[black-roses]

Me and my family went to ARC for Alana's netball and Alana started acting out and she was not cooperating and throwing cones at the other kids and so the teacher told her to leave. As she wasn't following the rules dad comes to get her and Alana didn't want to leave my sister tries to reassure her make it a game of who could run the fastest to the door. So Alana has my dad's hand and she makes herself limp so dad is just dragging her along the floor in front of what could of been like maybe 20 people including adults and kids. I noticed this lady looking over at my dad all suspicious and I feel uncomfortable because I don't like my dad dragging Alana on the floor and she looked uncomfortable so my sister tries to grab Alana but dad is like you can't baby her she has to learn for herself and then just forcefully drags her. It was a bit triggering for me to be honest the way he was handling her. So now we got out of the centre but then Alana is still kicking up a fuss and starts hitting my dad, dad gives her a little slap. I'm still uncomfortable as it's very triggering especially since of my childhood a lot of memories like that just float. I notice a dad with maybe an 8 year old daughter and the daughter seems concerned she's like oh dad look. The dad seems to be like just you know just going home with their daughter it's not there business etc. It just felt so uncomfortable and like I know Alana is like very active kid she's always doing things can be very uncooperative but I felt like how my dad was doing it well it was just uncomfortable and just made me feel a lot of emotions towards my own childhood. I was very disappointed with dad to be honest but also like just disappointed really as well that sometimes Alana can make a lot of fuss and misbehave with kids. I did what any auntie would do I told her not to do to the kids it's naughty. I even yelled don't do that Alana it's not nice.

[CANDC]

@0black-roses I am sorry this is so triggering for you. I get caught between wishing adults would learn to talk to children and children would not fight the efforts of adults to teach them what is proper conduct.

This also reminds me of my own childhood where strong handed methods were used if we got out of line. Adults expressing anger and punishing does not usually have the intended result.

Thanks for sharing this experience. I can relate to this in my own life. @CANDC

[Tart Cherry Jam]

You are justified to feel the way you feel regarding your dad's treatment of his granddaughter. You cannot change his ways which is unfortunately but you can avoid yelling at your niece and telling her that misbehaving with kids is naughty. Instead, you can try working with her empathic side, inviting her to look at her behavior from the point of the kids who are on the receiving end of it.

[Discombobulated]

I can understand why you felt triggered, it bringing back memories of your own childhood perhaps, did your dad act this way with you?

It can be really difficult when children won’t comply and you’re in public and trying to get them to behave but slapping isn’t going to help her, she’ll just learn it’s okay to slap to get your own way imo.

I agree with Tartcherry, when Alana is calm it’s a good idea to talk to her about appropriate behaviour and how her behaviour might upset other children. I hope that can happen. Children don’t instinctively understand codes of behaviour or see situations how we as adults do.