I'm not sure how to deal with my partners mother. She can be quite interferring, and doesn't handle confrontation well at all. So it's a catch 22 for me, as I can't handle the way she deals with things, but at the same time I've been warned by her husband not to confront her as she doesn't handle it well.
We were staying with her temporarily when I was pregnant and we had found out that I was going to be induced. As my partner could not speak with the Midwife face-to-face, she offered to chat with him over the phone at a pre-arranged time and answer any questions he may have re. my induction. My partner was working from home that day and had an informal meeting but agreed to speak with the Midwife anyway, and told me to come and get him when she called. When she called I was ready to walk into the room where he was, when his mother demanded that I wait until after his meeting. I was obviously still on the phone with the Midwife and kept walking toward the living room (as I didn't feel it was her place to tell me what to do given that my partner was fine with it and she was aware that he had agreed to it), when she ran over to me and swiped my hair to try to get me to listen to her. I thought this was very overreaching to be honest, but I didn't say anything to her about it as I didn't want to make it a 'thing'.
Ever since baby has arrived she has been very overreaching
E.G. Telling me 7 times in the space of 4 days to use a dummy during the day, which has meant I've had to tell her 7 times that me and my partner only want him having a dummy during the night
On separate occasions when my child is asleep she has told me to "Leave him be" "leave him alone", "don't touch him", and "don't go near him". 2 of these time I was nowhere near him but she was preemptively telling me not to bother him, and 2 of these times I was going towards him to fix his blanket to keep him warm/clean spit up. This really bothers me, as I'm not comfortable with another person telling me to stay away from my own baby.
One day me and my partner were going to the shop and decided to take the baby with us for a little spin, when his mother told us that we're not allowed to as it's risky with the pandemic. (I was going to run into the shop whilst my partner sat in the car with the baby, we hadn't got a chance to explain that part to her before she interrupted). I know she has a point about not bringing baby into the shop, however, surely it's not her place to tell us what to do with our own baby?
At one point my baby had nappy rash and I was using a lotion the Doctor had recommended. I told his mother how good the lotion was when she started insisting that it was the egg white and Sudocrem that she recommended that cleared his nappy rash. Later on I was changing baby's nappy and her husband mentioned that his nappy rash was gone so I told him about the lotion. I then caught my partners mother give him a look, and her husband then said to me "Are you still using Sudocrem and egg whites though? Make sure you put plenty on". I found this really bizarre, surely it's a good thing that I found a good lotion that made my baby better? Yet, I feel like she took offence to the fact that I found something better than her idea of egg white and Sudocrem to heal it.
Am I being unreasonable in thinking that her behaviour needs to be addressed? I would ask my partner, but he has a tendency to get angry and doesn't handle situations as diplomatically as I feel I could and might make it worse. We're no longer living with them, but they call round a lot and we go to their house, and I would like this to continue so that we can remain close, but I can't handle her interferring anymore and need to nip it in the bud.