As a kid, getting to dress up, stay up past your bedtime, and trick-or-treat for candy is one of the most exciting nights of the year. But at least one kid may be missing out on the fun this year, after his mom discovered he secretly cut up his sister's costume, just days before Halloween. As punishment, she told the 8-year-old that he wouldn't be allowed to trick-or-treat with his sisters, but now she's worried that she went too far, and is asking the good people of Reddit to weigh in.
The drama started recently, when the anonymous mom heard her 7-year-old "crying bloody murder" and went to investigate.
"I went upstairs to her bedroom [and] I see my son with scissors and my daughter's costume that we made together as a project was all cut up to pieces," she recalled. (That's right — she made the costume by hand, and now it was all in tatters.)
When she questioned her son, he told his mother that the costume was “ugly" and that he "didn’t like it.”
"I told him that was the meanest thing he’s done, and that he’s grounded and can’t go trick or treating," she continued. "He completely freaked out, had a tantrum, kicked and screamed and we just put a pillow under his head until he stopped and got our other kids ready for school."
But the drama didn't end there. Apparently, her son wanted a second opinion, so he called in the cavalry (aka Grandma).
He told his grandmother all about the punishment, which ultimately came back to bite the mom in the butt.
You see, the poster says her son has autism, which might explain some of his behavior, but not all. She says he is high-functioning and typically well-behaved, but recently, some of his outbursts have been kind of mean, and she's doing her best to teach him a lesson when he's gone too far.
"[My mother] called me yelling about how could I do that to our child and he has autism and he didn’t know what he was doing," the poster explained. And that gave her pause.
"My husband thinks maybe we also over reacted and we should let him earn the chance to go trick-or-treating, but he completely destroyed his sister's costume and that’s not something we can brush off," she added.
Lots of people on Reddit loved that the mom was putting her foot down to teach her son right from wrong.
One commenter who has high-functioning autism said that "regardless of the autism factor, [your son] knows what he did and he deserves that punishment."
"Autistic children are like any other children," said another person. "They will test boundaries to see what they can and can’t get away with and if they never face consequences for their actions they will turn into monsters."
Therefore, it shouldn't matter if he is on the spectrum or not — instilling good behavior early is important for every child.
"If you let him off the hook, after he called his grandmother, you've taught him how to play you," a third commenter warned.
Others were unimpressed.
"Do you really think he is being mean just for the sake of being mean?" one person asked. "Doubt it. Boys act up because they want attention, positive or negative. Your son likely has a problem beyond being autistic. This problem is manifesting in his treatment of his sisters. I think there are better ways to address this."
"Your punishment does nothing to resolve future issues," a second person said, adding, "you aren't giving your kid the attention he deserves, and now he's going to treat his sisters even worse because his parents like his sisters and treat them nice but don't like him and treat him poorly. I feel like a more natural consequence would be that he would have to make another costume for her before he can go trick or treating."
"He is the [expletive] but Halloween is once a year and very special to a kid, even though what he did was very bad," another person said. "I think the punishment of no trick-or-treating is worse then him ripping up the costume."
"Maybe you could do something like make him work with you to make a new one for her, and give him another punishment like just being grounded or something?" the commenter continued. "I know if I was a kid and I missed halloween I would be really sad since I would have to wait 365 days til the next one, and it was one of my favorite days. Kids are also really impulsive so it's really easy for them to make bad decisions."
After considering the many comments left by redditors, the mom wrote that she and her husband decided to hold strong.
"My husband and I have decided he will not be trick-or-treating," she updated. "He has shown no remorse throughout the day."
She added that they plan to discuss the whole matter with their son's therapist, but reiterated that "this malicious behavior is not going to be tolerated," and that she didn't want to "coddle" her son before teaching him ethics.
At the end of the day, she thanked everyone for their responses, but stuck to her guns — here's hoping it works out for her.
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