Stranger child takes your toddler to the toilet

[Sparklybutold]

I had a really unsettling experience today and I wanted to gauge opinions.

My husband and I took our 3 year old daughter to soft play today. We were sat on a couch, between my husband and I we were playing/watching our daughter. A father and his 2 daughters sat near us. I struck up conversation with the father. His 2 daughters were 12 and 13. His 12 year old started to interact with our daughter straight away. At first I was a bit surprised as she was very forward and stroked/picked our daughter up which our DD responded to, seeming at ease. The 12 year old then asked if she could play with our daughter and I said yes. I was watching them but the soft play was fairly large. I thought there was only one entrance/exit so wasn't too anxious as I could see if my DD left and continued to chat with the father. After about 5 minutes I got up to look for my DD and I couldn't find her. I came back to my DH to get him to go into the soft play to see if he could find her (I have a mobility/pain disease which limits my movement). He couldn't find her either - I got up straight away and as soon as I got to my DH I saw my DD come out of the toilet with the 12 year old. The 12 year old said she washed her hands. I asked whether my DD asked to use the toilet, the 12 year old seemed a little guarded. DD seemed fine showing me she washed her hands. DD wanted to go back to play with the 12 year old. I restated to the 12 year old that if my DD needed the toilet again to come get me or her dad. My DH and I took it in turn to then watch them both. I then went to the toilet and when I came back I could hear my daughter saying mummy, I came out and saw my DD was looking for me. The 12 year old was trying to encourage her to continue playing but I could see my DD wanted to leave. So I scooped her up, said bye to the father and his 2 daughters and left.

This happened about 8 hours ago and I still feel very uneasy about it all. Effectively for roughly 10 minutes I had no idea where my daughter was.

So AIBU and overthinking it or AINBU?

Two parents and neither of you noticed?
You need to watch your children more carefully.

Effectively for roughly 10 minutes I had no idea where my daughter was
Wasn’t she in your sight line? 🤨
It didn’t occur to you to look for her for 10 minutes?

You really must watch... imagine if it had been the dad rather than the 12yo girl.

Also I recommend sticking to 0-5yo soft plays so there are no older kids.

Don't beat yourself up because no harm done probably, but just like at work you have to reflect on "near miss" events.

I spoke for roughly 5 minutes, then started to look...

Yeah... still too long. I got too comfortable.

Do you think the 12 year old had nefarious intentions towards your DD?

Ps in a non-scary way, impress on your dd how important it is never to go off with a stranger.

I've done this with dd pretty much ever since she could understand words - possibly even overdone it but hey ho - the other day, a nursery classmate's mum was jokey-whingeing that my dd hadn't greeted her when we bumped into her once (I never force her to either). Nursery teacher immediately put the mum right and said that my dd's stranger danger was healthy. So it's never too early to talk to your toddler about that imo.

She seemed overfamiliar - this could be for multiple reasons. Her dad spoke how both were extremely good with children and seemed to enjoy playing with them (the 13 year old wants to be a children's nurse). It did surprise me that she seemed to stroke, pick my daughter up (which her dad did try and intervened and checked with me when his daughter did this, but my DD seemed ok). What unsettles me with the whole thing is the toilet thing and how anxious and unclear the whole thing was - did she just wash her hands or did she help my daughter use the toilet? It wasn't clear.

I agree - I let my guard down.

You never know if the poor 12yo might have bad boundaries because the way she herself has been treated.

I'm cynical because I've known some absolute creeps (I mean charged and found guilty in court type creeps) and they really can be anywhere. As I say imagine if it had been the dad who'd offered to take your dd to the loo.

Log it in your mind as a near miss, everything is OK, but adjust Health and Safety procedures from now on (as it were)

But the op thought she had no reason at the time to be worried about her dd’s whereabouts for a short time. She has explained in her post that she looked for her dd after 5 mins, but that it was another 5 mins before she spotted her coming out of the loo with the older girl. She also explained that it was a large soft play, and the op had sight of the only exit, so presumed her daughter was playing with the girl, rather than had been taken to the loo by her.
One thing that struck me was that 12 and 13 yr olds sound a bit old for soft play? Our local one doesn’t seem to be patronised by any child above primary age.

@Mummy08m

Yes - this crossed my mind as a possible reason for the 12 to having poor boundaries.

I've already spoken to my DH about it as I feel we both let our guard down and effectively didn't know where our daughter was for 5-10 minutes.

There's a huge softplay/adventure play in Croydon that has babies all the way up to teenagers (it has go karting etc) but when I'm there I watch dd like a hawk, barely let go of her hand. So I can imagine the setup with 12/13yos.

Creeps can be anywhere but very, very few of them are 12 year old girls. Far more likely she thought she was being helpful and was not aware that it wasn't the most appropriate thing to do.

Not sure you read my comment properly. Read the first paragraph again, slowly...

@watcherintherye

Interesting you should pick up the ages of the 12/13 year old. I spoke about the incident with my 13 yo son when I got home and this was one of the first things he said as the only reason he goes is to be with his sister. The 2 girls were the oldest by far, average age about 6/7? But the maximum age allowance for the soft play was 15.

@angelikacpickles

Part of me wholeheartedly wants to just accept this - that she really was just a lovely friendly girl. But god you just never know. It was certainly a lesson learnt for me (and DH as I feel when he takes her out he's probably a lot more relaxed than me).

Maximum age allowance was 15?
In a space suitable for 3 year old’s? That sounds like utter carnage.
Even assuming a 15 year old would actually been seen dead at soft play.

I did read it. It still doesn't make it likely that a 12 year old girl abused the OP's child in a soft play toilet.

As this was a child, no harm done. But it could have been an adult with bad intentions towards your DD. This is why it's important to keep a close eye out.

I will spell it out for you. Of course I don't think a 12yo girl is a creep because im not an idiot. I'm implying she may have been abused by one, most likely her father (who was there!) or other male relative and therefore doesn't understand normal boundaries.

Paedophiles are vast majority men.

I think if you'd read my first paragraph properly this would be clear but hey ho, op understood.

Fairly certain it said 15 on the way in - I think everyone up to the age of 15 has to pay for entrance? We've been a few times so fairly relaxed with the place. It's fairly open planned. I thought there was only one exit/entrance so purposefully sat watching it. I didn't realise there was one around the back.

Why did you strike up a conversation with a random stranger in the first place, op?
Seems an odd thing to do when you were already with another adult and were supposed to be watching your 3 year old?

🤔 it’s a weird one but statistically it’s highly unlikely a 12 year old girl is a predator… rather that she was overly involved and overstepped her boundaries in taking a child to the toilet. Isn’t your daughter able to say whether she “helped “ her at the toilet ? My under-3 could definitely give a good account of an event like that… enough to put my mind at ease anyway.

I was babysitting at 13 and I don’t see any big issue out of this, other that what you’ve realised already and that is you cannot be so lax in future with people befriending your child that you don’t know where they are for 10 minutes. A different 12 year old might have just lost interest and abandoned your wee one up a big slide or opened a door out of the building etc

15 in soft play? normally it is 12 or a height restriction for safety reasons.

Oh for goodness sake! I understand what you are saying, I just don't agree. Your implication is that the girl is an abuser because she has been abused herself. My point is that regardless of how creepy or otherwise her father may or may not be, she herself is very unlikely to have done anything to the OP's child. But hey ho, scaremonger away.