What a lot of nerve!

My almost four-year-old, while totally cute and absolutely delicious most of the time, is VERY strong willed. Any time that things are not going his way, he starts completely freaking out, screaming, crying, etc. Moms, you know what I am talking about.

One day last week, we are out having lunch in a kid-friendly (of course) place. He starts freaking out because I tell him he can't sit next to me in the booth and he needs to stay where he is on the other side of the table. Every parent knows that the way to stop tantrums is to absolutely NEVER give in to them. So I begin to tell him he needs to calm down or we are going to have to leave, which only makes him cry louder and harder. I keep repeating, "You really need to calm down and stop crying." Eventually he does, and we have a fine lunch.......until:

The mom who was sitting at the booth that backed up to ours decides to tell me what a horrible mother I am! First, I want to point out that she had her back to us. During my son's tantrum, I could see her glancing over her shoulder at us. When she gets up to leave, we make eye contact. I give her the mom-solidarity smile, which she sort of returns. Then, she gets right in my face and says something along these lines:

"I have something that I really want you to consider. I live with a man whose spirit was broken as a child by his mother, and it is really hard. Don't break his spirit." I was sitting there speechless. Then she continued: "You need to work on your anger." And with that, she turned and left.

I suppose in her house the children get to do whatever they want, she doesn't care and no one ever raises their voices, but at my house IN THE REAL WORLD, things are different. I don't know, maybe she thought I beat him in the bathroom or something. I am still in shock that someone would be that bold AND so off base.

For the record, when I repeated this story to my family, my nine-year-old daughter was ready to go hunt this woman down and punch her for suggesting that I was a bad mom. "You are a great mom," she told me, which, of course, is really the only opinion that matters. But to that mom out there who just couldn't mind her own business: Thanks for your input, but you don't have any idea what kind of mom I am...my kids think I am pretty great!