To leave early after my dad told off my son?

[Sparklesbigtoe]

Will try & keep this brief cos I didn’t get many replies on my longer one and I’d really like to know if I’m overreacting or not. 5 yo DS & I are staying with my dad for a few days. Yesterday while we’re eating dinner he raised his voice (not quite shouted) at him & told him he has no manners and he doesn’t want to eat dinner with him again and that he needs to go straight to bed. DS wouldn’t sit still, kept getting up and burping at the table. All bad behaviour I know and I was dealing with it but my dad butts in. He goes on at him so much DS starts crying. He then suggests I’m not bringing him up properly and not teaching him any manners, says DS is rude for ignoring him earlier that day when he asked him a question (I wasn’t there but he wouldn’t have ignored him, he may have not understood or frozen out of shyness, which happens sometimes). I took DS to bed and went to bed with him and haven’t seen my dad since. I feel extremely unwelcome here now and just want to go home. Problem is we’re in rural Wales and the only way we can leave is to have my dad drive us to the train station. We’re due to stay till Sunday. What would you do? If I end up staying, what do I say to him today? He’ll never apologise to me or ds or admit he was in the wrong.

Ok so your son was being a bit silly, but i can relate to you a lot OP, my dad was the same when my children were small- he also has criticised my parenting, when he himself was emotionally abusive to me and my siblings when we were growing up- we all have significant mental health problems as a result and one of my siblings took their own life last year.
My kids are grown now and don’t have much to do with their grandfather- he can’t be bothered with them, and clearly my parenting can’t be that bad as they’ve all grown into decent, kind adults.

My advice to you would be to keep your distance, he sounds like a shit parent and a shit grandparent, your son doesn’t need his toxicity.

I think that the responses are somewhat skewed here by the fact that the OP referred to it simply as her father having 'told off' her son. A telling-off, in the sense of 'Don't burp at the table; it's very rude!' would have been quite justifiable. It sounds as though her dad didn;t just tell the child off, but persistently verbally attacked him, and, perhaps more importantly, openly interrupted and interfered with the OP's attempts to discipline him (she was not ignoring his behaviour) and criticized her iin front of her child. Being so disrespectful of the mother in the child's presence is IMO worse than even the most outrageously bad table manners. If he felt he had to criticize her , he should have waited to do so in private.

Obvs your dad is right about the manners, but i don't believe that shouting helps the situation.

Sounds like you're permissive and your dad's too far the other way (both wrong in my opinion)

But to answer your question, yes you probably should leave, your dad is clearly sick of it and you don't want your child shouted at so sounds like a win win for both parties.

Neither approaches work. Shouting at a kid until they cry is gross and letting them get away with everything is also gross. Both as bad approaches as each other.

I'm surprised at the number of people siding with your father. He's only 5 years old, especially boys find it very difficult to sit still and do adult conversation. It's just a phase and he will get better and you were dealing with it. I'd suggest a calm conversation with your Dad about itIf it carries being uncomfortable, get a taxi/ask your Dad to drive you to get a train.
My Dad is the same, mealtimes were horrid growing up, especially for my younger hyperactive brother. And when my two were younger we visited less often as it was too stressful all round, not just mealtimes but he struggles with the mess and noise of kids. Fair enough, his house. We do shorted, infrequent visits.

I would have left.

Your dad is a grown ass man and if we can expect better from the 5yo we can expect better from him. Telling a child you don't want to eat with them ever again is just lashing out in anger, and isn't dealing with shit.

I also advice taking questions like these to spaces with behavioural therapists (there are Youtube channels and social pages for this) because this forum is notoriously bad for providing reasonable advice when it comes to younger children especially.

For a 5 year old, better questions are:

"What was your favourite thing about school today?"

"What did you eat for lunch?"

"who did you sit next to?"

Basically more specific questions that require factual answers can be better for engagement.

This is why I cannot take some of you seriously.

As an old man he's excused for lacking skills but the 5 year old who is newer to the world isn't???

If you're not expecting "perfect parenting" then you all wouldn't conclude that one dinner where her child acts up is a sign that she's not parenting her son well. Kids act up all the time for various reasons and many of you would be better relations to children if you were more curious about their behaviours.

Yes, and I’d add that I also think it’s very possible that OP’s DS was acting up specifically because he was picking up on the atmosphere.

@Sparklesbigtoe you've said that you’re scared of your father; it doesn’t sound like he was a loving father you felt safe with as a child and it doesn’t sound like he’s a loving grandfather now, or that you’ve had many previous visits to him. If you and your child are in an unfamiliar situation where you don’t feel really relaxed and comfortable, your DS is going to sense the tension, and possibly your anxiety, even if nothing is said overtly.

That alone could be the cause of behaviour that’s unusual for him.

It’s sobering to see how many MNers seem to be devoid of empathy for children, how rigid and authoritarian so many are. Small child behaving inappropriately at the dinner table = absolutely inexcusable; grown man scaring his daughter/grandchild = totally fine.

I really wish these attitudes were a thing of the past; society would be a lot better for it if they were.

You know it was rude behaviour and DS wasn’t listening to do so sometimes it’s good for another adult to tell a child something and for them to listen and obey

DS knows what he did was wrong and didn’t like getting told off so cried

what you should have done if sorted DS out. Settled in bed and gone back down to talk to your dad

it is very hard being a single parent. Im one as well

I’m sure your dad didn’t mean oh we’re a shit mum but he prob got fed up of DS ignoring you