AIBU to ask in-laws to remove their shoes

[KHE89]

I'm not a mum yet (sorry to be intruding) but i wanted to get a mum's perspective on this.
I grew up not wearing shoes in the house, and whenever I go to someone's house, I take my shoes off when i enter (unless told otherwise).
My husband and I don't wear shoes in our own home. However, my in-laws wear their shoes in my house when they come over. Yes they make an attempt to wipe their shoes on the mat, but come rain or shine, they keep their shoes on.
This bugs me. When i do become a mum, I want this to stop because i want to minimise the amount of dirt in the house. If the child is playing on the floor, i don't want shoe dirt in that area.
AIBU to want this, and want my husband to have my back on this, even if he doesn't agree to this? We came to blows over this, but I don't feel like it's unreasonable.

I couldn't give a toss if guests have shoes on or not. Everyone I know is intelligent enough to take shoes off if they are genuinely crumbly with mud. Otherwise, I can deal with a light vacuum after they've gone. The hall carpet is an original feature of a 1980s house that once had dogs. It looks ok, but I'd hate a guest to wear cream socks on it

I encourage the kids to take theirs off, mainly so they can go in the cupboard and be found again.

There are lots of reasons why it may be embarrasing to be asked to take shoes off. You may have sweaty feet, a foot problem, grabbed odd socks at the last moment... Guests rarely wear their grottiest shoes over. Slippers are horrid to wear. Would you really have a full range to cater for all guests. Would you buy in size 2 and size 12 for me and DH? For me, sliding around in size 5s is frankly hazardous. Slithering around in blue bags looks ridiculous and is a waste of the world's resources.

By the time babies get mobile, they put so much rubbish in their mouths anyway, that it's really not worth getting uptight over a few guests wearing nice shoes in the house.

You're not being unreasonable. You could get a cute wooden sign and nail it to front door.

I think you will may have to just put up with it since you should have put your foot down originally and stopped anyone coming in to your home wearing shoes in the first place. It clearly divides people over something which should be a way to just respect someones wishes when being a house guest in their home. But people somehow think it's rude. We're all different.

I like the idea of providing slippers for each person who doesn't really want to remove their shoes since it might make them feel special or help them come round to your thinking.

I remove my shoes in other peoples homes. And so does my husband. But in-laws don't remove shoes in their own home.
When we moved to be closer to MIL after I had her first GC my DH asked MIL to remove her shoes yet she was clearly annoyed by this request. Perhaps she doesn't like being asked to do something different to how she behaves at her own home? It could feel like a judgement on them.
Also it could have been down to MIL's own issues about parenting and this being her first GC she would need to get used to her son making requests in the interests of his baby.
A few months later when BIL got his first flat and we visited there with MIL she suddenly had a different attitude and told US to remove our shoes for BIL and his girlfriends flat (they have not had children so not baby related request to remove shoes). Which we were removing our shoes anyway since thats how we roll.
Just an example of MIL treating people differently since she was still annoyed with us and would bring up the whole "removing shoes" issue in arguements with my DH....
From this you could take that so long as the request of removing shoes doesn't reflect on your in-laws parenting. See if you can make up a different excuse which doesn't mention the baby at all. Just in case that becomes an issue.

Only in a handful of Western countries is it considered normal, by some sections of the population, to keep shoes on indoors.

The rest of the world takes them off, and quite a lot of nations also wash their hands on entering a home after being in the big dirty outdoors. They don’t have the same blind belief that antibiotics can fix everything. As it happens, they are correct.

Just write a bloody poem and be done with it

there's another entire thread of tat out there ....

They don’t have the same blind belief that antibiotics can fix everything.

genius
I rarely laugh, but you rarely made me crack up!

I like the idea of providing slippers for each person who doesn't really want to remove their shoes since it might make them feel special or help them come round to your thinking.

How is providing manky slippers worn by a succession of visitors going to make anyone special?

They don’t have the same blind belief that antibiotics can fix everything. As it happens, they are correct.

It's other way round, actually. Growing up and being exposed to germs for a young age helps build up a child's immunity system so they will need fewer ABs later in life.

If you think the slippers have to be manky, probably says a lot about your own hygiene.

Mine always did the same ,it drove me mAd ,plus it’s rude ,we have tiles or Lino everywhere now ,as I go so fed up with it

Only in a handful of Western countries is it considered normal, by some sections of the population, to keep shoes on indoors

Any evidence that these sections of the population have higher rates of illness? I don't think so.

If you think the slippers have to be manky, probably says a lot about your own hygiene.

you share your footwear with other people? I don't. So unless you provide brand new ones for every guest....

I generally ask people to remove their shoes. But like many people who do this, I have an area in my home with a shoe cubby, slippers, and a bench to make it easy to do so. However, recently, I learned that shoes are actually not a very significant source of dirt in the home. I was surprised by this, but hey, you learn something new every day. I don't really care because I like this custom. On the other hand, I am curious why you say, "my in-laws" instead of "my visitors." Do your in-laws have extra-dirty feet?

If you think the slippers have to be manky, probably says a lot about your own hygiene.

I don't really want to wear slippers that have been worn by lots of other people, do you?

I wonder what not wanting to wear second to third hand slippers says about my hygiene.

And I wonder what thinking that slippers being worn by different people aren't manky says about yours.

Surprised nobody's suggested the obvious, hassle-free solution:

blue disinfectant foot bath outside your front door, just like leisure centres used to force you through prior to swimming lessons as a small kid.

Except shallow enough for shoe soles.

(BTW, why was there always someone's rogue verucca plaster floating in it? Bleurgh)

My inlaws do this too - pisses me off. They live on a farm and walk everything... mud, dirt, animal poop etc all over their floors, both carpet and lino and I kid you not the floor has not been cleaned apart from a cursory vacuum maybe once every 6 months in about 6 years.

They do not have the respect to only wear clean shoes in our house ad also my FIL happily puts his dirty shoes all over our material couch.

We definitely enforced the shoes off rule in our house when our kids were babies, one in particular ate everything, rocks, metal filings (both my DH and FIL are welders/metal workers and track this stuff in on their boots) and would lick people's shoes as a baby if there were wearing them in the house. They regularly tracked wet, muddy prints in while saying 'I know you don't like shoes on in the house but we wont be here long' Grrr!

*verruca, even.

No, because we wash them in our culture and buy new. Ikea sell them for £2 a pair. Plus, how disgusting are you feet if your making slippers manky? I’ve had the same pair of slippers for 2 years and they’re not anywhere near “manky”. And I wear them everyday for hours at a time, not occasionally for an hour like the house slippers get used. This country get more and more bizzare.

No, because we wash them in our culture and buy new. Ikea sell them for £2 a pair.

Environmental impact of that isn’t great.

You buy new slippers? That is so irresponsible and wasteful.

Just hoover and wash your floors.

My partner is Asian and we remove shoes in our house.

I find it cleaner. It really does cut down on dirt and filth.

We also vacuum every day. I prefer it. Dirt doesn’t get stuck to your feet.

If you could see some of the fungal infections some old blokes let fester you would be asking them to put on over-shoes.

I do hoover and wash my floors 😂 that’s why I dont want your gross shoes and feet on them!

I find it fascinating how this topic divides people

I think YABVU and weird to be worrying about your in-laws spreading ‘germs’ around hypothetical children you haven’t had yet.

But I do understand your irritation. My ILs are also ‘shoes on’ people and every visit, without fail, they trample mud up the stair carpet. I couldn’t care less about ‘germs’ (in fact I’m a huge believer in exposing my child to bacteria and potential allergens as much as possible) but I do care about the mess it makes and the extra work involved in clearing it up!