Little Disneyland mishap with a friend.

[wheeitsme]

If it were me, I'd be mortified that my kid could have hurt your friend!  I'm sorry that woman screamed at you and, IMHO, neither of you did anything wrong.

This.

Because the Mom didn't pay attention to her child, that child got hurt and almost hurt your friend.  And while the Mom was lucky it was Disneyland and not a parking lot (where the child running out like that would have been even more dangerous to her), darting at a place like Disneyland is still really dangerous for a small child. 

[The TARDIS]

I think the mother was a nasty piece of work. Yes, accidents happen, and when that happened both parties should have made their apologies and moved on. Personally I think the mom was at most fault, but were I Rose I would have apologized, too.

But to scream in Rose's face and then tell OP to control her friend? No. She gets no pass from me. Virtual hugs to Rose!!

The worst part for Rose was being shouted at by the angry mother. Rose gets very scared if people shout at her for reasons other than warning her of danger. Should she hear someones SHOUT her name, she'll stop walking; it is something she was taught from very early in her childhood. It was how her mother kept her from falling off curbs or walking into traffic until she learned how to find them on her own.

It became somewhat Pavlovian because she associates shouting of any sort with "danger, danger, danger!" That is why Rose initially thought she caused the child a serious injury. For her sake, should clumsy me trip or drop something by mistake around her, I say "Oops! I'm okay!" immediately to prevent her from worrying. She's the skittish type who startles easily if she doesn't hear you coming.

OT: You should see her play Marco Polo with our group of friends. Whoever scares the daylights out of her wins! It's HARD to sneak up on her in a quiet environment. She can 'feel' you coming.

[Talley]

Rose was in now way at fault. Neither was the child, doing what toddlers do if they get a chance. The only person in this who did anything wrong was the mother of the toddler. Little kids do sometimes get away from their parents. A parent's normal response to that would be to catch the kid as quickly as possible, apologise for anything they have done, make sure that no one else is hurt/nothing is damaged, then drag off child.

I think I might have met that toddler girl's cousin and his mom recently... A few weeks ago a friend and I were walking our daughters to school in the early morning, when it was still dark. There were lots of other people out, walking or riding bikes as the street we were on also leads to a large secondary school and a lot of the kids cycle there. Behind us were some people with several children, some around 5 or 6 yo and one a small child between 2 and 3. The little guy was running on the footpath, overtaking us several times, then waiting for his mother and so forth.

Well, we crossed the road, watching out for cars and bikes and were just about to say good-bye to our daughters when we saw the little guy race out into the road, no adult within 20 meters of him. And the inevitable happened - cyclist winged him. The cyclist had done nothing wrong - he wasn't going overly fast (the road goes downhill there, so it's a bit harder to stop, perhaps), he had a lamp on his bike etc. But he cold not see someone very small, wearing dark, non-reflective clothing dart out in front of him until it was too late. The man immediately stopped to check on the kid, who was screaming, and also stopping any car from running him over. The mother finally comes up, and what does she do? She starts berating the cyclist! For not watching out for her kid.

I have to admit that I was speechless. My DD, on the other hand, who is 7 and has had the rules of the road for pedestrians drilled into her both at home and at school, could not refrain from commenting: "That little boy should not have run into the road without looking! He should have held his mom's hand!" Maybe DD was a little PA, but I had to agree with her.

BTW, the kid was not hurt. My friend's daughter is in after-school care with the little guy's sister, and the sister told her that the boy was absolutely fine. I still don't like to think what would have happened if he had run out in front of a car instead of a bike...

*ok, threadjack over* 

[Otterpop]

The mother should have been apologizing to your friend for not having control over her daughter.
Your friend did nothing wrong.

This.

Add me to the list.  That was my immediate thought when I read that in the story.  I suspect the mother felt guilty because she knew it was her problem that she didn't have her own child 'under control', but rather than admit her own culpability she had to blame it on the blind person who didn't even see what happened!

Add me to the list too, please.

Yup, this ^.  The child could have tripped over anything.  This time, it just happened to be your friends cane.  Next time, she'll blame the curb, the light pole, a car...

[bopper]

Rose didn't do anything wrong.

The mom did not have control of her child.
The child tripped over something.
The mother blamed whoever she could because she wasn't going to blame herself!

[RebeccainGA]

We have similar incidents with DP's chair all the time - we go around corners, or come to the end of an aisle at the store, or even just going into or out of a door, and people trip, bang into, or generally fall over DP's foot rests (and sometimes just don't see her in the chair AT ALL and nearly fall over the armrests!). For some able bodied folks, disabled people and their equipment are INVISIBLE.

Rose was fine. You were fine. The kid and the mom needed a lesson on behaving in public.

[Outdoor Girl]

What if Rose were not blind but needed a cane for mobility issues?  On a forward step, a 'regular' cane would be in close to the same position as a 'seeing' cane and the toddler likely would have made Rose fall, thus injuring her.  If someone's toddler had done this to my father, I'd be rather furious with the mother and letting her know in no uncertain terms that the fault lied entirely with her failure to control her child.

You and Rose were perfectly fine; child shouldn't have been running but the fact that she was is entirely the mother's fault.

I have noticed on more than one occasion that when a person is doing or allowing something they shouldn't and an accident or near accident occurs, they often react aggressively towards the other party.  I wonder if it is a subconscious thing:  'This is totally my fault but I'm going to yell at that other person because it will shift the fault to them and make me feel better.'

I was heading in to work one morning.  The entrance to the parking lot was also the entrance to a small park where people often walked their dogs during the day.  A couple of older ladies were out with their dog, not on a leash, when the dog ran right in front of me.  I managed to brake and not hit the dog.  One of the ladies came over to my window so I rolled it down, expecting to get a thank you for not creaming their dog.  Instead, I got berated for driving too fast.     (Which, for the record, I wasn't.  I was doing less than 40 km/hr by that point.)

[MrTango]

Neither the OP or Rose did anything wrong.  Hopefully, the kid learns to watch where she's going in the future.

I can see perfectly well, and if a toddler ran across my path that close to me in a crowd, there's a good chance I'd miss seeing her also.

[Girlie]

When I was growing up, we may have gotten comforted if we fell and hurt ourselves, but it was usually in a "well, these things happen" sort of way. Of course no one wants their child to be hurt, but the truth of it is, children do fall down. They do get scrapes and bruises. That's just how life is.

The mother in this scenario may not have been completely to blame for her child getting away from her - those things happen too. But she is completely at fault for her totally irrational and incredibly rude response. This is not what I would term a "Mama Bear" attitude, because that would assume that the child was in actual danger or being threatened. This was a Snowflake, through and through.

[SciFiLeslie]

I am sorry things went all south for you and Rose.  I have to wonder if perhaps later the mother felt bad about how she reacted.  I hope she felt just awful about it.

[LifeOnPluto]

What a nasty woman (the mother, not your friend). Didn't she realise your friend was blind? The white cane should have been a give-away. Or did she really think your friend was "pretending" to be blind whilst secretly plotting to trip up innocent children? The mind boggles...

[Moralia]

Ugh. I'm getting so tired of "Mama Bear" types who fly off the handle over every little incident.  For one thing, it's exactly the wrong way to calm an upset toddler.  When my kid would fall for whatever reason, we'd matter-of-factly pick her up, check for boo-boos and kiss or bandaid as needed.

A calm demeanor makes sure the kid know there's no reason to be upset. I can't tell you how many kids I've seen go into full hysterics because of their parents' self indulgence.

Also, that age is just about old enough to start learning about things like blindness and to know that a white cane means they can't see. Again, I know this from experience in teaching my daughter about wheelchairs, canes, hearing aids and the like.

[cjeanies]

That mom was absolutely SS.  Toddlers don't know to look out for other people in crowded places.  That's why you hold their hands if you let them walk.  So they don't get hurt and so they don't trip anybody up.  It's common sense.  Now of course, it's possible that she was doing that and the child just got away from her.  But, given her reaction, I think she's more like the mom in Talley's story, who thinks it's perfectly fine to let a child that age wonder far ahead.  It's just crazy to let a toddler out of arms reach in either situation, in crowds or near busy roads.   

[Raintree]

I agree with the other posters. This mom was a piece of work. "Control your friend"? Excuse me? Control your child and don't let them plow into people with disabilities. Of course, accidents happen, kids run out in front of people in excitement, and I wouldn't really have blamed the mother either so much as long as she was appropriately apologetic.

[cicero]

wow. that mom is really really horrible.

i can understand the "mama bear" coming out when you see your child in tears, but to tell you to "control your friend better" (when it was *her* daughter who was not under control) was way over the top. Your friend is not a toddler, or a pet, or someone with a mental disability who might need more "control" - she is blind.

Plese give rose a hug from me.