I'm still fretting over a morning fuss I saw between a dad and toddler.

[Grasswire2]

I was walking home from farmers market, and passed a little coffee joint that has a playground for kids. A mom, dad, and two little ones had exited, and the dad was trying to get one of them into the front of the double stroller.

Screaming. Lots of screaming from the child and the dad. The dad was actually manhandling the child in an abusive and painful way. He was trying to scrunch the kid up and force him into the stroller seat, head first at one point. The child screamed "You're hurting me!!"

I stopped, and asked the mom, who was standing quietly by "Everything okay?"

She said "Benny's just having a meltdown. He didn't want to leave."

I said "I have some blueberries, if that would help distract him." She shook her head.

I immediately knew that this father is an abuser. The fray was still going on, kid screaming, dad manhandling him.

I could have stopped it in a minute, gently. I have ten grandchildren. I know how to calm the child in a minute. Distract him. Tell him he's lucky to have the Front Seat, and did he see that funny squirrel in the tree?

Calming that dad would have been another thing altogether.

Now I'm kicking myself for not saying more. That family is in for a world of pain. I should at least have whispered to the mom "Leave him. He's dangerous." (half kidding here.)

I was married to an abusive narcissistic man who once kicked our son down the stairs, and another time flushed his head in the toilet.

[mopinko]

1. we cant do everything. it would be bugging me, too, tho.

chances of me not getting in the guy's face are low, but i aint normal.
could be tho. i dont always have the bandwidth for the weight of the world.

be kind to yourself. maybe at least you did give her a bit of a prod. someone else noticing is not something that would be missed.

[mopinko]

2. ok, i'm reminded of a story,

my ex was a dick. nothing particularly epic. a man baby, mostly.

so, like all good wives i should have come equipped w some sort of radar to always know where things are. but i didnt.
this was particularly a problem when traveling. which he loved to do, bless his heart.

on a trip to see the mouse one time, we were in the parking lot of the place we were staying. 2 kids then.
digging through the bags, looking for the keys. yes, long ago, actual keys.

i'm digging, kids are fussing, he's whining, i'm digging.
an older couple walks by the scene. i catch her eye and she says- dont worry, it's in there somewhere.
been there done that.

and ya know, i remember that little pat on the back often. still.

[housecat]

14. Sometimes the wrong way is trying to make others do the right way.

However we could try to get the authorities involved.

[Diamond_Dog]

3. I'm so sorry that that had to happen.

I had a similar experience about a year ago, but first let me say I understand how you wished you could have done more ....but remember you risk your own safety getting yourself in the middle of a situation like that. A guy like that could likely be packing a gun. But I know that saying that probably doesn’t make you feel much better. I’m so sorry.... I hope that mom comes to her senses after her abusive monster of a husband made a scene scary enough for a stranger to take notice. It’s an awful situation.

I was sitting in the car in the parking lot of our bank one day while my husband went inside. After a while, group of people came out of the bank, adult and kids. One little girl, obviously full of energy like kids are, zoomed out of the door first, ran down the sidewalk, stumbled, and fell face down on the pavement! I thought, oh my God she all right?? One of the women in the group ran after her, (her mom, I assumed) ... and, instead of picking that child up, she started whaling away on her while she was lying face down on the ground! Pow, pow, pow! The woman was screaming, “I TOLD you not to run! I TOLD you!” The girl was screaming and crying. The woman shoved the child into the car. “Get in there! Shut up!” etc. etc. I was absolutely horrified! All the other family members just got in the car as if this was nothing unusual. I wish I could have done something, but what could I have done? To this day I can barely stand to think of what conditions that child must be living in at home. It makes me very, very, sad.

[Grasswire2]

4. I had witnessed a different incident several years ago.

I live next to a park, and many people walk from the little downtown through the park and then down the street I live on, down to another park. Lots of foot traffic.

One time I was walking there and a man came through the park path with a little girl tagging along behind with him pulling her along. She was sobbing; just crying her eyes out. Maybe three years old. The man was scruffy -- didn't look as if they belonged together. I didn't like what I saw. I didn't say anything.

Later, the worst came to my mind. And I hadn't said anything. I could have spoken to the girl. "Oh, honey, are you okay? Do you need a drink?" At least the man would have known that someone saw. Someone saw that sobbing child. And him.

Argh.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

7. I had a similar experience with my mother,

At the ice skating rink when I was a kid.

The instructor, who seemed like a grown-up, to me, saw what was happening and scooped up ice to help my bleeding forehead.

I’ve often thought of him and wished him well, wherever he is now.

[XanaDUer2]

5. child abuse surrounds us

at my job, many homeless people come in, some with babies and young children. One day, a little homeless girl , probably stressed out, pulled the black foam earpiece off earphones and ripped it up.

No big deal. There are replacements. When my coworker went over, she said what happened and let her replace it.

The little girl was around 2 or three yrs old. Her mom took her middle finger and flicked her daughter, hard, twice, against her forehead. Like THWONK! it reverberated, it was so hard. Little girl started screaming. My coworker said Please don't flick her, and the woman responded that it was her child and she'd do whatever she wanted, then left before the deputy could intervene.

Not sure what happened to them, but I still think of that little girl

[Grasswire2]

6. sigh

the human condition -- so many children suffer in so many ways

[XanaDUer2]

10. And animals

the voiceless

[Diamond_Dog]

11. It just never leaves you when you see something like that.

[momta]

8. So sorry.

I've had similar incidents. It's hard not to regret a missed opportunity to help, but I think what you did was helpful.

I had a hairdresser tell me once that a kid was being fussy so the mom held the kid upside down and told the hairdresser to cut his hair while she held him. The hairdresser refused. That pleased me.

[Demobrat]

9. Abortion on demand.

Some people should not have kids, and probably wouldn’t if they really had a choice. This is what happens when people are forced to have kids they don’t want and can’t take care of.

They blame the kids and the kids pay the price. I know. I’m one of those kids.

[Duppers]

17. Same here....

My father was abusive. My mother should've left or have stood up to him more. But being so religious she couldn't have faced the social stigma of being divorced. That caused a great deal of resentment in me all my life. She was the "what would the neighbors think" kind of person.

[Demobrat]

22. My father did us all a favor and left

my mother with four kids to raise alone. I’m the oldest.

When I was 14 my mother told me that if she had known when she was younger what she knew then about birth control I would not have been born.

I didn’t blame her. I totally got it. Still do.

[wnylib]

12. I had just left a downtown post office

when I saw a woman pushing a stroller down the street, with a baby in it and a toddler walking next to it.

For no reason that I could see, the woman suddenly stretched out her arm and smacked the toddler twice on the side of the head. The woman didn't say anything or even turn to face the child. Just whacked it as they were walking. Had the child said something too low for me to hear? Done something just before I came out of the post office?

Doesn't matter. You don't treat a toddler like that. I debated what to do. They were strangers so I didn't have names to report it, and CPS deals with more severe abuse. Probably wouldn't do anything even if I could report it.

So I walked up to her and said, "I saw that. It was uncalled for. Straighten yourself out before you do something worse." She swore at me and said to shut up.

I'll never know if she gave it more thought later. For those kids' sake, I hope so.

[2Gingersnaps]

13. SIGH

And this, folks, is why this country is awash in untreated mental health. Freedom and rights are one thing, but with privilege comes responsibility. Just at what point in time did the more privilege you had the less responsibility was required?

[XanaDUer2]

15. stigmatized, untreated mental illness

stressed out parents. Glad Biden got the money going to kids and families now. Understaffed, burned-out social services workers.

So much pain.

[PatrickforB]

16. There is a lot to be said for just being nice to your wife and kids. Grandkids now! :)

Life is so very short. It is horrible to waste it going around being angry or abusive, and the fact the man was angry too is a big red flag. Somebody has to be the adult, and it needs to be BOTH parents.

Sometimes I think that by the time we get good at life, we're on our deathbeds. What is that old saying? Youth is wasted on the young?

[Lonestarblue]

18. We are a country awash in anger.

Anger that is stoked every day by right-wing media that tells people someone is taking advantage of them or cheating them or dealing unfairly with them or causing them not to be successful or have that job they want. And that anger rarely stays inside. It finds an outlet, and children are the most defenseless recipients of that anger. That we have people in the media deliberately stoking that anger is unforgivable.

[Warpy]

19. A man engaged in a poiwer struggle with a crying child would have turned on you

in a second. About all you could have done is call the cops and they wouldn't have gotten there in time.

Since the mom was calm and observant and not losing it also, perhaps she's coming to the conclusion you'd like to have suggested.

[IcyPeas]

20. saw an awful thing in Target once...

a grown man... maybe 6.5' whacked a little girl on the butt twice... hard. She looked to be 2ish. He was in line. We were all watching. I wanted to cry. None of us did or said anything.

this was maybe 7 years ago. I can't get it out of my head.

[Grasswire2]

21. I wonder what the man would have done if I had simply gotten out my phone..

...as if to film this.

[XanaDUer2]

23. He might have stopped

he might have stalked over and slapped it outta your hands, or hit you. You'll never know. His wife may have told you to mind your own business.