Dear Black Mommy, I didn't react like I thought I would when my toddler threw a public tantrum

Dear Black Mommy,

I was not prepared for the public toddler tantrums.

Or the moments when both my infant and toddler are crying—needing me, wanting me—and I’m just sitting on the floor, crying with them. You do what you can to calm them, but in your head, you’re screaming, shut up!

Or is that just me?

No? Just me? Okay, I’ll be the transparent one for us.

It’s OK. I will be the transparent one for us. I talk about surviving my first public toddler tantrum on TikTok. It happened at one of my favorite places. (Hint: I know we are supposed to be mad at this place, but my picky-eater daughter loves their toddler snack bars and we were out and needed to restock.)

When she started screaming, surprisingly, I didn’t tap into my ancestors and go full “Black mom mode.” I didn’t channel my mama. Or at least how I thought Black moms were supposed to react at this moment. You know the one—take-you-to-the-bathroom-spank-you-there-spank-you-again-when-we-get-home kind of mama. And let’s be clear—I definitely wouldn’t have gotten those snack bars afterward.

Or maybe she wouldn’t have even needed to spank me. Maybe it would’ve just been that look. You know the one—sharp enough to cut air, daring you to touch anything in the store before we walked in there.

Better yet, where are my millennial mamas? Who remembers the “Boondocks’’ episode when the kid throws a tantrum over a candy bar and the mom gives him that work in the middle of the store? “Have you tried beating his a**?” Grandpa asked.

Yeah, that was not me that day. Not at all.

Instead, I sank, and my first instinct was to push that shopping cart with her in it as fast as possible out of that store. As a matter of fact, I ended up speed walking as fast as I could to the front to cash out, giving her one bar just to shut her up and leaving.

But when I was in the aisle, what got me was the white woman who walked, pushed us, and shook her head in disgust. What made it worse is that we locked eyes, I looked away. And I swear I felt the disappointed sighs of every maternal ancestor in my bloodline because I didn’t clap back and yell, “What?! You’ve never seen a screaming kid before? Mind your business, Karen!”

The stereotype of an angry Black woman is one thing, but an angry Black mama? It’s exhausting not to be what they think you are. There’s pressure not to fit the angry stereotype, not to lose it—even when you’re losing it.

I left that store feeling like I’d taken an “L” in my motherhood journey. I didn’t think I handled the situation like I thought I should have. But the comments under my TikTok suggested the exact opposite and overwhelmingly supportive.

“It’s OK, mama, you did your best in the moment,” someone wrote. “Regulating emotions is hard. Just be patient with yourself and your toddler, even in those embarrassing moments.”

Another wrote, “Most of the folks at the stores understand that’s how toddlers are, and the ones who don’t, that’s on them.”

And another added, “Be gentle. There are no L’s. She is learning and so are you.”

My main takeaways from this experience: don’t be so hard on myself, and these kids don’t care; they will embarrass you no matter what. Finally, she’s a toddler! A little person trying to navigate her emotions, just like me.

We’re in this beautiful, messy motherhood journey together—one deep breath, one tantrum at a time.

xoxo,

This Dear Black Mommy