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21st December 2023
12:30pm GMT
The mum-of-one asked for the public’s opinion on her decision to assign chores to her two-year-old daughter.
She initially explained that her little one is at the age where she wants to do everything mum and dad are doing.
She loves helping out with their pets and is obsessed with their spin mop. So, the woman explained that every day they assist their daughter with a couple of chores.
When she wakes from her nap, she helps empty the cutlery from the dishwasher and mops the floor - and she loves it!
The little girl also feeds the family cats and they use their measuring cup to teach her about numbers when laying out the dry food.
All was going well, until her aunt arrived at the house with her mum to collect some jewellery. She witnessed her niece’s daughter in the middle of her chores and slammed it as “inappropriate and abusive”.
The mum explained in her post on Reddit: “My mom and aunt came over the other day to pick some jewellery up for my cousin's wedding.
“While they were here, my kid woke up from her nap and helped unload the dishwasher. My mom joked about how that was my first chore and that it was funny it's my kids first chore, too.
“My aunt then told my mom and I that it wasn't appropriate and abusive to give young children chores and that I'm using my kid to be lazy and get out of work. That kids should spend their childhoods playing and that they have plenty of time to learn life skills when they become adults.”
She went on to say: “I told my aunt she had no business speaking on my parenting” before adding that the aunt "left dramatically sobbing and I am now on day 3 of constant texts from family about what a piece of sh*t I am in forcing my kid to grow up too fast and I'm starting to question myself.”
Other parents on the Reddit forum jumped to defend and reassure the mum-of-one.
One wrote: “You're using your child's interest in helping out as a learning experience for her, with proper supervision. There's not a single thing wrong with what you're doing!”
Another added: “Teaching children how to tend a home is not child abuse! It's actually good parenting. How are kids meant to grow up to be capable adults if we don't teach them anything?”
Among the hundreds of responses was another mum who wrote: “Toddlers love to help and giving them age-appropriate chores is highly recommended by pretty much everybody but your aunt.”
