Loud parenting and grandparenting that goes on and on...

[FiveLoadsFourLiftsThreeMeals]

Am I unreasonable to be irritated by the unnecessarily loud, fake/ over enthusiastic "cheerleading" style of child-accompanying that seems to happen when multiple family members accompany or look after one or two small children?

Longer background for the few who can be bothered to read below no need to read it obviously:

I'm very tolerant of child noise (as in noise made by the actual children) but my neighbours have had their little granddaughter all summer, while I was off work and at weekends and oh my goodness the grandparents are so loud! At first I told myself it's nice they're so enthusiastic, but they're in the garden basically cheerleading in kind of loud baby voices for hours every day, and when the parents collect the little girl (coincidentally just after I get in from work on week days) they settle in for an hour before taking her home and join in and there are four of them at it!

I've been noticing similar out and about (two parents with one toddler at the pool were trying to work their child up to whoop and scream by doing so themselves going down the (toddler size) slides and then splashing him and each other directly on the pool steps even though the child himself was playing contentedly and fairly quietly, scooping and pouring water from his little bucket just making the odd comments and smiles to his parents until they got him riled up).

Just now I was out for a walk and an extended family coming up behind me were the same - five adults on foot being loud kind of at two relatively quiet small children on little bikes, with lots of shouted baby talk and cheerleading. They were the only other people around and were maintaining a distance about 30 meters behind me and completely ruined the otherwise potentially very peaceful walk.

YANBU to find the adults annoying or

YABU and a grumpy old woman?

Try sitting in the quiet carriage, it's not a library. Or put ear phones in.

I sometimes worry we do this and people might think we are a bit OTT/ cringe. But then I think you know what we aren't 'faking' we just genuinely get a lot of joy from our child and give them a lot of attention.
If the alternative is giving less effort because your worried people might judge you that's a bit sad especially in your own bloody garden!

I know exactly what you mean, my in laws do this and it drives me crazy. They’re all so loud screaming & cheering everything my DDs do, they narrate absolutely everything that happens (e.g. each toy they pick up - what colour is that? what shape is that? Where is this colour toy? etc) and won’t leave them to play at all so we can have 5 minutes of adult conversation. I’m exhausted by the end of visits and my kids ridiculously overexcited. My family on the other hand will play for a bit and engage if they bring any toys/books over to them but the visit doesn’t revolve around them in the same way.

It 's the excessiveness of it all though. Many of my friends are now grandparents and are guilty of this . It is cringe inducing if I happen to be around. But I wouldn't want to hurt anyone's feelings .
It's the same principle as performance parenting. Surely people realise that nobody cares or admires your child as much as you. Delusional to think otherwise.

I get this, my next door neighbours are lovely and have 3 DG now. The one daughter is the mother of one said child and is the loudest, shrillest performance parenter ever. It drives me insane. She winds up all 3 kids, two are her niece/nephew.

I WFH and regularly have to close the windows as she is so loud-they are in the back garden though and my office is at the other end of the house 😳

They all descend en masse every Sunday as well and throughout the summer have honestly ruined a Sunday afternoon/evening in my garden as I can’t stand the noise. Even my DD7 comments as to how loud they are.

If I didn’t like my neighbours so much I would have to say something 😫

Er no.People who are in social setting, or live close to others, it’s not necessary to take over that environment, by shouting at the top of their voices, to their children, grandchildren
I’m a parent, l get though, not everyone wants to hear it.It’s different hearing children play, but when the parents are louder than the children, then, it’s just over the top.
You turning it around as a 'you’ problem, maybe it’s because you’re one of those parents, that thinks, everything revolves around your child.

You can hear everything though in a garden. If they could be heard through the wall, that's different.

There is such a thing as a messed up child, adolescent, or adult whose parents or grandparents have made far too much of everything he or she has said or done.

"The Too Precious Child", by Berman, Rose, and Williams, explores the effects of this ultimately adult-centered style of parenting and adult involvement in children's lives, which you call "happy loud times". It's not the good news you think it is for those children currently being treated as if they are performing ponies.

You are right - it is not. It is very damaging.

I was on a boat on a lake in Eastern Europe this summer with 4 Americans of this extremely loud performative type and one 2 year old child. I wasn't sure whether to feel sorrier for myself or the child. It was fucking exhausting and pretty much ruined what was in fact a very expensive trip. There was much side-eyeing amongst most of the passengers and I think the same (can we throw these clowns over board and save the child?) thoughts running through our heads.

had one on the bus today - 20+ minutes of hell
v loud volume "one car, two cars, three cars" all the time looking round to ensure that everyone was appreciating the running commentary😬

There is a happy medium, which the majority of people seem to intuitively understand and practice.

Neither of the extremes is good for the child.

Some people just can't bear not to be the life and soul of the party, and if a small child is minding his own business and not showing any inclination to provide the party they crave, they won't let up until they make the party happen.

Interactions with children have to be on their terms; it's the opposite of loving attention to the child, actually, despite how it looks on the surface.

I actually missed this post until it was quoted.

The poster has made something up and put it in quotation marks as though it's actually a quotation. I never said, nor implied, that I had a "neglected childhood from [sic] [my] mother".

I said that my mother didn't play with her own children which was completely normal and appropriate for her generation of parents and my generation of children. I had plenty of siblings and friends- children actually do not need their parents to play with them in order not to be neglected. Play with peers and alone is important and play directed by adults is not necessarily better, in fact it's arguably a poor substitute.

Justaanothermum was presumably neglected by her English teacher during the lesson about quotation...

Parents need to love and care for their children, meet their needs for food, shelter, safety, acceptance, warmth, appropriate clothing and other necessities, as well as their higher level needs - giving them space and opportunity to play and learn through playing, not directing their play, and meeting or enabling their needs for education, socialisation, friendship , society, life skills to be met etc. etc.

Children need access to education but their parents don't have to be the ones who actively teach them to read, just provide the opportunity and resources and environment to learn. The same goes for play.

Children also need space and time which isn't structured and narrated by adults in order to develop creativity and self reliance and be comfortable and confident in themselves.

My mother wasn't perfect but she was a good enough, if very busy and often stressed, full time working professional woman with five children. She certainly wasn't a neglectful mother.

Her performance grandparenting was out of character and jarring because it very clearly was performative in her case. It probably was an attempt to prove something to me and others as she probably did absorb the modern idea that parents (lets be honest, mothers) are meant to do lots of imaginative play and perhaps she wanted to over-compensate for not having done that 30+ years before she became a grandparent, but it wasn't a standard requirement in the 60s and 70s especially for the minority of mothers of large families working full time. None of my friends parents played with their children either, as far as I remember. Perhaps they kicked a ball around, did a puzzle occasionally or played a board game, but certainly not imaginative play as far as I'm aware and we wouldn't have wanted parents to play with us - children played together. I found it difficult to witness from her because it didn't suit her and stifled my children's play style as she was very directive and unimaginative.

Either way this isn't a thread about playing with children but about the loud running commentary on their every move done in an odd, loud, childish voice, over enthusiastic exclaiming, whooping and applauding, and generally non stop adult loudness accompanying the presence of perfectly inoffensive young children.

Wow, you sound a bit, odd. I am not sure I would like you around kids of mine.

This is another example of a lack of reading comprehension. Nobody "hates" their own children or "despises" other children. This isn't even merely hyperbolic, it's utterly inaccurate. The complaints are about the adults!

This behaviour doesn't seem to be in the children's interests, it's the multiple adults - usually where adults outnumber children in the group - essentially competing to outdo each other and performing for one another.

Your posts are some of the most embarrassing, 2003 MySpace edge-lordy, cringe worthy stuff I've seen on this site, so we'll done for that. Seriously. I'm cringing so hard for you I'm wearing my arsehole as a scarf.

Also the word your searching for is bitch. If you're going to (try to) insult people with misogynistic language at least have the stones to do it properly.

Seriously. I'm cringing so hard for you I'm wearing my arsehole as a scarf

Had to look this up...

Yanbu. People being unnecessarily loud in public is one of my bugbears.

We get it, if you don’t agree with a different opinion you get nasty.It might work in your real life, but it doesn’t work here.
The person who is coming across as entitled is you.'you’re odd’ because you’re not English, that doesn’t make sense! I’m not English either, what has that got to do with anything.If you’re rude and aggressive, then you’re rude and aggressive it doesn’t matter what nationality you are.
This thread isn’t about not liking children, it’s about the parents and grandparents, who go completely over the top, overriding, whatever
social setting there in.Point being, do children need to be shouted at or constantly praised in public, it’s ok for people who have experienced this, to also give their view.
You feel differently, no problem, because that’s what this thread is for, to get all different views.There’s just no need though, to be nasty to get your point across.

My daughter is disabled. She learned to crawl properly (on hands and knees, not just army crawling) about a week before her 2nd birthday. 9 months on we still praise her for good crawling or managing to climb up an entire flight of stairs. If she actually learns to walk I promise you the novelty won't wear off within a few days!

Edit: We aren't super loud though (I hope). I'm very conscious of annoying other people, especially if we're inside!

Wow, comments have been deleted, mine
included replying to someone who was being completely out of order, apparently the reply’s were breaching Mumsnet guidelines, which is laughable because, l’ve seen so many other comments on Mumsnet which are absolutely disgusting, but still stay up.I’ll leave it there, l stand by my comment though, l didn’t say anything wrong, l most certainly wasn’t being rude or offensive.

This.
Cheer up.