AIBU to find it weird when adult friend acts like a baby?

[Puzzled47]

I will preface this to say this is one of my oldest friends and I love her to bits, she is kind, thoughtful, we have great fun etc.

However, she has a habit of acting like a baby a lot of the time and it genuinely baffles me! She's always done it to some extent but I'm sure she's got worse in the last year or so. We are both early 30s btw.

Examples include:
Regularly talking in an actual baby voice (no human under the age of 30 around) and using phrases like "would you like some more winey winey?"
Calls her parents mumma and dadda, never mum and dad etc
Refers to a shower as a "joosh joosh" (wtf?!)
Calls her husband all sorts of really cringy pet names (in public) in a baby voice like "sausage boo" and "bubba".
She sometimes physically acts quite childlike too, it's hard to explain but things like holding a mug of tea, or a glass of water, she holds it with both hands and tips it up to sip with her arms tucked tight to her body (she has no physical disability before anyone suggests that).

It's odd as she is physically extremely petite and quite underweight and has mentioned before how she feels insecure at not having a womanly figure. So I find it odd that she chooses to act like a child if this is one of her insecurities?

Maybe I'm just a massive bitch but this is weird behaviour for a grown adult right?

YABU - this is perfectly normal, I wouldn't bat an eyelid at this behaviour
YANBU - no, weird

Does her mother speak like this? I lived next door to someone well into their sixties who used to put on the Miranda Richardson Queenie accent. I think she thought she was being cute and funny but she wasn’t.

She definitely turns it on and off, and she definitely does it more around men, now she’s married obviously less so but she seems to like the “I’m such a tiny little woman and here’s a big strong man” kind of situation. She does a very girly cutesy little giggle when she’s trying to charm people too.

It doesn’t particularly annoy me about her (which is strange as I’m usually very intolerant of any overly frivolous behaviour, screaming and shrieking etc) she’s my friend and it’s not her defining quality and I love her despite all this. I just find it so damn weird!

You’ve given enough specifics OP, I think you’ve solved your own problem if your friend is on here or the Daily Wail get wind of this thread 👍🏽

I've noticed two of my colleagues (both on the Autusm Spectrum) do this too. I think personally, that it's comforting for them. Almost like a cloak of safety and if it makes them feel better about things, so be it.

@Blacktothepink

Arrested personality development.

Exactly

Oh no I absolutely could not.

I know if someone who’s like this, she and her sister speak to each other using baby voices and the dog basically IS a baby - she is middle aged and has a highly professional job!

Another vote for a trauma or abuse in the past.
People often exhibit regressive behaviour having been through abuse.
Particularly around opposite sex who were the perpetrators of abuse.

Have a friend like this as well, uses it when she wants someone to do something for her, complete with a pouty face. I think she thinks it's cute. I find it highly irritating, especially when her husband runs off to do whatever the hell it is she can't seem to do herself.

I don't know, it's not great that something that sets her apart from everyone else so much is something you find weird- if you are one of her oldest friends ... I don't know, I have quirks and I'd hate to think any of my friends analyse them as opposed to just accept them

I’d be very very surprised if it was abuse related. I’ve known her for 20 years and while I know these things can be kept very well hidden, I just highly doubt that being the reason. Call it gut feeling. I think she likes the treatment people give her when she acts like this and it’s just habit now.

Does she say “ickle” instead of “little”?

Does she stand in that pigeon toed way, to look cute?

I, like 93% of the other voters, went with YANBU AT ALL

@Puzzled47

I’d be very very surprised if it was abuse related. I’ve known her for 20 years and while I know these things can be kept very well hidden, I just highly doubt that being the reason. Call it gut feeling. I think she likes the treatment people give her when she acts like this and it’s just habit now.

I would just be creeped out, i'm amazed anyone responds well apart from pervy blokes.

I find it highly irritating, especially when her husband runs off to do whatever the hell it is she can't seem to do herself.

But you see, it is working perfectly for her.

I think in most cases it is as simple as that, not necessarily indicative of anything sinister.

When you think of all the women posting on Mumsnet whose DHs won't lift a finger to make life easier for their DW... Maybe the vomit inducing baby talkers are geniuses?

Bitty 😏

I just spat water everywhere marmite 😂😂

It sounds as though her and her DH are partly into 'Adult baby' play and are enjoying doing some of it in public. I worked with a young woman who used to do this when she first started. We soon put a stop to it. She was small, but had big boobs and was blonde. She used it to make men jump and they did. Which says a lot about men.

I’m imagining her with a voice like the (middle aged) actor who played Moaning Myrtle. shudder

Why do you care what people call their parents? It can just be family terms of affection. Most of the posher types I know call their mother Mummy, Mumsy or Mama as adults.

The baby voice is weird. I would just ignore her talking like that a bit.

The funny words for things though, again I know lots of posher families who almost have a dialect of these terms and they usually stem from affectionate family humour. It doesnt bother me, although I think it's quite odd to use those sorts of things with people outside the family as its usually kind of in-jokes.

The mug thing: are you sure she doesnt have even minor issues causing this? My siblings and I do this a bit and it's because a) we are cold a lot and tucking arms against your body helps retain heat b) we all have a tendency to trapped nerves in wrists/elbows (minor/very common) and worry about dropping hot drinks. Again, bracing arms against body can help you feel like you have a more stable grip on something.

Sausage Boo 😂

I'm a bit like that when I'm tipsy.

I don't use baby language, and I don't use silly pet names, but I go higher pitched, and use more childlike gestures/actions.

It's not something I like in myself, and so I rarely drink. My friends used to refer to it as my 'mouse phase' of a night out.

I would feel the same as you OP, like: "I love you, but that's weird".

I’d be very very surprised if it was abuse related. I’ve known her for 20 years and while I know these things can be kept very well hidden, I just highly doubt that being the reason. Call it gut feeling. I think she likes the treatment people give her when she acts like this and it’s just habit now.

Abuse can take many forms though. A pervasive misogyny in the home can have the effect you describe, which is a learned helplessness on the part of a little girl growing up with toxic attitudes toward women swirling around.

Most adult women get what they want by straight up asking for it or getting it themselves, or discussing it with a partner if it's a big undertaking or an expensive purchase. Women brought up in healthy homes enter discussions using their normal adult voices, with confidence that they are talking to a reasonable person and that there is a good chance of agreement. Women brought up in unhealthy homes resort to other tactics because they have never experienced any honouring of their 'voice', their pov, or never got what they wanted through reasonable discussion where they were treated as equally entitled to their pov.

Remarks about women on TV, remarks about women who are professionals, politicians, journalists, any women in the public eye, or even remarks about 'wimmin drivers', or casual comments made about the appearance of women on TV and in everyday life can all add up.

I would guess that the home this friend of yours was brought up in was one where misogyny was part of the wallpaper. Hence her baby voice and her clear struggle and discomfort with the idea of a womanly shape.

If you’re such good friends why have you never said anything?
I’d not be able to keep quiet when she said sausage boo 🤣🤣

I've known two women who did this, often in a rather coquettish manner to any man who happened to be around. It never appeared to annoy the men but alienated plenty of women. It was very tedious.

Statistically unlikely, but it may be flashes of dissociative identity disorder. Is there a pattern of this happening when she’s tired or stressed etc?

I know an upper class, tiny lady who does this too. No history of abuse, very happy person. Clearly somewhat of a thing. The baby voice turns my stomach.