to think people should offer some help to a person travelling alone with three children?

[emkana]

I finally lost it when I tried to get off the bus at the longstay car park, trying to stop ds from running off, trying to unfold the pushchair, poor dd (6), bless her, trying to lift out the suitcase for me - and a bus full of people was just sat there, watching us. So I said to dd, but really to people in general "would you believe it that people will just sit and watch a six year old trying to lift a suitcase" to which some w*er replied "well it's not my responsibility is it"

ffs

I agree with Onagar, but I think it is a general issue, and not really something specific to this OP.

In non-industrialised societies, the average birth spacing is 4 years. They are often communities who help each other, but who would also expect parents to not put high burdens on that community by having two young children close together.

There is definitely a feeling on MN, often put across in threads, that women should be able to have as many children as they like, as closely together as they like, and if someone else says they don't want to emotionally/physically/financially support that child then it is selfish.

I had 2 kids under 3 years; it was really hard. It was also my fault.

It takes a village to raise a child, but in real world villages, the community has a lot of say in who has children, how many, and when.

Cookiemumster, the op explained why it was difficult to ask for help earlier in the thread.

However, I really don't understand why people keep saying this, if you could see someone struggling like this, would you really just sit there pretending to stare out of the window!

I agree with onagar actually. We did think about the practicalities of going about with children etc. when planning our family.

Sorry hazey, thread is so long that I only read the first page and last.

This is just bizarre.

Afaik the birth spacing in non-industrialized societies is not down to regard for the community, but depends on the length of breastfeeding and resulting lack of ovulation. I breastfed all my children for 2.5 years, so I behaved as non-industrialized in that regard as I could. So am I excused?

YANBU at all. All this not-my-responsibility crap is a bag of shite.

I must say though that I have almost always been helped out in situations like that, and when help wasn't offered I have been known to look around for someone nice and able-bodied and ask them to give a hand, please

I have to say am quite shocked by MillyR's comment! Sorry - but would you be saying the same thing if the OP hadn't mentioned that her DS had SN? She is obviously "managing" quite well and I think it is quite worrying that so many people are being so dismissive to the OP, I think it demonstrates the type of society that we all now live in. As the whole coach had been effectively rude to her and her children (and we all know they were tutting under their breath don't we about how she was "managing") we are all expecting her to "suck it up" and get on with it, as she has explained they had already pushed her children and her out of the way to ensure they got a seat.........Honestly am quite disturbed, will obviously now be walking past the collapsed person in the street, kicking old ladies out the way so that I can get on to the bus 2 seconds before them and then ensure that the heavily pregnant woman is left to stand on a long journey whilst I sit in comfort.

Get a grip people, I am not suprised the OP was frustrated and came here to vent her frustration and has now been flamed. Unbelievable

Emkana, that is totally untrue. The birth spacing cannot be explained by extended breastfeeding; the academic reference for the literature review of that is Ulijaszek 1995.

I can't believ that people really think, 'three young children - oh well she shouldn't have had them so close together'!

I have 14 months between my dd's and I consider myself blessed for having had them, most (ok, some) of the time I feel I am doing a good job, but I still struggle, doesn't everyone?

Also if someone came onto a bus struggling with several bags of shopping i wouldn't think ' well, they shouldn't have bought so much stuff, and whats more they are old, and should have known how difficult this might be, therefore I won't help them' - that would be ridiculous, wouldn't it?

Hang on a minute, for those saying it is an issue of having too many children/too close together or whatever, what about those with only one or two children and would just like to be shown the consideration and courteousy of people trying to help each other and make each others lifes just a bit more pleasant?

How many times haven't most of us cursed because you wish that someone would for example help you down the steps with the buggy or other similar things. No it's not a necessity but it's nice.

In most Latin countries where they are far more child centred I think this lack of consideration is so much less common.

I don't think my comment is related to special needs at all. My DH is disabled and cannot get on public transport if it is likely to be crowded; I have no issue with people with a individual with special needs in the family being less competent; if anything the family unit becomes more competent as they have to think things through in advance.

I have managed far less well with my kids on public transport, and have been unreasonable; neither of my kids have a special need.

So how do you explain unexpected "BIRTH SPACING?".

nO 2 was a "Happy accident"(Oh yes,and she is sn,but still a very very happy accident and much loved.)

So was dc1 if it comes to it,was told was unlikely to conceive.

Agree, the bizarre point about too many children too close together is a moot one (as well as being pretty horrible ffs); once when I had only DD1 she fell asleep on the train a bloke very kindly carried our bags off so I could carry her. Maybe we should all just not have kids at all

Hazeyjane, getting old is not within a person's control.

I do think we should help people wherever possible, just to be kind, even if the person doesn't really need help. Almost everyone holds doors open for people and so on.

I wonder how many of these people would have jumped up to help the Pamela Anderson lookalike that was struggling to lift her bag in 8 inch stilleto heels but had a lot of boob on show, no one would have thought to tell her that her heels were to high so they wouldn't help her would they?

And then for the thread to go along the lines of "Well you should have thought of it when planning your children". Oh the luxury of planning, in a wonderful world it wouldn't have taken over 2 years to get pregnant, and another 2 to ttc without anything happening, you can really plan things like that can't you.

You are making me wonder what the hell I am doing here and if I will bother to come back frankly.

gosh, doodle, what a tantrum.

MillyR, I can't find the article you are referring to, but I did just find the following sentence in The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Human Growth and Development, one of the authors being the same Ulijaszek: "The potential value of breast-feeding in birth spacing [...] should not be ignored." So I would be interested to find out in more detail how it is totally untrue that birth spacing has at least something to do with extended breastfeeding.

Doodleyodoo, there are some quite extreme views on this thread. But of course, most of us on MN are normal and nice to others as a result of acting through instinct rather than assessing whether they DESERVE help. Of course you should come back!!!

I can kind of see your point Doodley, but I have to say, Pamela Anderson doesn't really do it for me ...

Fucking hell! So much for Mumsnet being a "supportive network of people". Jeez.

Emkana - I would always help someone out if they were in this situation. I notice (in between the roasting) that a few people have said the same, so hope this restores your faith in human nature.

It is called Human Energetics in Physical Anthropology. It explains all the factors, benefits and costs of breastfeeding, pregnancy and fecundity in human energy costs. It is a fact that average birth spacing is 4 years in subsistence societies, and that cannot be accounted for purely by physiological barriers to pregnancy; they simply do not last for 4 years in an individual woman outside of famine situations.

A nuclear family cannot have energy independence unless the birth spacing is 4 years or more, and this matches what happens in real societies.

That is why one of the types of famine are called 'first child second child' in some African languages; it is associated within communities with close birth spacings.

Indeed a tantrum I shall have as there is no chocolate here and I want some!

I just find it so totally bizaare that there are so many negative comments about something that 20 years ago would have been common place to do! I dread to think what society will be like in the future if we all carry on like this, I want my dc to be brought up with good manners and if that means in a couple of years time she offers to help carry my bag because she is a well mannered child I will encourage this and not view it as "not managing".

I know that my unsteady 75 year old father would have been the first to jump up and help emkana, which actually is just so wrong! But I expect if my mother was in the same situtation and struggling then no one would have helped her either.

i don't think anyone on here has said that THEY wouldn't help, quite the opposite. just that in response to a sarky remark the chap is quite entitled to point out that the children are not his responsibility.

I didn't expect anybody to raise them for me, just to move a bloody suitcase

if you're responding to me, emkana, then i am surprised that no one helped your daughter. but i'm not surprised that you got a pissy response to your pissy comment. what were you expecting? to shame them? what would have been the point?