You try to do the best for your kids but there is not a parent alive that doesn't get it wrong sometimes. The trick is to learn from these missteps. I received a life lesson I still carry around from an incident over a decade ago.
My son was not yet three, when I took him to a toddler reading group at the local library. It was less than a year before my son was diagnosed with PDD-NOS (pervasive developmental disorder - not otherwise specified). Aiden and I walked into the room hosting the event and not surprisingly I was the only daddy there. There were many moms with their infants and toddlers and me and my boy. When you are stay at home dad, as I have been much of my now 13-year-old son's life, you get used to being the only pop around in many situations.
Things got going with a female library employee reading a colorfully illustrated children's book in a highly animated manner. Early in the proceedings Aiden popped up from his sitting position on the floor in front of me, rushed to the front of the room grabbed a different book from a table and returned to me with a big grin on his face. Aiden then sat on my lap, opened his new reading material and started talking to me about it in a not so quiet voice. As I whispered to him to be quiet and closed his book urging him to listen to the storyteller, I noticed them for the first time.
There was at least three mothers in the room shooting me some dark stares and I felt judged. I imagined I was being written off as a screw up dad who didn't know what he was doing. Preoccupied by the unwanted attention Aiden and I had drawn, I was unable to stop my son as he jumped to his feet again and repeated his previous action. This time as my son returned with yet another book, he came within a hair of stomping on the hand of an infant who was on all fours on the floor next to me. The mother of the baby issued a loud gasp and fired daggers from her eyes in my direction.
In not my finest hour, I fled. As I stood and took Aiden abruptly by the hand I witnessed almost all of the moms were now gazing at me in a far from approving manner. The only person who had my back was the library employee who kept reading and genuinely smiled at Aiden and I as we passed by her while exiting the room. My boy asked me repeatedly why we were leaving. As we put on our shoes in the library entrance, I heatedly explained to him it was because he wouldn't sit still and listen. Aiden never got upset. He accepted his fate without protest but with more than little bewilderment.
During the short ride home the remorse struck me. I apologized to Aiden. I realized I shouldn't have let those moms fluster me like that. What transgression had my son committed? All he wanted was to have his dad share a book with him. What I should have done is taken the books he had gathered, found a private corner in the library and read to him one-on-one.
As I mentioned off the top I learned from this experience. Years later when Aiden was in elementary school I would occasionally be conversing with a mom as we waited outside a classroom and feel I was being talked down to. The lady I was speaking with would be giving some not so subtle advice or opinion on child raising in a pain staking "are you following me?" manner better suited to a toddler than a man in his late 30s. I would smile, offer comments and take it all like a good solider.
After the library incident I decided I was going to do what I could to not feel judged. My wife had no reservations in entrusting me to care for our infant son when she returned to the workplace, so why should I care about how others perceive my ability to raise my child? I rationalized my wife's a great mom, she believes in me, so |I have got to be a pretty good dad.
Not one looking be judged I have learned the value of not assessing other parents as well. Having an autism spectrum son has really helped out with this. When my family is out in a restaurant and a child at another table has a full scale meltdown, I don't immediately jump to the conclusion this kid has been raised improperly.
I open my mind to the possibility this child may have a condition that renders them unable to adequately deal with things out of his or her control. He or she may have just learned their favourite food item is no longer offered on the menu and as child with autism, obsessive compulsive disorder or something else; is greatly troubled by a disruption to routine. In any outburst or unusual behavior you see in a child you are not familiar with, there may be a backstory behind it you are not aware of.
I have a go-to-move in public situations where a child is acting out and his or her parent looks at me sheepishly and offers an apology for the outburst. I smile and offer two words, "No worries."
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