"Would you mind stopping that now, please" Was I rude?

[dizzydizzydizzy]

Lying down with eyes shut on gigantic upcycled bench made of pallets and astroturf.

2 kids ages about 8 jumping off backrest of bench onto seat about 20-30cm from my feet. Their mother was sitting in the bench about another metre from that (the bench is 5m long). They did it about 10 times each and each time they landed by my feet they made the bench vibrate. I then asked them if they could possibly stop doing it.

Their mother told me I was very rude and said I should move to an empty deckchair.
I told her I needed to lie down. She then told her kids to keep jumping.

Was I being rude? Or was she?

*play equipment

Amen.

She could have been sat eating a sandwich and told the kids to piss off. She would have still been in the right. Have you actually read any of the ops posts?!

She was rude and obviously the kids are learning this horrible behavior from her. So disrespectful to tell them to keep jumping when there is obviously other available space for them to play and not be harassing someone. The mum sounds very chavy and her kids will be just the same.

@AllThingsServeTheBeam I’m pretty sure telling playing children to “piss off” would not make anybody “in the right”. If she was eating a sandwich then presumably she wouldn’t be expecting peace and quiet and tranquility around her. And if she would that would also be a ridiculous expectation.

Oh yay, classism! What fun

I meant in the way she told them to. Not literally using the words piss off. Christ. The op was right. If she was sat, lay, eyes open, eyes closed. The kids, well the mother, was being unreasonable for letting them bother someone else.

She's doing them no favours is she.

Buy this and clobber them, won't be playing on your bench after both of their skulls are caved in.
Salutations,
PregnantMumOf4

@pixie5121 And I don’t agree that I’m ableist, or that a public place is appropriate for a nap. Are other people seeing lots of napping people in public? I’ve never, ever seen this bar a pub at 2am.

it’s ableist because if you are disabled or chronically ill then sometimes you will have no choice about what is ‘appropriate’. I’ve had to lie in the floor in much worse places due to my disability. If you can’t walk you can’t.

Sorry @pixie5121 ! Wrong person tagged. @PlasticineMeg the comment above was answering you.

Never mind rude, you were appallingly unreasonable. There was another bench available.

You don't have the right to hog a public bench and/ or dictate how others use it.

Having long covid doesn't give you freedom to lie down anywhere you please in a public place and insist others modify their behaviour around you. There are hundreds of thousands of people with long covid getting on with their lives as best they can and not throwing their weight around as you were.

You don't have the right to police how other people's children use a public facility when their parent is right there. Children are not public property whom any random adult may scold or order about.

I'm thinking that the username dizzydizzydizzy says it all. However, it might have been better to say, "I'm sorry...dizzy spell. Could you not jump on this one, please. I may be sick."

i would have said, cut it out. that's enough.
why are people so scared of telling children when they are out of line.
if the mother doesn't care, why should that mean that the rest of us have to put up with it.
we've gone from one extreme to another, from children being cowed, to letting them set the agenda everywhere always.
nonsense.

You can clearly tell who is entitled and has the feral kids on here.

There have been times when I was out where I had to lie down immediately so I wouldn't faint and vomit on myself.

Anyone with half a brain cell and consideration for others would realise that someone lying on a bench is likely unwell and and to stop their kids from jumping around.

Imagine having sudden vertigo and brats jumping off the bench vibrating it making it worse.

And NO, nobody has to explain their health condition so you can decide whether to honor their request or not.

Too bad we can't carry a spray bottle of water to spray the parent and kids like a naughty pet.

OP , she was VVVVU

@alexdgr8 Read the posts above yours, to see why people are ‘afraid’... some parents feel entitled to their children harassing others and become extremely unhinged in their defence of indefensible behaviour... I’m so glad I’m moving to an isolated area, people are getting to be v strange these days.

Oh dear.
In your youth and perfect health; unwell, disabled, and elderly are invisible to you.
Time has a way of fixing that attitude for you.

Exactly and also if OP is anything like me they will struggle to get back up off the grass again

What? Don't lie on the item designed for people to sit on, Forget your own comfort? Just lie on the ground... this is a really odd suggestion.

Have you heard yourself 🤣

@mathanxiety are you for real?

Children are not public property whom any random adult may scold or order about.
They should be, it takes a village….

DISGUSTING behaviour from that woman!

Benches are for people to sit on, op needed to lie on it as feeling as well.

Benches are not a toy for kids to clamber all over and jump off with their mucky shoes that may have dog shit and all sorts on them. People then have to sit on that bench, they could get their clothes all cos some woman can’t possibly say no to her kids.

also OP was their first. Therefore that woman and her kids should have backed off and left her be. There will have been loads of other space the kids could play.

I don’t know when we became so ridiculously child-centric in this country but it has to stop.

Children’s wants do not trump adults needs which is what it boils down to in this situation.

Hate to think how entitled this kids will be as young adults…

Also really don’t understand the uproar on here about telling other people’s kids off!

Politely asking them to refrain from doing something they shouldn’t is hardly going to scar them for life is it?!

Don’t be so precious