Not everyone has a way with kids—or even tries to when faced with youngsters in public.

In this woman’s case, that became clear when she refused to play along with a neighbor’s method for calming down her kid when he was crying.

Her flatmate thinks she could have handled the situation better.

Was she in the wrong?

Let’s analyze the situation.

AITA for not playing along with my neighbor to help her calm down her child?

So I get into my building and I’m waiting the elevator when I see a woman and her child – a boy no older than 5 – coming down the hallway.

She was carrying some bags and managing the kid, so I – trying to be nice – asked them what floor they were going to and pushed the button for her.

Sounds nice! Who knew it would make both of them mad?

And then all hell broke loose.

The boy immediately fell to his knees and started to scream and cry because he was the one who wanted to push the button to their floor.

I was thinking to myself: “Why did his mother tell me their floor if she knew that’s his thing?”

It was obvious I was asking for this purpose and not a mere curiosity.

And there I was in this tiny elevator watching it all unfold.

Surely the mom would deal with it and she would be off the hook, right?

The mother tried to calm him down all like: “Don’t cry little one, the lady was just trying to be nice”.

I don’t have kids, and I’m not one to judge parents for how they deal with their children’s silly tantrums in front of strangers, but I also don’t entertain this if I get myself involved somehow.

And then the mother said: “Look, she’s sorry she pushed the button, aren’t you sorry?” – and she looked at me like waiting I’d apologize to the child.

I said: “No, I’m not, keep me out of this.”

She was just being honest, but the mom didn’t approve.

And then she forgets the crying boy and her priority was to come at me all like “what’s wrong with you, can’t you see he’s a child?”.

And then we argued back and forth until I got to my floor and left the elevator.

My flatmate thinks I came off as if I was reprimanding the mother when I refused to play along and that’s an ******* behavior.

I don’t know what to think.

AITA?

I think she needs to teach her son the valuable skill of emotional regulation.

Let’s see what Reddit has to say.

A reader shares their thoughts.

This person is amused.

A commenter shares their experience.

Another reader shares their opinion.

Someone sounds baffled.

Another commenter chimes in.

Both the mom and the child learned a valuable lesson.

And maybe the poster, too.

If you liked this post, you might want to read this story about a teacher who taught the school’s administration a lesson after they made a sick kid take a final exam.