Anyone who’s been a nanny knows, not all kids are angels.

Imagine being a nanny for seven children, and one of them throws extreme tantrums if he doesn’t get his way. What would you do if the child’s mom didn’t allow you to punish him in any sort of way?

In this story, one child is particularly devilish, but the nanny has to get creative for the parents to understand the problem.

Let’s read the details…

Don’t let your kid have consequences? Ok!!

So I’m a 23F nanny. For the family I work for there are 7 kids.

Yes 7.

All ranging from 14 years old to 10 months old.

I have been working for them for 8 months. And never really had an issue. They are a good family for the most part.

What about for the other part?

A key part here is the kids are all homeschooled so they do not get out a lot. Unfortunately that leads to mom and dad spoiling them quite a lot. And since I’ve started had a bit of a discipline issue.

They throw tantrums, throw things and scream a lot.

Finally mom recently put on discipline because their tantrums led to me getting and injury.

I was pushed down the stairs.

OK that’s some horror movie hijinx. What else happens?

So she implemented a timeout routine. And it was going well for almost everyone. Here is where the story truly begins.

The second to youngest it 2 and a half almost 3. His tantrums are some of the worst and instead of really discipling him she coddles. If he screams and yells she just picks him up and gives him whatever he wants.

He will also throw things and hit whoever is telling him no. And mom doesn’t do anything.

On Wednesday this week mom had an appointment and when he woke up from his nap and she wasn’t there he freaked out.

I tried to calm by playing games, food, or reading books. But nothing worked he just got louder and more aggressive. He even hit me and his siblings.

Cool cool cool. Somebody’s gotta stop this little monster, right?

Eventually he woke the baby and when I got her tried to even hurt her. So with no other real options working to calm him down, I pick him up sit him on his bed and said timeout you do not behave this way. When you calm down you can come out.

He finally is calming down after several minutes and mom comes home.

She was quite upset that he got a timeout because she says that he is too young and doesn’t know better.

Now I understand he is young but I’ve been a nanny for awhile and I have learned 2-3 is normal age for discipline so they learn to know better.

I’d say so. But what does mom say?

I only do a minute per year age and only goes longer if they can’t calm down though I check in every minute.

She was also upset I used his room as a timeout.

Now that part I get and can understand that at this age associating timeout with where he sleeps. I can agree we don’t do that.

But I had to ask when he’s acting like this what do you want me to do?

She said let me handle it.

Um, OK but what if she’s not there?

If I’m not there give him what he wants hits not worth the fight.

Ok…..but what if it’s something I can’t give.

She replied, “If you can’t, just let him go through it he’ll calm down quickly.”

I looked at her like are you serious? You do realize how he can be right? But ok.

Cue malicious compliance.

Can’t wait.

The next day mom had another appointment and she was gone when he woke up. And of course he wanted her and only her.

I said sorry she’s not here why don’t we play a game.

He screams no.

I ask if he wants a snack?

No he screams and starts slapping at my hands.

I ask to go read a book or go to his siblings room for play time.

He screams again and hit me in the face.

I told him please don’t hit me.

So he screams in my face and goes off throwing things at me and everyone around and just goes off.

It only takes one of seven to make a scene. How’s OP gonna handle this?

I tell everyone to go to their rooms. I tried everything to calm him down and it didn’t work so I did exactly what she told me.

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!

He continues his tirade throwing things, pulling things off shelves, and screaming.

I obviously kept him from things that would hurt him like glass, ceramics and when he got on a table to push something I picked him up and put him down.

Though he did bite me really hard when I did that. Not enough to bleed but enough to leave a good mark.

I let this go for about oooh 15 ish minutes until mom came home.

And when she did he was still freaking out.

So… he didn’t just stop on his own?

She just goes what is going on.

I explained the situation and told her I’m just doing what she said and letting him cry it out till he calms down.

She said that’s not what I meant!

I asked what did you want?

She didn’t really have an answer.

I told her I couldn’t use discipline and I couldn’t calm him you said to let him go, he’d calm down, and he hasn’t yet.

Like the Energizer Bunny of tantrums.

I made sure anything dangerous was taken away but I didn’t know what else I could do.

Now, I could have picked up what he threw around, but I wanted her to see what he was capable of. And I wasn’t going to risk getting hurt again from taking things away.

She looked upset but didn’t say anything and just looked at him still throwing his tantrum.

The baby wakes up and she goes to get her.

When she comes back to try and calm him he screams to pick him up and he hits her and keeps going till she puts the crying baby on the ground and picks him up.

Mom’s not setting a great precedent but will OP add injury to insult?

I was kinda shocked she fed into it.

I told her he’s old enough to know what he’s doing. He knows that he’ll get what he wants when he does these things and it’s only going to get worse. And if it’s going to continue I’m going to continue to do nothing because I won’t risk getting hurt or the other kids in the process.

I showed her my bite mark and she went pale a bit and said, “He did that?”

Yep there it is. Truth hurts.

I said, “Yes he did.”

She took a breath and said why don’t you go home for the day and I’ll talk to dad about this.

When I came to work this morning there was a timeout chair for him. And I’m allowed to use it at my discretion.

Ouch. This sounds like a problem, child.

Let’s see what the comments on Reddit say.

This person says, uhhhh quit?

Someone else says, sometimes you gotta take a beating to make a point.

Another person is like… what would you call a *bad* family???

Somebody else says, show me the money.

Another poster echoes the quitting sentiment.

This kid’s bite was worse than his bark.

If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.