Parents offended at my choices

[NC4THISS]

I know I am probably BU here, NC’d.

DC is 6mo and every decision me and DH make about them seems to cause offence to our DF/Ms and I just don’t know why.

Sometimes medial things like whether to give them rusks, I don’t want to, they did and then I’m thrown a barrage of ‘oh well it didn’t do you any harm, we didn’t have that google in our day we just had to actually learn’. What am I doing wrong for every choice to make them feel like it’s a personal attack on their parenting. It’s not I just say what we’re doing and why I’ve come to that decision and it strikes a nerve.

Today has made me upset, maybe I’m more hormonal than usual. Told last week DC has CMPA HV has referred us to dietician. Told DF and family today so they don’t buy me/us and milk related produce for Christmas and DF just replied with lots of other reasons Dc could have a rash. As if I’d just woken up this morning and chosen today and decided he’s allergic to something. I realise that’s different but it just adds to the parents debacle.

What to we do? AIBU to be frustrated at them constantly taking offence at every choice we make? Or was it just different in their day and they feel threatened that we don’t ask them for advice often/at all.

I had this with my mum. My mum used to visit for a few days every month so she got to see what I was doing. Everything I did was wrong - wrong formula/food, wrong clothes, wrong nap times, wrong meal times. She constantly was trying to get me to change it. I believe it was about control - she didn’t have any and she couldn’t accept it. It was her problem but it was very wearing for me and DP.

Agree with other only share VERY important things (like the formula for CPMA) making it clear that that is what you are doing - no room for change. For everything else just carry on as you are - you know what works for you and your baby and when it doesn’t work it’s you who will have to deal with consequences.

Today has made me upset, maybe I’m more hormonal than usual

More likely to do with the twattish grandparents and their comments. I don't think any of us should have to ascribe justifiable feelings to our hormones to make them more acceptable.

Avoid telling them as much as possible. If they can't follow allergy advice then it isn't safe for the child to visit, that will be their loss as much as anyone's.

You do need to develop a thick skin with some relatives - every family has a couple who insist on taking it as a personal insult if you do anything remotely different from their advice.

Times have changed. I had my children 35 years ago, and I'm so glad I'm not having children now, it's so much more complicated. My kids were fine, very little trouble as children, turned into nice adults, so obviously a lot of what I read on MN I think "wtf?? WHY??". But I hope I can hold those thoughts in if and when I become a grandmother.

As a mother of an adult, you still want your children to get on OK, to not make mistakes, and I presume once I have grandchildren I will have the same love and desire for them to have the best start in life. It's very hard to believe someone knows better than you do when you have brought them (or their partner) up from babyhood, and when they are only half your age. Especially when you look back and realise how many "sensible mature decisions" you took in your 30s and 40s seem to have been impossibly reckless or inconsidered from the vantage point of 30 years hindsight. So continue to do your best by your children, but try to understand where she's coming from, and it may be easy to let the comments roll by without upset.

That's quite a passive aggressive post, @MereDintofPandiculation. Not that I don't see where you're coming from, but it's perhaps not quite as subtle about thinking you're superior to parents of your child's generation as you'd want to be.

@MereDintofPandiculation

Times have changed. I had my children 35 years ago, and I'm so glad I'm not having children now, it's so much more complicated. My kids were fine, very little trouble as children, turned into nice adults, so obviously a lot of what I read on MN I think "wtf?? WHY??". But I hope I can hold those thoughts in if and when I become a grandmother.

As a mother of an adult, you still want your children to get on OK, to not make mistakes, and I presume once I have grandchildren I will have the same love and desire for them to have the best start in life. It's very hard to believe someone knows better than you do when you have brought them (or their partner) up from babyhood, and when they are only half your age. Especially when you look back and realise how many "sensible mature decisions" you took in your 30s and 40s seem to have been impossibly reckless or inconsidered from the vantage point of 30 years hindsight. So continue to do your best by your children, but try to understand where she's coming from, and it may be easy to let the comments roll by without upset.

And yet you acknowledge yourself that you are glad not to be having your children now, because it's 'much more complicated', @MereDintofPandiculation. Why not recognise that your adult children, whom you raised, you say, to be good people, and who fully understand the 'complications' of now, raise their own children as they see fit without your preference for the childrearing techniques of yore? And if you can manage that with your children, why not condescend less to younger people in general? We know what we're doing. Same as you did.

I always find it so weird how many people are insistent that their parenting was far superior to today's, and are very upset that their children don't want to replicate their own upbringing exactly. Why do you think that is, if it was all so perfect?

But @MereDintofPandiculation your children will know far far far better than you what it is to be a parent in the 2020's, raising children who will live in the 2020's and beyond! Technology has changed, cultural norms are different, safety has improved, knowledge has grown. Your children will be far more aware of that than you will. As will their peers.

@NC4THISS

Ah crap, maybe it’s how I’ve worded the OP sorry *@Aquamarine1029* you're running the decisions you and your husband make by them anyway we’re not really, DM would ask why don’t we get DC some rusks and then I’d go on to explain no and why I don’t want to.

Don't explain. Just say 'we don't want to' (didn't know you could still get them!)

Eventually just tell them that they did things their way. You're doing things your way. Nothing wrong with either.

I think some families (quite a few, actually) have a culture where parents refuse to see children as independent adults for a long, long time. Having a child - and everything that goes with it - tends to bring this out.

I would raise it, in a nice way. "You made your decisions as parents, and I'm sure that some of them were not the same as your parents made for you. Now it's our turn, and some of our choices will also be different from those you made. This is not a criticism of you. Please don't take it personally. Every generation makes their own choices, because parenting changes and children are all very different."

Then, if/when they raise it again "We've spoken about this before. What can I do to reassure you that we aren't critical of your parenting?" (Increasingly, make it about this being THEIR problem, not yours).

just smile and agree, then ignore and do your own thing, its as easy as that !

It is so bloody annoying when grandparents take changes to standard childrearing practices as a personal slight. I have it with my DM/MIL. Take the Back to Sleep campaign. My own mum put us all to sleep on our fronts, but was 100% accepting of - and grateful for - the new evidence-based advice when DS was born. MIL on the other hand would raise her eyebrows an make this "humph" noise if it was ever mentioned that it is safer for babies to sleep on their backs. Drove me potty. Still does.

@titchy

But *@MereDintofPandiculation* your children will know far far far better than you what it is to be a parent in the 2020's, raising children who will live in the 2020's and beyond! Technology has changed, cultural norms are different, safety has improved, knowledge has grown. Your children will be far more aware of that than you will. As will their peers.

Yes, and weirdly, the people I know who remember their childhood very fondly and talk about how lovely their parents are, tend to be the ones whose parents don't feel invested in having their children replicate that childhood!

I've a friend who has a relationship with her parents that I really envy, and their standard line with her seems to be general interest in what's changed and what she does.

Sod them being offended. It's our baby, you and partner and doing things your way.

My mother doesn't do this, but my father really, really does. Any opinion I have (about anything, but mostly my children) which isn't a word-for-word repetition of his, makes him really angry and aggressive. I have occasionally wondered if he was about to hit me. He doesn't do this with anyone else, just me.

To be honest, I don't care why he does it, I just don't see him any more. I've never openly criticized the way my parents brought up my sisters (I was mostly outsourced!), but every slight deviation on my part is seen as almost an act of war!

Can you talk to them and say that if they don't stop, you will have to see them less? If I said that to my father, he would definitely hit me, so I'm not really sure how these things work for the normal people! If you are at their house and it gets too much, can you just leave? If they are otherwise loving and reasonable parents, perhaps they will be willing to at least see that their behaviour is upsetting you. If their behaviour becomes in any way dangerous to your child because of the allergy, then you always have more extreme options, but as a first option I would suggest talking to them honestly.

YANBU

I agree with PP - distance yourself with regards to their involvement and the information you give them. I found I had almost the opposite problem when my much younger DB and DSIL had their DC (18 years gap between the DC) and SIL would often ask advice.

I would say "Well I did this but I think the guidance has changed" "You should do what works for you and your baby as they are all different." I hope she didn't think I was being deliberately unhelpful but having had a baby doesn't make you a childcare expert, in the same way as having had a filling doesn't make you a dentist! Well, sort of anyway!!

If they are offended, then so what? The sky won't fall in.

Rusks were considering unhealthy back in the 70s so am surprised your parents advocating them. They are full of sugar and disgustingly sweet. I'm a grandparent and didn't give rusks to my children - my MIL thought I should.

Oh my gosh this!!!!! My in laws are the exact same! I was told by them that my DD needs a dummy so MIL took it upon herself to buy them! I put them straight in the bin!

Honestly, best advice I have now is just to listen and ignore, I limit when MIL can see my DD because I just get disrespected as a mum.

My mum tried this with me when I had dd as did the onlaws. They are all loving people so I listened without judgement and patiently and then sweetly replied that dd was my child and I would take on board their advice but ultimately do what I thought was best. I would then reiterate this everytime I got unsolicited, outdated advice. There were lots of little nuggets of wisdom in their too that I am glad they shared but ultimately I stood by the fact that I would do what I thought was best. Dd is 4 now and I have stuck to this mantra. It helps that dh is on exactly the same page and would reiterate the same message.

So my advice would be do not overshare and then stick to the mantra that you will do what you think is best for your child and that may well be different to what they did with you.

Smile, nod, ignore and do what you feel is best for your baby. Tell them stuff on a need to know basis, don’t overshare.

Your child is not you so by doing things differently than your parents did with you does not mean that you are criticising them or their parenting. Rules and guidelines change all the time, o am sure there will be stuff that parents do now that will be considered unhealthy in the future. Stick to your guns and if they get offended, that is sad but their choice as you are not criticising just trying to do right by your own baby!

My mil eye rolled at me lots when mine were babies, along with catch phrase- never did mine any harm. I just breezed though it with a lot of 'well that's what dh and me have decided'

never did mine any harm

This sends me into a small (internal) rage. I hear this too, more so from my DM, but on the whole DM does give lots of unwarranted advice compared to DF.

They are not together they are both in separate couples after divorcing some 15years ago so I have had some thoughts today that omg it must be me that’s the problem and not them.

This weekend DM hissed ‘ well, what are YOU going to do when DC is doing all different things to you when he has his own because it’s all changed again!?!?! ’

So I just replied ‘ be grateful that science has moved on ‘

I agree with the other posters. You are over sharing. You are an adult and you make your own decisions. You do not need to run it by your parents. Share on a need to know basis. Otherwise talk about the weather and how many pops your baby has had.

To be honest, grandparents who behave like this are really shooting themselves in the foot.

They're never going to get to make the decisions about their grandkids. That's a parenting job, not a grandparenting job.

All that's going to happen is that the grandchildren's parents are going to get pissed off with their interference and criticism. And then the grandparents get less and less contact with their grandchildren. Because who wants to spend the day with Bossy Granny?

If you want to be part of kids' lives... be nice to their parents.

My MIL used to make passive/aggressive comments - DS had a milk intolerance also. She made some comment that it was OK to give him cow milk as he will grow out of it.

I said something along the lines of, 'well, I want to believe you, but am a bit stick - your advice or his consultants who has a medical degree...'