Annoying caregiver comments or actions

QUOTE(andreap @ Mar 20 2008, 04:40 PM) [snapback]679692[/snapback]
this is officially a tangent now...but they also give the babies food all the time without asking. last week they were spoon feeding them whipped cream!!!! i was stunned silent. they will let them suck on coke, ice tea, etc out of their straw. i'm going to have to think of how to respond. i just don't understand when grandparents think they can do or say whatever they want, just because they are family. yikes!!!


so my IL are not the only ones!!!! that is insane...peanut butter with choc. did you tell her that peanut butter is highly allergenic? i have been debating how to address this food issue. if i wait until it comes up again, i am usually too shocked & scared to respond. would it be too direct to send an email before visiting or even forward an article on food allergies explaining that i prefer for them not to be fed without permission????

how do you girls handle the issue of others feeding them whenever/ whatever they want to? it is mind baffling! do they just want to see a reacation? my babies were enjoying their pears & cheese when MIL started spoon feeding the whipped cream. there was NO reason for it. when she tried offering ds more cream... i eventually said, i think that's good.

i would love to know how you girls have handled this. it's hard to be as direct with the IL.

 

I have been reading all these posts with interest. When it comes to food I am very worried. My MIL is they type who will give whatever she wants. I don't have any advice on how to handle anything, as I don't know how to handle mine, but I think it is interesting so many have issues with the inlaws thinking it is ok to do whatever.

Dianna

 

QUOTE
i would love to know how you girls have handled this. it's hard to be as direct with the IL.


It's hard to be direct, but these are your babies and you have to put your foot down. If someone started feeding my babies something inappropriate, I'd politely ask them to stop and suggest an alternative ("Andrew really loves banana, would you like to share one with him?"). If they insisted, I'd just push back as hard as it took. Anyone who doesn't respect your judgment on these things is WAY out of line, and if it comes to a confrontation, they're in the wrong, not you.

 

1.) Paw-paw knows your thirsty and you need a sip of my tea.
2.)My mom always says"Turn on your heater at night they might freeze!"
3.) Oh.. your poor feet they must be freezing! (Note we live in Florida!)

 

I hate to complain about my mom but one thing did becmoe a HUGE issue with us. I never warmed their milk (used room temp nursery water) so when I went to milk at 1 year, I decided I would not warm that either. We got into some heated arguments over this. She said it would hurt their stomache to give it cold. I ended up asking my Dr. just to put the issue to rest and he looked at me like I had two heads when I asked if it was ok to give cold milk. He said yes that is fine!

 

My very painful SIL just sent me an email saying she "may have to come earlier" if my husband is going to be away alot. I emailed back "no August was what was arranged ". Since my husband is not terribly close to her, I'm less encouraged to be overly nice to her. She was the one who was here for two weeks when the babies were born and didn't make a SINGLE meal while she was here !!! I have refused to have her here without my dh being around, she isn't MY SISTER !! She wanted to come without her brother here -- just to see the babies. NOPE NOT HAPPENING !!


yIKES on the IL feeding your babies !!!!!!!!!! Especially with the allergy issues these days. It really is boundaries, rules, peeing on the fence posts -- marking your territory. If they are feeding your children without your permission they DON'T RESPECT YOU !! It is necessary for them to respect you and your concern for YOUR CHILD'S SAFETY . You might need to have a FREAK OUT and reset the boundaries. And don't feel guilty, you are the mom and protector mommy bear !!!!!!

STAY STRONG GIRLFRIENDS !!

Heather

 

my MIL just said this yesterday she says it alot but in PP i have written i just forgot how annoying it is.

DS and DD were in high chair waiting for their food as i am in kitchen making there bottles. MIL in living room with them and they are fussing because they afre hungry. she yells to me "is this there pacifiers" UM YES WHO ELSE'S WOULD THEY BE. I JUST SAID I THINK SO THERE THE ONLY ONES IN THERE. i have the pacifiers with their names on them also.....DUH.........

 

In the hospital MIL would constantly tell me "The nurses say you should try to keep them awake in the day so they will sleep better at night." Good advice - BUT - she was always shushing and rocking them to sleep at the same time and it was the middle of the day! I finally had to say something one day. You don't do that to someone who is getting 3 hours of sleep a day.

The boys were about 3 weeks old and we had just gotten both of them home from the hospital when MIL got on my case about waking them up to feed at night. She had the nerve to ask her family doctor about it and I was told "Dr. X says you should never wake a baby to feed them." She then went on to tell me about the triplets in a nearby community and how the doctor told their mum to let them cry it out at night - they were 7 months old. The hint was that I was supposed to let my tiny babies cry it out at night!!!


Up until they were 4 months old every single cry was a tummy ache and often followed by a formula, or gas drop recommendation. I was told a cousin "had to" give her baby a bottle of water for every bottle of formula to help him poop. I asked the cousin who said her doctor was against it, but her parents insisted. Just because my baby passes gas does not mean he needs water to help him poop.

The tummy ache thing was the breaking point Christmas day. The kids had been passed around and around and when they cried it was my fault for giving them the wrong formula (by wrong they meant not the same as SIL used). I picked up my boys and went straight home.


That's about the worst though, I love my MIL on the whole.

 

Everyone with their stories of relatives feeding their babies made me think of more step-MIL annoyances (the one responsible for most of my list). I once walked in on her trying to give the boys BEER. They were 9 or 10 months old, then. I freaked out on her telling her that nobody gives them anything without asking their parents and that beer was NOT OK. She had the nerve to respond that it was fine because they didn't seem to want any anyway. WTF?! I told DH that she was NEVER to be left alone with them. Fast forward to 14 months when we visited FIL... she took the boys on a walk WITHOUT TELLING ANYONE. I finished cleaning up from lunch in the kitchen and the boys were nowhere to be found. I was frantically searching the house & yard (which borders a swampy forest area -- no fences) when SIL noticed that step-MIL was missing as well. Boy did I let her have it when she got back! There are some people who really just don't have a clue.

 

I so wanted to come post here last night, but with my mother in law here, figured I should wait till she left, but had cranky babies, so posting now. She said something last night, that made me laugh and I thought of this topic right away.

My husband was feeding Lucas. Lucas is great at burping. Can't believe such huge burps come out of such a little baby. Well my husband was burping him and it was a big one. My mother in law freaked and for a good five minutes lectured us on being careful with letting them burp.....WHAT!!!!!!! We can't control how they burp, the size of the burp or any of that...what should we not burp them because she is worried the baby will hurt himself by burping??? I found it just very odd. How are we to be careful over something we have no control over? ....sigh...

Dianna

 

Heee, I'm glad y'all liked "yupperdupperdooooz!"

I just remembered another one! Two of my college friends came to visit us for a weekend a couple months back.

Our kids were at a particularly gassy stage. It didn't seemed to bother them, they just passed it a lot.

Every time one of the kids passed gas, my friends would say, "Tootsie-wootsie!"

I don't know if they thought I needed to know each time?

Two gassy kids + two old friends--you do the math! We heard more tootsie-wootsie's than I would want to hear in an entire lifetime. I just wanted to say, "Babies fart!"

 

QUOTE(debid @ Mar 23 2008, 10:10 PM) [snapback]683729[/snapback]
Everyone with their stories of relatives feeding their babies made me think of more step-MIL annoyances (the one responsible for most of my list). I once walked in on her trying to give the boys BEER. They were 9 or 10 months old, then. I freaked out on her telling her that nobody gives them anything without asking their parents and that beer was NOT OK. She had the nerve to respond that it was fine because they didn't seem to want any anyway. WTF?! I told DH that she was NEVER to be left alone with them. Fast forward to 14 months when we visited FIL... she took the boys on a walk WITHOUT TELLING ANYONE. I finished cleaning up from lunch in the kitchen and the boys were nowhere to be found. I was frantically searching the house & yard (which borders a swampy forest area -- no fences) when SIL noticed that step-MIL was missing as well. Boy did I let her have it when she got back! There are some people who really just don't have a clue.


my MIL came up stairs one day and took my DD downstairs with her without even telling us just because she heard her making noise. DH was in bathroom and i was changing DS when we came out we both were frantic running around upstairs when finally after 10 minutes of looking DH went downstairs to ask if anyone came inside the house and there she was giggling at him. TALK ABOUT PISSED

 

QUOTE(debid @ Mar 23 2008, 11:10 PM) [snapback]683729[/snapback]
I once walked in on her trying to give the boys BEER. They were 9 or 10 months old, then. I freaked out on her telling her that nobody gives them anything without asking their parents and that beer was NOT OK. She had the nerve to respond that it was fine because they didn't seem to want any anyway.



ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!!!!!!! and i was upset about whipped cream! i would have lost my mind! giving BEER to babies... sounds like she needs to hold off on the beer herself!