Weird old lady

[Nowayvenus]

Do you think this is weird? Went shopping with my boys, as we went to the till to pay a little old lady went up to my youngest saying that he looked cheeky and grabbed his wrist to pull him towards her, I think she was going to pinch his cheeks. He backed away so I said he was shy and kept between them, so she then started on my eldest. I said he was shy too and moved us all away to another till.
I know she probably didn’t mean any harm but it freaked me out.

I love it when older people talk to my children. My son enjoys talking about his toys or showing them his sticker book

Thats so lovely. I think I have ‘resting toddler talk to me’ face, as on the bus, waiting in queues etc, I often get told about whatever toys, superhero’s, Squishmallows, tv programme, random tots are into or have on their person. I get to find out which is the best, what they do, what they’re all called etc. I really enjoy hearing about all this stuff and asking/answering their questions. If they ask where I live, I tell them in a block of flats . I’d never give away or ask anything identifying about street names, etc.

*old ladies

Yes. I know. I was quoting the " lady " part of OP's disgusting thread title and all thoughts of correct grammar/ spelling went out of my head.

My young preschool dd and I were waiting for a bus. A mentally unwell man who could have been anywhere between 50’ late 60’s approached my dd and tried to to engage her in an unusual and confronting way that made her and I feel unsafe. I politely acknowledged him while moving myself and my daughter away.

Another man waiting at the same bus stop approached me and explained that the man was a well known local with mental illness and was harmless. However, he shouldn’t have approached my daughter and spoke to her in the way that he did.

He assured me that we were safe and that he would talk to him. He did go over a chat to the man and seemed to be a calming influence.

I did have compassion and empathy for the mentally ill man. At the same time I protected my daughter. In no way did I see fit to retell what happened by describing the man as a weird old man, nor did I condemn him to others.

You can protect yourself and your children and other people without attacking people who really don’t deserve it.

Tbf if the elderly woman wasn't aware it's not appropriate to grab other peoples children I doubt shes on mumsnet and will be aware of this post or will be feeling attacked in any way.

Thank you for all of your responses, I do really appreciate all of them, whether you think I did right or wrong.
I did find it highly amusing that I had been kidnapped. This has been my first post and I am very shy myself. I posted because I wasn’t sure if I was overreacting feeling weird about the situation. I still hoped that I handled it as politely as one could. So I have to admit it took me a while to get brave enough to reply.
I fully take on board the comments that I did not know the lady’s situation and I hope that I will be more tolerant in the future. Thank you to those who mentioned it so that I can learn.
My boys are not the best socially, they were very little when lockdown happened and our situation was that they did not see anyone other than myself and my husband during that time. They are very reluctant to have any physical contact with their own grandparents who they now see frequently.
My youngest (5) was not happy about being grabbed, he mentioned it to daddy when we got home but seems to have forgotten about it now. My eldest (6) just gave a dirty look at the time (very much his thing) and hasn’t mentioned it since.
To repeat myself, I really am grateful for all the comments, I wasn’t even sure that I had actually posted it correctly! I hope I have learned, and as a carbon based life form, that is all that one can hope for xxx

It is your job to protect your children. Grabbing strangers' children is unacceptable. Please do NOT take on board anybody who claims otherwise.

It's not your job to crush your own boundaries to accommodate total strangers who may or may not have some sort of problem that you cannot help them with anyway. Walking away from grabby people behaving weirdly is exactly right. Putting yourself in front of your kids is exactly right. People pretending to be offended at that are trolling, nutters or just not very logical.

Regardless of her reasons, what she did was unacceptable and your reaction was absolutely spot on.

While that is true, by calling her a weird old lady on a public forum it is normalising contempt and prejudice against the elderly. If the general population wants a more inclusive society with less discrimination than we need to be able to identify and talk about discrimination.

FWIW the last post by the Op seems to show that she has taken on board the comments from pp about being a bit more understanding of the elderly while also protecting her children. So, good on her.