You Can't Take Down Other People's Kids

Took the girls to an indoor bounce house place at the local mall today after school. This place consists of about 10 bounce houses set up with chairs and tables arranged between them, allowing me to sit on my butt while the kids get a good workout.

Now, lest you think I should be in there bouncing with them, a recent incident at some other place prompted our bounce house place to outlaw adults in the houses. Hallelujah and amen. No more guilt for parking myself in a centrally located chair and catching up on my reading. In case you think I'm an irresponsible parent whose child shall be stolen, they have a security checkpoint at the only entrance and exit, so back up off me. And I DO look up every so often and think "Yeah, they're probably still around somewhere, because who would willingly leave this wonderland without a fight?".

Today, the girls discovered some balls strewn throughout the place that can be used in the "sports" bounce house. They were attempting to make baskets in a hoop outside the thing, with often hilarious results. They ran off with the balls and I lost track of them for a bit. Suddenly, Boodle comes running by saying pretty testily "stop it, I said stop it, I don't like that!" Assuming it's her sister hounding her, I look up to see a random girl, probably five or six, chasing my eldest and grabbing and pulling her arms to get at the ball.

I usually assume my kid's in the wrong in these situations, because face it, it wouldn't be the first time she's swiped a ball and been a stink about it. However, there's a certain tone that she uses that I recognize as "Hey, I'm seriously being wronged here, so help a girl out." I tried to use just words to deal with them, but this girl, who was about a head shorter than Boodle, was ALL OVER HER, grabbing her shirt, her arms and anything she could to get at the ball. I then tried to get her attention, using my always effective Stern Mommy Voice, to no avail. Mind you, she was not crying, was not hysterical, was not claiming an injustice. She was just determined to get that ball. I finally tried to just get an arm in between them, and she would not give it up, was pulling on me and not listening to a WORD I was saying. I was simply trying to get her to stop so we could work it out, but it was useless-she just was out of control. I couldn't even manage to get the ball away from them both and try to get them to share.

About this time, I realized that I was either going to body slam her to get her the hell AWAY from my kid, or I was going to do the unpopular thing and just give her the damn ball. Being a reasonably sane person, I finally got the ball from Boodle and gave it to the hellion and she ran off.

During the fracas, one of the workers who normally patrols the area was trying to tell the girls to share, also to no avail. When it was over, I turned to my daughter and said something to the effect that I knew she had the ball, but that the other girl was not behaving right, not listening, and was out of control, so she should just go play in another area for now and let it go. The worker then realized that I wasn't trying to mediate between my own kids, and that this girl was not mine. She and I wondered where the parent was (probably somewhere with her nose in a book, ahem). We rolled our eyes a little and the worker took Boodle off to find another ball.

Hoo-eee, was I mad. How do I deal with this situation and not come off the schmuck? If I step in any further with this girl, I will probably end up in trouble for actually making physical contact, even if it's just to separate her from my daughter. If I take the ball away and give it to the girl, my daughter suffers a big, fat injustice at the hands of her mother.


When Boodle came back by with a new ball, I stopped her, hugged her and tried to explain why I did what I did, and that I couldn't do anything more to someone else's kid who is acting out of control. I told her I was proud of her for not throwing a fit, as she would have done if it was, say, her sister acting like a maniac. However, she seemed to realize that this behavior was way over the line, and that we needed to take it in stride this once. Good for her.

Knowing that I did what I could without causing more drama doesn't lessen the feeling I have that I've done Boodle a disservice in not teaching her how to defend herself physically. There will come a day when some ass kid will push and push, and I want her to know when it's okay to push back.

I feel the need to enroll Boodle in karate, if only to give her the tools to defend herself in the future. If she ever came home to report that she'd been in a school yard fight, and got in trouble for defending herself or someone else, believe me, she'd get an extra scoop of ice cream that night. I got no truck with my kid standing up for herself or others in the face of a bully who just won't quit.

Whoa, do I know how to blow a small incident into monumental proportions or what?