You see: Cute child helping with the shopping. They see: Kid blocking up the supermarket ailse with a rogue trolley. The world is a very different place on opposite sides of the parenting gulf.
Oh look, how helpful your adorable, sweet child is being. Pushing that big trolley all by themselves. “I’m helping mum.”
Don’t you have the cutest child? Only to you. And maybe to other parents of kids the same age.
However, to the adults without kids in the busy supermarket, your child is not cute. Or helpful. In fact, they are causing a trolley traffic jam while they take up the whole aisle “helping” you.
Parents know that letting their child push the trolley and fetch the teabags is preventing a meltdown. Non-parents don’t really care. They think children should be able to make it through the supermarket without a tantrum anyway. What are they? Wild animals?
With our tongue firmly in cheek, and in the interests of bridging the gap, here are some “what we see/what they see” takes on a few familiar small child situations.
CLICK THROUGH the gallery to see the two worlds looking at the same image:
Do you see children’s behaviour very differently now that you’re a parent?
Want more? Try this:
