In-laws shared beds with 4 year old DD and used my bedroom while babysitting

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I’ve changed my name because I’ve told a couple of people in real life about this and don’t want the link.

My DH and I have been away for a couple of nights without the kids (9 and 4). His parents looked after the kids the last two nights. We have 3 double bedrooms and then one kid’s bedroom with bunk beds.

We had one of the doubles set up as the spare room that the in laws always sleep in, with the usual fresh bedding etc. The second double has my 9 year old in. The third double is mine and my husband’s bedroom, the bedroom with bunk beds is where my 4 year old sleeps.

On the second night my DH parents (my children’s grandparents) decided that my 4 year old should sleep in the spare room with Grandpa (my FIL). My MIL got into my and DH bed (our bedroom not ready for guests, no clean bedding, things like medication left out).

I’m furious. Partially because I don’t think it’s appropriate for a grandfather to decide to sleep in a bed with his granddaughter who is 4. I’ve asked her whether it was ok. She understands the PANTS rules. She said that grandpa kissed her on the lips.

Secondly my MIL getting into my bed is a massive breach of privacy.

I don’t like my PIL so that may be clouding my judgement, but how they acted isn’t ok, right? What do I (my DH) do?

What?!

ETA that I missed a page and have now seen the explanation. But there are many families for whom a peck on the lips is absolutely normal. Lots of people did it when I was a kid.

I'm a hugger rather than a kisser, and very much don't like lip kisses, but I'll still defend those for whom it's normal, against people who leap to fairly sick interpretations.

Read the thread. We are talking about lips kissing. Which i missed from this post.

Edit for clarification. We are talking about lips kissing thats what I meant! Not just giving your grandchildren a kiss.

Well, if you agree that this happened the way the poster has said, why in God's name have you gone batshit on here?
You say they are a 'huggy' family or whatever, so it doesn't sound completely out of context.
Why didn't you just calmly sit them down and ask them what had happened rather than accusing them of all sorts.
I think you need to find some else to look after your kids whilst you go on your break.

Oldest is 9 ? If this is first time for lip kiss, big alarm, however what have they been like for previous 9 years, lots of older people do kiss kids in a normal way, nothing intended.

When me and my siblings were very young we would kiss our grandfather goodnight on the lips and it would be wet and slobbery. Then we would say yuck and wipe our lips with our hands. I don't think there was anything weird in it though lol. At least that's what I always thought.

Granted my kids have not spent overnight with grandparents but is this normal to ask kids what happened when r if anything happened between them and grandparents? Why did you even leave kids with them at all.

He maybe molested her. They need to go.
Never again. Put boundaries up.

I’m quite laid back and I like my in-laws, but I would go fucking nuclear about this I think.

Lots of boundaries being crossed that I just wouldn’t be ok with.

I have a 4 year old gs and I het the occasional kiss on the lips .

My DS also 4 will stay in bed with my parents but not the whole night - I could see for example if he was ill or really unsettled that this might happen etc - but the fact the mil slept elsewhere is odd imo. They could have left her in your bed asleep alone and then slept in the spare room. The kiss is also a bit odd. I wouldn’t have them overnight again for childcare

Oh OP,
Reading this made my stomach drop.

Does he normally kiss her on the lips? This is a massive no, no for me. So that alone would make me lose it but I’d have a boundary set in place about it… so would lose it based on that.

The other thing is, do you normally bed share if unsettled or upset? Perhaps they thought they were doing the right thing?

YANBU, and I hope your DP gets where your concerns come from

I think that is really sad not to let your five year old kiss you on the lips. There is absolutely nothing wrong with him doing that - you are his mummy!

I wonder if the kiss on the lips was just a peck goodnight in front of MIL and perfectly innocent or was there more to it? 🤔...... definitely more questions need to be asked....

The problem with your argument is- which I don’t actually disagree with, you can’t really trust anyone 100%, is that if someone is inclined to sexually abuse a child, they will do it. DFIL had a whole weekend with DD, he had access to her at any point and if he was going to do it, it wouldn’t be contained to when he had the opportunity to have her sleep in his bed. The sleeping in the same bed may cause a feeling of ickiness for people, but paedophiles are not going to be stopped by having a separate bed.

So we are forced to take risks when leaving children with any family member/childminder/teacher. Unless you never leave them alone. But the sleeping in his bed doesn’t necessarily increase the chance of abuse. If he was going to do it, he would. So if she’d have returned and DD had not slept in his bed but DMIL had gone out for a few hours, or slept in a separate bed due to snoring, would people still be jumping to the worst case scenario? I doubt it

I agree. This sounds very much as if the 4 year old could only go to sleep if grandpa was near, he was tired so it was easiest if she came into the double bed, and he fell asleep. Massive overreactions around here.

What we don't know from OP how she prepared her DC for the GP staying overnight, which room they would be in etc. Nor do we know how easily her children settle once in bed and whether they usually stay in thrown beds or wander into their parents' room. All of those things have a bearing on what happened on the two nights OP was away.

Sounds like that's the end of your child free holidays for a while!
Oh well, they're not necessary anyway.

A little much. I wouldn’t ask them to sit but they probably love the kids and didn’t think anything of it.

I am really glad you are looking after your little girl so tenderly. The whole thing would creep me out.

It’s sad a man can’t kiss their granddaughter on the lips without being labelled a paedo. If the child has asked to sleep with grandad then why shouldn’t he?

Someone sleeping in my bed though is a no no.

Wet and slobbery because of him making it that way, or because you did? Because if he was making it 'wet and slobbery' that's unsettling to say the least

I think sometimes little children kiss on the lips - that's not so weird, although not something I'd encourage - but if FIL initiated the kiss on the lips, I'd be concerned. I also really don't like the idea of a small child sharing the bed with anyone other than a close female relative, or her father. It raises my hackles. MIL sharing the bed with the 4-year-old while FIL slept in the bunk bed would've made more sense.

If I were confident that my in laws weren’t paedos, I couldn’t get too upset by it. If the kids weren’t upset by it, I’d probably let it go. But then, I adored my grandad and used to hop into bed with him all the time. And kissed him on the lips. A more wonderful, gentle man you couldn’t hope to meet.
If my MIL got into my bed I wouldn’t be delighted but I wouldn’t mind if my mother did.
The point is, everyone’s circumstances are different and what’s ok with me may not be ok with you. Neither is unreasonable. Everyone has different boundaries, working with different people, and if the situation has made you uncomfortable then you and your husband should absolutely address it and not feel irrational doing so.

In our family it’s normal to all kiss on the lips.
you’re blowing this all out of proportion
You should be grateful they looked after your children for you.