Kissing babies

[MUMbailey70]

Yesterday my partners son and girlfriend came around with their 3 month old baby. A little boy. They are very funny about anyone holding him but i did manage to get a little cuddle. As I held him i absent mindedly kissed the top of his head. I was in no uncertain terms told that kissing was a no no and I felt terrible. They told me that they had already fallen out with her mother over the issue. I obviously wont do it again as its against their wishes but I just wanted to ask what other people think of it. I know you shouldnt kiss babies on the mouth because of the worry of hpv but did I do something wrong ?

And don't even kiss ones that are yours, according to some weirdos.

Ha! Yes, feel slightly judged for not BF my DC but giving her a kiss.

Sounds like a pfb situation.

I don't see anything wrong with kissing family members.

The only benefit babies get from being kissed is if the breastfeeding mother kisses them as the touch can determine the nutrient levels/needs in the breast milk

This has got to be the biggest load of poop I have ever read on here. 😂

But it's not the point. It doesn't matter if it's their first or tenth. If you ask someone not to kiss your baby they don't kiss your baby.

This!

They're being a bit overprotective probably but they're the parents so best to follow their wishes. They might relax in a few months

Parents make the rules. Everyone else follows them. Simple.

No matter how batshit.

In the case of kissing babies - I don't think the parents are being unreasonable to request tjis.

Not your point maybe, but my point.

YANBU at all. It seems to be a thing all of a sudden.

Obviously anyone with cold sores needs to be very very careful but otherwise a kiss to the top of the head is fine.

There's a poster on here who has never kissed HER OWN baby, so there's obviously some fairly extreme messaging out there. You see these threads (from various points of view) quite a bit these days and I don't remember seeing it as much in the past. Maybe it's a covid thing?

Having said all that, you're right in that the right thing to do is to respect their boundaries.

Our hospital makes a big deal out of the risk of kisses from people who aren’t the parents. It’s all over our discharge pack, our hospital and home midwives talked to us about it and our HV reminds us often too. This is my first baby so I don’t know how new the advice is, but it’s a relatively easy thing to not do, and we’d have been annoyed if we’d asked people not to and they’d done it anyway.

Maybe it is PFB and we’ll laugh about it in years to come, or nobody else on MN would care, but in a world where advice and risks are being thrown at you left, right and centre; it seemed needlessly risky to allow this. Had we not seen a load of photos and had a load of lectures from health professionals, it wouldn’t have crossed our minds, but we have, so the NHS clearly thinks there’s enough of a risk.

OP, I don't think you did anything wrong if you weren't told beforehand not to kiss the baby. Just don't do it again.

Now you no for next time. It is pretty common for people to ask you not to kiss their babies.

That's interesting @TakeYourFinalPosition , mine are four and nearly two and I don't remember anything about that (even for the little one who was summer 2020) but maybe it's even more recent than that, or regional/cultural.

regardless of your own personal opinion on kissing babies, if someone says don't kiss my baby, you don't kiss their baby

Disagree. More likely the other way round where the parents of the baby refuse to see those that don't respect their wishes and boundaries of their child.

I think it's really sad. You see so much maternal isolation and struggling on here, we've lost the idea of 'a village' completely in this country. Mums get encouraged to not have close family visit for weeks but having a newborn in complete isolation is unnatural.

It's just a kiss on the forehead. It's such a natural response to holding something small and lovely.

Seems ridiculous to me too, precious first born?

Yeah that's my feeling too.

I remember my aunt visibly physically resisting kissing DD1, and saying "don't worry I won't miss her". I told her not to be silly, so she gave her the shortest peck on the hand I've ever seen. My aunt is very special to me and her late daughter was my best friend, I would've been happy for her to shower my DD (who she never gets to see due to distance) in kisses.

The idea of stopping my mum kissing my girls is awful, they should have cuddles and kisses from Nana (and from MIL).

Might help if they said it before the kiss happens though. Or do all new parents think people have crystal balls and a third eye?

Exactly this

Or they could just ask first?

I think it's perfectly reasonable that OP didn't realise she needed to kiss the top of her grandchild's head. She's said she won't do it again now she's been asked not to.

My MIL regularly kissed DD's face when she was a newborn and it drove me nuts as MIL gets cold sores. It was so awkward but we had to keep saying "no kisses" . . . I'm not sure if she would do it absent-mindedly or whether it was deliberate (she can be quite contrary and thinks a lot of the advice given to mothers these days is nonsense). On the other hand, my dad (who also gets cold sores) didn't even have to be asked, he knew not to kiss DD's face.

After the initial few weeks/months when they're a bit more vulnerable, I wouldn't have minded a kiss on the top of her head though. I don't think parents ask for no kisses to be deliberately mean or hurtful, there's just a huge fear when you have a baby. You want to do everything you can to protect them from the perceived millions of terrible things that could happen!

Mine are 3.5 and 8 months and I don't remember being told anything regarding kissing either! Like you, I wonder whether it's regional/depends on the NHS trust.

I have never read such utter tripe. Some of the things written on this site are truly mind boggling.