To not like the way DM is talking to my twins?

[Lipsticktraces]

I’m aware that I’m probably being petty here, but it’s starting to get on my nerves.

I have three week old twins. They’ve been in hospital since birth due to being premature. I’ve been staying with them and we are all currently in a side room in NICU.

DM visits every day and has generally been great during a very difficult time. However the way she speaks to the babies is starting to really get on my nerves and I’m not sure if I’m being U or not?

Examples: I was changing twin twos manky babygrow yesterday. He was grizzling while I was doing it and she started saying “isn’t your mum horrible. Look what she’s doing to you. She’s awful” I bit my tounge as I’m fully aware I’m sleep deprived and short tempered atm. However later on I had to give babies their vitamins and they started to cry a little as they don’t like the taste. She again started with the “isn’t your mum horrid” routine. This time I asked her not to say that about me as I’m only doing what needs to be done and trying my best. She responded that it’s just how you talk to babies and there’s nothing wrong with it.

In addition to this she keeps saying to twin two that she’s “going to smack his bum if he doesn’t behave” (he’s the more highly strung of the two) I let it go for as long as I could, but eventually had to ask her to stop saying she would smack him. Even the suggestion of it makes me feel really angry and upset. Again she replied that it’s just how you talk to babies

I get that it’s probably a generational thing, but Aibu to ask her to stop? I really don’t want it to become a habit that carries on. I don’t want my babies to grow up hearing about how awful their mother is to them and how they are going to get their bums smacked! I’m also fully aware that my nerves are shredded after three weeks in hospital so fully prepared to be told I’m being precious!

She knows exactly what she's doing. She is undermining you and wants to paint you as the bad guy. You are not oversensitive and it's not normal for anyone to spout shit about smacking and horrible to premature babies ffs.

It isn't a "generational thing" I would never say that.

Ask her to consider what a nurse would do if she overheard the smacking comment!

If she doesn't stop about the mummy thing start returning it with granny comments then it might make her realise.

I would also ask her again say you don't like it and you don't need to hear negative comments as you are not feeling up to it. That it isn't the way to talk to babies. Give her a granny baby book.

Congratulations on your lovely babies.💐

Oh I feel your pain. My Mil used to do this. If dd was crying she’d say ‘did your mean mummy pinch you?’ It tipped me over the edge at what was a difficult time anyway and I’ve never forgotten it.
No advice really as I never managed to stop her-just got more and more worked up which probably made dd more upset and made it even worse

Be interesting to see what 'Generational' crap you all come out with when it's your turn...

OP - Congratulations on your twins. I know how stressful it must be with them in NICU at the moment, hope it's not for too long.

Some of what your mum is saying can be treated as light-hearted, the other, not so much. But if you don't like it, speak to her. If she carries on, then get angry till she gets the message.

Mum of a 26 weeker here. Look no one gets the NICU. No one. Not even the most well meaning of family and friends get what it’s like. Even when your baby is ‘fine’, you are always conscious of other babies and their parents who may be having a bad day. So don’t hold that against them. A doctor friend of mine told me how ‘lucky’ I was that I could leave him with the nurses at night. She’s a good kind person and she works in a hospital. And even she doesn’t ‘get it’.

The running commentary sounds familiar. Instead of mean comments about your mother I would say, ‘hey granny wants to keep you in a dirty nappy. Silly granny.’ Also maybe pre-empt this by a running commentary of your own. I was always ‘narrated’ nappy changes to the baby- oooh now I am going to take the nappy off, ah it’s a little stinky here, come on, wipe wipe, yes mean Mummy I am here but it’s your stinky bum, you’ll thank me later, ah look, who’s all clean now, etc.’

The ‘is he cold?’ comments are par for the course. Just bat those off.
Now is not the time to get into a fight over the labelling comments. Once you are home, start praising twin 2 for something else instead (as their personalities develop).

On a practical note, will the nurses let you organise the tube feeding yourself? By the end I was allowed to heat up the milk and tube feed myself. It’ll stop the crazy 3 am ‘all lights blazing’ thing. It’s not a medical procedure so I don’t see why not.

congratulations on your babies! I hope you get home well soon.

Yanbu but she probably doesn't think she's being horrid.

When you speak to her calmly, it might be worth telling her about the experiment done on 2 plants-will try to find a link. They were bought in ikea & set in 2 places with similar conditions. One plant was talked to with positivity & happiness, the other told it was rubbish & bad etc. They developed very differently.

Tell her that you don't want to take any risks with negativity towards dc & that you hope she won't be offended when you remind her if she says something you don't want dc to hear. Offer her an alternative like 'oh I know those vitamins don't taste nice but mummy is looking after you so you get big & strong & come home soon to see all your lovely things'

I totally understand where you're coming from OP.

With my first baby MIL would walk around holding her crooning "You don't love your mummy, you don't love your mummy, you love your grandma best, you love your grandma best" over and over again.

I have to say I wanted to strangle her at the time. I was young and inexperienced and tired and she was an intimidating woman. If I had my time over again I'd like to think I would have said "Oh don't be so silly, give me the baby back now" but at the time I just couldn't somehow.

Stand up for yourself calmly if you possibly can. I wish I had.

By the way the kids eventually realised she was a complete fruitcake.

NICU would try the patience of a saint. Especially when you get staff who seem to delight in wrecking the shreds of sleep you DO get with the "oh welcome to being a parent" shit (I remember raising once that I hadn't eaten for about 2 days as they'd scheduled all DD1's NG tube feeds which I was expected to do directly up against ward food times - and I got the "well sometimes being a mummy means you have to go without a meal to look after your baby" reply from a staff member who looked about 12 years old... my reply that if I was at home I'd have a toaster, or a fridge I could grab a pot of yoghurt out of or whatever fell on deaf ears... 7 years later and it STILL winds me up now!)

DD2 was in hospital last year (my kid manages to get pneumonia in a heatwave) and there was one guy on night shift who I swear was Brian Blessed's long lost twin. In the end I joked with another staff member that was on that "I know threats against NHS staff aren't tolerated - but if he doesn't turn the decibel count down I'm going to kill him before tonight's over" and she just giggled, bollocked him and he discovered the ability to whisper (he'd woken DD2 up three times prior to that)!

My MIL drove me insane when the kids were babies with the "oooh she says mummy why are you doing that"... "oooh she says mummy I need my nappy changed".... "oooh she says mummy I don't like this look I'm crying mummy." I wish I'd taken it on and tackled it gently back then but I didn't have the assertiveness to do so - and it just niggled and needled and there's basically no relationship there left between me and MIL now. She thankfully had to ditch the "oooh she says" crap as DD1 was a ridiculously early talker and could tell us exactly what she thought of everything on her own without an intermediary well before she was 2!

I've pulled my own parents up several times when they've fallen into the "you were a naughty girl" versus "that was a naughty thing to do" trap as the kids have grown up, and my step father still needs gently channelling to make sure his language is positive when he's dealing with my youngest who has SN.

Congratulations though OP - my teeny tiny preemie is now one of the tallest in her class, top of her class for most stuff (she's less fond of maths), a right gobby stroppy bugger and no one believes me that she was as premature as she was.

Does she say nice things as well? Occasional teasing negative remarks might be just about OK if they were balanced by nice ones about them and you, but if everything she says is negative, it's just not on. I would be nipping this in the bud at once.

I also personally think the words "horrible" and "horrid" are very strong words, not to be used lightly. I think it's more suited to Bobbie in the Railway Children saying, with good reason, "everything's perfectly horrid".

O here's the plant bullying thing

https://www.adweek.com/brand-marketing/ikea-bullied-a-potted-plant-while-encouraging-another-then-showed-schoolkids-the-impact/

This really isn't a generational thing at all.

Sing song comments to babies, yes, negative comments no.

OP, I'd say there's a strong link between your D's comments and your own parenting as a child. You and your DB both have had MH issues and that'll be down to your parenting. Your DM is just continuing her poor parenting onto the next generation.

These comments do need nipping in the bud now, or they'll be said to your twins long after the baby stage.

Anyway, hope the twins are able to go home soon, best of luck to you. X

@Kosha I don’t really want to tube feed him tbh. He constantly rips the tube out of his nose and gets really distressed. The kitchen to heat the milk etc is at the other side of the NICU so I’d have to go out there three times a night. I’m feeling stressed enough with the constant BF and expressing tbh. The breastfeeding consultant has just been in to tell me I should pump after EVERY feed. I’m feeding twins twenty times a day ffs! My nipples will fall off if I have to pump twenty times a day on top of that.

It’s not a good day today

The fact she is labelling one as naughty already would give me the rage!!

YANBU I had a HV day similar "nasty mammy" when I was taping DS's oxygen prongs ffs.

The medical stuff is shitty especially when they are prem and/or sick no need to make you feel worse.

Hope you get home soon.

Are these her first DGCs - if so this could be her partly getting into the swing of things/and/or masking her concern for you and babies welfare/ it's not ok but it's early days and she might improve as babies grow and you all get out of hosp.

She obviously got some ingrained old fashioned idea about how you talk to babies and doesn’t mean any harm. I’d just tell her as politely as possible that this is not how people talk to babies anymore every time she does it and hope she gets the message.

I’d nip it in the bud now or it will send you up the wall!

sounds passive aggressive to me. My own mother did this and it wore me down. As it turned out she was taking more and more time with DD and always putting me down. Just be careful OP and nip it in the bud now.

Ah fair enough. The breastfeeding and pumping is a faff. When he was one I stopped and I had a ‘bye bye Medela’ party. Fingers crossed they both latch nicely soon and this stops. I stopped expressing after every feed once he got to his due date (we came home at 36+3). And I had just the one baby. I feel your pain. Although I had fed my older one so at some point I felt comfortable enough saying ‘this is a good latch and he’s draining the breast so I am not going to pump any more.’
Good luck and there is a wonderful FB group for Preemie Parents that you might find helpful. Parents of Preemies UK. Lovely admin and many wonderful ladies with a ton of experience.

I am confused as to why you are letting her visit regularly, she certainly seems to have done a number on you.

Congratulations on your twins!

I say things such as “horrible mummy” to my DTs when they’re screaming their heads off and I have to change their clothes for example, but always follow up with an explanation why I’m doing it. They just seem so angry, perhaps I shouldn’t but I do.

YANBU to ask her to stop, if saying it nicely and explaining your feelings doesn’t work, I’d start getting stroppier every time. They’re your kids, she doesn’t need to approve of how you’re choosing to raise them! You also don’t have to justify why you’ve decided x y and z (probably projecting here!). She’ll get it in time hopefully...

I hope your babies are out of hospital and home soon 💐

I can't believe people think you are being too sensitive!! Being undermined like that is awful. Positive talk around babies is so important. Well done for keeping going and being there for your babies.

There'll be a time soon enough when they're capable of declaring you a "horrible mummy" themselves as they stomp off up the stairs melodramatically in revolt at the word "no"... she doesn't need to start that off this early herself!

It's not a generational thing. I'm in my 60s and would never say such a thing. I can't remember my mother, born in 1930, threatening to smack her grandchildren either. Tell her to stop it now.

@Gersemi I don’t really get why you would ever tell a baby you’re going to smack his/her bum. Especially not a tiny baby who weighs a whole 3.5lbs!

Why is that addressed to me, OP? The post you're responding to was one where I pointed out that this isn't a generational thing because, being of the same or an earlier generation than your mother, neither I nor any contemporary that I knew ever said that.

While I'm at it, an obsession with burping babies isn't generational either. I breastfed my children and virtually never burped them. By contrast, someone on MN was saying yesterday how she currently gets up at night religiously to burp the baby after her partner had breastfed him.

I get “we are going to send you back” “he’s crying don’t like him now” from family members. Joke or not it sets me off on a hormonal rage