Why is it that the worst parents are the ones who get the most offended when they get called out on it?

What would you do if you were working in a pet store when a parent came in and let her kids run wild, terrorizing the animals?

That is what happened to the worker in this story, so when she yelled at the kids, the mother got upset about it, so she told them to buy what they need or leave.

I think she handled it really well. Read through the full story and see what you think about how she handled it.

My parenting style is none of your business!

It was about 30 minutes before closing and it had been a way-too-long-8.5-hour-shift of dealing with the most blatant ignorance and stupidity humanity has to offer.

They had one of those days.

I was tired, I was hungry and I was in serious need of a shower. I just wanted to go home and crash for the rest of the evening. Then…they walked in the store.

It was a younger, maybe late-20’s lady and her 3 kids, 2 girls about 10 and 8, and a boy of maybe 4.

Kids love animals.

As soon as the front door opened, I hear screaming kids, and I think “oy vey, here we go”.

No sooner had they set foot in the store than all 3 kids made a mad dash for the animal room.

Parents really need to keep an eye on their kids in the store.

My area. Their mother had waved them off so she could do her shopping without having to deal with the stress of being a parent. I mean, retail workers are paid to babysit, aren’t they?

I’m on high alert now, because children are supposed to be with their parents at all times while in the store.

There is no excuse for letting your kids run wild.

We have signs posted all over the place saying this (not that it ever makes much of a difference) and these kids are going to be more than a handful.

They immediately start screaming at each other and are banging on pretty much every pane of glass in the room.

These kids sound awful.

I’m not talking tapping the fish tanks, I mean flat-palmed full-windup banging on the glass. Think Dora from Finding Nemo. Now multiply that times 3.

Now give each of them the voice of an angry Howler Monkey. Yeah, that is these 3 kids.

This is not her job, but nobody else will do it.

So, I’m chasing these kids around trying to alleviate the hurricane that followed in their wake.

Exasperated cries of “don’t hit the tanks please!” “don’t put your fingers in the bird cage!” “stop yelling at the rabbits!” echoed from the animal room.

She put her foot down.

Mom is all but invisible while all this is happening, apparently trying to decide if Fido needs a chicken or a pork-based food. Seriously, I feel sorry for that dog.

Finally, I gave up trying to herd all of them and yelled “You all need to stay with your mother while you’re in this store!”.

This isn’t the end of the story.

The oldest girl looked at me with a smirk and said “Well, she said we could come look at the animals”. I replied with “I don’t care what she told you, the rule is that you need to stay with her while you are in this store”.

They finally wandered off to cause chaos elsewhere and I breathed a sigh of relief. At least they were out of my department. Problem solved.

Heh. Yeah, right.

And, they are back.

Well, the kids found their mother, who promptly told them to go away because she didn’t want to deal with them right now.

I’m picking up the disaster area they left behind them when suddenly the screaming picks up again. I glance over to the cat area, and what I see makes the rage boil up inside of me.

What kind of parent allows this type of thing?

The two girls have pulled a cat scratching post off of the shelves and are playing ring-around-the-rosy with it.

You know the kind that have a square carpeted base and a tall post in the middle? Yeah, that kind. They are twirling around this post as fast as they can, yelling and screaming incomprehensible screeches at each other.

She has to deal with it once again.

The youngest boy had swept half a shelf of small animal products off of a bottom shelf and was jumping off of the shelf repeatedly.

I sighed audibly and I and another coworker ran over to the aisle they were currently destroying.

She has had enough.

I was done dealing with them. I get paid to help customers and maintain the animal cages, not to babysit a flock of little kids.

I’m yelling at this point. “HEY! Put those back on the shelf! Go stay with your mother! I’m not going to tell you again!”

Mom is not going to be happy.

Just then, the genetic origin of the pestiferous crayon gobblers materialized behind me, deciding now was a good time to check up on her kids.

Mom: “Why are you yelling at my kids?!?”

Me: “They need to stay with you while in the store, and they have…”

She is not putting up with it anymore.

Mom: interrupting “MY PARENTING STYLE IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!”

That’s it, I’m done. I’ve tried to be nice, but I’ve had it. “Nice Retail Employee Mode” off. “I Don’t Care About You Or Your Money Anymore Mode” activated.

Now that is how you deal with a customer like this.

Me: “Your parenting style BECOMES my business when your kids are terrorizing the animals and damaging store property.

We are not your babysitters, so do your job as a parent and control your kids before they break something or hurt themselves. Now buy your stuff and get out before I call the police to escort you off of store property.”

Hopefully, she will never come back.

She stared at me for what seemed like an hour before grabbing the youngest by the arm and huffily storming out of the store.

I could hear whiny cries of “but I want to see the animals again!” trailing off into the distance. I just stood there and shook my head.

Why am I not surprised?

And here’s the kicker: she had parked her minivan in a handicap spot without a handicap license. Don’t you just love people?

The worst parents are always the ones who get upset when people call them out for it.

Read on to see what the people in the comments have to say about this awful story.

You can’t let people like this get away with it.

It isn’t a parenting style if you’re not parenting at all.

The kids deserved to get bitten, though.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post this story about a woman who reports her manager after they had zero compassion for a family tragedy.

Of course, not all kids are naughty.

She did the right thing by stepping in to protect the animals. It should be the parent doing this, but if they won’t do it, someone has to.

In my opinion, she handled the whole thing very well. It must have been uncomfortable, though.

The post Her Kids Were Causing Chaos In The Store—But The Customer Said Her Parenting Wasn’t The Employee’s Concern appeared first on TwistedSifter.