Feel a bit shakey after ds 10s behaviour

[BearGryllsDad]

For reasons I won't go into I had to take the DCs into town with me to do some exercise. Afterward I took them into M and S as I wanted to check out the sale and get the kids a meal in the cafe (kids eat free, or one does anyway). I have never heard so much moaning and playing up as this from ds who is 10 nearly 11. At one point he was crying because he finished his food and leave even though I still had food on my plate and my drink. His little brother was happily entertaining himself, but ds was making a scene to the extent some people were noticing.

Then whilst I had a quick look arousnd the sale items, mum, mum, mum I want to go. Mum, mum, mum. You said one shop. And on and on he went. I told him to give me five minutes, but he couldn't. At one point he lay on the floor feigning something. He started winding up his younger brother calling him a weirdo and sniggering at him. Pointing out pink t shirts and saying they were for him. In the end I told him to stop as he was being infuriating. I didn't loose my temper and kept it together. But I am sitting at home feeling an angry, shakey mess. I've even had a few tears. I often feels like he tries to control things and play up if we have to run errands or so something that is not centered around him. As soon as he gets home he plugs into YouTube and that may be part of the problem. I know m and s is boring but should he be able to tolerate 30 minutes of boredom at his age without making such an embarrassing scene?

Except the lunch wasn’t something he enjoyed either so it wasn’t ‘broken up by lunch’ for him. You said ‘a walk around the shops’, which it also wasn’t.

If he doesn’t enjoy being taken out for lunch then that’s his problem. It’s a treat and he should’ve been grateful.

It is his problem, and the OPs. It’s not a treat if he doesn’t see it as a treat.

😂 oh pumper, your kids are in for a shock. I think I’m done here.

It’s not a treat if he’s not being treated. It’s just more boredom for him.

I am really genuinely curious to know how many adults would happily sit and watch something they had zero interest in for 40 minutes with nothing to do and no friends to talk to. And then follow someone round a shop they had zero interest in for a further, say, 30 minutes. No phone or book or magazine or your own errands to run. Literally just watching and following someone else while they go about their day.

This would drive me round the bend. I would be crawling the walls with boredom. Am I so unusual?

I schlepped around with my parents as a child while they ran errands, but I always, always had a book or two with me. Lifesaver. OP has stayed very quiet on whether DS had anything to do while she did her stuff.

@Wouldloveanother agree 100% children need boundaries, we all have boundaries adults have to follow the law otherwise we face a stretch at her majesty’s pleasure.

if society was able to do as it pleased with no repercussions/ punishments we’d all be drug dealing pimps speeding down Oxford street while drunk swinging swords

humans are destructive

Why do you keep minimising how much time he had to spend following his mum around? It undermines your point a lot.

It was 10.45 until 2.30pm. Hardly a mega marathon.

Nope, not at all unusual.

I was the same as a kid - yes, I went out on errands but I always brought a book or a GameBoy with me and I often just sat in a quiet corner and read while my mum shopped.

What did he do during the 40mins-hour exercise?

No, you’re not. People just expect kids to be robots.

I work 9 hours a day, with one break in the middle, often at a time I don’t choose and don’t particularly like. I cannot check my phone, make a snack or cup of tea, chat, read a book, or anything like that as I don’t have that type of job. I need to do it otherwise I wouldn’t be able to afford to live. It’s very boring. But I’m aware that it’s life, so I tolerate it. At the weekends my kids do occasionally need to do boring things, because when else are they supposed to get done?

If someone offered to buy me lunch in return for going to an appointment then walking round a shop with them I’d be happy-ish to do so, as long as they were the type of person who also did things for me. Sometimes in relationships you go places you don’t love, and the trade off is that they do the same for you.

Talk about missing the fucking point the life skill isn't shopping, it is realising that the world doesn't revolve around him and his YouTube obsession, and it's about sometimes having to go along with things for other people (I assume op had no other childcare today hence why she says at the start she HAD to take them with her).

And if he wants a book he could, you know, bring one. By age 10/11 most of us have gotten out of the habit of packing a little bag of toys and snacks so our child doesn’t tantrum while running errands. They can usually do that for themselves.

Maybe he did have a book? The OP is being very cagey about what he did during the exercise time.

I’m guessing she taped him to a chair facing a wall and told him not to make a sound.

No screen time for one day!

I work 9 hours a day, with one break in the middle, often at a time I don’t choose and don’t particularly like. I cannot check my phone, make a snack or cup of tea, chat, read a book, or anything like that as I don’t have that type of job. I need to do it otherwise I wouldn’t be able to afford to live. It’s very boring. But I’m aware that it’s life, so I tolerate it

But that's the whole point. You tolerate being bored at work because you're paid and need to do the job to pay the bills, buy food, go on holiday etc.

But here, you have DC being dragged round town while their mum goes to a gym class and browses the M&S sales. What's the benefit to them apart from being bored to tears?

I accept days like this happen sometimes when you have children, but I'd also do whatever I could to alleviate how boring it was for them. Allow them to bring a book or a DS to play on, offer to take them to McDonald's or the pool or the park halfway through to break things up a bit, etc.

🙄 walking around some shops counts as physical activity, it doesn't haven't to a sport, swim or run about.

I think the op just needed to make sure sons got out of the house for a bit.

It wasn’t just half an hour though, what was the exercise part? A walk into town? Plus a cafe is really dull for kids, as is watching your mum rake through sales. I think you could have been more understanding of how bored he was, and then avoided the poor behaviour.

You are joking surely? At the same age I was attending our local high school (the old forms 1 - 7) and I can assure you that I would never have behaved like that - no matter how bored I was.

In the end I told him to stop as he was being infuriating. I didn't loose my temper and kept it together.

Maybe that's where it went wrong. He needs a proper bollocking with threats of consequences and following through when you get in. My kid wouldn't see any technological screen more than the front of a damn microwave after pulling that shit with me.

That's not what people are talking about.

OP says they went to an exercise class for 40 minutes - people are asking what the DC did during that time, but she has refused to answer.

I think you’ve read the OP wrong. There was a forty to sixty minute mystery ‘exercise’ that he was also dragged along to.

He was going to football afterwards and spends much of the rest of the time doing activities he enjoys. That’s the benefit. Not everything has to be immediately tempered by visits to the pool or McDonald’s.

And presumably if he wanted a book he could bring one.

Cool, the OP’s kid did.