AITA for telling a parent to control her 8 year old?

A Redditor shares a tense encounter at Walmart where their medical alert service dog was distracted by an 8-year-old, leading to a fainting episode. Despite repeatedly telling the child to stop, the situation escalated when the parent arrived, dismissing the Redditor’s concerns and calling them an “ahole” for reacting strongly.

Now, the poster wonders if they were too harsh or justified in demanding the parent teach her child proper behavior around service animals. Read the full story below to weigh in.

‘ AITA for telling a parent to control her 8 year old?’

I 17 m went to the store with my grandparents for a day out of the house, and I have a medical alert service dog I bring almost everywhere with me in case of medical emergencies, I had went to the hygiene part of Walmart and my grandparents were on the food part of the store.

I was looking at soap and other things my dog was laying in front of my legs on a traffic leash in case of fainting episodes I have, I had my back turned and this 8 or 9 year old child yells mommy a puppy and runs up to me and tried to touch my dog and I told her no and she kept doing it and I kept telling her to stop it and that’s not how you should ask and I told you no I mean it.

And about 3 minutes later my legs gave out and my dog didn’t alert on time because of this kid touching him and I’m pretty sure I passed out because I was laying on the floor with my dog licking my face I have bruises on my legs from it and the kids mom showed up and I told her to control her child and teach her not to pet random dogs she doesn’t know because it’s a good way to get attacked by a dog.

And she called me a ahole and said I was overreacting when her daughter distracted a service dog and I told her it was illegal in the state and that it was a class c misdemeanor then she walked away. so aita for telling a mother to control her kid?

Here’s what the community had to contribute:

Agitated-Response338 −  NTA. You were just trying to protect your dog and your health, and the mom should’ve handled her kid better.

faxefff −  NTA. Your physical health being negatively affected justifies you telling off the mom. it is also never a smart idea to pet random dogs as not all dogs (regardless of if they’re trained or not, allow strangers to pet them). 100% on the mom.

Aggressive_Cattle320 −  NTA. If your dog is like most others, they wear a harness or vest that alerts people that it’s a service dog and warns against petting or interfering. The dog is doing a very important job for their human.

The mother should have been watching what her child was doing, and it would have been a good opportunity to teach her daughter the respect we need to give to working service dogs. Keeping their focus is vital to their job. he mother was disrespectful and rude, and you had every right to be upset. While children may not always understand the situation, parents do. It’s their job to make sure that kids understand the rules and mind their manners.

I’m a dog lover, too, and I have so much admiration for the intelligence and skills of these amazing dogs, but I never do more than feel my heart smile in just viewing them hard at work. Hope you are feeling better and sorry you had to experience that unnecessary drama.

Fickle_Toe1724 −  NTA. Next time, call out for a store employee. You want an incident report, and the police called You want the mother’s name and address, and the child’s, because YOU were injured because your dog was distracted by a child attacking him.

The mother and child should face the consequences of their behavior. For some parents, that is what it takes for them to take responsibility for their own inactions on teaching their kids..  Stay safe.

NothingToSEEHere_32 −  NTA. She could at least apologize. 8 years old is old enough to understand no means no…

WillLoveCoffee4Ever1 −  NTA! It’s a service dog and you have a medical condition. You should have called the police, because you could have seriously injured yourself when you fainted. Sorry, don’t care if she has a kid who thinks dogs are cute. She should be telling her daughter no. People like this shouldn’t get away with this sort of behavior, where they think their child and they, are entitled to do as they wish. The mother was being ignorant.

Plus_Duty479 −  NTA. Also, punctuation is a thing. I could barely read what you wrote. Use periods and commas dude.

emtittman −  NTA. Not at all. A good parent teaches their kid not to run up to random dogs. She obviously didn’t teach her kid that and you had to suffer the consequences. You handeled it a lot better than I would have.. Hope your bruises heal quick!

cascadia1979 −  NTA. Her neglectful parenting and inability to keep her child from going up to a random dog caused you actual harm. You had every right to call her out for her poor parenting choices in that moment. 

catwithafishtail −  YTA for posting another fake as f**k service dog story.