to be annoyed by these 'learning by experiences parents'

[grumpydotcom]

Name changed for safety.

Feeling thoroughly pissed off with the 'perfect' parents I've crossed paths with today .

First encounter. I'm cycling to work this morning and need to get a move on. Come to the cattle grid type thing on the cycle path and child on bike is blocking the crossing. Parent has already crossed and is patiently encouraging the child to follow. Child is having non of it .Parent is aware of queue behind but Freddie's 'learning experience' and need for Freddie to make the crossing on his own in his own time (for as long as that may take ) is more important , at the expense of others , no sense of urgency or consideration for queue behind which is building up.

Second encounter lunch time in Greggs queuing for a sandwich . Queue is massive and does not seem to be going down. Reason - parent with small child at the front and child wants to pay . Parent patiently explaining to child about contactless and how that works, and then child drops the card and everyone waits while child is encouraged by parent to find and pick up the card (under the counter ). Parent laughs ' never mind Freddie you try it again ,you can do it' and turns and smiles at the queuers as if we should all be impressed. Staff at Greggs look around awkwardly .

FFS pick up the child and the bike and remove them from the cycle path so others can pass!!!!!

Take the card off the child and pay for the sandwich without delay and get out of the way!!!!!

Thank you

many cyclists round here will hold up huge queues of traffic for ages

The advantage of my local cycle track is that it keeps us cyclists off the road and out of the way of motorists on the alternative road route.

There are however 3 cattle grids which means single file , one way , and one at a time. So if there is a 'hold up' it's pain for cyclists in both directions.

Reading my post from yesterday I admit I sounded like a arse but I do stand by the principal.

I've also noticed that I did not post the outcome. What ultimately happened was that Freddie with his little bike had to reverse and go through the pedestrian gate at the side. He was becoming more and more upset and no amount of coaxing was going to get him to peddle over the cattle grid even if we had obliged all day. I would also say that this was initiated not by parent of Freddie but by another lovely parent with a buggy and child on scooter, who saw the situation, applied common sense and held the gate open for him.

@Onlyforcake accommodating others is a two way street.

Not really. Stroppy impatience is an all too common sight from a wheelchair.

@Onlyforcake I promise I don't tut at elderly people . I've explained upthread what I feel is the difference.

And they would all applaud around the cattle grid so as I commanded Freddie to move whilst his mother sobbed, chastened, a changed woman
This is hilarious 😂

I also acknowledge that is was a public space. Mother of Freddie can take as long as she feels is appropriate and there is nothing I can do about it (except rant on MN)

People faff about.
What can you do, nothing?

Which others are you suggesting should be accomadated? The elderly person in the queue behind you who can't stand for long but has to while you let your child faff about?
The person who has 20 minutes for lunch and can't be late back because people are dependent on them?
Most reasonable people are prepared to tolerate unavoidable delay where a person can't help being slow, but to deliberately delay other people so your child can play shops in public is entirely different, and the antithesis of accommodating others.

Why should a small toddler need to know how to use a card machine? Unless their parents are planning on sending them off to do the family shop next week they can wait until they are old enough to use their own go Henry card. I can put my hand on my heart and declare that I never gave my dd a blank cheque book to practice writing out cheques, or taught her to memorise my PIN.

I do accept though that I used to sign over my family allowance book to her ( now that is outing me) because it was her spending money and school lunch cash. But she was a teen at the time.

Yes, because the only two options are learning the lesson at the front of a queue holding everyone up, and not learning it at all leading to financial ruin. 🙄

Learning about spending happens at the local shop when it's not busy not at tescos when it's heaving

We have a bike track for the school kids the local children know they can only play on it if there are no bikes on it (they love to run up and down it) but I've seen in other areas young kids totally allowed to take over then the parents complain that the teenagers are "taking over" the kiddies play park I mean they literally cannot go where they are supposed to be! 🤦‍♀️

Seems like a good learning experience is how not to inconvenience others

The first one the parent sounds unreasonable but I'm less convinced by the second scenario. Really how long is this taking? A couple of minutes is reasonable but ten minutes would be taking the Mick.

For me there is a time and place for "experience's". A busy shop and a toddles or young child trying to use the contactless machine isn't the time or the place. And isn't necessary either - in that situation the children learn by watching what's going on not necessarily by doing. And there are situations when it isn't allowed - for example in a shop if there is age restricted items being purchased.

In case of the cycling thing, the parent could still have given the child the experience but by waiting to one side so the queue of people could get past first. Poor kid probably felt the pressure of the people behind them, which just isn't helpful either.

At least the child doing the 'one small step for man' routine wasn't learning to climb stairs while the rest of the world was expected to cheer its skills, irrespective of how their time was being wasted.

I agreed with the OP but I think you're wrong here.
It's not about teaching children they're more or less important than adults, it's about being aware of your surroundings and teaching your child to be considerate of other people. It's ok to have these teaching moments but as soon as someone else comes along you say "sorry, I need to take over now as other people are waiting"

It's probably come about because when they were children, their parents said horrible stuff like "children should be seen and not heard" 🤣 and they've tried to be nicer but have gone too far the other way and are now being ignorant and entitled.

There is a balance to be had.

This comment 🤣🤣🤣

YABU

Lots of things hold us up every day, from elderly people using their walker on a narrow street to new staff struggling to learn the till. This is just one more thing in the grand scheme of things rather than the penultimate one.

My daughter has just turned 9, on nice days when we walk home from school we often swing past the supermarket and.... shock horror... I send her in to pick and buy the ingredients for tea.

The only reason she is capable now of doing that now (and from the age of 8) is because she has been allowed to help at a younger age.

The biggest inconvenience was to me .... the time I asked her to buy a basic meat such as chops and sausages to go with veggies and she bought a blasted $40 roast so I had to send her back in as I didn't have time to cook the roast. I would never buy a roast meat at normal price (rather than on special or discounted) and kicked myself for not telling her before she went in not to buy a roast lol.

I let her know why I didn't want her to buy a roast in the future and problem sorted.

OP - You yourself say that your teens are not slightly self sufficient so it sounds like you could do with letting your own children learn some of their own lessons in life too?

I haven’t read the whole thread, but OP, what’s wrong with using your words and saying ‘excuse me, I’m in a rush, can I get past?’ And with leaving yourself ample time to shop/eat etc.

and on treating children like adults - would you get annoyed to the same extent if it was an adult with a learning difficulty or other impairment slowing you down? Why shouldn’t children be treated like human beings with as much right to be in the world as you?

maybe there’s things to learn from these experiences. Are you living life at such a breakneck speed that you can’t afford any time to interact with people? Is that really healthy for you? Are you going to be able to go at the same speed throughout your life? Probably not, as you age. Will you hope for any kindnesses to be extended to you if you happen to develop arthritis and drop your debit card in the supermarket?

Your anger is telling you things, and tbh I’m not so sure it’s telling you that other people are stupid or wrong.

Worth repeating

Oh, for crying out loud, all pps who have construed that OP gets impatient with the elderly, disabled or any other people with extra difficulties who need more time is totally misunderstanding the post.

I am always looking out for people who might need help or patience, and if I'm next in line I can cheerfully cope with the person I'm behind talking to the cashier about the weather for a moment or a parent and child taking a little extra time, but when people are simply OBLIVIOUS to a queue building behind them that is NOT OK.

This does NOT make me an impatient arsehole. Why can't you understand that??

*using your words" you are talking to her as if she is three years old.

Children are not adults. We are not expected to treat children as adults. If you want strangers to do that they would be far harsher. Children bumping in you - look where you are going! Children staring at your ice cream - stop being so rude! We give children a lot more leeway rightly than adults.
And no carer is going to teach an adult to pay by contactless in a busy Greggs at lunchtime. That would lead to lots of verbal complaints.

And yes lots of people are very busy. Do you work? In a job where you get a half-hour break so every minute is precious?

And no it has nothing to do with having kindness with someone with arthritis. I find people who are self-absorbed and do not think of others tend to be impatient with others as well. All the OP is asking for is for everyone to think about other people's needs as well.

People who complain that someone would not treat an adult in the way they are treating a child, do not mean it when they imply we should treat children the way we do adults. They would be loudly complaining if strangers actually did this.

There is a time and a place for teaching your children, sometimes it is appropriate to encourage them to try something different and to be independent, other times it is appropriate to teach them they need to be considerate to others.
As an adult the parent should be perfectly able to judge when is and isn't appropriate.
It is a completely different scenario to someone elderly or disabled holding someone up.

YANBU. Do the parents not feel embarrassed? Do they not feel anything about holding up everyone else?

I would have said "Come through the gate right now as there are other people waiting behind you, or I'll take you through myself" and if he didn't move, go get him.

I would let DD tap the card, but wouldn't stand there explaining how it works beforehand FFS. Give them the card, let them tap, explain what happened afterwards when out the queue! As soon as DD dropped the card , I would have picked it up. . Because there's a fucking queue of people behind me.

Not quite the same situation, but I saw another example of the "Oh my family are so adorable I am sure you won't mind all waiting for them" mindset.

Anyone who has been to Dovedale on a sunny weekend day will know how busy the stepping stones are and how frustrating it can be queuing to get across. There is really only room for one person on each stone so the traffic is one way, which means that when loads of people start crossing in one direction a queue builds up from the other side, until they get a chance to go and so on. Anyway you can wait a long time to cross and then of course you are limited to the speed of the person ahead of you as there is no room to pass.

Now I am not so much of a grumpy so-and-so that I mind children taking their time and being a little hesitant and nervous. Nor do I really mind much about the dogs that utterly freak out and have to be coaxed - although I have a silent internal dialogue along the lines of "Why don't you just pick it up and carry it across".

No what really exasperated me was the Mum who, having crossed herself then called to her family who were still on the stones to stop and wait there while she got a photo of them. So she waited until the people in front of her children had crossed and then had them all posing for the photo. And then, oh no, that one wasn't very good so she must just try one more time.

I wonder when she looked at the photo later whether she noticed the expressions on the faces of all the people waiting behind her family who were all at a stand still waiting for her to get her picture. Or the queue still waiting to cross.