North Carolina mom Tracy Bennett was in line at Costco with her two young boys when a stranger approached and began lecturing her. "You see these babies? They fuss like that because they want your attention. Maybe you should get off of your phone and give them your attention,” the man said.
At the time, Bennett was too defensive to react, but eventually she penned an open letter and posted it on Facebook, and the post went viral. In the letter, Bennett explains she'd been in line for a while, but the kids continued to get restless. "No one sees the constant, never-ending flow of attention we provide for our children," she said. "We are only human, and there are a lot of problems in a day to solve. Sometimes we have to direct our attention somewhere else for a moment, but it is always in the best interest of our children. That’s not just something moms say, it’s ingrained in us, it’s how we operate," she wrote.
Bennett told Good Morning America that the response to her open letter has been "overwhelmingly supportive."