To be so angry that MIL fed DS 4month

[PretzelPrincess]

So I left DS who is 4 moths old with MIL just while I popped to the super market, half an hour max. I come back and she's feeding him a banana He's 4 months and I have explicitly said over and over I don't want to give him solids just yet. I'm so angry just thinking about it. I feel totally undermined. Don't trust her with DS anymore. Urghhhhhh.

CrystalDeCanter is not a wanker at all. The post was perfectly reasonable and sane.

I wouldn't be worried about banana at 4m, or missing a 'first', but I would be LIVID if I had made my view on something clear in relation to my DC, and my MIL had gone against this so deliberately.

YANBU OP.

It's a shame that your ds hasn't got a severe dislike of bananas like my ds has. He puked his first banana everywhere within 60 seconds of being fed. To this day (teen) he detests bananas.

Your MIL has been deliberately undermining you. I would have been very clear that this is not on.

ok I understand that you're upset that she went against your instructions and in that she was entirely wrong and YANBU to be angry BUT as one or two others have said it was the norm not long ago to wean at 4 months - plenty of people still do (including me) it won't have harmed him. As for seeing all the firsts, do you have to have them all? what if you're out when he walks for the first time? Its bound to happen. I honestly don't remember lots of the "firsts" of my two (and they are only 3 and 4). There's always another one, first day at school first getting dressed alone, first dry night etc. This is your MIL, unless you want a massive family rift that will damage your kid's relationship with their GP, try to relax a bit. BY all means tell her firmly that sh emust follow your instructions and that it is not up for discussion but don't go OTT about this.

I agree with Crystal and Weatherall.

Doesn't matter that it was the norm.

OPs baby didn't need feeding & MIL knew that OP had no intention of feeding him solids yet.

Why does she know better than OP?

Fuck me - to those posters saying chill and it won't kill them, etc - it actually could have! Especially if the OP hadn't seen what happened.

I know of a child that had to be blue lighted to hospital - parents had no idea what was wrong. Paramedics kept asking what they had eaten. Parents kept saying nothing, hasn't been weaned yet.....

Step forward MIL several hours later when she heard where the family where - mystery solved - she had decided to feed the baby!

fuck me, it still makes my blood boil 18 years later

YANBU

Whether it used to be the norm or not is irrelevant. It's the disrespect and undermining of the OP that is the problem. It would be a long time before I trusted her again.

Another one here who fed her babies bananas at 14 weeks - we did back then.

But that's not the point. It doesn't matter if it was bananas or chicken tikka, quite frankly. Your MIL deliberately did something behind your back despite being asked not to - she thought her ideas were better than yours without a qualm or even noticing a boundary. What's next for her? What else of your approach to parenting doesn't she like and will ignore or counteract whenever she can?

I don't think the OP is over reacting at all. It was not up to the MIL to decide when the baby should start weaning or be fed. It's not her baby!

The fact that she did it when the OP went out is just down right cheeky and rude, not to mention completely undermining.

Who cares if it sets off a row OP, you need to get your DH to say something else she'll just think it's ok. She sounds like a nightmare.

Thank you crystal, I am at my best at four am being offensively called "mad", "a loon", and "hysterical". Perhaps you need to think about the effects and offensiveness if the language you use too since it was equally charming?

What is it with some grandparents and their desperate need to exert control and undermine a parent's perfectly reasonable choices? There is no excuse for it.

No of course the banana won't kill him but its the undermining and 'I know best' attitude that is totally out of order. Your DP needs to read her the riot act.

theo and onehand I respectfully disagree. However at least you had the decency to not go wading in accusing posters of being mad or loons, which is so offensive it's unreal.

The long and short of it is that a MIL or other Grandparent isnt the person who gets to make decisions about parenting. Weaning, sleep training, haircuts, etc, all these things plus many more are for the parents to dictate.

Her undermining you is the issue. Not the banana.

She wouldnt be in sole charge of my dc until they were at an age they could tell me what theyve been up.to whilst at Grannys house.

Who knew a banana would cause this angst....

Maybe she was eating it and he reached for it. Maybe she idly broke off a bit for him to play with. Maybe she broke a bit and put in a bowl coz of mess.

Breathe a bit. This all sounds a bit OTT....

Sorry, going off on a tangent here but both mine were weaned at 4 months as per advice at that time (years ago). What is the reason for change of advice? Both mine are healthy, not overweight, no allergies etc. when I read threads like this and see peoples reactions, I feel like I've fed them poison. That said, I do believe your mil was massively unreasonable

What is it with mothers and mother-in-laws doing as they please with their GC? So disrespectful to the parents of the child.

Hair cutting, giving solids in bottles, etc, ...

''I did it in my day'' is no excuse. Times change, knowledge moves on. Loads of toe curling old fashioned practices were seen as 'the norm' in old days. The advice to wean as near to 6 months as poss. is there for a good reason. Not just to piss off grand-parents.

Mine were weaned at 4 months although the advice had recently changed to 6 months when my youngest was weaned so I wouldn't have a problem with a baby that young having food.

I would have a problem with GM making decisions without consulting me and with my parenting being undermined. I would also be sad that I had missed out on my pfb's first foods because granny had decided not to respect my wishes. Your DP needs to talk to her about boundaries.

I don't think it's OTT at all. I weaned all mine at 4 months. I don't think mil was putting the baby at risk. What she was doing though was defying her dil. She knew baby wasn't having solids, she knew that 'firsts' are important and that sil and dil had made a decision not to wean yet and she completely ignored all that and did what she wanted to do. That's the problem here. Yes it's just a banana but that banana represents a lack of trust and respect that is very upsetting.

I would have been very upset if my mil had done something like this. Fortunately I never had to deal with that as my mil (a health visitor!) bent over backwards to respect what we wanted to do. As she should because we are the parents.

Is she a good grandmother aside from this? If she is then is it really worth falling out over it? Yes, she undermined you and words should be had about respecting your rules for your child but then let it go.

When DS1 was 6wks old I left him in the car with my dad, fast asleep, while I nipped in the shop. I came back to find DS wide awake and suckling madly on his dummy. It popped out when he saw me and when I picked it up I noticed it was covered in pink stuff. I asked my dad if he knew what it was. "Oh, he woke up and cried but his dummy wouldn't stay in so I dipped it in my Oasis to help him..." We laugh about it now :o

A bit of banana is unlikely to do any harm, the undermining is the issue however - as a PL said - was she actually feeding him or did he grab it off her?

The feeding at 4 months wouldn't have been the issue for me it's the going bhind your back and giving him his first tastes. My mil is just the same and fed dd gravy. Now she is weaning mil complains she isn't having enough bottle a day.

YANBU in my opinion. He's not her baby to make hose decisions about.

No one used to know that regularly leaving a child to scream itself to sleep 'cry it out' can effect the child physically long term. We know now. So we don't do it.

But still my mum thinks it's ok. 'Just leave her to it - i did with you and you're ok'

Really encouraging me to leave DD with you mum. Not.

jetsetlil I think the advice is in the process of changing again. HE was telling us at baby group that they currently tell people to wait until 6mo but member of the group who is a nutritionist says that WHO are recommending/planning to recommend that in the developed world solids can be given from 4mo, HE agreed she had read about this. Have since heard the same from my GP and the other HV.

I can see how the Oasis thing is a non-event, Bearfrills, but if your dad had been nagging on at you for weeks to dip his dummy in squash, and you'd patiently explained that's not why we do it nowadays, rots their teeth etc etc.... you might have felt a bit differently about it.