Was this a bit off?

[MrsShawnHatosy]

I don’t have children, happy to be told IABU. But:

saw a dad this afternoon pushing baby in buggy. Buggy was forward facing. Dad was wearing headphones. It just seem odd to me that he was cutting himself off from the baby - could neither see nor hear him?

Have you never been outside before?

Not at all off. They’re just walking. That’s how buggies work so they can look around?!?

dad was probs out for a walk with a podcast

See it all the time. Father pushing pram with phone balanced on handle watching who knows what. Mother with ear buds in talking on the phone or listening to music 🤷‍♀️

Fair enough. I know nothing as not a parent.

Seems like a pretty normal walk with a child in a buggy. I'm sure if the baby cried he would hear it.

If the child was in buggy for a nap or rest, makes perfect sense.

Some buggy walks are simply to get poor sleeper babies to chill down and take a nap.
The parent doesn't want to do much interaction because they want the baby to go to sleep.

Im with you i hate seeing parents push a pram with headphones on. Its so anti social to your child

If Dad was trying to get the baby to fall asleep then not being able to engage is pretty much the aim!

Shocked at the responses. Surely a parent walking with their child should not have headphones on? It’s the little bits of human interaction they are missing out on, the little bits of chatter etc.

Sad state of affairs that this is viewed as normal now. Ok so my DC are adults and AirPods didn’t exist then but I wouldn’t want to be cut off from my child.

If that’s the way they are all the time, or that was the only bit of time the dad had with the child that day then it’s not great to not interact. If the parent was with that child all day, and spent the other 90% of it interacting with them, then absolutely fine that the child has the chance to observe the world and get some fresh air, whilst the parent gets half hour to listen to a podcast and exercise whilst still caring for the child. Obviously no idea which it is.

It's called iPhone parents. They'd "do anything for their kids" except parent them.

When my kids were small fresh air sunshine and my music blasting were what saved my sanity some days.

Some on this thread have clearly never had babies who are terrible sleepers and will only fall asleep if being pushed around the block for hours at a time.

Childcare experts at our babygroups always said have rear facing pushchairs most of the time, so you can talk to and interact with them.
But sometimes, them looking forward and seeing what's going on is also ok. And often both mum and dad have to work these days, so don't get as much free time.
Parents always being on phones/disconnected is an issue.

Why? I genuinely have no clue what you mean. Of course parents don’t have to be interacting with their children every moment.

Have you never taken a little time to yourself when parenting? Are you literally speaking to them from the moment they wake until they go to sleep at night?

I'm with you, OP.

My kids are adults now but I always had them facing towards me in the buggy so I could see them and they could see me and they could listen to me rabbiting on.

I like to think I'd do the same nowadays, and not listen to music with them facing away from me. I don't even use headphones when I'm walking the dog; I like to talk to him.

You don't want to teach them to talk otherwise they never shut up and then start asking questions. It's best to shortcut them onto cocomelon once they can sit up, then you can avoid interaction up until school age. If they do attempt communication, a quick and loud "stfu" is usually enough to persuade them not to do it again. I believe you can get baby headphones now.

Oh, you’d have hated me in DSs baby days. I couldn’t walk far due to ligament damage, or this is exactly what I’d have done to get a perpetually-screaming baby to sleep (and to stop myself going totally insane). Instead I had to put him in the back of the car in his rear-facing car seat, put the radio on and drive around until he fell asleep.
He’s now 11 and as far as I can tell, he suffered no lasting emotional trauma or attachment issues from this awful, neglectful parenting of mine.

Yes, following on from my post, I did have a child that needed walking round for ages to go to sleep. I still didn’t shut them off from my world by wearing headphones.

But then now when I’m out I only wear one airpod as I hate being cut off from what is going on around me and I never have a child with me.

I’m not saying I never sat down with a cup of tea and watched tv with them, particularly at the crack of dawn. I wasn’t a perfect parent but I never shut myself off from them.

Are you older? most headphones these days have transparent mode, you can hear your music and the outside world 😂

What is it with all of these threads judging people for things that don’t concern them/they have no idea about.

Just focus on yourself and stop judging everyone else.

This is clear

Even in transparent mode I still hate wearing two headphones in both ears.