5 year old boy pulls other boy's pants down

[2Boysandmom]

My 5 year old pulled this other boy's (age 3-1/2) pants down at daycare.  Which in itself is no big deal, but when the other boy bent over to pull his pants up, my son poked him in the butt with his finger.  My son has never done anything like that before, I've never had trouble with him in that department.  He knows not to touch and not to let others touch him.  When I found out, I gave my speech about all that again, told him that was gross and I never wanted to hear of such a thing again.  I pawned all of this off as kids being kids.  The two of them are buddies, so he wasn't trying to hurt the other boy or be mean to him; I really just figured he thought he was being "funny".  But the mother of the other boy called CPS and made a complaint about my son.  My feeling, and everyone else's that I've talked to said that this was just taking it too far.  This woman had to take the whole week off of work because she was so upset by the whole thing.  I remember when I was kid, it was normal to play doctor and all in all, be curious.  I am not justifying what my 5 year old did, but that's just it...he's 5.  #1 is this "normal" behavior of my son and #2 should this woman be so upset?  I'm really afraid she's causing more problems with her son by making such a production out of it.  Now we have to meet with CPS possibly and have a counselor talk with both the boys, etc.  My son has never been touched by anyone, nor has he seen this behavior.  It's not the cause of something terrible that has happened to him.  He just did it; he feels bad and is embarrassed and I'm quite certain will never do anything remotely close to that again.

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

Your son's behavior does not fall into the category of alarming. Five-year-olds can be prone to such mischief. The parent of the other child is entitled to whatever reaction she wishes about the behavior; that is out of your hands. I'm going to assume that, once the facts are known, this will all blow over. Just cooperate with the process and help bring it to a conclusion as soon as possible.

[MrsVain]

maybe i am just old fashioned or something, but to me it is definately not normal for a 5 year old to do anything like that. i dont think it is okay or normal for kids to play "doctor".  And i certainly dont think yours son's behavior as mischievous. Not only would i be alarmed I would be downright upset!! However, i am not trying to say that you did anything wrong, talking to him is a good thing, and it more then likely was done to be funny, sometimes they do the strangest things. i would be concerned "WHERE" this behavior came from. At that age, my first thought was that he was copying or imitating someone or something. maybe even something he saw on television, and hopefully not anything anyone has done to him. as long as you come down on him about it being bad and not the type of behavior you allow , and why and what exactly and so forth. I think you did the right thing, for sure you dont want to idolize it by making that big of deal out of it right now. Be sure to pay attention if it happens again, that would indicate a problem.

i also think the other mother was over reacting but that seems to be the way of things now. Some parents love drama and i agree with you about that messing up her kid even more so then what actually happened. It is too bad that she needs to over react on it. But like the doctor said you will need to cooperate with the process and let them know that it did concern you also and you talked with your son and are watching his behavior so it doesnt happen again.

good luck and god bless.