Being a mom is not easy. Constantly making sure your little one is getting the right amount of attention while doing a bunch of other errands along the way has to be really tiring. Above all, young kids go through stages while growing up and they are all likely to turn into “mean little” humans that “enjoy” throwing tantrums and getting things their way no matter what it takes. Hopefully, this doesn’t last long. The thing is that no matter how hard you try, sometimes it’s impossible to cope with your naughty child’s behavior.
It’s even more devastating when the tiny humans decide to misbehave in public. Most of the time parents feel embarrassed and are secretly judged by the passersby who believe they sort of failed at parenting.
A mom who was traveling from Portland to L.A with her 18-month-old boy while pregnant with her other child knows this all too well. Fellow passenger Beth Dunnington recalls what happened when the boy experienced a meltdown while waiting to board the plane. This time, however, no one regarded this mom a “bad” parent. On the contrary, strangers stepped in and made sure the little one was all good.
“A toddler who looked to be eighteen or so months old was having a total meltdown, running between the seats, kicking and screaming, then lying on the ground, [and] refusing to board the plane,” Dunnington wrote on Facebook.
Dunnington wrote how the young mom was all puzzled and had no idea what to do as her boy took the terminal for his personal playground.
“She couldn’t pick him up because he was so upset, he kept running away from her, then lying down on the ground, kicking and screaming again,” she wrote.
“The mother finally sat down on the floor and put her head in her hands, with her kid next to her still having a meltdown, and started crying.”
And as both the boy and his mother were sobbing, things took a different turn.
“… (I’m crying just writing this) … the women in the terminal, there must have been six or seven of us, not women who knew each other, approached and surrounded her and the little boy and we knelt down and formed a circle around them,” she wrote.
The strangers knew they had to help the struggling mom calm her child down so they approached and did their best to entertain the boy. Dunnington herself sang to him “The Itsy Bitsy Spider,” while another one peeled him an orange. As for the rest, one of them gave the boy a toy she took out of her bag, and the other one gave the mommy some water. They all did what they knew best.
“It was so gorgeous, there was no discussion and no one knew anyone else, but we were able to calm them both down, and she got her child on the plane,” she wrote. “Only women approached.”
They all boarded the plane eventually and took their seats without discussing what had happened. Well, it seems that it really takes a village to raise a child.
“We were strangers, gathering to solve something. It occurred to me that a circle of women, with a mission, can save the world,” she wrote. “I will never forget that moment.”