FALL OUT WITH FREIND OVER her dd

[Kidstrack]

I have a friend who has a dd nearly the same age as my dd, my dd is 3 in 2 weeks and friends dd is 3 in July, they are due to go to nursery in August, problem is my friends dd hits and lashes out at all children the same age or smaller including my dd taking it most of the time, however this morning at toddler group my friend was in the toilet and her dd kicked a baby in the tummy and then followed a toddler into a play tunnel and grabbed the wee soul by the hair and nipped and scratched until the LO cried, i went and got my friends dd out of the tunnel by lifting her out from one end so as she couldn't get to the LO again, her dd gave me the most dirtiest look i have ever seen (for a child that age), stood looked around notices her mother wasn't in the room and ran into the hall of the toddler group screaming mummy mummy she hit me, meaning me! i explained what happened to my friend and she went and got her coat and her dd coat and left the toddler group, i'm now at home with my stomach churning in knots because i phoned my friend when i got home asking if she was angry with me, she said she is extremely angry at me for

1. Lifting her daughter
2. Saying to her dd NO don't hit
3. She says i have something against her daughter(i have nothing against any child, i love children and deal with them all as individuals) and that i should never say anything to anyone elses child if they hit out I explained i only lifted her daughter to prevent the child being attacked again, and as a friend i explained maybe it was time to try some other way of dealing with her dd hitting out i.e taking her away from the situation, time out for 2 mins in her buggy, or giving her a stern warning or they were having to leave, she has now accused me of trying to tell her to raise her daughter and i have oh so perfect children, (my children are not perfect) i disipline them as i see fit at a situation, my friend has only ever said to her dd " oh don't do that darling" thats all she has ever done, so i thought it was a duty as a friend to say to her on the phone, i have always stuck up for her at toddler groups and things when the other parents talk about her and her dd, now she is accusing me of all sorts and i feel crap now, my stomach is in knots and i don't know wether just to walk away from this friend, afterall she did hang the phone up on me, please give opinions please, have i been a horrible friend?

Breathe through it kidstrack and let it go......

It's up to her now to mull over what has been said.

you have done nothing wrong what you done was right shes in the wrong her dd shouldnt be doing that to other children i would go made if my dd1 whos 3 acted like that
i cant understand parents who let there kids bully other children

I think you did the right thing i had no prob when my ds was younger with my friend remonstrating with him if i was nit around and vice versa..i would suggest that your friend has issues of her own.1.wHY IS SHE SO CROSS AND DEFENSIVE AT YOUR,IMO,EXTREMELY MILD REACTION AND 2,wHY IS HER CHILD SO VIOLENT.pLEASE DO NOT TIE YOURSELF UPIN KNOTS I DO NOT THINK YOU COULD HAVE JUST LET THIS HAPPEN AND I THINK YOUR REACTION WAS EXTREMELY GENTLE.lol

Kidstrack, if that's what your friends are like, I'd hate to meet your enemies!

lol, dp says i'm a big softie when it comes to freinds and their kids, maybe they use me as a babysitter!

Sounds to me like you did the right thing and she's possibly a bit embarrassed that someone else dealt with her daughter. Probably a bit sensitive too (aren't we all when it comes to our lo's!) and is probably taking it as implied criticism since you dealt with it differently than she would have done. She needs to realise that it's better that YOU dealt with her dd rather than some other fed up mum who is trying to protect their poor attacked child and who might be less gentle.

However I reckon you need to decide if the friendship is worth it, if it is, you're probably going to have to apologise (even though I think you're in the right here) as it's unlikely she'll want to admit you're right and lose face over her daughter's behaviour even if she knows it in her heart of hearts. I also think that although it might have come out in the heat of the moment it's no bad thing that she knows that other mum's aren't happy with her dd. How else is it going to be fixed if she's currently not dealing with it? And again, better to hear it from you than someone else.

I might be wrong, she might have listened and might make a move to apologise, but if not you might need to approach her in order to save the friendship if you think it's worth it, but maybe this might be a good opportunity having opened the door to talk about how much her dd hits yours, do you really want that to continue?

Kidstrack you sound just like me. This happened to me several years ago when someone I used to go to school with and who's son went to school with my DD suddenly stopped speaking to me and giving me dirty looks, I think because I booked DD birthday party at the same venue she was planning to book for her DS. (I wanted to ask her the reason but I did not want to give her the opportunity to have a go at me in front of other people). She was particularly vindictive as she turned several Mums who had previously been friends against me and I remember doing the school run and seeing them in a huddle, staring and probably talking about me. I used to go home feeling sick and did not eat properly for wondering what the hell I'd done. After a few weeks though it all seemed to blow over and several of the Mum's who had ostracised me then tried to speak to me again, however, I was very cool and made a point of having no more to do with any of these superficial people and funnily enough the bitch of a mother who did this to me now has no friends at school at all as over the years people have seen right through her. Genuinely nice caring people like us always come out on top in the end and people may be slightly scared of your friend now but believe me as years go on if her attiture does not change she will end up with no friends and no support. If I were you I would let her cool off and if nothing progresses after that then sever the friendship. You sound like a decent person and you did nothing wrong and do not deserve the reaction tht you got from her.

kidstrack I really feel for you. You have been the perfect friend, you have been supportive in the past over your friend's dd's behaviour, you did the minimum necessary and absolutely the right thing to stop your friend's dd hurting another child, and you have had the balls to say what's difficult to hear - that she really needs to tackle it. Only a really good friend would do all those things - especially the last one. EAnd even now you seem concerned for her, rather than angry. It's very sad when all this gets thrown back in your face. However, your friend clearly has got a lot on with her dd and over-reacted, becoming defensive and having a go at you and your kids. She's in teh wrong, but she's also upset. If she doesn't call you to apologise - which she should - and if you want to have a go at saving the friendship I would leave it a couple of weeks and then call her up. just ask how she is and see how the conversation goes. You're a good firne and it would be her loss if this goes. In the meantime don;t beat your self up about this. good luck

just read the thread about her getting smacked. I think almost certainly this has something to do with her behaviour. Children mimic their parents al the time. I sometimes hear DDs shouting at each other threatening to take toys away and they're so good at it it makes me . She's is being given the message that smacking is ok. Not that I suggest you point this out to your friend - that really would be goodbye to teh friendship!

when ds started pre-school he started with a little boy who hit everyone. when i talking to his mum it was clear her husband bullied and hit her.they also all lives in one room. - it explained to me why her son was doing it. whenever his mum was not there and he hit someones child the other mum would realy shout at him. however when she was there they wouldnt. couldn't quite believe it. after a few times when he hit ds and she did nothing about it only saying ' ohh i raised my voice and said no you dont hit him. think she was bit embarressed but i so was fed up with it by then. her son has been in school for nearly the year hes like a different child. still got a crap homelife but at least hes happy as preschool.

I fell out big time with one of my closest friends (who is/was the godmother of dd1). Her sons were wild, vicious and unruly to the extent that, after one particularly fraught afternoon during which they ransacked the playroom, ripped books, broke the masts on the wooden sailing boats and pulled the tape out of cassettes, having hit dd2 with a hammer (off the top of a kitchen shelf), I had had enough. I told her that her children needed a bloody good hiding and some steady discipline - and that before they left my house, that they should tidy up some of the chaos they had caused.

She roared off in a haze of Volvo diesel fumes and I haven't seen her since.

She was a senior paediatric nurse and I was a health visitor.

So a 'bloody good hiding' would help unruly kids then?

No - I did not mean it literally - but she did just let them run amok and when I tried to stop them, she smiled and said that boys were different to girls and that explained everything. And in fact, I am not a smacker with my own children, but I was very tempted to smack the bottom of the child who walloped my baby with a hammer that he had scaled a kitchen cupboard to find, whilst I was in the loo and his mother was supposedly watching them. She didnt even say anything to him, just said that in her house they had "anything dangerous locked up".

She was locked up at home then, dOng (GGG?) Bloody ineffectual namby-pamby parent she sounds

Thats so awful (the hammer!). It's just my ds (4) is so physical at the moment, I am at wits end trying to turn his behaviour around and feel really bad when he does push/hit other children.

This thread is making me feel like I don't do anything to try and stop him, when I am trying everything! (apart from smacking him). I am hoping it's a phase and don't want him to have no friends. :(

But SEA - that is the point - my friend did NOT try to stop them, at all,at all, at all....

I make him apologise and go on and on about it to him and feel bad for ages about it.

When someone else tells him off I'm pleased as it reiterates that he's done something wrong. If you're having hard time with child it obviously helps if others support you.

SEA.... you're different to dOng's woman because you want to do something about it. However, going on and on at children doesn't help. Perhaps you need to keep exploring other avenues. I'm not saying that you are doing anything wrong. What I love about MN is that someone else has the same issue going on as another and with the many suggestions on here something will work.

Trust me... he'll have friends Different things work with different children. I have 5 and a different thing seems to work with each of them. DT1 is doing her best to be a spoilt demanding madam. I'm trying to cut that short before she gets any older. She's 2 and because she's wee the entire family pander to her. So, not only do I have to "encourage" her out of her demanding ways, I have to tell the rest of them to stop giving in to her. Ah the joys of families...........

Thanks for that Marslady its true I do go on! We all pander to him as he's the smallest too!

MN has been great with lots of suggestions. I can't keep off it though everything else is going to pot! (I've also notes I use too many!!)

I've smacked my dd 3 times in 3 years. dont know if you are allowed to anymore but i try and think b4 i do it so i know that it's for something big. it's been for biting and i smack her on the bum, not very hard but enough for her to realise that hurting other people is bad. sorry if that makes me a bad mum...

My mother in law-ex teacher-says you shouldn't encourage violence with violence, you know they smack someone you smack them etc, but then i look at my husband and think...SOD THAT! He such a spoilt little brat and that's at 28. Instead i try and talk to DSS about why he is feeling so angry, so at the moment (he is 3) i have him tell the door off for banging his head or trapping his fingers, and his toys if they don't do what he wants. But he has to explain tho them what they have done wrong and what he doesn't like about it...seems to get him to forget about the prob in question too. Other kids are a bit of a nightmare though because you can feel an added pressure to do something that they feel is acceptable. Normally i take DSS out of the situation and talk to him at his level. That way i'm not making him feel inadequate but he can't play again until i am happy that he has understood the issue.
In my opinion i wouldn't go all out to smack my child but i wouldn't say i never would either.

manitz - you just said ''i smack her on the bum, not very hard but enough for her to realise that hurting other people is bad'' - but you've just done the exactly same thing to her. how can you tell a child hitting is wrong when you are doing exactly the same thing to them.

manitz - you smack her to make her realise that hurting other people is bad ......can you see the bizarreness of that?

yeah, i understand that its contradictory but i was being chucked off the computer so had to type quickly. what i meant was although i try not to smack and i would consider smacking/hitting or violence without control a useless punishment.

I think there comes a point where i personally want to use it as the last resort. each time i've used it it has shocked her. I also explain exactly why she is going to be hit and that biting is NOT acceptable. I don't really know if it works but i do think that there needs to be some way of dealing with my/your/ones child if it is violent towards other kids and i don't mean just normal pushing and shoving. We also use naughty step and occasionally i've done that putting her in a room and counting (which I personally think is crueler than a smack). Now all we have to do is count and she snaps to it, just the threat of the naughty step is enough and that's our main method of control.

clearly i think with one of the children described in this thread constant agresion and violence in the home is not going to help the kid understand how normal people behave towrads one another. but i dont think being smacked calmly with an explanation once a year is going to harm my child or lead her to move towards violence. Just my opinion of course.