Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Little Buttholes

So here is a question for everyone, moms and non-moms. What do you do if you see someone else's child push and hit your child? Especially if this child is around 2.5 years old, and your sweet little baby angel is only 10.5 months. Here is what happened. I dropped off the Pig in the babysitting room at the gym this morning and got ready to head into the Turbokick class. I sat him down on the ground in front of some great toys in hopes that he would be immediately interested and forget my existence.

No dice, he turned around immediately and crawled after me. Luckily he was distracted half way by a an excersaucer. There were two other kids playing with said excersaucer, and the Pig crawled over, pulled himself up, and tried to put his hands on whatever the 2.5 year old had his hands on. The 2.5 year old pushed his hands away, and then looked at me. He knew I was the mother hen. Then, the Pig put his hands on it again, and this time, the 2.5 year old grabbed his hand and pushed him down as hard as he could. The Pig went flying! He did one of those falling spin things. He didn't cry.....he just decided to get back up and try again. The 2.5 year old looked at me, and I'm sure could see the "I will kill you" in my face, and he ran across the room like nothing ever happened! I did, I wanted to grab him and shake him while telling him that he can't push down babies!!! Of course, I know better, so I just gave him the, "oh no you didn't" look. He knew what he did, and he knew it was wrong.

I wanted so bad to tell Maria, one of the babysitters. I wanted to tell her that he pushed him down with malicious intent, and that he needs to know that is not okay. I just stood there while she came over to pick him up and make sure he was okay. I told her he was, and decided to just let it go. I was afraid that they would make me wear some sort of "tattle tail" on my yoga pants for my Turbokick class. I mean.....I'm 31, so I should act it when it comes to these things.

So, here is the question......what do you do in that situation? I know that they are all kids...bottom line, but they know what they can and can't do.....they aren't idiots. Well, most of them aren't anyway. I'm so glad that I didn't do anything since the little boy belonged to a potential friend that takes the same class.

But, what do you do when you are the only adult, and kids are acting like assholes? Do you discipline them since you are the only adult, thus putting you in charge of all actions? I would think so, but I know that some people are super sensitive about these things. You don't want to be too strict, but you don't want to let them get away with murder. What a touchy situation. What would you do?

4 comments:

Amy Pertl-Clark said...

Well, you certainly have described a tricky situation. As a former teacher of young children, words always come out of my mouth before I can stop them! Try to say something like "Remember we use gentle hands." or "He (meaning Sam) is so curious. Could you show him how this works?" Both of these are positive messages that help a child understand how to handle such a situation.

Brandon said...

Punch said offender in the head. Remind him that Sam's uncles were college athlete's, one of which IS FROM TEXAS.

Keep on Keepin on.

The Bibler Family said...

That is the reason I don't go to the gym anymore. Of course not going to the gym is why my thighs touch. :) Glad to see you are doing so well, and your little boy is absolutely adorable. Natalie

Kincade ;-) said...

OMG!! I just had a similar thing happen at a Burger King play area!

These 3 little brats were blocking Austin and Emma and wouldn't let them play on the equipment for a good 8 mins! I let it go for a while thinking surely they will figure this out themselves...no luck.

The little girl pushed my Austin down and screamed in Emma's face. The teacher in me took control, and I immediately stood up to tell them all to keep their hands to themselves.

The mother of the brats told me her kid didn't do it. Who did?! She's lucky Austin knows not to hit girls!!

I calmly explained that I had seen the episode and just wanted all the kids to play nicely on the public play area. She mouthed off saying some very nasty things in Spanish about the Uselton family.

Shocker! I speak Spanish. A very nice little Spanish Fly came out of my mouth. My kids never heard me day a dirty word. The brats and mom however, did understand my momma bear Spanish threats and name calling and quietly exited the playarea. We then had it all to ourselves for our nice family outing.....

ROFLMAO!!!!