We live close to my Grandma and she is still very active and helpful. When DH is at work we help each other out with shopping/lifts etc.
Our DS is a toddler and from birth my Grandmother has been so over-the-top. She gives him her absolute undivided attention, excluding everyone else, which is so irritating. Someone will be talking to her and DS will toddle over and she will just drop the conversation completely to talk to him, which I don't feel is right. Any answers then will be monosyllabic as she sings to him etc. When I breastfed him she would make comments such as 'He's not hungry. You're not hungry are you, Baby Nim?' and try to distract him to look at her by poking him!
She looked after me as a baby whilst my Mum worked and ironically I am now closer to my mum as I realise the wedge she drove between us (never encouraging us to make up after arguments/always taking my side etc). I am sure some people will think he's just being a normal loving Great-grandma, but she has always been very good at emotional manipulation.
Naturally my DS adores her; she gives him whatever he wants and is always asking me to leave him with her (I don't; she has cataracts and a bad hip and I don't trust that she will spot hazards in time).
She lost her own mother when she was a few years old and for her whole life has 'mothered' everybody. She loves babies and children, and she often does and says things that make it seem as if she wants to prove that she is more 'loved' than their own mother, such as telling me that a cousin's baby had been calling her 'Mummy' (At 8 months for god's sake!)
Honestly, reading this back I must look like I'm so insecure and worrying unecessarily about a harmless old lady, but she is so obsessive; I feel like we've all faded into the background. When she calls up, all she asks about is my DS, which is quite hurtful tbh.
There is no way I can just see my Mum alone as Grandma now lives with her. She has started talking about me going back to work (I am a SAHM) and mentioning people whose Mums/Grandma's looked after their babies. I just know what she's thinking and even if I wasn't SAH, there's no chance she could look after him; she's 80 ffs.
I don't want to see her less, because that would mean seeing less of my Mum. At the same time; it's not healthy for DS to be pandered to all the time (as he grows up,) I'm worried about her trying to drive a wedge between me and DS (as she did with me and my Mum.) I just don't know how to deal with it, without looking pathetic. Can anyone help?
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Please help; she is driving me mad!
16 replies
Nimthenamechanger · 26/04/2013 14:14
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