Other Peoples kids and My DD Grrr

[aslyn]

Sorry double post

[lifeguard]

Sounds like a tough situation - hopefully you will all be out of it soon.

I honestly don't know if there is a way to say something & it have the effect you desire. The parents obviously don't see it as a problem & will likely just think you are overreacting.

Can you focus instead on your daughter & helping her to understand that not everyone is nice & polite but that it doesn't have anything to do with her?

[BrittneyMarie]

wow. what horrid behavior. i guess id say just explain to your dd that some people are just rude and hard to get along with and its not because of anything she did. i will never understand people who think its "cute" to have disrespectful children.

[lynsage]

Tell your son to quit tattling, tell your daughter to keep anything she doesn't want the other kids to play with in a box in your room, and tell both your kids that calling people names, being mean and taking other people's things is wrong but they are only responsible for their own behavior, not that of the other kids.

And tell yourself that you can't make people change the way they raise their kids- you can only raise yours right and you can only control your reactions to other people's behavior, not their behavior itself.

If the kid calls you a "rhymes with witch" to your face, calmly explain to her that you feel disrespected and you don't wish to be spoken to that way.

Personally I would also tell your DD that there's nothing wrong with her, that kid just has some issues about playing nicely with others, and to give the mean kid a wide berth and find other kids/toys to play with- the kid might snap out of it if she realizes acting that way makes people not want to play with her, and even if she doesn't it puts a stop to the drama.

[SunshineJ]

Wow. Any chance you could stay in a hotel for the rest of the visit? As for your DD I would instruct her to not play with this child, to avoid her and to not engage her in any way. If the child comes near your DD, have your dd just smile and walk away. Nothing else you can really do about it I'm afraid. However if the child calls you any names directly, that's another story. At that point if the parents are there I would address them in the manner of "while you may find this type of behaviour endearing, I do not and find her tone and words very disrespectful and would expect an apology for such rudeness." If the parents aren't there I'd tell her basically the same thing - such behaviour is not "cute" and that it is disrespectful and rude, that I expected an apology and for it not to happen again. If the parents don't like it tough tooties - you do not have to be spoken to like that by a child anywhere! Just wow!

[JL83]

Originally Posted by aslyn

not a min later my DS comes to me and says "X" called you a bad word, the word that ryhmes with witch. Now this little girl calls everyone shes got a problem with that word or for guys an a-hole..The parents think its cute, personaly I don't..I would have snatched up my DD and put soap in her mouth for talking to any adult like that..I was LIVID. The girl got in no trouble and I was the bad guy for taking something back that clearly belonged to my DD..I dont know how to handle this with the parents but I really do not deserve to be disrespected by a 5 yr old..

The 5yo did nothing to you. You were not disrespected or anything else. She didn't call it to your face. Your son shouldn't tattle.

Why do you care what words some one else's 5yo uses. You aren't going to get much sympathy here for saying you'd do something most of us think is abusive in putting soap in a kid's mouth if it had been your child.

It's just a word! A word you wouldn't have known about if your son hadn't tattled. Why should she get in trouble? I could see you having a point if she'd sworn at you directly. But she didn't. She said it around other kids. And isn't that the general social convention? Kids can swear around kids, teens around teens, adults around adults... But, generally we don't cross those lines.