Shouted at someone else’s child, WIBU?

[wooooooop]

NC as might be outing.

I take my 10mo DS to a small church hall playgroup, it’s mostly free play time with a singing session at the end. It’s been a lovely group thus far, DS has a great time there and I get to interact with other adults! There is a little boy there of about 3 or 4, he’s never supervised by his Mum who is always sitting at the other end of the hall chatting, or on her phone. DS and I usually steer clear of him as he seems quite a boisterous child, and he often snatches toys from the other children.

DS and I were playing with baby toys today, and I didn’t notice the other boy approaching from behind us until he kicked my poor little DS in the back as he reached for a toy I instinctively shouted at him (I didn’t say anything horrible to him, I was just so shocked at what he’d done that I shouted at him to go away), he clearly went to tell his Mum that I’d told him off as she came storming over demanding to know why I’d shouted at her child while I was trying to comfort my own sobbing baby. I was more angry with her than her DS so I told her that if she’d supervised her little bully, I wouldn’t have had to shout at him and my baby wouldn’t have been hurt. Instead of apologising for her son’s behaviour, she went to the group leader and asked for me to be banned from the group!

I’m so upset, I don’t know if I overreacted or not as this is my first child and therefore my first rodeo with playgroups!

YANBU at all. Maybe it'll make him think twice about doing it again.

YANBU. She needs to parent better.

I have gone 'ERRR NO' quite aggressively and loudly, and even accidentally shouting as you say reacting in the moment, for similar reasons

Twice I've had a parent come and challenge me and I explained what happened and said ' if you won't supervise your child properly then expect people to tell them off'. One went on to say their child hadn't done what they had done and I said 'you weren't watching were you'.
I have to supervise.my disabled child constantly even at 6 so I see so much

Yabu, the mother should have been supervising her child.

You could have spoken to the organisers or if you needed to shout you could have shouted at the mother. Shouting at the child might have been in shock but unless you would shout at the adult then no, it’s not okay.

It’s not okay that the older child kicked your baby but he shouldn’t have had the opportunity if he was being supervised his parent.

Shouting at the child might have been in shock but unless you would shout at the adult then no, it’s not okay.

I would imagine most parents would shout quite a lot at an adult that assaulted their baby!

You reacted, raised your voice, that's fine! The Mum was being over defensive. If my son had hurt a baby, accidentally or not, I would have apologised. It's usually the ones who are on their phones and not supervising who kick off. Xx

Urgh this is why I left several toddler groups as some of the adults just ignored their kids so they could chat then got snippy if you stop one of their darlings giving someone, grabbing toys or standing on babies

What?! Would you have just smiled and said some encouraging words to a random child who had just deliberately kicked your BABY in the back? Do you honestly think I engineered a situation where my own tiny child got hurt just so I could shout ‘go away’ at the other child?

I don't think shouting at a 3yo is ok actually - by all means block them if they're going to hurt someone and tell them a firm no, but shouting is scary for little kids and a 3yo has very little impulse control. I think it sounds like you disapprove of the way the mum handles her child's behaviour and were waiting to have an opportunity to parent him yourself. The mum does indeed sound like the problem, but that's not an excuse for taking out your frustration with her on the kid

he kicked my poor little DS in the back as he reached for a toy doesn’t really give me the impression of ‘deliberately kicked your BABY in the back.’

But to unpick things a bit, firstly it isn’t unusual to let children aged three / four roam without constant supervision. The mum isn’t necessarily doing anything wrong. Otherwise, anyone with more than one child wouldn’t be able to go to these sorts of groups.

Secondly, assuming that he did kick your baby in the back deliberately then it isn’t unreasonable at all to pull him up for it, even to raise your voice. What is completely unreasonable is to start ranting about him being a ‘little bully.’ Even if you thought it, shouting it in the middle of a playgroup like that is unpleasant for everybody.

Children do stupid stuff sometimes. For the most part, parents are understanding about it. He was clearly wrong to kick. You were wrong to start shouting and name calling. But you obviously posted for people to tell you how amazing you were to call out the three year old, so well done you.

Ywnbu!! Poor baby!

YANBU.

Slightly different perspective, but I could be really horrible to other children as a child. My own mum and Nana never told me off or had me in the wrong really. I can however remember being told off by a couple of school friend’s mums (completely justified), and actually, that had an impact, more of an impact actually coming from somebody outside my own family. I realised others didn’t like how I was behaving, and I’d better change my ways if I wanted friends/to be invited to things.

It is a shame we don’t discipline children more communally anymore when they behave badly- parents and teachers should stick together as adults (from a previously badly behaved child 😂).

At the singalong plus ‘stay and play’ I used to take very little Gdcs to, mobile phones were not allowed, or at least we were not allowed to use them.

A pity more such venues don’t have that rule.

Sounds like it was an accident and you labeled him as a bully. The mum should supervise him more but you were out of line. A simple “hey, be careful, there are babies around” would have been more appropriate.

You need to learn the eye stare and scary low voice that stops children like this in their tracks ;)

I don't think you really understand what older children are like yet.

When yours is 3, he'll be the one wandering around creating havoc.

But that's just the nature of children. They all get older and their needs and deeds change.

It isn't very nice of you to call a child a bully and a little darling. Your language around this child is very telling.

It's highly likely that when you have a second baby, your PFB will go up to it and punch it or bite it. Toddlers don't understand how to share, so they hit out.

Seriously, many are struggling to survive as it is!

Any venue that tells me I can’t have my phone with me isn’t one I’d be going to.

I don’t give a toss about her parenting. All I am interested in is my own child; that woman and her son don’t cross my mind enough for me to have been dreaming of an opportunity to parent him.

I also can’t pretend I care if I scared him, perhaps he won’t try to hurt babies in future. He scared and hurt my baby, and I shouted at him to go away. What exactly would you have done?

Very patronising, perhaps my error was admitting to being a FTM. I also don’t think it’s very ‘PFB’ to be upset that my baby was deliberately kicked in the back.

My DS won’t be ‘wandering around creating havoc’ because I’ll be supervising him this children runs amok because nobody watches him! The other children the same age as this child manage not to hurt anybody because they are also adequately supervised by their parents, and are always kind and gentle towards the smaller babies. Some children are nicer than others.

I’m not having a second child.

My DS won’t be ‘wandering around creating havoc’ because I’ll be supervising him Only planning on having the one, are you?

I saw him deliberately kick my son, then snatch away the toy my DS was reaching for after he’d kicked him. There was absolutely nothing accidental about it.

Yes, didn’t you read the last part of the post you just quoted?

Also I thought you commented on a post just last night that ‘four year olds can be mean’, so which is it?

I didn’t ‘shout at his mother in the middle of a playgroup’, you just made that up 😂 I shouted two words at the child, and they were ‘go away’. I spoke to the mother at a normal pitch because I was comforting my baby at the time.

Think David might have lost attention half way through that softly softy monologue