AIBU to feel so absolutely mortified

[DoraSpenlow]

Just need to get this off my chest as I have no-one to talk to.Went for lunch today at our local community cafe. On the table next to us (there were no other tables before anyone says we could have moved) there was a young woman and a boy aged about 12 playing cards. The boy was being very loud. From his behaviour I automatically assumed autism. They finished the game and started another which seemed to involve slamming plastic discs down on the table. I admit it was quite irritating.

I could see DH was getting annoyed and as I went up to the counter to order dessert I whispered that yes it was annoying but please don't say anything. But no, he just had to, and I heard him say, excuse me but do you think you could keep the noise down a little, we can't hear our conversation. My heart sank. The boy ran off and locked himself in the toilet and everyone was looking at DH as if he was the worst man on earth.

He really is the kindest, gentlest man. Always there to help a mum getting a pushchair up steps or to offer an elderly person a steadying arm. In his defence he was not at his.most patient as we have had an awful few days. He has been undergoing tests for prostate cancer, his best friend has been dying and we heard this morning that he had died.

Since being home I have had a real go and he said he was sorry he didn't realise the boy's issue and it was not his intention to upset anyone. He just wanted a nice lunch with his wife after a crap few days and to relax a bit.

I am down to do a voluntary shift at the cafe tomorrow.morning and I just feel too embarrassed to go. Should I cancel?

You've had a 'real go' at him for politely asking someone to keep the noise down in a cafe??

Do you always treat him like this?

Awful behaviour.

I completely agree. Have some compassion for your husband. He must be terribly worried about his health, grieving for his friend. The last thing he needed was his wife tearing strips off him because he dared to say something (doesn't sound like shouted) to a stranger in a cafe.

Honestly I think you should aplogise to him.

Yes, I suppose I am timid as I hate making other people feel embarrassed or uncomfortable. I am well aware that parents/carers of children can get a hard time when they try and do 'normal' things outside the home with their children.

He didn’t deserve a bollocking from you! Poor sod must be feeling low. He meant no harm.
And be honest, your mortification was on account of your being known there, and nothing to do with causing upset to the next table’s occupants.
I think you should take the trouble to soothe DH and apologise to him, for all those reasons. Both of you need a calming, distracting evening! eg 🍻

But go in to work, of course. If you do not, you'll find you never do ever again, and you’ll have cut this place out of your life all over a silly embarrassment.
We all drop a clanger of some sort now and again which makes us want to become invisible, but letting that have any power over us is bonkers.
Go in with you back straight and say you’d like to get a little thing off your chest (and be very brief about it, and be cheerful not sorrowful)

As the poet wrote, ‘It’s no hanging matter/ It’s no capital crime!’

But you don't mind making your husband feel uncomfortable by having a 'real go at him'?

Your poor husband. I think support should have gone to him well before a noisy stranger. Hoping things work out for him. Yes go in why ever not you’ve done nothing wrong

I am with you, OP.

Community cafes are often open and echoey with few soft furnishings to absorb noise. Perhaps yours isn't like this but anyway, the clue is in the term 'community' cafe. Probably a wrong choice for you both today.

I would have been pleased to see a young person playing a board game.

I have been in the position your husband is in now and would go elsewhere rather than ask a child to stop playing a game. If I wanted somewhere quiet, I would not think a community cafe was the best place.

Yes, you should turn up for your shift tomorrow.

I can see that this is all a bit like mixing work with pleasure, so it’s a bit awkward. But your husband was ok to ask politely if they could let you have your lunch in peace. Go tomorrow and it will all be forgotten about within a couple of days.

Aren’t community cafes places where vulnerable people are welcomed? Maybe that’s why everyone was shocked.

Not in his side? We have never been through such a stressful time. Together. I'm on edge and stressed too and I was upset that he had made a disabled child and his mum/ carer feel uncomfortable. Going through bad times yourself doesn't give you the right to be uncaring of others

If it’s obvious the child had autism then they’d obviously come to a community cafe because such spaces are generally more tolerant of the disadvantaged (whether due to SEN or illness or poverty).

So you and your husband could have just gone elsewhere. Obviously you shouldn’t have a go at someone the day after their best friend died though. You should’ve just rolled your eyes at him and carried on. He shouldn’t have said anything but equally he didn’t harm anyone.

You can still go. Just say he didn’t realise and he’s had a really hard few days.

yet you are to your husband

Thank you.

Well I don't see why you had such a go at him when you got home- saying you were uncomfortable about it fine if you volunteer there and also thought he may have overreacted or misjudged. To now consider letting them down tomorrow- no. You should go in and as others have said you can explain if necessary.

Why would you feel mortified? It’s a cafe, and the child and his needs shouldn’t trump anyone else. Whoever he was with should have done a better job at realising it’s a public place too.

My niece is profoundly autistic. Her mother takes her out and about but if she gets loud (she pretty much non verbal but has a few words and can make noise) then she takes her out of the shop/café/whatever. She well knows her trigger points and tries to avoid them but every once in a while they can’t be. But she doesn’t think people should adjust to her daughter, more that she tries to have her in a space that she knows her daughter can deal with. I think a bit of latitude on your DH’s part - but if a simple request to keep the noise down led to such a strong reaction the mother should have anticipated that.

You didn't see the way other customers were looking at him/us.

I think its like this.

When we go through really hard times, our brains can fixate on minor details to protect us from feeling the full weight of the big heavy stuff.
A big example of this is when someone's died and someone ends up fixating on the fact their mother in law didnt send flowers to the funeral, or that their sister left early from the wake.
I think thats what your brain did here.
He was under deep stress and it sounds like he was polite, and you have overreacted and had a massive go because you are also stressed. He misread the situation, he's human, and we arent all born with an innate autism radar or know how to deal with every individual with autism.
You owe him an apology and drawing a line under it, and the cafe wont think anything of it!

People also just stare because there’s is something unusual happening. Not necessarily in judgement.

In what world do you consider your behaviour reasonable. For goodness sake, apologise to your husband!

I asked him not to because I could see the boy had issues. But he still did it. Parents/carers with autistic children have it bad enough without random making life more difficult.

I would have been really gutted and sad if this had been my child (and it could have been). So YANBU but also your poor DH is having a very rough time. So I think this is just one of those bad moments where actually everyone needs a bit of compassion and you should extend a good dose to yourself as well.

Community cafes are usually noisy places; there are mums and babies groups, toddlers all around, people with physical and other disabilities; it's not a calm and relaxing tea room type of a place. What your husband should have done is just whispered to you it's too much in here today and left. We had to leave a cafe like that recently.

I don't agree your husband did the right thing, however I think you did not need to lay into him at home. He would have known that, he knows he was off and grieving and it wasn't the right place for him today.

Community cafes are exactly where noisy children with SEN go, and yes, sometimes that's noisier and more disruptive than other cafes. I was approached numerous times by an adolescent boy in such a scenario, I felt fine about it, he was pestering us but my dd who was also a teen didn't like it and we don't go there any more.

No point in making more of it now, though. Just go in tomorrow. I do disagree with everyone that it won't be noticed or you are making too much of it, it's a volunteer run social space, and as such, people will have noticed. I'd explain why my husband was off and move on.

We had pre-booked and pre-ordered our main course before the latest bombshell. Plus it is only about 200 yards from home. We thought it would be the relaxing experience of always has been before. Obviously a big mistake.