To think FIL was BU to leave children to go to end of street?

[smallholdingdreams]

Hi,

DH and I were working from home today and were out for a couple of hours on appointments.

FIL was at our house looking after DC, one just turned 3 a couple of weeks ago and the other is 5. 5 year old on waiting list for assessment for suspected ADHD and can have frequent angry outbursts resulting in hitting/kicking/throwing things/pushing 3 year old, so you can’t really leave them alone and incidents can happen very fast.

Realised later on that FIL locked them in the house to walk to the end of the street, where he was parked, to get a bag of tumble dried bedding from his car, something not necessary and could definitely have waited until we were back. My 5 year old can unlock the front door from the inside.

I know back in ‘our day’ parents used to do all sorts so it’s not the most horrific thing in the world but I still feel quite annoyed, given how fast my 5 year old can turn, that it only takes mere seconds for something to happen. DH thinks it’s fine and we don’t need to mention it.

I think fil judged it safe to nip to the car keeping the kids safe inside the house.
If you trust him generally to look after your kids, I think you are over worrying about this event. I agree with your DH

Excuse me, I’m a boomer and I would never have locked young DCs in not even for half a minute!

By the title, I thought you meant your fil had let the DCs go to the end of the street alone, which I also would never do.

I would tell your fil that he’s never looking after your DCs again.
Str response from your DH.
Do you think he was locked in alone when he was very young.

Sounds like it’s a thing that a thoughtless man would do rather than a baby boomer.

So you feel qualified to makethis generalized verdict on the toital Gen X or boomers?

When they’re young, and all you’ve experienced it’s very obvious that they shouldn’t be left alone, and you get used to putting off things that need doing, because they’re the priority.

At some point you will leave them unsupervised, and in your head it will be a big deal, regardless of how old they are, but then you get more comfortable, and so do they. If you have younger ones, you would probably leave them alone a bit sooner, because your experience with the older ones has been okay.

What I’m saying is that it’s not quite as obvious looking backwards where that line is. I can’t remember when I would have felt comfortable being out of sight, or going upstairs, or letting them out in the garden.

Another factor is that we had more fear of our parents - we hesitated to open the door because we knew we’d get a clatter. GPs sometimes minimise those effects in their memory and can’t understand why we supervise closely for longer than they had to.

It just might not be as obvious to him as it is to you, and it might just need a conversation to get on the same page.