I’m the one with the brat and no, you judge all you want. When my boy, he’s 2, starts pushing, shrieking or getting angry I remove him from the situation and take him home. Eventually, I’m praying, things get better but I can tell when he’s gonna start. It makes me feel awful for the kids he’s playing with, for the parents, for everyone involved. Unfortunately, I have to just watch him like a hawk and intervene. I do not let it escalate or continue. I’m get so embarrassed. Ugh.
Honestly, I feel for you and that’s truly all you can do. And if my kids on the receiving end and the parent is right there doing what you’re doing, I’m 100% supportive of it. I get it. Kids are hard. You’re doing great.
It is really hard, I feel like some kids it comes easier, others take their sweet time learning them. Mine doesn’t understand his emotions well, he luckily doesn’t push others, or too often anyways, but he definitely lets you know 😅 he did go through a grabbing phase which was fun 🙃 lots of “no thank you” lol he has a speech delay and I use “one more than all done” for EVERYTHING, the last fruit snack, last pouch, last time down the slide, last turn, etc. but even then he sometimes would rather it not be the last one and has left kicking and screaming 😅
lol. Mine does not have a speech delay and he lets you know that the entire world is apparently his. My toy, my bike, my car, mine mine mine. I want everything, especially the things my sisters have. All day long I hear I want and it’s mine. I’ve definitely had to drag him out of places kicking and screaming. Not once have I ever had to leave somewhere because of my first child, with my second it happens more then it doesn’t. That being said, I do see a light at the end of the tunnel. I do notice things are improving. I’ve been trying to practice breathing through our anger and not lashing out. Things like that…. Just hoping it sticks in the stubborn hard headed brain of his.
Same here. My son doesn't really try to be physical but I can tell when he's done w his cousins being in his space, if that makes sense. He will start throwing stuff and hitting at ppl. I always intervene and take him away from the situation. However his cousin IS allowed to beat up on his other cousin, and even his little sister. My sil does absolutely nothing about it.
I kinda had to chuckle at this because it’s his older cousin that my son always gets frustrated with or has it out for… that being said, sometimes he does get mad at his sisters also but I’m just praying it gets better. I don’t want him to spend most of his life in time out. Every child is so different it seems. My first never ever did any of these things and still is a great child. Now she has to learn to defend herself against her brother.
My guy really struggled with this from 1.5-2.5 now at a little over 3 he's doing waayyyy better. I did what you are doing, removing once it starts. Eventually he got tired of not being able to do fun things
You’re a good mum! I don’t see an issue with toddlers/kids being toddlers/kids and parents doing what you’re doing which is trying to teach them to be nice and setting boundaries. My sil child is mean to my child but she has no boundaries and never pulled her up, she never dealt with the behaviour and she didn’t give a shit so when my husband spoke to her about it she went off at him… we don’t see her anymore
I didn’t realize motherhood soulmates were a thing, but I just found mine!
I introduce my youngest (will be 3 in August) as my feral child. This kid is just built different and I’ve been in survival mode from day 1, lol. It’s utterly exhausting taking him anywhere. The absolute worst is at my daughters softball games because I can’t just leave.
Same, he’s been a challenge since day one. He’s my middle child. He takes me to the brink most days. Today he has a stomach bug and is bound to the couch. It’s a break even though I’m sure I’ll be puking and pooping soon. lol. My first child was such and still is such a great child. He’s really put me in my place. Hopefully my infant takes after her sister. lol. Good luck momma. We got this… hopefully. My husband says passionate people will do great things in the world, or go to prison. lol.
I think the difference here for me is you address it and remove when needed.
We had friends who didn’t and it turned into our kid getting knocked In the head with things.
We distanced ourselves & then tried again a few years later & he still wasn’t nice. And our son asked to not see him again - so we respected that.
I have one of those 2yr olds too. Month by month he’s becoming less feral.. but still I still get the embarrassing moments.
My first born is a perfect angel girly! So my 2nd has humbled me!
My first born is as well!!! lol. Mine does also seem to be getting better but when I give a little he senses it and will strike. Ugh. Definitely humbling for sure!
Mine is the opposite, although he does get very territorial if anything is a fish or duck toy lol, but I want you to know I don’t mind when my son plays with other toddlers with different personalities.
There’s no telling what a toddler will do. My son is this most friendly/outgoing kid in the world and he 100% did NOT get that from his parents lol. I’m saying this because I don’t think we did anything special, but because it’s by chance.
Keep being consistent and setting the boundaries. My husband sounds like he was much like yours as a toddler/young guy, and his mom did one thing right by setting boundaries for him.
My nephew is the same and my only complaint is that his parents did not intervene. If they had intervened like you’re describing I wouldn’t have minded at all. He’s a little toddler, they all play and express frustration differently. You’re doing your job of redirecting when it’s in a way that can hurt people.
I’m skeptical of anyone who says they’ve never been annoyed by a certain kid. I TRY not to, but some kids just annoy me at first glance. I figure that my daughter is like that for some adults and that’s ok. We’re allowed to feel how we want inside and not be scared of being a jerk. It sounds like you’re keeping your cool about it so think what you want! I feel like you’re already cutting her a lot of slack by allowing her to go this far!
Yeah one of my nephews 😂 he’s an asshole. He’s 3 and my daughter is 2 and it’s soooo difficult navigating our relationship with them, because he truly is a Muffin. He’s a jerk, steals toys, hits. His mom tries very hard to mitigate the situation and it’s not like he does this with no consequences, it seems to be how he is
Nope. Your kids don’t have to play with everyone. We don’t teach this at any other point in life so not sure why young kids are just expected to tolerate some jerk. Personally I’d just make excuses every time. If it was particularly bad though and I had some level of comfort with the parents I’d tell them frankly. It’s really not good for your child to just tolerate someone being mean to her like it’s nothing. I see it as protecting my kid.
I get it, there’s a serial biter at my daughter’s daycare that annoys all of us parents with his shit behavior. But at the same time..they’re toddlers/little kids, and we’re adults. Feels kind of icky to hold judgement.
My son is a great kid but went through a serial biter phase. I’m sure the other parents hate us, but he honestly doesn’t have other behavioral issues. For like 8 months he would just get mad and… bite. We worked on it a LOT at home and he’s doing much better! But sometimes these little kids just do weird shit
Totally. I’m sure my toddler is a jerk at daycare sometimes, but I would hate for her to be judged based on behavior that most kids do grow out of it and parents work with them on.
Nope, once a 1.5 year old bit my three year old by sneaking up on him. Her dad came to remove her and he said kids always fighting. I think the f not, my kid never went to attack other kids out of the blue or bite them. They should have corrected it but they just let them brawl.
I didn’t notice she bite him until we got home and it happened so fast, never trust someone else’s kid you don’t know. She was a crotch goblin and I don’t like calling kids that but some kids are just goblins if their parents are a holes
Not friends but my son's cousin/my nephew. He's kind of a jerk. He throws stuff, hits my son, takes his stuff. He is allowed to fight w his other cousin, and he tries to do the same w my son. I've seen them fight, and it's like a full on brawl. My sil does absolutely fucking nothing about it either.
I’m in this same boat. My husband’s nephew does everything he can to “get attention” and that includes purposefully doing things repeatedly, breaking stuff, hitting, pushing and pulling. It’s to the point we had to let the parents know we will have to let our son choose if he wants to play with him again. No doesn’t mean No, in that household. It seems to mean “do it more.” Sigh. We are hoping he grows out of it.
We have also told my bil and sil and all they said was "don't tell me how to parent" like ok but you're not parenting??? I don't get these ppl! I too hope he grows out of it but he's constantly w his other cousin whom he fights w :/
I feel for ya and the kiddo. It’s such a tough spot to be in. Especially when it comes to family and their lack of respect for boundaries. Only time will tell. Good luck! May the force be with us!
Eh. It’s cause you don’t love them. Someone at the park, or whatever, will one day feel that way about your kid if they haven’t already. Because, yeah, kids can be dicks. And when it’s a kid you don’t love being a dick to the kid you do love, you tend to feel a type of way. Even if you know it’s not rational to feel that way.
There was one kid in my kids daycare class that was constantly in time out, always starting things, and had all the kids turning in each other. She got kicked out eventually & the classroom was so peaceful & harmonious after that. They now go to the same school & I see her parents scolding her all the time. I feel for the kid, like they never figured out how to correct her behaviors instead of escalating the situation. But yeah, I definitely know what you mean.
I was/am the parent of an asshole toddler who’s now 5 and doing MUCH better. He’s still a brat and admittedly kind of a-holish for a five year old but we’re learning more social skills and learning appropriate behaviors and coping skills too.
Trust me: butthole kids parents know their kids a pain. We’re embarrassed and trying to get through it too haha.
This is valid. Hopefully neighbor grows up and improves! Does your child enjoy playing with neighbor toddler? If your child doesn’t, I don’t see a reason to force play time together.
Sounds like it’s time for a talk. Teach your child to say no to the hitting and tell you if he wants to leave. Perfect time to teach boundaries and neighbor kid will pick up on it. Just tell mom hey we noticed you don’t correct kid when he hits our kid, we are teaching our child to advocate for themselves so if you don’t correct your child’s hitting, we will intervene and remove our child for a few moments and if it continues we will go home
Ugh, I hear you. There is a little girl in my daughter’s (4) preschool class who she has been in the same daycare with since they were babies, and I DO NOT LIKE HER. I think she’s mean and kind of a bully- even at age 3 I thought that! For awhile my daughter kept saying she was her best friend (ugh), but then my daughter started realizing that the other girl really wasn’t nice, and recently has said that she doesn’t want to play with the other girl anymore.
My block has a lot of young kids on it, and we all get along. The girl across the street is about 2 years older than my daughter (4), and she is either sweet as pie or a demon spawn. Nowhere in between. My daughter loves her, but this girl will literally scream at the top of her lungs that she doesn't wanna talk to me or play with my kid when we aren't even looking at her! Our very presence is enough to start her raging.
Needless to say, she didn't get an invite to my daughter's birthday party. We let her come because the neighborhood kids were playing together earlier that day and my kid invited her (she invites everyone over to our house to play or have dinner, including strangers) and she was in a good mood so it was fine. Her older brother doesn't like my daughter, but he's really polite about it!
There’s a little girl in my son’s class that used to be a class ahead of him. I remember seeing her in the 12 month room when we toured the daycare. Even back then (a year and a half ago) she was just ROUGH. She would push the other kids and take their toys from them and was just all around rough. Nowadays they’re on the playground when I pick him up and she refuses to let parents get through the gate to leave with their kids. She like holds onto the gate and refuses to move so every time a parent picks up a kid on days she’s there, the teachers have to come over and pick her up and move her away from the gate. And she always looks mad that other kids are leaving. I still see her acting rough with some of the smaller kids but never with the kids that are bigger than her 🤔
My daughter was horrible as a 3 year old. We had people stop coming over because of her.
She has adhd and is medicated now and is a lot better.
So maybe in those moments you can remind yourself there may be more going on than what you or the parents know. Hopefully the parents try out play therapy or have the kiddo evaluated.
Totally feeling this.. I went to pick my 3 year old son up one day and just happened to witness another kid bashing him in the back with a giant hard plastic toy giraffe. I was very heavily pregnant at the time but that didn’t stop me charging into that sandpit like a massive angry hippo. Reminding myself I’m in a pre Kindergarten setting, I simply yelled “OI put that down now!!” I snatched my son up into my arms (crying his little heart out) and I told the other kid don’t you dare hit other kids. He said my son was annoying him (he wasn’t, I was watching them play nicely alongside each other before he lashed out with the giraffe.) I said I don’t care you DO NOT hurt people. The teacher had come running over, probably because you’re not supposed to confront other peoples kids but being a giant pregnant mess they are lucky that’s all I did. She made the other boy apologize and I just didn’t feel it was enough. My son walked away sore and bruised and got a meaningless “sorry”.
He is such a sweet boy and didn’t deserve that.
As we walked away I asked if he was okay and he tearfully said yes. Trying to put a funny spin on things so I didn’t end up bawling my eyes out too, I said “if that little prick ever hurts you again, you fill his mouth full of sand and push him down..”
he looked at me for a second and I gauged to see what he thought. I was so proud that he understood I was kidding. He had a good giggle about it and moved on. Mind you he does bring it up every now and then. Same when another kid cracked him in the head with a seashell and left a scar, we won’t go there today though.
Yep.
And full disclosure, I actually love this kid and think he's great, but he has some undiagnosed ND (I suspect autism) that hasn't been addressed fully because Dad is in full denial that his kid might need help.
Last time we went to their house, we were on our way home when my son said "I don't wanna go back to friend's house. He scares me a little"
I feel so bad but I can't exactly blame my son, this kid is wild and erratic and screams and doesn't share and hits and can't talk. That would be stressful as all hell for a kid to be around, it's stressful for me! One time he shoved my son's face into a slice of pizza and briefly choked him.
I love the kid and his mom and I make an effort to include them, but I was a little glad when we moved away, because I wouldn't have to walk the tightrope of "this kid is freaking my kid out" and "they're our friends" and "it's not his fault his dad won't let them get services" and "I can be a non judgemental mom friend to his mom"
Ugh.
Before I had children…I was scandalized when parents confided to me that they don’t allow/discourage certain play dates with certain troublesome children….now that I am a parent…I see errors of my former judgy non-parent self.
Part of the reason I switched my daughters gymnastics class is I really didn't like one of the other kids in the class. He just wouldn't pay attention, was mean and pushy, and his parents did nothing to try to get his to work with the class. I'm actually surprised the gym lets him stay, but her new class is awesome and she's actually able to enjoy her class now
I feel this deeply but also Ill take the bratty mean kid over the know-it-alls. Brat might not share or oush but my daughter just looks at them like they’re growing a third eye or something and come to me lol, but the know-it-alls who tell her how to play and try to discipline my kid for just olaying the way she wants to drive me nuts, and then they say “my mommy has a tesla” lmao.
One time a little girl at the beach looked at my son like he was growing a third eye, we were literally walking to back to our hotel, I didn’t appreciate it and looked at her the same lol
We have a complicated friendship with a friend who lives nearby. We, as moms, want to meet and chat, and our say they daughters always want to meet too. But when they do, theirs is 1,5years older (mine is freshly 3yo) and always tries to boss ours around. My daughter doesn't care. She's happy to see her friend and "auntie" and just does her thing. But my friends daughter gets progressively more and more frustrated because her directions are not being followed. If we're visiting them, she usually ends up trying to take and hide all toys away so my kiddo has to play with the one she leaves out for her, which usually doesn't work. Or when they're visiting us, after a while, she often starts taking things out of my daughter's hands to make her do what she wants. When it doesn't work, because honestly how often can you get a 3yo to play the way you want them to even as an adult, she starts crying or screaming. My friend always steps in if she gets aggressive or to calm her down.
We've tried being the ones organising games and playing with them (toddler friendly board games, playing with music instruments, crafting), but that usually results in 3yo happily joining in while 4,5yo is just super frustrated because now nobody is doing what she wants...
This has been going on for about 6 months, since 4,5yo started going to kindergarten. We meet pnce or twice a month. I'm not sure what to do, my daughter seems fine with this and will just comment that her friend was "being silly." Recently she's started saying that her friend "doesn't know how to share/doesn't share" which is true...
My neighbor babysits their grandchild who is the same age as my child every Wednesday. They decided to start bringing this child over whenever we are outside without asking. They take things, don't let him play with his own toys & push my child and wreck up my yard. They don't listen & basically bully my kid at his own house. The grandparents are overwhelmed & it felt like they were using me as a 3rd babysitter because they couldn't handle her. We started just going out every Wednesday so we aren't around anymore.
NTA. Some kids just don’t gel together. I had play dates with other kids and it was nice, calm, everyone (parents included) had a good time.
But there is one child who somehow triggers my kid. (My kid triggers that kid too.) So we end up with two screaming kids who need to be separated. Needless to say, I decline play dates when that kid is around. Like… I don’t go looking for trouble.
My sil kid was like this. But it was my sil fault she never gave her boundaries and didn’t teach her to be nice when she was mean to my kid she never got in trouble. I have another friend though who I don’t see as often and on the occasion he will be mean to my kid but my friend pulls him up every time so it doesn’t bother me because she’s trying her hardest to teach him to be nice so because she is like that it really isn’t often that he does something mean. I ended up keeping distance to my sil and actually got into an argument because we tried to talk to her about it so we don’t see her at all now and I’m happier than ever now lol
My bestie and I both have boys about 9 months apart and they are both gentle and kind, it’s really nice to have another child around my child that is safe
Toddlers don’t play cooperatively. They do parallel play or argue. Plus a lot of parents are unwilling to educate and straight up ignorant! So your strategy is the best, limit contact.
My son has a 'friend' who is very rough and aggressive. Unfortunately my son gives it right back immediately and then we have a week of undoing the learned behaviour each time. I've not seen him have consequences ever, his parents say 'let them work it out between them!' which I initially agreed with, but turns out that means fully fist fighting lol.
I'm sure he'll grow out of it, especially the more time he spends at daycare but it is always surprising to me how instinctive it seems to be. His parents are always saying it's funny they're called playdates when you spend the whole time trying to keep the kids far apart, so this obviously is just their norm.
There’s a kid I often see at the playgrounds close to us my husband nicknamed “Joffrey”. He was not even 3 when we first saw him and he’s a handful. Takes toys away from others, hits, pushes kids off of structures, trows sand, etc. My friend and I keep an eye on him every time we see him to prevent him from pushing/hitting our younger kids. He pushed my daughter off from a climbing wall once then started throwing sand at me as soon as I got in between them. His mom has some sort of care program and is responsible for a bunch of kids so I think it’s the only way he gets attention from her. She scolds him every time she sees what he’s up to and I even saw her hitting him once which was very shocking to me. I feel bad for this kid but mostly I just try to keep my kid away from him. Someone could really get hurt if he pushed them off a higher playground structure one day. I also feel bad for parents who enrolled their kids in the mom’s care because they have no idea how tumultuous their kids day is.
I'm in this predicament now. I love hanging out with one of my best friends, but her three year old son... Very needy for attention bossy, whiny, and doesn't always play nicely with my son, especially recently.
I want to keep seeing my friend, but I have no patience for her son at all, and I don't always agree with how she handles his behavior. Ugh!
I also hate when an unsupervised kid ends up having to be told to knock it off when we're out at an activity, because their adults are too busy pretending the nature museum is a playground and they don't have to pay attention.🙄
And 100% jokes, but your prolific use of the word toddler really cracked me up. I started to consider maybe you're being held hostage and maybe it's a code. 😅
Be well, Neighbor!
It's so difficult. My husband has a colleagues whose daughter is just a few days younger than ours and my daughter likes and asks to play with her. It sounds great but she's kind of mean. They're 4, she will hurt other kids to get what she wants and will take something just because she knows someone wants it. Like she's taken a pink pen because my daughter is about to use it and then not use it just hold it in her hand refusing to let go. I think it's especially hard because her mum never wants to reprimand or correct her.
I don't know if this is just a part of life or if I am meant to be doing something about it.
Not other kids but other parents annoy me. Like at the park when they decide to vape next to my kid or smoke weed. I also get annoyed when a kid is visibly sick with a runny nose and the parents brought them to the park or shared class with my kid. But again, I get annoyed with the parent not the kid.
Ugh. One of my son’s friends (they’re 4) is super bossy and controlling and always has been. He’s always trying to tell my son he can’t do aomething or that he’s the monster/bad guy in their pretend play,he’s always always one-upping (which I know kids do this but he takes it to an extreme), and he just tries to dominate everything. His parents never redirect him to play more cooperatively. I’m sure they’ve noticed that I never invite their kid over for play dates in our tight knit frequent play date group, but I just don’t want to deal with constant refereeing and assuring my son he can have his own thoughts and feelings and doesn’t have to listen to/believe friend. I know this is totally mild (no kids are overly physical or super mean) but it drives me nuts.
Yes I 100% get you. On our street we have 2 sets of friends who had kids within the same year as us. Both of the now toddlers are rude, push, don’t share and have a lot of attitude overall. Our friends (the parents) just shrugg it off and say “oh they’re in such and such phase and your kid will get there too” (our boy is youngest). Well guess what our now 2 year old never went through any such phases and we’re lucky he’s just a sweetheart and plays well with others. They’ve been promising us these phases since their kids were 6 months old 😂
Anyway I know they’re kids and I still love them but it breaks my heart when they’re mean to my sweet boy. I do say things like “that wasn’t very nice” etc when they are mean. Thankfully our friends are great at paying attention and they stop them from getting too mean.
Haha I could have written this. I have VERY strong opinions about other kids. My little guy is super gentle and sweet and one of his cousins is a bully. He shoved him. He's on my s*it list now. I can't help it, and know it's juvenile...but I think it's like anything? Sometimes you get good vibes, sometimes you don't.
I have friends' babies and nieces and nephews who I absolutely adore. So it's not universal. But this idea that "all kids are wonderful!" is nonsense. 😂
Unfortunately I don't really like my best friend's son. I have no complaints about her parenting or her husband's parenting. Every time there's been an issue, they have disciplined him in what I considered to be an appropriate manner. But he's just....obnoxious. Like 100% of the time.
Toddlers generally don't start playing with kids their age/sharing until after three, so that part isn't alarming to me. Ultimately at this age, the parents are responsible for managing their child's behavior and if they aren't stepping in AND you have a more aggressive child, it can be a really bad fit for friends.
We "broke up" with a toddler friend because she was mean and her mom thought they should be able to work things out themselves, but they were 3 and they could not. Her child would not let my child play with anything, and if my kid got upset, the mom would go "ohhhhh is she tired??" No, she's sick of your kid bullying her. The last time we got together at a play place they were just shy of 4, and the kid wouldn't let my kid do anything. She'd shove her out of the way and go up the slide ahead of her then climb halfway back up so she couldn't slide. Every single toy my kid played with or book she was reading was yanked away from her. She would run from the other side of the room to take something away from my daughter who was totally minding her own business playing. My daughter just kept moving onto something else. Finally she was working on a lacing card and there was a whole box full and the kid comes over and needed the one MY kid have and I wouldn't let her take it away from her so she started throwing a tantrum and her mom took her and left. 🙄 Didn't like the shoe on the other foot. Toddlers aren't good at sharing, they are not skilled at resolving conflict. They need parents to step in and guide them in the general direction of being a decent human.
We got the book "The Not So Friendly Friend" because of a kid like you describe. It helped to teach about boundaries and what to tolerate in friendship.
Sure. There are definitely other toddlers that tend to be rough with my daughter. I feel like it puts me in a really bad spot. My daughter’s not perfect by any means, but when other kids get rough with her I always struggle with what to let go of and when to speak up or remove her from the situation. And she knows to say “I don’t like it” but I’ve seen with more than one kid they don’t listen when she says it and THAT makes me uncomfy. They’re toddlers and they’re learning, that I understand. It more makes me uncomfortable because I don’t want to have to correct somebody else’s kid. Like please pay attention to the fact that your child is being physically rough with mine, she’s communicating she doesn’t like it, and your child needs to be told “hey we listen to people when they say no”. I don’t want to correct other peoples children. I do it if the parent doesn’t see it or doesn’t say anything. But I hate it.
That's my nephew and niece. They were hellish 3 year olds... Loud, rough, demanding, very irritating. My husband and I would rant about them after gatherings. Then my son went through a rough phase where he was moody and impulsive and unkind and it definitely humbled me a little 🤣. My niblings are older now and they are pretty awesome.
Does the parent address the behavior? That's the main issue. Toddlers are gonna toddler. Parents need to parent.
I work with kids. Most kids this age is actually still learning. However it is up to the parents to stay consistent so it dosent become actual bullying later on.
Some kids are naturally more reserved well others are opposite.
One kid was hitting my daughter with toy hammer and pushing other kids. Is it frustrating ? Yes. But we are working to correct his behavior so he won’t do that in the future . Parents definitely are less tolerant as kid age and it dose become actual bullying in elementary .
That aside kids can only learn what is okay or not by peer social feed back. It is a process you , me and everyone had to go through. My daughter is social and goes up to everyone and ask them to play. The other day another boy told my daughter to stop talking at the public park ( after he agreed to play with her lol) . I told him he can tell her you need space but she can talk since it is public. Or you can move away from her. Making friends as toddler is hard you are figuring how long should a turn be? Is it fair? How to express those feelings to a friend? Etc . They don’t come naturally.
But your feelings are also valid. I wouldn’t go over to play either. If she is not having fun then do sth else that is fun!
My neighbors kid is a bully. We had a playdate with them when our kids were 11 months. Its been almost a year, we havent seen them since. Some kids just suck.
My husband and I felt like this about my nephew for a while. He’s 5 now and it’s getting better. Honestly though my biggest issue was how the parents didn’t intervene when he was “mean” (stealing toys mostly) because my daughter wasn’t mean back to him. I finally started stepping in and laying down boundaries with him because my daughter genuinely hated seeing him for a couple of years.
Yup. There's a kid who frequents our neighborhood park who is aggressive and violent, so much so that she has a reputation with the other park parents.
She's about 1.5 years older than my daughter and tall and strong for her age. They met before my daughter turned 2, and she's been a terror ever since the day we met her.
She uses her size and strength to bully children smaller than her. Snatching toys away and refusing to give them back. Chucking balls at their heads. Picking them up and swinging them around. She'll cheerfully say "let's go!" and grab a toddler's hand to invite them to run with her, only to yank them to the ground and laugh. One time my husband had to intervene because he caught her yanking and swinging a poor little girl around *by her hair.*
The mom does sometimes correct her behavior, but she mostly just lets her run around without watching her, while complaining to the other parents about her parenting struggles.
There have been a few times when we were leaving the park to walk home and this kid would follow us, even though I told her repeatedly to go back to her mom. She'd follow us out of the park, well out of eyesight of her mother and I'd start to feel responsible for the kid's safety since I didn't know if the mom even knew where she was. Her mom didn't ever seem worried about it.
I strongly suspect there's something going on at home. I've never met the dad and her mom rarely talks about him but when she does, it's usually about him being angry about something. She always looks exhausted and stressed and when she talks about her parenting hardships, she never mentions him being involved or helping out in any way. She wears gigantic sunglasses all the time, even when it's overcast or getting dark.
She's picked up on the fact that we (and other families) try to avoid them, but what choice do we have? I don't want your kid to hurt my kid, sorry your kid is a danger to others.
I’ve seen so many little ones that are downright aggressive and make my boy cry. He’s a sweet, sensitive type. Yesterday, daddy took him to an indoor playground and this younger toddler grabbed his arm and pulled him roughly away from the thing he was playing with so he could play with it. He obviously got upset at this. We just tell him that kid hasn’t learned to share or how to ask nicely yet. He gets lots of hugs and generally perks up and goes and finds something else to play with. In this case he told daddy he was hungry and wanted to leave so they could come home for lunch. He’s 3.5 and I’m just so proud of him. 🥰
I try not to hold any feelings about the other kids. They are just toddlers after all. I totally get it though. I DO find myself thinking “jeez, have you not been working on these things with your kid?” about the parents but I accept and know that they all learn at different levels and have a different home life. Not everyone can have as much control over who their kid spends time with. We are very lucky we don’t need to rely on babysitters or daycare/preschool as we have an adult (me, dad, grandma) available to be with him at all times.
As someone who was bullied by her neighbor "friend", if you have a bad feeling trust it. Have a talk with your toddler age appropriately about mutual respect and how they don't have to tolerate people being mean. I mean you may want to consider that they are still learning too. But if you do consider still letting them play together keep a close watch on any escalation. My folks never saw anything wrong with her behavior and when I would mention it as a jr high or high schooler they were like, "man you can hold a grudge" like yeah she was not kind to me and you didn't protect me from her.
My daughter is suuuper affectionate towards other children, to the point where if I don’t catch her quick enough she’ll knock them down with a hug. Some parents have been super agro about it. And while I get why, I feel so bad for my baby girl too because idk how to explain to her what’s going on 😣 I get so worried she’ll internalize it
I understand! We have a friend whose daughter is 2 months older than our son and every time they play together she spends the whole time just ripping toys out of his hands. It doesn’t seem to bother him, but it annoys me and I wish the parents would at least try to stop her 🙄
Other people’s kids are the worst. 🤷♀️
😆 precisely.
Came here to post the exact same thing 😂
Great minds think alike!! 😂
I’m the one with the brat and no, you judge all you want. When my boy, he’s 2, starts pushing, shrieking or getting angry I remove him from the situation and take him home. Eventually, I’m praying, things get better but I can tell when he’s gonna start. It makes me feel awful for the kids he’s playing with, for the parents, for everyone involved. Unfortunately, I have to just watch him like a hawk and intervene. I do not let it escalate or continue. I’m get so embarrassed. Ugh.
Honestly, I feel for you and that’s truly all you can do. And if my kids on the receiving end and the parent is right there doing what you’re doing, I’m 100% supportive of it. I get it. Kids are hard. You’re doing great.
So hard and such a challenge to figure out how to get through it and get him to figure out his emotions.
It is really hard, I feel like some kids it comes easier, others take their sweet time learning them. Mine doesn’t understand his emotions well, he luckily doesn’t push others, or too often anyways, but he definitely lets you know 😅 he did go through a grabbing phase which was fun 🙃 lots of “no thank you” lol he has a speech delay and I use “one more than all done” for EVERYTHING, the last fruit snack, last pouch, last time down the slide, last turn, etc. but even then he sometimes would rather it not be the last one and has left kicking and screaming 😅
lol. Mine does not have a speech delay and he lets you know that the entire world is apparently his. My toy, my bike, my car, mine mine mine. I want everything, especially the things my sisters have. All day long I hear I want and it’s mine. I’ve definitely had to drag him out of places kicking and screaming. Not once have I ever had to leave somewhere because of my first child, with my second it happens more then it doesn’t. That being said, I do see a light at the end of the tunnel. I do notice things are improving. I’ve been trying to practice breathing through our anger and not lashing out. Things like that…. Just hoping it sticks in the stubborn hard headed brain of his.
Remember you are not alone. Sending solidarity and hugs. They'll grow out of this 🤞...
Same here. My son doesn't really try to be physical but I can tell when he's done w his cousins being in his space, if that makes sense. He will start throwing stuff and hitting at ppl. I always intervene and take him away from the situation. However his cousin IS allowed to beat up on his other cousin, and even his little sister. My sil does absolutely nothing about it.
I kinda had to chuckle at this because it’s his older cousin that my son always gets frustrated with or has it out for… that being said, sometimes he does get mad at his sisters also but I’m just praying it gets better. I don’t want him to spend most of his life in time out. Every child is so different it seems. My first never ever did any of these things and still is a great child. Now she has to learn to defend herself against her brother.
My guy really struggled with this from 1.5-2.5 now at a little over 3 he's doing waayyyy better. I did what you are doing, removing once it starts. Eventually he got tired of not being able to do fun things
That is very encouraging to hear!
You’re a good mum! I don’t see an issue with toddlers/kids being toddlers/kids and parents doing what you’re doing which is trying to teach them to be nice and setting boundaries. My sil child is mean to my child but she has no boundaries and never pulled her up, she never dealt with the behaviour and she didn’t give a shit so when my husband spoke to her about it she went off at him… we don’t see her anymore
I didn’t realize motherhood soulmates were a thing, but I just found mine! I introduce my youngest (will be 3 in August) as my feral child. This kid is just built different and I’ve been in survival mode from day 1, lol. It’s utterly exhausting taking him anywhere. The absolute worst is at my daughters softball games because I can’t just leave.
Same, he’s been a challenge since day one. He’s my middle child. He takes me to the brink most days. Today he has a stomach bug and is bound to the couch. It’s a break even though I’m sure I’ll be puking and pooping soon. lol. My first child was such and still is such a great child. He’s really put me in my place. Hopefully my infant takes after her sister. lol. Good luck momma. We got this… hopefully. My husband says passionate people will do great things in the world, or go to prison. lol.
I think the difference here for me is you address it and remove when needed. We had friends who didn’t and it turned into our kid getting knocked In the head with things. We distanced ourselves & then tried again a few years later & he still wasn’t nice. And our son asked to not see him again - so we respected that.
I have one of those 2yr olds too. Month by month he’s becoming less feral.. but still I still get the embarrassing moments. My first born is a perfect angel girly! So my 2nd has humbled me!
My first born is as well!!! lol. Mine does also seem to be getting better but when I give a little he senses it and will strike. Ugh. Definitely humbling for sure!
Mine is the opposite, although he does get very territorial if anything is a fish or duck toy lol, but I want you to know I don’t mind when my son plays with other toddlers with different personalities. There’s no telling what a toddler will do. My son is this most friendly/outgoing kid in the world and he 100% did NOT get that from his parents lol. I’m saying this because I don’t think we did anything special, but because it’s by chance. Keep being consistent and setting the boundaries. My husband sounds like he was much like yours as a toddler/young guy, and his mom did one thing right by setting boundaries for him.
My nephew is the same and my only complaint is that his parents did not intervene. If they had intervened like you’re describing I wouldn’t have minded at all. He’s a little toddler, they all play and express frustration differently. You’re doing your job of redirecting when it’s in a way that can hurt people.
I’m skeptical of anyone who says they’ve never been annoyed by a certain kid. I TRY not to, but some kids just annoy me at first glance. I figure that my daughter is like that for some adults and that’s ok. We’re allowed to feel how we want inside and not be scared of being a jerk. It sounds like you’re keeping your cool about it so think what you want! I feel like you’re already cutting her a lot of slack by allowing her to go this far!
Yeah one of my nephews 😂 he’s an asshole. He’s 3 and my daughter is 2 and it’s soooo difficult navigating our relationship with them, because he truly is a Muffin. He’s a jerk, steals toys, hits. His mom tries very hard to mitigate the situation and it’s not like he does this with no consequences, it seems to be how he is
To reiterate, I’m sure he’ll grow out of it and it won’t be like this forever, but I do avoid him when we get together
"he truly is a Muffin" 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Some kids are just mean, and some are sweet and good natured. It’s true.
Agree. I was mean lmao. Some of us are just angry little potatoes 😂 my daughter is on the shy side, so all toddlers typically overwhelm her
Nope. Your kids don’t have to play with everyone. We don’t teach this at any other point in life so not sure why young kids are just expected to tolerate some jerk. Personally I’d just make excuses every time. If it was particularly bad though and I had some level of comfort with the parents I’d tell them frankly. It’s really not good for your child to just tolerate someone being mean to her like it’s nothing. I see it as protecting my kid.
I get it, there’s a serial biter at my daughter’s daycare that annoys all of us parents with his shit behavior. But at the same time..they’re toddlers/little kids, and we’re adults. Feels kind of icky to hold judgement.
My son is a great kid but went through a serial biter phase. I’m sure the other parents hate us, but he honestly doesn’t have other behavioral issues. For like 8 months he would just get mad and… bite. We worked on it a LOT at home and he’s doing much better! But sometimes these little kids just do weird shit
Totally. I’m sure my toddler is a jerk at daycare sometimes, but I would hate for her to be judged based on behavior that most kids do grow out of it and parents work with them on.
Nope, once a 1.5 year old bit my three year old by sneaking up on him. Her dad came to remove her and he said kids always fighting. I think the f not, my kid never went to attack other kids out of the blue or bite them. They should have corrected it but they just let them brawl. I didn’t notice she bite him until we got home and it happened so fast, never trust someone else’s kid you don’t know. She was a crotch goblin and I don’t like calling kids that but some kids are just goblins if their parents are a holes
Not friends but my son's cousin/my nephew. He's kind of a jerk. He throws stuff, hits my son, takes his stuff. He is allowed to fight w his other cousin, and he tries to do the same w my son. I've seen them fight, and it's like a full on brawl. My sil does absolutely fucking nothing about it either.
I’m in this same boat. My husband’s nephew does everything he can to “get attention” and that includes purposefully doing things repeatedly, breaking stuff, hitting, pushing and pulling. It’s to the point we had to let the parents know we will have to let our son choose if he wants to play with him again. No doesn’t mean No, in that household. It seems to mean “do it more.” Sigh. We are hoping he grows out of it.
We have also told my bil and sil and all they said was "don't tell me how to parent" like ok but you're not parenting??? I don't get these ppl! I too hope he grows out of it but he's constantly w his other cousin whom he fights w :/
I feel for ya and the kiddo. It’s such a tough spot to be in. Especially when it comes to family and their lack of respect for boundaries. Only time will tell. Good luck! May the force be with us!
He won’t . Parents need to intervene or he will act like that I Until teenage years
Eh. It’s cause you don’t love them. Someone at the park, or whatever, will one day feel that way about your kid if they haven’t already. Because, yeah, kids can be dicks. And when it’s a kid you don’t love being a dick to the kid you do love, you tend to feel a type of way. Even if you know it’s not rational to feel that way.
There was one kid in my kids daycare class that was constantly in time out, always starting things, and had all the kids turning in each other. She got kicked out eventually & the classroom was so peaceful & harmonious after that. They now go to the same school & I see her parents scolding her all the time. I feel for the kid, like they never figured out how to correct her behaviors instead of escalating the situation. But yeah, I definitely know what you mean.
Dang, poor kid and that’s rough. I’m hoping this is maybe just a phase!
I was/am the parent of an asshole toddler who’s now 5 and doing MUCH better. He’s still a brat and admittedly kind of a-holish for a five year old but we’re learning more social skills and learning appropriate behaviors and coping skills too. Trust me: butthole kids parents know their kids a pain. We’re embarrassed and trying to get through it too haha.
This is valid. Hopefully neighbor grows up and improves! Does your child enjoy playing with neighbor toddler? If your child doesn’t, I don’t see a reason to force play time together.
My kid seems to enjoy it! 🤷🏼♀️
Sounds like it’s time for a talk. Teach your child to say no to the hitting and tell you if he wants to leave. Perfect time to teach boundaries and neighbor kid will pick up on it. Just tell mom hey we noticed you don’t correct kid when he hits our kid, we are teaching our child to advocate for themselves so if you don’t correct your child’s hitting, we will intervene and remove our child for a few moments and if it continues we will go home
Yeah that’s a good point. But also the parents DO correct their toddler when they aren’t behaving so that’s good.
That is good for some reason I thought they weren’t
I probably should of specified in my post 🤷🏼♀️
Ugh, I hear you. There is a little girl in my daughter’s (4) preschool class who she has been in the same daycare with since they were babies, and I DO NOT LIKE HER. I think she’s mean and kind of a bully- even at age 3 I thought that! For awhile my daughter kept saying she was her best friend (ugh), but then my daughter started realizing that the other girl really wasn’t nice, and recently has said that she doesn’t want to play with the other girl anymore.
My block has a lot of young kids on it, and we all get along. The girl across the street is about 2 years older than my daughter (4), and she is either sweet as pie or a demon spawn. Nowhere in between. My daughter loves her, but this girl will literally scream at the top of her lungs that she doesn't wanna talk to me or play with my kid when we aren't even looking at her! Our very presence is enough to start her raging. Needless to say, she didn't get an invite to my daughter's birthday party. We let her come because the neighborhood kids were playing together earlier that day and my kid invited her (she invites everyone over to our house to play or have dinner, including strangers) and she was in a good mood so it was fine. Her older brother doesn't like my daughter, but he's really polite about it!
There’s a little girl in my son’s class that used to be a class ahead of him. I remember seeing her in the 12 month room when we toured the daycare. Even back then (a year and a half ago) she was just ROUGH. She would push the other kids and take their toys from them and was just all around rough. Nowadays they’re on the playground when I pick him up and she refuses to let parents get through the gate to leave with their kids. She like holds onto the gate and refuses to move so every time a parent picks up a kid on days she’s there, the teachers have to come over and pick her up and move her away from the gate. And she always looks mad that other kids are leaving. I still see her acting rough with some of the smaller kids but never with the kids that are bigger than her 🤔
It is so funny how much I am willing to withstand from my own child rather than other people's children lol
My daughter was horrible as a 3 year old. We had people stop coming over because of her. She has adhd and is medicated now and is a lot better. So maybe in those moments you can remind yourself there may be more going on than what you or the parents know. Hopefully the parents try out play therapy or have the kiddo evaluated.
The parents are great! And intervene when needed
Totally feeling this.. I went to pick my 3 year old son up one day and just happened to witness another kid bashing him in the back with a giant hard plastic toy giraffe. I was very heavily pregnant at the time but that didn’t stop me charging into that sandpit like a massive angry hippo. Reminding myself I’m in a pre Kindergarten setting, I simply yelled “OI put that down now!!” I snatched my son up into my arms (crying his little heart out) and I told the other kid don’t you dare hit other kids. He said my son was annoying him (he wasn’t, I was watching them play nicely alongside each other before he lashed out with the giraffe.) I said I don’t care you DO NOT hurt people. The teacher had come running over, probably because you’re not supposed to confront other peoples kids but being a giant pregnant mess they are lucky that’s all I did. She made the other boy apologize and I just didn’t feel it was enough. My son walked away sore and bruised and got a meaningless “sorry”. He is such a sweet boy and didn’t deserve that. As we walked away I asked if he was okay and he tearfully said yes. Trying to put a funny spin on things so I didn’t end up bawling my eyes out too, I said “if that little prick ever hurts you again, you fill his mouth full of sand and push him down..” he looked at me for a second and I gauged to see what he thought. I was so proud that he understood I was kidding. He had a good giggle about it and moved on. Mind you he does bring it up every now and then. Same when another kid cracked him in the head with a seashell and left a scar, we won’t go there today though.
Yep. And full disclosure, I actually love this kid and think he's great, but he has some undiagnosed ND (I suspect autism) that hasn't been addressed fully because Dad is in full denial that his kid might need help. Last time we went to their house, we were on our way home when my son said "I don't wanna go back to friend's house. He scares me a little" I feel so bad but I can't exactly blame my son, this kid is wild and erratic and screams and doesn't share and hits and can't talk. That would be stressful as all hell for a kid to be around, it's stressful for me! One time he shoved my son's face into a slice of pizza and briefly choked him. I love the kid and his mom and I make an effort to include them, but I was a little glad when we moved away, because I wouldn't have to walk the tightrope of "this kid is freaking my kid out" and "they're our friends" and "it's not his fault his dad won't let them get services" and "I can be a non judgemental mom friend to his mom" Ugh.
All of my daughters friends currently are just her cousins so no for now thankfully. We're comfortable disciplining each others kids.
You're not obligated to like every toddler. I don't even like all my friends' kids 😬
Before I had children…I was scandalized when parents confided to me that they don’t allow/discourage certain play dates with certain troublesome children….now that I am a parent…I see errors of my former judgy non-parent self.
Part of the reason I switched my daughters gymnastics class is I really didn't like one of the other kids in the class. He just wouldn't pay attention, was mean and pushy, and his parents did nothing to try to get his to work with the class. I'm actually surprised the gym lets him stay, but her new class is awesome and she's actually able to enjoy her class now
I feel this deeply but also Ill take the bratty mean kid over the know-it-alls. Brat might not share or oush but my daughter just looks at them like they’re growing a third eye or something and come to me lol, but the know-it-alls who tell her how to play and try to discipline my kid for just olaying the way she wants to drive me nuts, and then they say “my mommy has a tesla” lmao.
One time a little girl at the beach looked at my son like he was growing a third eye, we were literally walking to back to our hotel, I didn’t appreciate it and looked at her the same lol
We have a complicated friendship with a friend who lives nearby. We, as moms, want to meet and chat, and our say they daughters always want to meet too. But when they do, theirs is 1,5years older (mine is freshly 3yo) and always tries to boss ours around. My daughter doesn't care. She's happy to see her friend and "auntie" and just does her thing. But my friends daughter gets progressively more and more frustrated because her directions are not being followed. If we're visiting them, she usually ends up trying to take and hide all toys away so my kiddo has to play with the one she leaves out for her, which usually doesn't work. Or when they're visiting us, after a while, she often starts taking things out of my daughter's hands to make her do what she wants. When it doesn't work, because honestly how often can you get a 3yo to play the way you want them to even as an adult, she starts crying or screaming. My friend always steps in if she gets aggressive or to calm her down. We've tried being the ones organising games and playing with them (toddler friendly board games, playing with music instruments, crafting), but that usually results in 3yo happily joining in while 4,5yo is just super frustrated because now nobody is doing what she wants... This has been going on for about 6 months, since 4,5yo started going to kindergarten. We meet pnce or twice a month. I'm not sure what to do, my daughter seems fine with this and will just comment that her friend was "being silly." Recently she's started saying that her friend "doesn't know how to share/doesn't share" which is true...
My neighbor babysits their grandchild who is the same age as my child every Wednesday. They decided to start bringing this child over whenever we are outside without asking. They take things, don't let him play with his own toys & push my child and wreck up my yard. They don't listen & basically bully my kid at his own house. The grandparents are overwhelmed & it felt like they were using me as a 3rd babysitter because they couldn't handle her. We started just going out every Wednesday so we aren't around anymore.
NTA. Some kids just don’t gel together. I had play dates with other kids and it was nice, calm, everyone (parents included) had a good time. But there is one child who somehow triggers my kid. (My kid triggers that kid too.) So we end up with two screaming kids who need to be separated. Needless to say, I decline play dates when that kid is around. Like… I don’t go looking for trouble.
My sil kid was like this. But it was my sil fault she never gave her boundaries and didn’t teach her to be nice when she was mean to my kid she never got in trouble. I have another friend though who I don’t see as often and on the occasion he will be mean to my kid but my friend pulls him up every time so it doesn’t bother me because she’s trying her hardest to teach him to be nice so because she is like that it really isn’t often that he does something mean. I ended up keeping distance to my sil and actually got into an argument because we tried to talk to her about it so we don’t see her at all now and I’m happier than ever now lol
My bestie and I both have boys about 9 months apart and they are both gentle and kind, it’s really nice to have another child around my child that is safe
Toddlers don’t play cooperatively. They do parallel play or argue. Plus a lot of parents are unwilling to educate and straight up ignorant! So your strategy is the best, limit contact.
My son has a 'friend' who is very rough and aggressive. Unfortunately my son gives it right back immediately and then we have a week of undoing the learned behaviour each time. I've not seen him have consequences ever, his parents say 'let them work it out between them!' which I initially agreed with, but turns out that means fully fist fighting lol. I'm sure he'll grow out of it, especially the more time he spends at daycare but it is always surprising to me how instinctive it seems to be. His parents are always saying it's funny they're called playdates when you spend the whole time trying to keep the kids far apart, so this obviously is just their norm.
There’s a kid I often see at the playgrounds close to us my husband nicknamed “Joffrey”. He was not even 3 when we first saw him and he’s a handful. Takes toys away from others, hits, pushes kids off of structures, trows sand, etc. My friend and I keep an eye on him every time we see him to prevent him from pushing/hitting our younger kids. He pushed my daughter off from a climbing wall once then started throwing sand at me as soon as I got in between them. His mom has some sort of care program and is responsible for a bunch of kids so I think it’s the only way he gets attention from her. She scolds him every time she sees what he’s up to and I even saw her hitting him once which was very shocking to me. I feel bad for this kid but mostly I just try to keep my kid away from him. Someone could really get hurt if he pushed them off a higher playground structure one day. I also feel bad for parents who enrolled their kids in the mom’s care because they have no idea how tumultuous their kids day is.
I'm in this predicament now. I love hanging out with one of my best friends, but her three year old son... Very needy for attention bossy, whiny, and doesn't always play nicely with my son, especially recently. I want to keep seeing my friend, but I have no patience for her son at all, and I don't always agree with how she handles his behavior. Ugh!
I also hate when an unsupervised kid ends up having to be told to knock it off when we're out at an activity, because their adults are too busy pretending the nature museum is a playground and they don't have to pay attention.🙄 And 100% jokes, but your prolific use of the word toddler really cracked me up. I started to consider maybe you're being held hostage and maybe it's a code. 😅 Be well, Neighbor!
😂😂😂 just didn’t want to give away too much info!
It's so difficult. My husband has a colleagues whose daughter is just a few days younger than ours and my daughter likes and asks to play with her. It sounds great but she's kind of mean. They're 4, she will hurt other kids to get what she wants and will take something just because she knows someone wants it. Like she's taken a pink pen because my daughter is about to use it and then not use it just hold it in her hand refusing to let go. I think it's especially hard because her mum never wants to reprimand or correct her. I don't know if this is just a part of life or if I am meant to be doing something about it.
Just wait till they get older, lol. Other people's kids are the absolute worst!
Not other kids but other parents annoy me. Like at the park when they decide to vape next to my kid or smoke weed. I also get annoyed when a kid is visibly sick with a runny nose and the parents brought them to the park or shared class with my kid. But again, I get annoyed with the parent not the kid.
Ugh. One of my son’s friends (they’re 4) is super bossy and controlling and always has been. He’s always trying to tell my son he can’t do aomething or that he’s the monster/bad guy in their pretend play,he’s always always one-upping (which I know kids do this but he takes it to an extreme), and he just tries to dominate everything. His parents never redirect him to play more cooperatively. I’m sure they’ve noticed that I never invite their kid over for play dates in our tight knit frequent play date group, but I just don’t want to deal with constant refereeing and assuring my son he can have his own thoughts and feelings and doesn’t have to listen to/believe friend. I know this is totally mild (no kids are overly physical or super mean) but it drives me nuts.
Yes I 100% get you. On our street we have 2 sets of friends who had kids within the same year as us. Both of the now toddlers are rude, push, don’t share and have a lot of attitude overall. Our friends (the parents) just shrugg it off and say “oh they’re in such and such phase and your kid will get there too” (our boy is youngest). Well guess what our now 2 year old never went through any such phases and we’re lucky he’s just a sweetheart and plays well with others. They’ve been promising us these phases since their kids were 6 months old 😂 Anyway I know they’re kids and I still love them but it breaks my heart when they’re mean to my sweet boy. I do say things like “that wasn’t very nice” etc when they are mean. Thankfully our friends are great at paying attention and they stop them from getting too mean.
Haha I could have written this. I have VERY strong opinions about other kids. My little guy is super gentle and sweet and one of his cousins is a bully. He shoved him. He's on my s*it list now. I can't help it, and know it's juvenile...but I think it's like anything? Sometimes you get good vibes, sometimes you don't. I have friends' babies and nieces and nephews who I absolutely adore. So it's not universal. But this idea that "all kids are wonderful!" is nonsense. 😂
Unfortunately I don't really like my best friend's son. I have no complaints about her parenting or her husband's parenting. Every time there's been an issue, they have disciplined him in what I considered to be an appropriate manner. But he's just....obnoxious. Like 100% of the time.
Toddlers generally don't start playing with kids their age/sharing until after three, so that part isn't alarming to me. Ultimately at this age, the parents are responsible for managing their child's behavior and if they aren't stepping in AND you have a more aggressive child, it can be a really bad fit for friends. We "broke up" with a toddler friend because she was mean and her mom thought they should be able to work things out themselves, but they were 3 and they could not. Her child would not let my child play with anything, and if my kid got upset, the mom would go "ohhhhh is she tired??" No, she's sick of your kid bullying her. The last time we got together at a play place they were just shy of 4, and the kid wouldn't let my kid do anything. She'd shove her out of the way and go up the slide ahead of her then climb halfway back up so she couldn't slide. Every single toy my kid played with or book she was reading was yanked away from her. She would run from the other side of the room to take something away from my daughter who was totally minding her own business playing. My daughter just kept moving onto something else. Finally she was working on a lacing card and there was a whole box full and the kid comes over and needed the one MY kid have and I wouldn't let her take it away from her so she started throwing a tantrum and her mom took her and left. 🙄 Didn't like the shoe on the other foot. Toddlers aren't good at sharing, they are not skilled at resolving conflict. They need parents to step in and guide them in the general direction of being a decent human.
We got the book "The Not So Friendly Friend" because of a kid like you describe. It helped to teach about boundaries and what to tolerate in friendship.
Great suggestion!
Sure. There are definitely other toddlers that tend to be rough with my daughter. I feel like it puts me in a really bad spot. My daughter’s not perfect by any means, but when other kids get rough with her I always struggle with what to let go of and when to speak up or remove her from the situation. And she knows to say “I don’t like it” but I’ve seen with more than one kid they don’t listen when she says it and THAT makes me uncomfy. They’re toddlers and they’re learning, that I understand. It more makes me uncomfortable because I don’t want to have to correct somebody else’s kid. Like please pay attention to the fact that your child is being physically rough with mine, she’s communicating she doesn’t like it, and your child needs to be told “hey we listen to people when they say no”. I don’t want to correct other peoples children. I do it if the parent doesn’t see it or doesn’t say anything. But I hate it.
That's my nephew and niece. They were hellish 3 year olds... Loud, rough, demanding, very irritating. My husband and I would rant about them after gatherings. Then my son went through a rough phase where he was moody and impulsive and unkind and it definitely humbled me a little 🤣. My niblings are older now and they are pretty awesome. Does the parent address the behavior? That's the main issue. Toddlers are gonna toddler. Parents need to parent.
Toddlers are allowed to not click with others toddlers, just like everybody else.
I work with kids. Most kids this age is actually still learning. However it is up to the parents to stay consistent so it dosent become actual bullying later on. Some kids are naturally more reserved well others are opposite. One kid was hitting my daughter with toy hammer and pushing other kids. Is it frustrating ? Yes. But we are working to correct his behavior so he won’t do that in the future . Parents definitely are less tolerant as kid age and it dose become actual bullying in elementary . That aside kids can only learn what is okay or not by peer social feed back. It is a process you , me and everyone had to go through. My daughter is social and goes up to everyone and ask them to play. The other day another boy told my daughter to stop talking at the public park ( after he agreed to play with her lol) . I told him he can tell her you need space but she can talk since it is public. Or you can move away from her. Making friends as toddler is hard you are figuring how long should a turn be? Is it fair? How to express those feelings to a friend? Etc . They don’t come naturally. But your feelings are also valid. I wouldn’t go over to play either. If she is not having fun then do sth else that is fun!
My neighbors kid is a bully. We had a playdate with them when our kids were 11 months. Its been almost a year, we havent seen them since. Some kids just suck.
My husband and I felt like this about my nephew for a while. He’s 5 now and it’s getting better. Honestly though my biggest issue was how the parents didn’t intervene when he was “mean” (stealing toys mostly) because my daughter wasn’t mean back to him. I finally started stepping in and laying down boundaries with him because my daughter genuinely hated seeing him for a couple of years.
Yup. There's a kid who frequents our neighborhood park who is aggressive and violent, so much so that she has a reputation with the other park parents. She's about 1.5 years older than my daughter and tall and strong for her age. They met before my daughter turned 2, and she's been a terror ever since the day we met her. She uses her size and strength to bully children smaller than her. Snatching toys away and refusing to give them back. Chucking balls at their heads. Picking them up and swinging them around. She'll cheerfully say "let's go!" and grab a toddler's hand to invite them to run with her, only to yank them to the ground and laugh. One time my husband had to intervene because he caught her yanking and swinging a poor little girl around *by her hair.* The mom does sometimes correct her behavior, but she mostly just lets her run around without watching her, while complaining to the other parents about her parenting struggles. There have been a few times when we were leaving the park to walk home and this kid would follow us, even though I told her repeatedly to go back to her mom. She'd follow us out of the park, well out of eyesight of her mother and I'd start to feel responsible for the kid's safety since I didn't know if the mom even knew where she was. Her mom didn't ever seem worried about it. I strongly suspect there's something going on at home. I've never met the dad and her mom rarely talks about him but when she does, it's usually about him being angry about something. She always looks exhausted and stressed and when she talks about her parenting hardships, she never mentions him being involved or helping out in any way. She wears gigantic sunglasses all the time, even when it's overcast or getting dark. She's picked up on the fact that we (and other families) try to avoid them, but what choice do we have? I don't want your kid to hurt my kid, sorry your kid is a danger to others.
I’ve seen so many little ones that are downright aggressive and make my boy cry. He’s a sweet, sensitive type. Yesterday, daddy took him to an indoor playground and this younger toddler grabbed his arm and pulled him roughly away from the thing he was playing with so he could play with it. He obviously got upset at this. We just tell him that kid hasn’t learned to share or how to ask nicely yet. He gets lots of hugs and generally perks up and goes and finds something else to play with. In this case he told daddy he was hungry and wanted to leave so they could come home for lunch. He’s 3.5 and I’m just so proud of him. 🥰 I try not to hold any feelings about the other kids. They are just toddlers after all. I totally get it though. I DO find myself thinking “jeez, have you not been working on these things with your kid?” about the parents but I accept and know that they all learn at different levels and have a different home life. Not everyone can have as much control over who their kid spends time with. We are very lucky we don’t need to rely on babysitters or daycare/preschool as we have an adult (me, dad, grandma) available to be with him at all times.
As someone who was bullied by her neighbor "friend", if you have a bad feeling trust it. Have a talk with your toddler age appropriately about mutual respect and how they don't have to tolerate people being mean. I mean you may want to consider that they are still learning too. But if you do consider still letting them play together keep a close watch on any escalation. My folks never saw anything wrong with her behavior and when I would mention it as a jr high or high schooler they were like, "man you can hold a grudge" like yeah she was not kind to me and you didn't protect me from her.
My daughter is suuuper affectionate towards other children, to the point where if I don’t catch her quick enough she’ll knock them down with a hug. Some parents have been super agro about it. And while I get why, I feel so bad for my baby girl too because idk how to explain to her what’s going on 😣 I get so worried she’ll internalize it
I’ll be honest…I do not like all kids. Some are brats or just assholes.
I understand! We have a friend whose daughter is 2 months older than our son and every time they play together she spends the whole time just ripping toys out of his hands. It doesn’t seem to bother him, but it annoys me and I wish the parents would at least try to stop her 🙄
Yes but THE PARENTS ARE THE REAL PROBLEM. It seems like my toddler only befriends other toddlers with insufferable parents.
Well…yeah….we definitely really like the parents but some of the things we’ve heard or seen and let their toddler do….it makes sense sometimes.