AIBU... MIL and Chocolate!

[Stardust1901]

I've name changed as this is possibly outing.

I'm pretty annoyed but don't know how to approach this.

Yesterday MIL babysat for us so DP and I could go out for a bit. Lovely! We are very grateful.

However once we get back and MIL leaves, I start to tidy up. MIL has given my baby (5months) half a bar of chocolate. She didn't ask if it was ok or anything, I'm quite annoyed.

I'm not one of those who believes 'she babysat for you so just be grateful' but I don't know how to approach it and tell MIL that I'm not happy without coming across as ungrateful.

I'd be absolutely fuming!

I presume you said she'll need a bottle about x time & y time etc and that nowhere in that did you say 'half a bar of chocolate'. She's only 5 months old fgs. You feed them what the parents have said, not whatever you bloody well feel like.

I wouldn't leave my DD with her again, christ alone knows what she might think its fine to do.

I well remember the smug, we know better than you, looks I used to get from DM and DF when I insisted on things like this. It was always, well we gave it to you and it didn't do you any harm.
The problem often is that you don't always tell them these things in advance because it never occurs to you they'd be so unenlightened.
OP no way could you have expected your MIL to do that, such an unnecessary stupid thing. If she babysits in future give her an extensive list of what you don't want her to do -keep a list to add to as it occurs to you.
Good luck

Rubies 'old people cannget confused'. Seriously?!. She's quite feasibly only in her 50's anyway, but my 87 year old Aunt looks after her 5 grandchildren regularly without 'forgetting' that babies drink milk, not eat chocolate bars.

Old people can get confused.

They can, but most people become grandparents for the first time long before they are at high risk of dementia. Also, giving chocolate to babies has been frowned on by the NHS for at least 25 years, as it certainly wasn't the done thing when my daughter was a baby. So it's not really a generational thing either.

Then expect a moan on Gransnet about how DIL has given her a list as long as her arm with dos and donts!

Presumably this is the first food your DD has had apart from milk? It's a big milestone having first proper food and your decision when and what she should have. She had absolutely no right to take that away from you, regardless of if she'd fed her chocolate or baby porridge!!

My DF (who sadly passed away earlier this year) tried to give my 8 week old DD a biscuit- "I'm just rubbing some sugar on her lips"...after Id said no. He was being a twit for giving an unweaned baby a bloody biscuit and a twat for ignoring me when i exclaimed.

I'd have a word. "Please don't feed DD chocolate again, she's not weaned, its dangerous/ive chosen to wait until 6 months etc". If you are waiting until 6 months and she knows that then personally i wouldn't be having her baby sit again and tell her why- because you can't trust her. Stupid cow.

What is grandparents bloody obsession with feeding babies sugar?

Why did she give your child chocolate? Who does that?

That's really quite awful. I'd be fuming if MIL did this.

My parents do stuff like this, my PIL do too. The only way to tell them is very clearly and firmly (but nicely).

It won't work, but it may limit the amount of feeding up.

"You're not even supposed to start weaning until 6 months anyway"

Nope. The NHS advise this to give a simple rule, but the evidence (and most other international health organisations) say otherwise. Younger than 3 months is bad. Older than 6 months is bad. In between has various pros and cons but starting slowly at 5 months is generally a good idea.

Either way some chocolate will do no harm to a 5 month old, as a one off, its continuous poor diet that needs avoiding.

The only way to tell them is very clearly and firmly (but nicely). It won't work, but it may limit the amount of feeding up.

What will work then?

PS. If she's got form for things like this Id say that DD was being very sick and you were taking her to A&E and did she know why? Or perhaps ring her and say 'Ive just found some chocolate amongst things and it looks like its been sucked, you didn't give it to DD did you?'.

I am cross on your behalf, how dare she feed an unweaned baby chocolate and how dare she give her her first food and take that away from you.

No it's not a generational thing. It's a stupid person thing.

My oldest is 36 and he never had chocolate as a child. He was entirely breast fed and not weaned until he was 6 months.

I'm the gm of two small children and I'm nearly 70. I don't get confused and give them inappropriate foodstuff because I'm not a fool.

I'd be fucking fuming if someone gave my 5 month old chocolate. For a start the advice is nothing but bm or fm for the first 6 months so my 5mo hasn't had any food yet and chocolate certainly won't be one of his first foods. Your mil knows fine well it's not ok to give a 5mo chocolate.

Just raise it. Say I saw chocolate on dd bib, did you give it to her? If yes then tell her clearly that it's unacceptable.

Also the kind of idiot who gives an unweaned 5mo chocolate isn't the kind of person who should be left unsupervised with the baby

God I'm so angry on your behalf. I'd never let anyone who did something like this watch my baby again.

You don't know what happened OP because you weren't there. OK giving chocolate to a 5 month old is unacceptable, but MIL could have eaten half the bar and then let the baby suck a bit of the half that was left - NO? How big is this bar we're talking about - I'm thinking a tiny bar of white chocolate but maybe it was a huge bar of dark chocolate!!! Either way stop stressing or tell MIL that's it - as you DILs like to say "go no contact"

Maybe the grandma ate most of it and the baby just had a taste? Not prefect but better than eating half a bar.

I wouldn't fall out wit your mil about it or you'll end up forking out £20+ for a babysitter.

Durham

So? One bite is one bite too much.

What happens to babies who are given chocolate then?

She probably didn't think there was anything wrong with it. Depending upon what age she is, when my older boys were babies, weaning them when they were a few months old [ 3 i think] was the norm.
My MIL and mother would have probably done the same with chocolate. A little bit on their finger tip mind you, not half a bar. I cant imagine it would have been much though. I doubt it will have done any harm. Just say how you feel and move on for goodness sake.

The 1970s baby was usually weaned on to solids by the time she was 3 months old. Studies over the last 40 years found that later weaning is beneficial to babies, and 4 months was recommended, increasing to 6 months.

I really wouldn't worry about. Babies were weaned really early in different centuries. They survived.

Just to clarify, my older children were born in the 80's. [ late 80's] It was the norm to wean at around 3 months.