difficult and damned annoying when another child is unsupervised and causing problems, but as another poster said, I would have moved the child in my care along, saying we could try to go back later. I definitely wouldn’t have touched the other child. Aside from anything else, you could have been accused of assaulting her and it could have got nasty!

@negomi90

You shouldn''t tough a strange child unless they're in danger or putting someone else in danger. In this case you could have just got in the way or asked her loudly where her grown up was/pretended she was lost in order to get the attention of her grown up who you could have then talked to.

You shouldn't be a crap parent either, but given some people are some other people have to touch strange children.

I don't think I would have felt comfortable touching another child its just a bit of a no no isn't it? But I have felt like booting someone else's child plenty of times so I get it, I think I would have hopelessly looked around for a parent and just told them could she wait her turn. No doubt you would have got a mouthful but at least you would have tried!

You acted as you thought best. The child came to no harm and at her age a parent/carer should have been watching her more closely.
I tend to go for loud voice ( I have a loud teacher’s voice!) as in “ are you lost ? Whose child is this?”

@SylvanasWindrunner

I honestly think people whose first thought is 'how dare you touch my child' and not 'oh, I'm sorry, I should have been watching her' are so far out of touch with what is acceptable parenting of young children in a public place that you can't reason with them anyway. If your toddler has been repeatedly annoying someone to the point they have to physically move your child away from them, you are failing to look after your child properly. It's as simple is that. It's lazy, bad parenting and you deserve to have someone call you out on it.

Totally agree. OP I think I know the place you were at and it's a nightmare for zoned out zombie parents on their phones not paying ANY attention at all and to all those saying "just move on" - HELL NO - we waited our turn, it was your child's turn - control your children! and exhale

I'd have done the same as you, OP. if you really have an issue with someone touching your child then bloody well keep them in sight.

@lazystar

You were in the wrong. You should never touch another child, especially as they were unknown to you unless they were in danger or hurt. If your child is only 4, can you not remember what a younger child is like ? Not only that, all children develop in their own time and way. The other parent obviously was aware or she would not have challenged you touching her child. She isn't here to justify her actions. You could, however have removed your child on to the next attraction and gone back to that one as a 3year old doesn't always understand the concept of 'my turn, your turn and is only just developing this idea - you also don't know anything about the other child. You could also have engaged your child with the other child and used it as a teaching aim in sharing with younger children, teaching patience and when that no longer worked then move away.

Are you talking crap or would you honestly never grab a young child who was about to step off a platform into the path of a fast moving train?

I cannot believe how disgusting and selfish you are if you would let that kid die.

And I can't believe how dishonest you are if you would save a kids life despite stating unambiguously that you would NEVER touch another child.

I think that kids need parenting, and however much I never wish to parent another person's kid, I sure as hell am if that's what's needed. In OPs circumstances, and with DP alongside me, I'd have been tempted to grab the kid by the hand and march her off and dump her with the staff (unless, of course, I was stopped by the errant parent).

I would have done the same as you OP but I would not have been as polite to the mother. I wouldn't raise my voice or swear, I can not bear swearing or angry raised voices in front of children (my own childhood issues). But I would have delivered home truths to the mother.

You weren't really unreasonable. The other parent should have been looking after her child. However, in Covid times, you probably should not have. I doubt that was her issue, though.

My oldest went to the nursery attached to a sure start building. Every day this mother would show up with her 2 kids who were NOT in the nursery, she would sit in the entrance lobby, log on to the wifi or make a call on her mobile and just ignore her kids and she was warned often by the staff SHE had to supervise her own kids and she would just tell them to get lost.

Her toddler regularly stole out of people bags, fought with other kids and fell down the stairs more than once (having to be picked up and comforted by random staff) but the mind blowing one was one day her baby crawled off and somehow got out of the door and a guy nearly ran her over. He came running in with her thinking she escaped from the nursery and the mother just barked at him to put her down and not touch her child then just carried on her phone conversation.

It like if YOU watched your child no one else would touch them - honestly can't stand people like that, if you're not going to do the bare basic of just WATCHING your child (honestly it takes little to no effort, the rest of us manage) then you shouldn't really have children.

I’ve had similar when mine were small. We would just give up and try again later.

I don’t think you were wrong btw. That’s just how I would have handled it.

@IntermittentParps
Forgive for not reading every other single reply !
And as she was with her own child, why is that not part of a teaching/learning experience?

All in all, excuses for touching another person's child when neither child was in any harm.

Don't think you did anything wrong. I had a similar situation once and I very loaded shouted who's child is this as I need the parents to come and get her please. The mum was not happy but as my son has ASD no way we could leave the thing and go do something else. Besides why should you reward bad behaviour it only encourages a child to behave like that.

Parents need to parent their child or they risk someone doing something they might not like

I don’t understand this either! If the child had needed help With something and you’d touched her (first aid for instance!) the parent would presumably have been thankful - I can understand being annoyed if you were being physically aggressive AND touching the child but to gently remove her hands I don’t see a problem and wouldn’t have an issue with anyone doing that to my child.

I’d have done the same as you OP. It’s not like you manhandled the child FGS, you gently removed her from your child’s space. Your child should not have to be disadvantaged. If the lazy fecker parent wasn’t watching her own child then she has no right to complain about someone else stepping in to do the job!

@LaetitiaASD
I can't believe how crap you are at not being able to read my first statement, that you copy and pasted back at me.

I said if the child was not in any danger or hurt.

At no point did I say I would let a child die.
I suggest you start reading before you make wild and untrue accusations.

I would however treat you like an adult if you touched my child without undue reason.

Try reading before you go off on a wild tangent.

@lazystar
Unbelievable comment. You obviously didn't read the OP's post saying that they couldn't just 'move on and come back to it later' as you and some others have opined.
The reality is that they would have had to go right back to the beginning of the attractions and queue. It seems to be a series of attractions leading from one to the next all in one building, which has a start and an end. If you leave the queue you have to go back to the start.
Parents are not there to think of placating someone else's child whilst denying their own child their rightful turn.

You were right. I was at the park once and a child was not "taking turns" with my child at the playground ie snatching and pushing. I managed this for around 5 minutes before eventually he went to hit my child and I stopped his hand and said "oh dear, we don't hit do we". The apparently absent mother then appeared as if from nowhere and told me not to dare touch her child! Madness.

@lazystar - the OP said that she couldn’t move her child on to the next activity and go back to the drawing one because it would have meant leaving the exhibit and going back in again, to rejoin the back of the queue. Why should @WhatDoYouDo1234’s dd, who had done nothing wrong, lose out because a lazy mum wasn’t parenting her child properly?

And even if she had been able to just move on, and go back easily, there was still a queue of other children waiting for their turn on the activity - why should the little girl get to push in ahead of all of them too?

[quote lazystar]@IntermittentParps
Forgive for not reading every other single reply !
And as she was with her own child, why is that not part of a teaching/learning experience?

All in all, excuses for touching another person's child when neither child was in any harm.[/quote]
Um. Is that a trick question?
The OP has chosen to come and have a teaching/learning experience with her OWN child, not to become a proxy teacher for some lazy mare who can't be bothered keeping an eye on hers