To not leave DD with batshit DM alone

[theymaynotmeantobuttheydo]

DM has no concept of danger and thinks nothing bad will ever happen to her. I often question how I survived my childhood with no physical injuries. Not a single broken bone or hospital visit...

There are (unconfirmed) rumours that she once gave my cousins 9 month old a sip of coke.

She lives localish to us and would have the kids DD6 and DD3 at the drop of the hat but I just don't trust her.. DH thinks I'm crazy as we could be off having a whale of the time but...

We use nursery for childcare.

I left DD3 for about 3 hours one morning as I had an adhoc work meeting and she put her in DS's forward facing booster seat for a non urgent car journey a mile away to collect something that could have waited. She "thought she was old enough to face forward now as she's big enough"

DD3 had a very minor scratch and I asked her to get some savlon and before i knew it she was applying some dodgy antibiotic cream to "take the redness away"
Oh when One DD was born she shoved some honey in her mouth at a few days old (some batshit cultural custom) before I could stop her. She has no boundaries. She can't be stopped or reasoned with. I had to insist she covered up her 6ft deep pond after she persisted with the fact I had never drowned in it as being a good enough reason to leave it.

My children need protecting from her. AIBU? I suspect not but DH thinks I am OTT!

Of course forward facing is fine for a 3 year old, but as op has said, in an appropriate seat. My dd, not long 4, is much too small for her older sisters high backed booster. It wouldn't be safe for her to travel in it.

Dotty do you mean the other way around?? Ie you couldn’t get your 1 year old to fit a rear facing seat?

My 4 year old is still comfortably in her Swedish 25kg (6 years old average) rear facing seat. Bought from the in car safety centre

She asked her to find the right batteries.. I'm pretty certain a 3 year old wouldn't interpret that as 'find button batteries and swallow them'.. all I would do is say 'oh watch her when she has those they can be a choking hazard' not decide she was insane and dangerous!!

The issue with button batteries is not that they are a choking hazard. They can be absolutely deadly if swallowed.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-29610570

OP YANBU - you have different views on child safety to her and she doesn’t appear to respect that. If she won’t get up to date and prove she can be trusted to stick to the safety rules you feel are important for your children, I wouldn’t leave the kids with her either.

Rf vs ff is a matter of physics, not opinion.
I don't think mil is batshit. The pond is quite obviously dangerous, the honey was probably ignorance, car seat not awful- many a 3 yr old travel in hbb daily. Batteries depend on the situation- mil holding out the tin for her to pick them up vs dd being handed the tin and told to come back when she finds matching ones...

I think mine would have thrown up with car sickness if I'd made them ride backwards (much as I would if sat in a rear facing train seat).

When mine were small rear facing seats were only recommended until 9 months or 22kg.

Yep, someone sounds batshit and it isn't the DM

I feel for you OP. My MIL is exactly the same. When I reel off some of the things she’s done with my kids, they sound fairly minor but overall, it just means I would feel very uneasy leaving my kids with her- which is why we never have.
It’s a mixture of general ditziness,not following instructions and downright dangerousness. I’ve got lots of tales but I remember once, before we had kids, we visited her and she was looking after her 1yr old nephew. Before his parents left him, they gave him some calpol, as he was a bit grumpy with a cold. After they’d left, she said she she was going to give him more medicine as he still seemed unhappy. I told her she couldn’t as he’d only had some half an hr ago and she’d be ODing him. She wouldn’t have it - I had to practically wrestle the bottle out of her hand. Always vowed never to leave my future babies with her alone!!!

I kind of see your point. I'm pretty relaxed about most of these things but the coke one would make me livid. The others wouldn't annoy me enough to write about them but you know her best.

She doesn't sound that bad, you on the otherhand though OP...you sound like very hard work.

Leaving the 3-year old to play unsupervised in the garden with the pond in while she went on an errand in the car a mile away would have been batshit. Taking the 3-year old on a short journey in a forward facing car seat is not batshit. People take 3-year olds on longer journeys in buses, trains and taxis without strapping them into rear-facing car seats, ffs. Yes, the child is more likely to be injured if there is a collision of some sort, but there really are far worse things you can do than strap a 3-year old into a forward facing car seat.

Unconfirmed rumours about a sip of coke made me chuckle 🤣

You lost me on dodgy antibiotic cream!

You have a far higher tolerance threshold than I.

She lost me on the "unconfirmed rumours" of a sip of coke.

You never had so much as a scratch in childhood. That indicates your maw's parenting could not have been seriously amiss.

Rumours of a sip of coke had me going too!

Batshit. The lot of ye.

I remember as a very small child having to pick nails out for my DDad from a bag of nails he had. One of my fondest memories as he'd give me great praise for finding the right ones.

Also never had seatbelts let alone car seats as children.

I do recall my mother giving my dd icecream when she was 1. I was annoyed with that. Moreso because I wanted to be the first to give her ice-cream, but as usual my mother rode roughshod over me.

I suspect you are inflexible.

You sound like extremely hard work op. A sip of coke? Get a grip

@Absofrigginlootly

Are you aware the biggest cause of accidents is poor driving? I assume you've taken regular driving assessments and hold advanced driving certificates?l

Have you checked your chosen seat is the safest of all the seats on the market. And have it checked weekly to ensure it remains fitted correctly (the biggest cause of injury in children in car accidents is poorly fitted seats)

Also, have you ensured you have a car with the highest NCAP rating?

Because, why wouldn't you if it keeps your child safe in the car?

My DD is 3 1/2 and was in a rear facing Cybex until about a month ago. Every time I strapped her in the car I got a good ten minute lecture from my DM about how ridiculous it was and how her "legs would break" if we got into a crash. I told her broken legs were better than a broken neck but she still wouldn't let up. My DM would never put DD in any danger, but parenting styles were a lot different 30 years ago.

theymaynotmeantobuttheydo they are your children and you are responsible for them. So don't leave them with your mum. You don't need a load of random people on the internet to tell you what to do.

(Am aware I am also a random on the internet!)

The battery thing would concern me but she obviously doesn't know that those things can be lethal.

I am having the cutting up grape war with my in laws. They don't spend all their time googling or seeing horror stories on parenting groups though so to be fair I wouldn't expect them to be all up on the risks. I'd send her an article about the button batteries and how they can corrode the windpipe.

I wouldn't be bothered about the coke or the cat seat to be honest.

Well the 3 year old is squashed and uncomfortable in the rear facing car seat. It’s completely over the top. When you go to the movies, do you like to sit with your legs nearly above your head?? You sound like a helicopter mum and your mum is probably the opposite. A balance somewhere in the middle would be best.

Yabbers don’t be disingenuous, there isn’t one car seat that’s safest it doesn’t work like that. Even a cursory amount of research on the subject will tell you that to be safe a car seat has to fit your child and your car properly. Some sears won’t fit properly into certain cars.

But rear facing just IS safer than forward facing. It’s not opinion. It’s scientific fact, supported by research and accident data.

And yes my children’s seats are highly rated, Swedish plus tested and installed correctly. I drive a very “safe” car and drive sensibly. Of course you can’t account for other people’s driving hence the rear facing car seats.

Oh and the accident stats show that children are way more likely to break their legs (as well as their spine) in a forward facing seat in a collision than a rear facing seat.

And my 4 year old can put her feet in her mouth without any bother. Obviously I can’t even get close as an adult (re: the cinema comment). So sitting with them slightly bent in the car doesn’t bother her in the slightest.

It’s not ridiculous or stupid. You do realise the UK lags decades behind other countries in terms of car seat safety and legislation no???

So why bother putting them in a car seat at all? If the biggest danger is bad driving, surely all we have to do is drive safer and we don't need car seats full stop.
Back in reality, I can research car seats, I can pick the best one for my car and my child, I can fit it safely and ensure my child is secure in the seat. I can do all that to protect my child as best I can. I couldn't do that and afford regular driving assessments. I could give up work so I no longer have the issue of needing to travel by car...of course then we'd lose the house... Or I could just do my best to keep my child safe. Note I say my best, as in to the best of my ability.

You do sound a bit over the top.
The only thing that would really bother me is the battery one (I think people who are brushing this one off are probably thinking about normal batteries).
The pool aspect depends how well she supervises. There is an uncovered pool at my inlaws but they never let the children out of their sight.
The car seat one might be related to where you live/who you mix with.
I have a three year old and 1 year old and I literally don't know anyone who kept their child rear facing after a year. I'm not arguing that they are not safer, it's just not something that has got into the parent consciousness where I live so I don't think she's unreasonable at all on that one.
The coke thing shows how overly protective you are- it's an unnecessary thing to do but hardly worthy of the horror you put upon it.