MIL disregarding our requests - what to do!

[SB10000]

Advice please?!! MIL has been asked on several occasions not to give our 20mth old squash, as she has suggested this and given it to him previously, the last time I mentioned this to her was a couple of weeks ago when I found squash in his beaker and politely asked her to only give him water. Today I came home from work to find another beaker had been taken out of the cupboard and had water in, thought was bit odd as he had a beaker already. When my toddler followed me into the ktichen he was pointing at the squash and acting as if he wanted some - after managing his tantrum over not being able to have any, I had a look at the beaker in the bowl and smelt it and it appears to smell of squash. I feel very frustrated at the fact that MIL cant respect our wishes and appears to be being sneaky and hiding the fact that shes giving it him. I am a fairly easy going person, the only thing that I feel strongly about is giving him a good start regards food and drink and not to confuse the poor little fella by ourselves and MIL sending out different messages - what are your thoughts - Am I just overr-reacting?!!!!

Can you explain to her that at many places like nurseries and schools, children are now only allowed plain water, no squash (this was true at my DD's nursery and now at her school too) and it causes problems when children are not used to having plain water. So it's easier (and cheaper) to get him used to it from the start?

Also it's easier as you can always get water, wherever you are, no faffing about. I speak as someone whose DD would only drink apple juice at one stage. We had one very fun holiday where none of the restaurants or cafes where we were had apple juice. We weaned her off it after that.

It could be worse than squash, but believe me, weaning them off squash/juice is blimmin difficult once you've gone down that road!

Remove the squash
Have someone else watch your child
Print out information on why squash is bad for children
Tell your mother in law that if she cannot respect you, then it's going to be a problem

Thanks all, I can try and explain the reasons why to MIL but I just know that she will still want to do it her way, have seen how she's been with niece and nephew! I will be removing the squash! :-)

Have someone else watch your child, it sounds like she's going to ignore things that are important to you and you are the parent. In the meantime have no squash in the house. Though I bet she would just bring some with her next time, from your recent post about her other dgc I'm guessing she has no boundaries and thinks she knows best.

Yes spot on! Thank you :-)