I'm here to hand in my membership dues for the "mean mommy" club.
My kids were taught from the earliest that they were to stay in their seats in a restaurant, keep still in a movie, not speak out loud or wiggle in church.
I remember going places with a neighbor when my kids were small and those kids were allowed to run wild. We'd go to a department store and her kids were running around, pawing at the mirrors, disappearing under racks and into dressing rooms. And my kids were not allowed to walk away from me.
Then we would go to a fast food place and her kids had to go to the bathroom 20 times and would sit on the back of the booth which had to be so much fun for the person on the other side of that booth.
Mine were expected to stay in their seats and learn some manners--even if we were dining out of a cardboard box. Maybe I'm strange but I don't think my lapse birth control use should interfere with other people enjoying their lunch.
It makes me nuts when I go to church and there's a ten year old sitting on the floor eating cheerios, slurping on a juice box, running to the bathroom 4 times and launching paper airplanes. If my puppy can hold it for an hour so should your child. Ok, maybe they won't be mesmerized by the sermon but they can read and color quietly while sitting still. It really won't damage their little psyche and they won't starve to death either.
We took our kids to see The Nutcracker when they were 3 and 6 and they didn't make a peep or move a muscle. But they had been coached ad nauseum and knew that a grown up night out was a privelege and they soaked it in.
Yes I'm bragging !!!! But those little hooligans around the corner are now irresponsible adults causing their mother all kinds of grief because they never learned any control, and mine are wonderful young adults and I'm very proud of them ! (Can you be banned from the boards for being an obnoxious bragging mom?
) But I can really get up on my soapbox over this. Why don't people think they have to curtail their kids impulses? I was in a pizza place a few months ago and the child behind me leaned over the back of the booth and spit out her chewed up pizza all over the seat next to me. I had just moved my pocketbook or it would have been filled with pre digested take out !!
