So how do you handle it when the child of a gentle parenter keeps physically attacking your kid?

[beerisbetterthanwine]

I have recently joined a toddler group that I have been looking forward to a space becoming available on for ages. But one boy there keeps deliberately physically attacking my son. This boy is at least three, more likely 3 and a half and is over twice the age and twice the size of my ds. Last week he came over when my ds was sitting down and stamped on both his feet as hard as he could. His mum did take him to another room and gently explained to him that this was wrong. He did come over to apologise and then went over to his mum saying ' That was a good gentle apology wasn't it?', for which he got lots of praise. Fair enough. Except ten mins later he grabbed hold of the hood on my son's jacket and pulled backwards as hard as he could so that my son jerked down to the floor, smacking his head against the wooden floor boards. His mum didn't really do anything. This week he slapped my ds hard across the head. His mum sat him on her lap for a gentle chat. He spent the rest of the time on his bike very clearly trying to ram it into my son as he toddled about. I basically had to spend the whole time acting as a physical body guard for my son. The mum did stay with her son and say things like, 'ooh now careful with the steering, go around justpick's son' which missed the point. His steering wasn't poor, he was trying to ram my ds. He is absolutely delighted when he attacks my son, he grins from ear to ear. He does it because it is fun and he can do it without consequence, my ds can't fight back and his mum just effectively gives him a cuddle and a gentle chat, i.e. lots of attention.
I never used to be anti-gentle parenting but now I see it as a hyper individualistic, egotistical, self indulgent crap. My ds effectively seems to be collatoral damage for her parenting experiment. It's okay for him to get stamped on, slapped and smacked about for as long as it takes her ds to slowly, gently learn that this is wrong.
I'm fuming.

Oh and she never, ever speaks to me or apologises or acknowledges her ds's behaviour to me in any way. I seem to be invisible to her.
How would you handle it?
Sorry for the ranty post btw, but I am raging.

His mother needs to get a backbone because gentle parenting like this never works. She needs to take him home as soon as he starts to misbehave until he learns that it's not acceptable. Being 'gentle' is bollocks and achieves nothing. I'd look for another group.

She followed him around and prevented him from hurting your son.

She told him it was wrong when he hit him.

What do you want her to do? Beat him?

In this instance I would tell him off myself and force the mother to acknowledge me. Then I would have a gentle word with her about how it's going to happen each time she doesn't discipline her bloody kid.

I don't have time for this type of crap.

Can't the group leaders have a word with her? Otherwise just keep calling loudly across the room every time her ds approaches yours; she'll soon get sick of listening to "Gentle mum, your ds is attacking my ds, come here and fetch him please" in the tones of a railway station announcer I've done just that
Or physically march the little bugger back to her every time he steps out of line, that seems to get their attention where all else fails...

I would also tell him off myself. Just things like "stop that please. That's not nice behaviour. My son is very little " etc. And I'd do it clearly so his mum could hear.

I had to drop a friend who was like this - both her kids were awful to DD - spiteful and violent.

As this is a toddler group and the mother is not a friend I would suggest that you intervene between this child and yours. I did this once and the mother went ballistic saying that it wasn't up to strangers to discipline her kids at which my friend piped up "perhaps if you did your parenting correctly complete strangers wouldn't have to do it for you" which shut her up.

Is there a reason your child is being attacked particularly? Have the other mothers said something to stop their child being hurt?

This is a really difficult one. I have experienced it and it's really hard when a patent tells your child to not to worry when they've just been thumped because their child just isn't happy on the inside. Even DD gave me a look and she was 4.

The only thing you can do is parent your own child. I think you can also say 'x, dd doesn't like that, please don't do it.'

I was very blunt with my cousin's child when he hit me. I said 'don't hit me, x'. He said 'I can' and I said 'You don't hit me. My children aren't allowed to hit me, so there is no way you are!' He looked a bit shocked but never hit me again.

Well that was polite.

You are asking for opinions.

So no need to swear at those who disagree.

Beings nanny I have experienced on many occasions stupid gentle parenting. It is pointless they learn nothing from it and just carry in being spoilt little brats. If things happen more than once to the 19mth old in my care I take things into my own hands and will speak to the child. Generally the parents are so week they just take the child away. If they can't have a battle with their child they probably won't with you either.

Fanjo it is not polite to suggest that I think a three year old should be beaten.
It you make provocative comments don't get on your moral high horse when people are provoked.
Read the post. I asked for people to suggest how I handle it. I wasn't asking people whether the situation was okay, as I very clearly don't think it is.

Its just I do feel she did actually address it.

If she sat and did nothing then yes I would agree. But she did address it.

Ah, I see.

If his mother's answer to everything is a cuddle then he's going to be a really horrible child - we had one at DD's school - this was a girl, but she was dreadful - her mother kept changing her between schools saying the schools didn't understand her daughter- no, she was just a very violent, unrestrained child.

Ok - depending how much confrontation you want you can:

1. Remove the child from your child physically every time - first using yourself as a physical barrier between them (DH has done this one, he also leans in very subtly to the attacking child so when they hit him they hurt themselves as well).
2. Turn to the mother and tell her that her son is unacceptably violent to your son and ask her what she is going to do about it
3. Find a new play group

Why dont you just shout at her and tear strips off her like you are doing now to me?

Problem solved.

Wait till the mum's not looking and give him a Chinese burn.

Thanks Moresnow, my ds is too little, he doesn't have words. He just cries. Which makes the attacking kid grin.

I think I might just tell the mum and kid that I don't want them to go near my ds as he is not safe around them. Think other parents will be aghast though. It is a small group and they have all known each other for years and think they all have a similar parenting approach.

I would probably speak to the people running the group and then section of a bit where my child could play and actively discourage the other child from entering that space. So I would say 'No the smaller children are playing here so you must turn the other way' and stand in front of/turn trike round so that it was facing the other way.

Fanjo, her son keeps attacking mine after her 'interventions', how is that addressing it?

I think both you and the kid could do with learning that how you treat others affects how they react back to you.
You can pretend to yourself but you can't kid me that you weren't extreme and provocative in your post.

So a space just opened up in the group? Open another space, by leaving, and tell the organisers why.

There was a boy a year older than my son who tried to hit him when I was picking him up at nursery. I caught his arm (gently, before I'm accused of child beating!) and told him not to touch my boy again.

Funnily enough, he never did.

Parents like that used to drive me mental.

I think your only option is to be incredibly blunt or find another group.

I think you need to find the Tiger Mummy in you and speak directly to the mother. What she is doing is not enough!

beerisbetterthanwine

You're doing a good job standing up for yourself on this thread so you can stand up to this mother and her boy.

Do you know anyone else who goes to this group you can talk to about this? They might have been through it themselves.

Other than that I think the best suggestion is calling loudly to the mother every single time he does anything bad to your child. Don't try to stop him yourself call the mother if it even looks like he his going ho hurt your son. She should get fed up with the constant calling and everybody else looking at what her son is doing so even if she isn't willing to do anything effective about it she might stop him going near your son in the first place.

Just give the kid a not so gentle bollocking in front of its mother if she's being so wet and ineffective. But then I don't really worry about offending people's sensibilities.

If it upsets her, tough. Better that than your child is injured.