To have told him not to press the buttons

[LiftyLift]

Yesterday I was in a busy shopping centre with baby DC in the buggy.

The shops are spread over two floors, with an additional top floor food court and parking on lower ground. There is a single, small lift to serve all four floors. For further context, one set of toilets that serves the centre is closed for refurbishment, so the only working toilets are on the top floor where the food court is so
the lift is busier than usual.

I waited in the queue to get in the lift to go to the food court toilets and when I got in there was a boy aged around 12 alone with obvious ASD. All of the buttons were illuminated when I got in and he kept pressing more buttons meaning we went down to the lower floor of the shops, then to the parking level and I asked him if he was getting out. He said no and I politely said “please stop pressing the buttons”. He repeated what I said and then was hovering his finger over the buttons while the lift went up and down stopping at each floor. There were people on every level waiting to get in, but there was no space for another buggy or wheelchair to get in.

I had to repeat kindly “please stop, people are waiting to get in” and he was growing agitated with me for not allowing him to press the buttons and started to hit himself.

When the lift eventually made it to the top floor, he got out and walked off with his mum who had obviously let him in the lift to play alone.

Was AIBU to tell him to stop pressing the buttons? I don’t think he should have been in there alone.

I dont think anyone is going to say you were being unreasonable to ask him to stop pressing the buttons. What are you hoping to gain from this thread apart from people saying the Mum shouldn't have let him ply in the lift?

How about WAIBU to think he shouldn’t have been in there alone?

I appreciate this might have been the only time his mum got too.

She shouldn't have left him alone.

I had a similar situation in the walled garden of our park where a lad was throwing sticks at younger children. His mother was across the park on a bench letting him do it, so I took her over to him and told her to take better care of him before he injured a toddler. She wasn't too happy but I didn't care. ASD doesn't mean you get to terrorise or inconvenience others.

• took him over to her.

Of course you weren't unreasonable.

I don't get the point of your thread though because it's obvious.

I think the only one being unreasonable on this situation was his parent. Who leaves any child in a lift to play with the buttons let alone one with additional needs that will physically harm if overwhelmed?! My youngest is autistic and my other two boys aren’t and I wouldn’t leave any one of them in a loft to do this. My youngest may have a meltdown about it, but that’s my problem to help him work through, no one else’s.

in lift 🤦🏻‍♀️

"I don't get the point of this thread"

are you new to MN? 😂

so many threads don't really have a point. It's just idle chat or wanting someone to confirm you weren't being an arse.

If there were people waiting at every floor the lift would have crawled up stopping at each floor anyhow.

Its four floors, and you wanted to go up, the max number of floors you could have gone down first is two. As the if it was going down anyhow, the max number of additional buttons he could have pressed after you got in was one.

You make it sound as if it was a huge drama, not two stops, and YABU to over-egg it like that.

Even though I think its wrong to let DC play in lifts, I think you've portrayed this wrongly and unfairly.

Not long now til term starts, and there won't be DC in shopping centres then

My immediate thought was what if the life had broken down. But then I am the mum of a now adult man with autism and additional DX and I’m very wary of using lifts to begin with when out with him and his care team.

Truth be told I wouldn’t have entered the life in the first place if I’d recognized the young lad was on the spectrum. And if I hadn’t realized till I was in the lift I’d have gotten out at the next stop for no other reason than I’d have known it was better for him to be in there alone.

Would I have told him to stop pressing buttons? No. Id have known it was better for him (for us) to let him carry on and that the last thing he need/we needed was for him to have a meltdown. It’s not as if we would have been in the lift all day.

Was the Op unreasonable to ask him to stop pressing the buttons? Yes. Because she could very clearly see before she got in the lift that he was on the spectrum and this was an out of the ordinary situation to begin with.

YWNBU. He shouldn’t have been left alone to play in the lift, ASD or not.

Of course you weren't unreasonable to ask him to stop

I’m a mother of two children with ASD and I’d never leave my children in a lift or even allow them to play in a lift as it isn’t safe but it’s worth mentioning that support for parents of children with SEN can be extremely scarce and she may be utterly exhausted and burnt out.
I’m not excusing it but there could be reasons she didn’t think straight about the situation or he may have been having a massive meltdown and she might have thought 5 minutes in the lift won’t do any harm.

Of course you weren't unreasonable to stop him pressing all of the lift buttons, impending meltdown or not. You and other people were being heavily inconvenienced by what he was doing.

The only unreasonable person in this scenario was his arsehole parent for allowing him to do this and inconvenience other people, some of whom could also have had disabilities that meant they greatly needed the lift.

Lifts are not toys.

Ah right.. you just want to have a go at someone else's parenting

This was what I was wondering. I realised asking him to stop was actually making him cross. Luckily he didn’t have a full meltdown but it could have happened. In a small
lift with no carer there would have been a disaster.

It can't have taken that long with only four floors surely? A minor inconvenience but I'm not sure I would have bothered saying anything, especially if he started hitting himself! Obviously his mum shouldn't have left him (but it's bloody hard work and we don't know what had happened before so maybe 5 mins in the lift was the best solution to whatever was going on).

Who pissed on your cereal this morning?

A minor inconvenience for me of a few minutes which is fine, I could see what was going on. I felt for the people who were waiting on the other floors as there was no room for them to get in. I didn’t know his mum was waiting at the top or how long he had been there. He was essentially blocking half of the lift to others who needed to use it.

I would have noticed that he was alone and either used the emergency phone to highlight this to staff or got out at the next floor and warned staff simply for the safety of the boy

To be honest, it’s my experience of 30 odd years that most people would have summed up the situation with the young lad and not bothered about having to wait a little while longer.

In other words I would have seen that he was a vulnerable child and sought help. If he mother hadn't of been at the top he could have ran out of the shopping centre.

You were unreasonable to ask him to stop when you knew he had ASD. A better approach would have been 'oh that looks like fun, can you press x button for me?' Failing that I'd have let him on and got out at the next stop.
It wasn't your place to say anymore when you knew he was getting cross as like you say, he could have had a meltdown that you wouldn't have been able to deal with.
Of course, it's not right he was in there on his own but I wouldn't have been trying to say or do anything to potentially trigger him and make things a lot worse..
Really, the mother needs to know its not okay to do that, other people depend on lifts, she can't allow her child to hijack it..

Thank you for a nice balanced post, I think that would have been a better approach. I wish I had said to the Mum that it wasn’t ok, but I’m assuming she just needed a break and felt he was safe contained in the lift.