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?

Wait til she starts school - these abusers are everywhere!! Every corridor, yard and toilet. She will never be safe, not for one moment. Best lock her up now.

Seriously this thread is absolutely ridiculous.... a child had fun playing with a 'big girl', 12 yr old had fun minding a little one. Mum and dad had a conversation with someone and relaxed a bit, so bloody what. No one did anything wrong. Yes the girl should have said they were going to the toilet but she probably didn't think of it and thought she was helping. Non issue.

I was a little bit like the girl when I was younger - I am ND and probably wouldn't have been completely aware of boundaries.

At 11/12 I would definitely want to be seen as someone who was good with kids and would probably be doing it to show off to the adults and show them how grown up I was.

Honestly if I'd been in this girls situation I can imagine feeling like I had been trusted to entertain the child and it was a big responsibility.

I remember in soft plays feeling completely separate from the adults and sort of forgetting they could see us. I can imagine how she may have needed the toilet and your little girl said she did too. She might have felt it would be irresponsible to leave a little girl in there. It probably would not at all have occurred to her that the little girl might need help going to the toilet.

If it turned out the girl did need help, I would probably have panicked and not known what to do. Definitely a part of me would be worried that it wouldn't be appropriate to help her go to the toilet but another part of me might be worried that I was being silly and that's what people do when they look after kids.

At this point I would consider going to get you to ask what i should do but would be worried about leaving her in the toilet.

I imagine I would have solved it by encouraging the little girl to do it herself the best she could (by shouting through the door) and then explaining to you afterwards.

I definitely would not have actually helped her with going to the toilet as I would have known that of all the choices, that one would be the worst one to get wrong.

Perhaps she saw you seemed angry when she came back and thigh tb she was "in trouble".

It would never even have occurred to me that someone might think something nefarious was going on or that I, a 12 year old counted as a "stranger" in the "stranger danger" sense.

Obviously none of this helps you because I'm not the actual girl in this story. And of course the girl could be an abuser with ill-intentions. But it's very very unlikely. I also wouldn't assume that, if she struggles with boundaries and social norms, it is because she herself is being abused. She might just be a ND girl trying to seem grown up, doing a lot of overthinking and getting a lot of things wrong.

It's an especially difficult age when it comes to knowing expectations. Everyone is telling you you're not a little kid anymore and that you're going to big school etc. Youre starting to feel more grown up but you're obviously not at all an adult. It's a weird in between age where you often want to be more grown up than you are.

Or course be careful and don't let your guard down. Keep an closer eye next time. But I don't think you've been given any reason to believe that anything inappropriate happened.

I understand why you felt anxious because the child was a complete stranger. However I do think a 12 year old girl poses little threat.

I could absolutely see one of my eldest DD friends taking my 3 year old to the toilet. She's the youngest child in her family and mothers my 3 year old.

My eldest loves children and would absolutely play with a toddler we'd just met however she's a bit more anxious when it comes to doing the right thing so would take the child to their parents rather than the toilet.

I assume dad was in soft play with older children because the weather was so grim.