An Encounter at the Skating Rink: Did I Handle My Child’s Public Behavior Correctly?
Saturday morning public skate smells like burnt hot cocoa and worn rubber, the kind of smell that sticks to your coat for the rest of the weekend. My 7-year-old Leo got new adjustable skates for his birthday, and he’d begged me for three straight days to take him. For the first 20 minutes, he clung to the dasher board like it was a life raft, inching along with his knees locked. I leaned against the opposite wall sipping lukewarm coffee from a paper cup, giving him space to work up the courage to let go. When he finally did, I grinned so wide my cheeks hurt—until he wobbled, caught an edge, and slammed straight into a little girl about half his size, knocking her right onto her bottom.
I started walking over, already mentally rehearsing what to say, when the girl’s mom skidded over first. She stopped in front of Leo, hands on her hips, and said loud enough for a few people nearby to glance over: “You need to say you’re sorry. That was rude to knock her over like that.”
Leo froze. That’s what he does when he gets overwhelmed—his brain locks up, his mouth won’t work, and he retreats. He stepped back, tripped over his own skates, caught himself on my arm, and hid his face in my jacket. I patted his back, then leaned down to check on the little girl, who was already pushing herself up and brushing ice off her leggings. “Are you okay?” I asked. She nodded, already looking past us at her friend waiting by the entrance. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
Her mom didn’t drop it. “He needs to apologize,” she said, looking directly at me. “If you don’t make him take responsibility now, he’ll never learn.”
I stood there for a beat, my hand still on Leo’s head. I knew what I was supposed to do, right? Nudge him out, make him say the words, prove I’m not raising a rude kid. But I also knew what that would do to Leo—he’d end up sobbing in the bathroom, and he wouldn’t remember anything about the accident except how scared he was of the angry stranger. So I said, “He didn’t do it on purpose, he’s still learning to skate. He’s overwhelmed right now, we’ll talk about it when he’s calm.”
She huffed, shook her head, and skated off with her daughter, calling over her shoulder that it was a shame some parents don’t teach their kids manners.
Leo and I sat on the bleachers for 15 minutes after that. He didn’t cry, just sat there peeling the wrapper off a lollipop I keep in my bag for overwhelmed moments, until he finally mumbled, “My brain got stuck. I wanted to say it, but my mouth wouldn’t move.” I told him I got it, that I’d been there too—there’s some moments where the words just won’t come, no matter how much you want them.
All the way home, I replayed the scene in my head. Did I handle this properly? Did I let him off the hook when he should have learned a lesson? Did I prioritize his anxiety over teaching him accountability, just because a stranger made me feel awkward?
I’ve been working with Leo’s school social worker on his social anxiety for a year now, and a lot of what she’s told me clicked into place after that day. The biggest thing she’s repeated is that forcing an apology out of a dysregulated kid doesn’t teach accountability—it teaches them that their job is to perform good behavior for adults, even when they can’t handle it. That doesn’t mean we ignore the mistake, though. After that day, I worked out three small, concrete things I do now when something like this happens, that I didn’t do that day at the rink.
First, I step in and acknowledge the other person right away, even if my kid can’t. That day, I focused only on Leo and left the other mom feeling unheard, which is why she got so upset. Now, if it happens again, I use a clear, specific phrase out loud for everyone: “I’m so sorry he knocked you over, that was an accident, he’s just getting used to skates and got flustered. We’re really glad you’re okay.” That takes the pressure off my kid, it gives the other person the respect they deserve, and it models what accountability looks like without anyone having to panic.
Second, I never force the words when my kid is frozen. Instead, we talk about it later, when their brain is calm enough to process what happened. After the rink, we sat in the parking lot eating fries, and I said to Leo, “I know your brain got stuck, and that’s okay. Next time this happens, you don’t have to say the full apology if you can’t. You can just wave, or nod, to let the other person know you care. Does that sound doable?” He thought about it for a minute, then said he could do that. That’s a concrete middle ground between forcing a performance and letting the mistake slide.
Third, I’ve stopped caring as much what the stranger in the skating rink thinks. It’s easy to default to what other people expect, because public awkwardness feels like a reflection on us as parents. But my job isn’t to get an apology out of my kid to make a stranger happy. It’s to teach him that when you mess up, you make it right, and that he can do that in a way that works for his brain.
Last weekend, we went back to the rink. Leo bumped another kid on the ice, and he froze again. I said my line, apologized for him, and he gave the other kid a little wave. The other kid’s mom smiled and said it was just an accident, and that was that. It wasn’t the perfect interaction people see in parenting reels. Leo didn’t say the magic words. But the other kid was fine, Leo didn’t have a meltdown, and we got to go home and eat ice cream after. I still second-guess myself sometimes, still wonder if I’m cutting him too much slack. But for right now, this works.
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