Trusting my dad with my baby

[ScaftyWit]

Ok, this is my first post but I've joined with loads of things in mind to ask, I feel like there's uncertainty in so much of my life right now.

I am writing this from upstairs in my parents' house. They don't live far from me and we've made a plan that I'll visit weekly with my son (now 15 months).

My son LOVES my mum. As do I. The problem is my dad.

He's not a very nice person. I have never liked him, he treated my mum like dirt when I was little and we've always had a strained, formal relationship.

I don't think I have any reason to suspect that he's done anything really bad to me when I was small but he has also always made me feel quite uncomfortable in an explicable, shuddery sort of way.

I have an older sister who is a narcissist (whole other story) and she once told me that he has been accused of being innapropriate by another family member but she didn't have details and I never know whether to believe things she says. For all I know if I bring it up again she'll deny having said it, that's what usually happens with the weird things she tells me.

So.

I feel very uncomfortable about the thought of leaving my son alone with him, although there's really no concrete reason for this.

I have told my mum that I am not comfortable but I don't really dare explain why as she's very defensive and already exploded at me for even saying that.

Every time I go there and ask her to watch the baby while I go and do something, within minutes I hear her off in the loo and realise she's left the baby with my dad. I ask her to just call if she wants the loo and I'll come back, I'm never indisposed.

I think she fears offending him if it becomes obvious that I don't want to leave them alone, but I always make convincing excuses.

Just now I went down and said to him "oh you need your nose wiped" and then when she came back I said under my breath "you should have called me" and aloud "he needed his nose wiped".

She got very angry and said shrilly "I had to go to the loo!!!!" and I said "I'd have come back down if you'd called" to which she gave me a very disappointed look and said that I was unfair.

My dad had gone off by this point so I said quietly "it makes me unconfortable, every time I ask you to call me and every time you just leave him."

She said "I am not going to call you I think it's unkind", so I said "then we won't come anymore" and she said "yes, I think maybe you should stop coming".

I am not exaggerating when I say this happens every time.

I know nothing untoward has ever happened and I really think it probably never would. I don't really think he is an abuser and even if he was, to my knowledge he's only been creepy to girls.

I don't feel that it's a safeguarding issue so much as a comfort/trust thing with my mum.

Apart from when it comes to discussing things that make her defensive, we are very close.

I have other problems at the moment and I really appreciate her support and don't want to stop visits or create bad blood.

AIBU?

Does your mum ask you to explain your aversion to your dad, OP? Or does she seem unsurprised by your wariness?

If you dad is old & ill, is he mobile enough to look after an active toddler? Could this be an approach you could use with your DM?

I don't know what to say, hope someone else points you in the right direction

I keep swaying between YAbu and yanbu.

But everything you've said is showing that you already know that.

Yanbu to not want your son alone with him. Yabu to expect your mother to exclude her husband because you want it so.

You're being very rational with you confusing feels here, so respect for that.

You can't help how you feel, some people are just creepy.

I wonder though that if the creepy feelings started after your sister said that to you about he was accused or something. Not the 'he's not a nice person' but the 'I don't think I trust this man' vibe.

Could it be like a false memory thing?

YANBU to want to protect your child from harm.

YABU to go to your parents house, leave your son in the care of your parents while you do something then get upset that your mother isn't then watching him 100% of the time.

If you don't want your dad watching your son, stop taking DS to his house because it's unreasonable to expect your mother to never need to leave the room for any reason and if she did your dad is supposed to either interrupt what he is doing to go with her (leaving your DS totally unsupervised) or she has to take your DS with her (which is going to get harder the older/more mobile he gets) and who wants to actively encourage children to be in the bathroom when you just want to go for a wee in peace? (Seriously, my DD is 8 and I swear she still waits until I am in the bathroom to want to talk to me/ask for something/cause unseen chaos on the other side of the door)

My SiL was like this when my nephew was born, she would not leave him with either grandfathers alone, not because she didn't trust them wrt hurting him or doing something inappropriate, but because she only trusted her mother and my mother to look after him properly. The problem with that is that it is impractical and impossible to stick to 100% of the time ... it got to a point where both GMs were tying themselves in knots to follow her instructions and they started having to say no to babysitting because they just couldn't guarantee they could follow her rules and both grandfathers were feeling pushed out and sidelined, and honestly they were embarrassed when people asked about their grandson that they weren't "allowed" to babysit alone.

It all came to a head when I was over with my DD, my mum was babysitting my 7 month old nephew and he was a bit under the weather so he had been clingy and grizzly all day which was exhausting in itself. My mum had loads of errands to run that afternoon but then he fell asleep ... she had two options 1) wake him up so she could get her errands run on her one day off 2) let him have his much needed nap. My dad was at home but she was terrified of leaving him with the sleeping baby just in case she got held up and/or SiL showed up early and found her not there. In the end I ended up staying to babysit let my DD have some grandpa time so my mum could go and do her errands without fear of causing a huge family row. When my brother showed up, I pulled him to one side to give him a big sister kick up the arse chat to stand up to SiLs rule or risk causing serious issues further down the line. He eventually agreed to speak to her and she reluctantly agreed to relax her rule and everyone was so much happier and it meant that visits were so much less stressful.

Now, my nephew is 2 and he adores his grandad - whenever he goes to my parents' he immediately runs to find my dad, he will follow him around, always wants to sit on his knee/cuddle with him on the sofa and loves "helping" grandad with his jobs and my dad is always taking him out and about - walking the dog, to the garden centre, to the park, watching football etc ... I can't imagine what their relationship might have been like if SiLs rule had been allowed to continue.

I think lots of people on here are being very unfair on the OP.

She doesn't like her dad and doesn't want her son left alone with him. That's ok. She's allowed to feel like that. She's allowed to have gut instincts.

She's asked her mother to play by certain ground rules and her mother has repeatedly refused to respect those boundaries. When the OP has challenged her mother her mother has basically told her not to come round any more.

OP, I don't think you are BU. It seems to me that the simplest option would be to have your mum over to your house without your dad if that's possible?

Some odd response. This isn't some stranger she talked to for a few minutes and decided was creepy, it's her father. She's obviously been around him more than enough to have a very solid idea of what he's like, even if all she can put into words is a certain vibe he gives off.

My father was a sociopath. Mostly it just came out in being a relentless prick to my mother (who had her own issues) and some other people he deemed far below him, but I always felt, from a very young age, that he was capable of pretty much anything and could turn on a dime. Almost all the time I was certain he wouldn't actually do anything besides be an asshole, but there's a vast difference between 'so and so is a good person I trust won't do anything bad' and 'so and so is an evil bastard who I trust won't do anything bad because it doesn't serve their purposes right now'.

Stop going to their house with the baby. Your mother clearly has at least a strong inkling of your issues with him because she went straight to being defensive rather than just being confused. She's going to keep doing this, and there's no way you could ever let her babysit because she won't even try and stick to your boundaries. In fact she's likely to leave him with your father to prove some kind of point. Let her come to you if she wants to see her grandson. If she chooses the creep over you and him then you know where you stand with her.

I think rumblingDM is right. The issue here is your mum. You are asking her to care, to show some inkling that she understands your feelings and she won't. She is colluding with your father's behaviour. She is not being a decent parent to you or a decent gp to your son.

There's a fair few people on here determined that YABU because you won't leave your father alone with your son and about the same number think YABU because you take him to your parents' at all.

People, this is what it's like when you come from a family with dysfunction and/or abuse. The bad guy doesn't exactly come with a sign saying "don't trust me, I'm a bad guy". There's usually a culture of not discussing things openly, even little things, you've usually been taught by the enabling parent from an early age not to do anything to "upset" the abuser - the kids get pressed into service on behalf of the enabling parent to help them ensure the abuser doesn't get angry. The abuse changes its nature as you get older, and they often lie about the most inconsequential stuff to the point where never mind any memories you might have of bad stuff happening - you just don't trust your memory full stop. It's easy from the outside to say "how can you entertain these accusations/let this person near your kids if you have these suspicions" but if you've been brought up with it you don't even believe in your bones that you have any right to say no to them.

I also agree with rumbling

The birth of your son, I think, has brought up a lot about your feelings about your mother, and whether she protected you or herself

I think you are testing her

And she hasn't changed. She's in a really difficult position and she's still with the man who was not good enough

So I think that maybe what you need to explore, yourself, is how you feel about her, and how you have contact with her without letting your judgment of her become overwhelming. And in time, talk to her about this, maybe

By the way, I know how hard it is to speak to a mother who becomes defensive at the mere sniff of criticism

Am finding this thread fascinating from a personal perspective because I'm going through the same myself, though with my stepfather. He's never given me even one reason to worry about him, and I've known him since a young teen, but since having ds I can't put my finger on why, but I distrust him. He's incredibly reserved and fairly emotionally stunted and I think that is partly it - I've known him for decades but still don't know him, really.

In my case I was actually sexually abused as a child, so I think I'm hyper aware.

Anyway, I've decided to not leave ds alone with my mum if my stepdad is there, and especially no overnights, ever. I'm 99% sure that my fears are unfounded but the 1% just isn't worth the risk.

Trust your gut feelings.
Most people don't have feelings like this towards their father. So there has to be some (unknown) reason for your feelings.

Your DC relies on you for safety and comfort. Your parents don't.

You could only see DM at yours, you could find another sitter.

Trust your feelings.