My awful parenting decisions (according to MIL)

[dogdaysareover]

I would like to begin this by saying it's a lighthearted thread. But it isn't. I am fucked off. So far I have:

1. Breastfed ("digusting")
2. Breastfed on demand (worse)
3. Breastfed in public (worst yet)
4. Am still bfeeding 22 months later (apoplexy)
5. Co-slept
6. Not given ds a dummy
7. Not left ds in his pram outside to cry. This would apparently "teach him"
8. Not left ds to cry himself to sleep at night
9. Not left ds laying on his back when he had reflux to choke on his own acid and instead carried him in a sling

10. Not sent ds to a nursery. He goes to a wonderful cm three days a week but this will apparently not socialise him 11. Allowed ds to feed himself. With cutlery (plastic) 12. Not cut ds's hair much 13. And bizarrely, yesterday, allowed ds to leave the house without a hat. Its May fgs.

This is not a stealth attack on any of the above practices. We are parents who make decisions based on what suits us/our individual child. I don't care if anyone does or doesnt do any of the above but just sick to fucking death of being told what a shameful parent I am/how spolied ds will be/how I have made a rod/created a monster. Ad infinitum.

Sil has followed mil's advice to a tee and she has, according to dh's family created the prefect child. Oh dfod.

So glad I don't have this problem anymore,but it makes me feel annoyed for you! You do what you want with your own kids, like others have suggested fuck off is the best phrase here.

I've done most of the things on your list too, op. Instead of rudely disagreeing, my mil has actually said how she thinks I'm doing a good job (there was a little breastfeeding disagreement with dc1 which she turned around pretty quickly). In other words I'm lucky to have such a supportive mil but I wouldn't put up with that kind of shit as she well knows!

Just tell her to back off. Tell her things have changed since she had her dc.

Ps out of interest do you go to work? Because mil did have issues with me deserting my children for such long days when I was working full time (which I happened to agree with but it really hurt when she told me).

How old is your Mil?

Yes, she is rude in voicing her criticism, but things were done that way when she was a mom. I suppose you've told her that things have changed?

She sounds very rude, but also very insecure. Keep doing a good job, nobody knows your baby like you. X

"Oh MIL (tinkly laugh) it's so good to hear about the way things were done before we knew any better".

MIL is fine with bfing, she tried and it didn't work out for her. She had never come across BLW but was uncritically interested in it.

What she fails to hide her disapproval of is me going to work. Comments about the time with her children being the best of her life, etc. Ironically other comments she's made indicate it wasn't at all - she was extremely isolated in a foreign country and when she got back FIL was away for months.

Oh and potty training. Nagging from 18mo. He finally got it when he was 3. And yes, if I'd not been working he would have trained much earlier, of course.

ha. She would not like me much either!

Alot of what is on your list (as far as your MIL is concerned) screams "I can't take over control of grandchild".

She cat breast feed and you doing so limits her "time" she can hold/be with her DGC.

So she rips it all to shreds.

Ignore the silly bint. Mine was like this and I have so little respect for her as person.

yea - had all that except perfect SIL - in my case it was a family friend.

Few years down the line and apparently they were always supportive of our choices .

Though I'm lucky - family friend now no longer mentioned.

I did most of those things (though the apoplexy was just one occasion when an 18 month old wandered over to where I was sitting, climbed up, lifted my shirt and had a snack).

I just embraced my role as hippy weird in-law, which adds to the rich tapestry of family life.

Ignore, ignore, ignore. Who are all these arsehole people who think there is only 1 way to raise a child properly. Even for my own kids I have managed to do things differently for all of them. One was in her own room from 7 weeks which wasn't ideal but because she woke up and stayed awake for hours after we came to bed no matter how quiet we were we said one night we would give it a try and she slept through from then on so we went with it. The last fella has co slept since about 4 months. One was bf 2 were ff. 2 had soothers 1 wouldn't touch them.

By your MILs rational we have become progressively more shit parents as the years have gone on. Thankfully no one in our families seem to notice or care.

I think if we don't do exactly as our mothers or MIL's do, some can take it as an insult, like we think they parented 'wrong'.

My MIL is awesome but my FIL was bloody annoying with his 'helpful' comments on where we were going hideously wrong.

I told him that I don't ever remember sleeping with him, so clearly he was not my child's father and to leave the parenting to us, you know, her actual parents.

MIL thought it was hilarious and FIL has been strangely quiet ever since.