To think if your kid can't behave in restaurants you don't go

[hardshoulderr]

Unless you really need to eat.
so obviously lots of sympathy to kids who are Neurodiverse.
But went out to lunch this afternoon, quite an expensive place ordered the food and wine and a family sat down kids on iPads, no problem, the volume really low.
voices are starting to be raised, the parents shush ,then I look over and so don't worry it's no problem.

This then escalate from raised voices and slight frustration to the kid spitting across the table shouting and swearing. I literally can't focus on what my friend is saying because of the shouting and the swearing from kids who like primary School age next to me.

I work with kids - you know what I've loads of sympathy, but I don't spend my weekends wanting to have kids spitting next to me.
I go to the restaurant and calmly ask the wait staff if we could move around this corner out of vision of the Family.
By then, the dad has gone home with one, the mother and other kids stay to continue the meal.
I have kids who are not Neurodiverse, but even though were a pain in the arse when we went out to restaurants, therefore would avoid eating out , certainly not to place at lunchtime. It would be like pizza early doors.

Is this unreasonable?

Rubbish! You’ve a snap shot of one meal in a restaurant, not their entire lives!

I'd say why bother if on iPads

I would never take an iPad out with us to with the intention of turning it on as soon as we sit down. What’s the point in taking them for an experience just to have them engrossed in a screen from the off? However I have been known to give my dd a phone to look at in a restaurant (once conversation, colouring and puzzles had been exhausted) because she was getting bored with the long wait and I wanted to avoid precisely this sort of disruption to other people. (Not spitting that wouldn’t happen, but loudness and shouting etc).

I think iPads and poor table manners are two separate issues. But Yanbu to be pissed off that your lunch was disrupted by this. If any of mine behaved like that in public I’d march them straight out. Sounds like that’s what they did with the older one?

I disagree. You teach your children how to behave at home and take them out of a restaurant to punish them if they even try to misbehave. If your children cannot behave you shouldn’t subject other diners to that. We dined with our children from when they were babies. Including top class restaurants.

Don't you train the children in good behaviour at home, before taking them out? That's the wisdom I know and have seen work.
Unless they are forgetting themselves as soon as they go out.

Totally agree it starts at home, but even the best behaved children at home don’t translate to well behaved children in a restaurant with no practice. New place, new noises, more people, more general noise, more distractions, it still takes work.

You work your way up. You start with table manners at home, progress to quick snacks in cafes, then lunch in family friendly places with kids activities such as soft play or colouring. Then you work through family friendly restaurants like pizza express, then lunch somewhere nicer but with quick service and finally, when they can cope with all of that, you take them to a proper restaurant. And if they’re being horrible then you absolutely leave, no matter what. It takes time, patience and effort. Much like teaching kids to read - you start with Biff and Kipper rather than diving straight in with Dickens.

My kids used to greet cutlery at a restaurant as if they'd never seen it. Drove me bonkers
they didn't need training. All in corporate social jobs now. Can eat.

It's not ideal to happening around you, but at least the one misbehaving got taken out.

We had a hierarchy of restaurants MacDonalds to start with / then Pizza Hut as behaviour was improving / then Frankie and Benny's as the starting place for "proper restaurants". But I didn't put up with silly behaviour and we did walk out a few times.

DS is ND so I knew sometimes he was overwhelmed, but he needed to learn to communicate with me when I was asking him if he was OK. We allowed him to leave the table and walk up and down - if he walked sensibly, and as he got older he could stand outside if it got too noisy as long as he stayed visible.

It isn't hard to train most children to behave in restaurants if the parental expectations are there and the parents are ready to remove them if the kids don't do as requested. I accept that some children find the environment too overwhelming - so then you don't take them.

Handing your child an iPad in a restaurant so you can chat is not good parenting (obviously some exceptions in the case of those with additional needs, but i also believe screen time as an outlet is only a thing because of overuse by parents in early stages of childhood and there's healthier options if not introducing screen time when its not developmentally appropriate.)

A device connected to the Internet being used by small children should be actively supervised, or watching tv shows should be an interactive activity discussed with others, and if its a child of an age to not need supervision they should be able to engage at the table and not need entertained every second. A lot of people introduce screens far too early and far too often.

I disagree that they need training. Those of us from the 70s never went to restaurants!! Remember my first swishy one when I was 19

I have replied to this in another comment but yes absolutely it starts at home but even children who can sit at the table and eat at home aren’t always able to sit and eat at a restaurant the same way without practice.

I mean, you don't go to the restaurant when you're 18 and start riding around on a tricycle. 😁😁

This is just a sign of the changing times though- we all eat out more frequently now generally than people did 50 years ago.

One day people will wake up to the damaging effect these devices have on children's brains, including behaviour. One day.

But don't need training more or less.

@Jellybunny98 was it you on the trike? 😁

I don’t see the issue with a child sat quietly using an iPad with earphones in a restaurant?

DD has eaten out at least 3 times a week in nice places since being a newborn. We’ve done the whole colouring, sticker books, games etc when she was younger but now at 7 if she wants her iPad she can have it. It’s actually the only time she’s allowed it, she doesn’t get it at home.

I wish 🤣

But the dad took the spitting child home, which suggests the parents did take this tantrum seriously.

But because your first experience was as an older teen/adult you were less likely to misbehave.

It's because eating out is so common place today and kids are doing this at a very early age. Probably too early as far as brain development goes. So a degree of "training" is required as they haven't naturally reached the stage of being reasonable.

When I was a kid (and I'm only a youngish mum now so it wasn't that long ago) people would have said it's stupid to ask this question, because it's obvious kids should be kept under control when out. You were very emphatic about ND, but surely the percentage of people with ND is roughly the same, even if a lot more are diagnosed.
To be fair, most kids behave better than a lot of adults.

Teach them at how to sit nicely at a table and use cutlery etc at home. Teach them how to speak not shout, how to say they don't like the food politely etc. THEN take them out, starting with casual places and work up.

I was away last week in Spain in a hotel. The vast majority of the other guests were Spanish and lots had DC. The DC were so well behaved compared to a typical British family restaurant/hotel. These are mostly young kids, under 6 I think, they sat and joined in conversation, eating proper food beautifully, the slightest loudness/shouting/screaming the child was told No and if they carried on one parent instantly took them out of the restaurant. The same was true for the swimming pool.

We didn’t see one single bit of “tech” being used by a child all week. It’s bloody incredible and brilliant.
I’m not sure why British kids can’t behave the same way! Well I do actaully, the parents can’t be arsed to teach them how to behave appropriately!

I can live with my slightly sub par parenting for under an hour every few weeks/months.

My original post was simply that given it doesn’t impact on other patrons I don’t see why tech in most restaurants needs banning.