To think MIL is crazy and can't be trusted with DD?

[Tulips26]

So MIL always seemed a bit strange, but never thought she would do this.

We have a 5 month old DD and live 3 hours away from her so she's been complaining since DD was born that it's so unfair and why can't I change jobs and move to her town. The last few months she's been asking almost every day to have DD over for a whole weekend 'alone', which is tricky to arrange because we live so far. And I'm also still breastfeeding so haven't been able to leave her more than 3 hours.

I got tired of her asking and asking and finally agreed. I pumped every day for 2 weeks to get enough milk for a weekend and we booked a B&B near Mil's house so we'd be close if she had any problems.

I thought MIL would be ecstatic to get the 'girls' weekend with DD she'd been begging for, but she was furious we'd booked a B&B so close to her house, said we didn't trust her and should have booked somewhere at least 1 hour away.

To be honest I wasn't really comfortable leaving DD alone for that much time with ANYONE, but I felt so pressured to keep the peace.

We dropped her off just before lunchtime on Saturday and had a nice day alone just me and DH. I phoned MIL at 7 to ask how things were going and to say goodnight to DD but her phone went straight to voicemail. Phoned a few more times, no answer and forty minutes later I decided I needed to check everything was fine and went to MIL's house.

I found DD screaming being looked after by MIL's other granddaughter who is 12 (our DD's cousin). MIL is nowhere to be found.

Our niece explains she's been really interested in babies and MIL said she could get work experience looking after DD while MIL went to the cinema!! What the hell??

I was fuming, phoned my SIL shouting but SIL wasn't aware this had happened and was extremely apologetic, picked up her daughter straight away.

MIL finally got home after her movie night with friends and started shouting at us for checking up on DD, saying everything was under control and that our niece was perfectly capable of looking after a baby and we should be encouraging her skills and giving her the experience of looking after a baby herself.

I left in tears and we drove home straight away. MIL keeps calling but I'm refusing to talk to her.

I've told her she can never look after DD without us present again. Not keen on visiting her for a long time either. SIL and DH both say I'm overreacting a little bit and that it was bad, but not that bad!!?!

@AllyBamma
It’s not good form to put a post like this on a thread. If you suspect a poster is a creative writer, you should report the post.

Personally I think this awful situation is entirely credible.

What is the psychology behind so many MILs and DMs insisting on having babies "overnight"? Are they trying to recapture their own child-rearing years? Bloody bonkers.
I don’t get this either

Since you haven’t come back to the thread, I hope you’re thinking about why you used your tiny breastfed baby to get a bully off your back. They’re people, not toys.

Completely outrageous - YANBU. How awful for you as well, you should be able to trust your MIL above any babysitter etc.

The 12yo is not capable of caring for a young baby. This is also abusive towards them, as well as negligent to your baby. Not only that, she was completely out of contact, presumably for several hours.

I would be telling her in no uncertain terms that she will not be caring for your child at any point in the future. She is completely untrustworthy.

X post since you have come back. Sorry, but that’s even worse. You gave her your baby to make her feel better?!

If she’s struggling with grief she needs a qualified therapist, not to play mum or have a “girls weekend” with a baby

Even if she hadn’t fucked off to the cinema you shouldn’t have agreed to this. Your baby is your priority, or should be!

What your mil did was not just reckless, stupid and immoral it was also illegal. Just remind DH that you'd have been within your rights to report her for child neglect.

How kind and unselfish you've been. The best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour and I'm afraid your MiL has blown it well and truly. She may not of meant to but nevertheless lacked the mental capacity to make the right decision. She prob lacks the mental capacity to understand why her behaviour is outrageous

Your DH needs to protect you and your little one now and what you all in your little family find acceptable, which is of course with you parents there when she is there with your little one.

In time you may be able to build some sort of relationship ...but I wouldnt worry if this monster in law is not a big part of your life ... she really cant have been that bothered if she went out with friends (instead of staying at home looking after baby as shed made such a fuss about).

The person who needs to step up here is your DH.

Wow! That’s utterly unbelievable behaviour from your MIL! it’s also hard to believe your DH isn’t backing you up here given how bizarrely she’s behaved.

Your MIL is batshit. YANBU

She's insane. Never, ever leave your DD or any future children with her unsupervised again.

SIL used to look after DH? Say no more... MIL has form. Totally unforgivable. If something awful had happened, who would have been Legally responsible and liable in this situation???

YANBU at all. I would be going no contact with MIL and if I was your SIL I wouldn't be letting MIL look after my child again.

Oh my god. I’m actually speechless. There is no way I’d ever be stepping foot in her house again

She did this deliberately to score points over you, treating your child as if the child doesn't matter, this was done deliberately to put you down and score points over you
You should never ever trust her again, if that's her opening move what will she do next to get one over on you?

I often think the MIL stuff on here is overblown but in this case she was so far out of order just demanding a weekend alone with 5 month DD- er, what? Why?? As for the leaving DD alone with another child - I might have killed her on the spot. That’s if DH hadn’t done it first, I can’t even imagine how horrified he would be.
Your DH and SIL are wrong. They need to be backing you up to hang MIL out to dry for a bit. And yes, she never, ever gets DD alone again as far as j’m concerned

Why are people bashing the op for leaving her baby with mil, yes it was an error, shes acknowledged that.
BUT when someone puts so much pressure on you, you eventually start to question if you're wrong in saying no, especially if other people are backing up the person placing the pressure, which u suspect there may have been some of that at play. Dad has as much responsibility as mum to the child's welfare, therefore if he says baby will be fine with mil, why would mum think twice about it? Especially when she's at a point of thinking "maybe I'm wrong for saying no, maybe baby will be OK for a couple of nights"
Everyone makes mistakes, we don't need to keep bashing op with that!!

I hope DH won't convince me to forgive MIL.

It’s entirely up to you whether you forgive her or not. I wouldn’t, personally.

You were guilted once into doing the wrong thing for your baby, in order to please MIL. Don’t allow yourself to be guilted into something you don’t want again, just to please her or DH.

You sound like you are too compliant with the wishes of others, and have people pleasing tendencies. You have every bit as much of a right to have your own opinions and feelings as your MIL and DH. You do not have to go along with what they want. Asset yourself. You have every right to.

Your DH and SIL don't understand this is wrong because their parents did it to them. This is batshit crazy and you need to stand your ground. I've never heard of anything more ridiculous in my life.

I don’t know why people are having a go at you, you haven’t done anything wrong. There was a lot of pressure being piled on you and she was manipulating you. She is so out of order and I have no doubts you’ll not let it happen again.

I stand by everything I wrote in my last post OP but reading your update about your mil losing her husband recently- I do think you need to give her some slack for that at least. Grief can do terrible things to people including making them not see situations clearly. Many people react defensively when they're feeling like they're being attacked for doing something wrong (which she definitely did!!!!)

Maybe if she's really struggling then she's just made a spectacular error of judgement. I'd still not leave my child with her, but I might be less inclined to fall out.

In hindsight, you should've taken baby home, dropped off DN and let MIL come home to an empty house with both her GDs gone. Perhaps then she would get a feel for how dangerous it couldve been.

I feel sorry for the DN, and if I was your SIL I'd be cross at MIL for putting her in that situation too. What did SiL think was happening that night? I assume she thought your MIL would be watching DN all night, no? I'd be furious if my babysitter had gone out and left the 12yo unattended, but even more so to find out she'd been put in charge of a 5mo! What if the baby choked? What if she had a fever? What if DN couldn't get her to stop crying and shook her in frustration? What if DN gave her a bath and popped into another room to fetch a towel leaving baby unattended? What if DN wrapped her in too many layers and she overheated in bed? If something happened to your DD, that would be on a 12yo's conscience forever. Totally unfair to put her in that situation as a "learning experience"! And DN could've still had the experience with MIL in the house, no? Why did MIL need to go out to give DN the "work experience"?!

YADNBU

Try not to give yourself too hard a time OP.

I would NOT be forgiving MIL but it is done. Your DD is ok - thank fuck! - just ignore MIL and any comments about her from your DH & SIL, and get on with life

It was clearly premeditated too, like the
begging, the insisting you were an hour away, she had it planned, she used her dead husband to manipulate you and to put her other granddaughters feelings over your dd's safety, fucking cow, honestly the sneakiness and planning that went into it would just make me not want to look at her again

Yanbu.
Stop engaging with her. She blew it. Did she orchestrate the whole thing for the 12 year old niece? Bit confused about that.
Trust your instincts in future.