Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To be upset with dd1 teacher.

558 replies

lisad123 · 10/02/2012 17:03

I know this is likely to kick off because it's about religion, but hopefully it won't.

We a family we don't celebrate Xmas or birthdays ect. Both dds have been brought up this way and it's never been an issue to anyone (beside PIL but that's another thread)!

Dd1 is 9 and at Xmas her teacher kept making comments about Xmas being the most wonderful time ever, if you don't celebrate your missing out on something special and wonderful and no child should miss xmas. I let it wash as we were taking girls away over Xmas so dd1 wasn't fussed.

Yesterday, someone in her class was giving out birthday sweets. Dd1 refused as she knows we don't join in celebrating bdays. It's never been an issue, we have plently of sweets. Her teacher made a comment and told her it was ok, she should have one and I would never know! Shock dd1 still refused and told me what teacher had said.
When she came out today she told me her teacher had put sweets in her tray, and told her they weren't bday sweets so she could eat them.
Now Friday is the only day we have sweets because she is a sugar addict and gets ratty and obsessive if we allow too many sweets.

So I spoke to the teacher and he said he felt sorry for her and didn't think it was fair. I explained that I understand that but this is our choice and he told me in future he would try not to say anything but he did feel sorry for her Hmm
She wants for nothing and I'm very proud of her for standing up so well to her beliefs.

I'm wondering if she was a religion that didn't eat meat if he would have such a problem.

So am I unreasonable to be upset with him?

OP posts:
entropygirl · 10/02/2012 23:32

:( :( at recruiting from the mentally unwell and vulnerable....makes it sound more and more like a cult. (or like scientology in fact)

Original poster
lisad123 · 10/02/2012 23:32

It's whomever shows an interest tbh. We have a fairly good mix of ages in our hall. I'm sorry your dh had to sit with those people especially if they scarced him Sad

OP posts:
entropygirl · 10/02/2012 23:34

Whomever shows an interest and children that cant get away....

WorraLiberty · 10/02/2012 23:36

to the point of one child putting their hands over their ears when a teacher began to talk about what is inside a church, she was quickly ushered out and we read a book and did a maths activity

Just to inject a bit of humour here....

Is anyone else picturing Ned Flander's boys in their head? Grin

Original poster
lisad123 · 10/02/2012 23:36

Totu I'm sorry I have made you sad, please post whether and whatever you like. My beliefs are mine, they would never make me post anything awful about someone giving their child a blood transfusion. Dh too has leukaemia Sad

OP posts:
BullieMama · 10/02/2012 23:37

Lockets my experiences relate to the children I work with in school and I have to follow the guidance of the parents.

CoralRose · 10/02/2012 23:38

Quite frankly you'd need to be mentally unstable to believe it's better to let someone die than have a blood transfusion.

rhondajean · 10/02/2012 23:38

Rofl worra!

I can assure you that's not a recommended part of the faith. As I said, I do worry tht they are more attractive to the more vulnerable who over read eve into the edicts of the faith.

Am I still making sense?

(goes and site with worra with a Wine

BullieMama · 10/02/2012 23:38

Nice one Worra!

Original poster
lisad123 · 10/02/2012 23:39

Grin @ Worral

OP posts:
lockets · 10/02/2012 23:40

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

TOTU · 10/02/2012 23:41

Don't you just love a Friday night bunfight!

So how is dh being kept alive if he's got leuk Lisa? What type does he have? Is he a JW?

MrsGnits · 10/02/2012 23:42

We have a JW child who's mum has said they can't study our Shakespeare play of choice because of the magic element. Mum requested that instead they do the one with the teen sex, wilful defiance of parents, gang warfare and suicide. Clearly, a far less corrupting force. They now have to effectively teach themselves the text as they can't be in a classroom where the text is being taught.

Fortunately, they are quite able but they won't do as well as they could have done.

BullieMama · 10/02/2012 23:43

I always smile inwardly as I am always the first to say oops X can't do this bit and sort out another activity when I am one the very people they would recoil in horror at being near ... But my beliefs are a private matter!!

entropygirl · 10/02/2012 23:44

I have just read the offending verse of the old testament. I cant see that it says that red blood cells are a problem (or rather I can't see why red blood cells are more of a problem than plasma)? I think it's pretty clear from the strangulation comment that this is just the business about not eating animal blood and nothing to do with human blood at all.

hope that has cleared that up then

rhondajean · 10/02/2012 23:44

Tempest? Midsummer nights dream? Scottish play?
People do think Romeo and Juliet is a nice little play unless they have read and understood it!
Whiole new topic Grin

BelaLug0si · 10/02/2012 23:47

I will freely admit to being biased! My DH had a childhood spent studying the bible, attending classes and hanging around in random peoples' houses doing more bible study with people who were frankly either desperately lonely and/or actually mentally ill. Oh and the dying as well. As a small impressionable child.
Leaving the religion is very difficult as it is a close community where relationships outside it are not encouraged. If you leave, potentially you are cutting off your entire family, friends and employment (many in his congregation worked together). I'm not sure that counts as a choice.
Many of the kids he grew up with have left. His PIL haven't - in fairness to him, they haven't rejected him as they are actually quite pragmatic as well close to their faith. We don't discuss their religion when we see them though.

As far as the original question, I think the teacher shouldn't have encouraged your child to lie and if you don't want your child to have sweets apart from certain days then fair enough; however the extension of having the sweets/celebration being at odds with the faith caused a look of puzzlement here.

Pandemoniaa · 10/02/2012 23:48

I do feel sorry for the children of JWs. I realise that, in the main, they will be kept separate from the non-JW world (which is an issue in its own right) but once they start school life must be one long denial of all the harmless but fun things that other children enjoy on an everyday basis.

I have to say that while I know people who were brought up in JW households, I know none of them who remained in the faith after they'd grown up and had the chance to get away.

So while I think that the teacher that gave the OP's dd some sweets was wrong to encourage her to be deceitful, I find the whole cult of Jehovah's Witnesses equally wrong on very many levels.

WorraLiberty · 10/02/2012 23:48

Am I still making sense?

Not to me rhonda but nor is any other fucker at this point in the night...

From one piss head to another Grin Wine

Blush
manicinsomniac · 10/02/2012 23:48

I'm sorry your husband is so ill lisa.

Pleas don't feel under any obligation to answer this. Totally ignore it if you want to, I am being out of line in asking. But:

Are there alternative treatments that your husband can have for his illness that don't involve blood transfusions? Or do your beliefs mean that there is no cure?

I only as because my Dad died of leukaemia in his early 50s. He got 8 years grace due to bone marrow transplant and blood transfusions. Obviously those years meant a massive amount to him as an individual but I think he valued them more in terms of what it meant to my younger sister and I have to have him around until we'd both turned 18 at least. I don't think you can overestimate the value of an adult relationship with your parents. I still feel he went far too young and both he and all our family missed and miss out on so much but I believe I dealt far better with his death at 24 than I would have done at 16.

Either way, I'm sure the conflict between your beliefs and your love for him must be devestating so I am sorry if this is a totaly unacceptable question. Do report the post if you are unhappy with it.

Original poster
lisad123 · 10/02/2012 23:49

He has CML and has done for nearly three years now Sad he has daily chemo tablets, how has a good chance of managing on long term treatment as its a long term cancer rather than aggressive.

He is a JW.
He has no bm match and doesn't stand much chance of finding one, and at present his stable on his current treatment.

OP posts:
rhondajean · 10/02/2012 23:52

Worra this thread has in no way just made me pour a blue label Smirnoff and 7up.

The black label and the tanqueray are safe for now Grin

Original poster
lisad123 · 10/02/2012 23:53

And it is possible to have a bloodless bm transplant!
Dh medical treatments are his choices, so far he has been lucky enough not to require too many difficult choices.

OP posts:
entropygirl · 10/02/2012 23:56

What i have essentially never understood about book based religions is that the book says stuff and what that stuff is supposed to mean is up for interpretation. But the interpretation is done by humans who are allowed to screw up. So the JW's could be entirely right about the paradise and the living on Earth after the final battle etc. but could still be wrong about blood transfusions....

It would be a hell of thing to wake up on the day of enlightenment (or whatever the JW's call it) and find that you could have let you child live a full life after all....

An interesting fact for you....red blood cells have no cell nucleus and cannot divide.

manicinsomniac · 10/02/2012 23:56

Ah, I see. Yes, I know BMT doesn't necessarily require blood but my Dad needed lots of blood and platelets too. But he had AML so a very different ball game. I heard that you're just as likely to die with CML as of it.

Thank you for answering and wishing you all the best for a successful outcome.

Swipe left for the next trending thread