To not want to give lifts with baby in the car

[alwaysfrazzled]

My baby is four months old and is a nightmare in the car. She screams the place down and always drops her dummy which upsets her even more. If I need to go anywhere in the car I make it short journeys and if I have to go anywhere longer than ten mins I always go with someone else in the back.
Sister in law is in hospital and needs a lift home. She stays a half hour drive away so that's an hour round trip.
She would have to sit in the back with the baby but it won't stop the screaming, on the way home would be a nightmare. I hate driving with constant screaming.
I don't want to do it. Would I be unreasonable to suggest she gets the bus home?
My partner is working away so not home to help. Her mum is on holiday. Nobody else can drive her home. Nightmare.

The baby's only 4 months. I wouldn't leave a 4 month old with a random school mom or neighbour.

The comfort of knowing you’ll step out of the hospital to a friendly, familiar face? Be able to get home and have a cuppa with a relative? Not having to sit at a bus stop waiting when you’re obviously unwell enough to be kept in hospital. It’s a bit sad if you really can’t see any way a relative picking you up when you’re ill would bring someone comfort.

Since they’re not the sort of family to pitch in to help you, I don’t see why you have been volunteered to drive with a screamy baby. I’d say that it’s simply not possible.

Would you really feel comforted knowing you'd forced your SIL to collect you with a screaming baby in the back seat? And then knowing that once you were home and settled, she'd have to do the same journey home again?

So you also expect the OP to hang around and have a cuppa, too, when she has her newborn with her, and children to pick up from school? It's a bit sad if you thing to do to a mother of a newborn, when if SIL wants a friendly face why doesn't she ask her best friend to pick her up, and not expecting this mother of a newborn to inconvenience herself and other road users, for a woman that is well and is being released.

A 'friendly face' might be nice, but when it means you are inconveniencing a mother of a newborn and risking other road users, it is an unacceptable thing to ask. And she is being released from hospital, so she's well now.

Apparently MNHQ no longer delete dangerous medical advice.

It's controversial because it's an outrageous suggestion. You can't medicate a baby so that they sleep without proper advice. That's a disgusting suggestion and I hope you don't have children.

Bully for you!

Can't wait to see you on the Pride of Britain awards!

How do you know she is well enough?

People are discharged from hospital not ‘well’ every day. As many recover at home, in fact in many cases hospitals won’t release until someone picks you up.

You sound incredibly miserable

how is it dangerous?

Calpol is hardly crack cocaine

OP why ask when you clearly made up your mind before you posted?

Were you just after validation?

Of course that's the nicest option, and I think most families like to help each other out, but life often means you have to suck it up and take the harder option. I don't see why the onus should be on OP and a young baby to have a really tricky hour for the sake of SIL looking into other transport options. Or why can't MIL alter holiday plans or can one of SIL's friends ferry her about?

@LargeHadronCollidHER do you know the implications of prolonged use of ibuprofen/paracetamol etc? On a young baby, giving them medication multiple times a day is highly to cause irreversible organ damage.

They don't release you if you are still in Active Sepsis. It's a safeguarding issue and a legal issue on behalf of the hospital.

If pointing out that it is selfish to expect the mother of a newborn baby to risk her baby's health and the lives of other road users for a CFing chancer who can call her best friend, a tax or a bus, I'll be proudly miserable and know I stand for fairness, safety and responsibility, not miserable CFing chancers.

Prolonged being the key element there

Once for a trip to get SIL isn’t prolonged use of anything

Calpol barely has any of the good stuff in it anymore either!

@LargeHadronCollidHER ok so it's fine to drug your baby against medical advice if it's to help other people?

Why should OP have to dose her newborn baby on Calpol, just to pick up SIL who has other options? People on here are beyond crazy.

Well, in my family, yes. It would be entirely normal to collect someone and spend a bit of time with them to make sure they’re ok when they’ve just be released from hospital. And on the flip side, when I’ve been unwell, perfectly normal (and much appreciated) for them to collect me and spend a bit of time with me. I don’t thin that’s an outlandish expectation, whether the person has a ‘newborn’ (four month old baby) or not.

But I have said multiple times that op shouldn’t feel obligated to go - just as long as she is aware it will likely have an impact on their relationship, because you’re unlikely to move yourself quickly to act as a babysitter or helper to someone who heard you were getting released from hospital, knew you had nobody to call on, and said ‘get the bus.’ It’s fine to be more self- centered as long as you balance that by being extremely self-reliant.

And I don’t think it’s a ‘sad thing’ to ask someone to do. It’s a normal thing to ask of someone. Normal families do these things, and ask these things for each other.

@LargeHadronCollidHER The baby screams until it vomits/chokes.

No one can drive safely when a baby is screaming in that state. It's a risk to other road users.

It's clear you're not a driver. The pity is all for you, the bitterness towards me for pointing out that it's not sensible, says more about you and your support of CFing chancers than it does about me.

It couldn't have been 'hell' because you had 4 kids 🤣

Just stick earplugs in or better still stick the kid in the boot.

And you don't see why it is unreasonable to expect this of a mother of a newborn with children in school, when she can ask her best friend or find other transport? You really think SIL being so self-centred is a good thing? What SIL is asking of OP is simply not reasonable, she is being self-centred and a CF. Why encourage that behaviour.

Of course I drive

You are clearly very bitter, and have said you’ve had to get out of hospital and take public transport, seems you’re one of those people who thinks ‘if I have to suffer why shouldn’t others’

You don’t seem to understand the workings of a normal, healthy family dynamic, people often put themselves out to help others.

Im sorry that you don’t have anyone in your life to do that for you.

It is NOT a normal thing to ask of a mother of a newborn baby, with children in school to pick up. It is not normal at all. No decent person would ask OP in her situation, they would ask their best friend, a family friend, or take the bus/taxi. They would not want to put someone out. Only a CFing chancer who is used to being self-centred would have the brass neck to ask such a thing of the OP.

Have you tried baby in the front? My first screamed in the car until I moved her in the front with me and she never screamed then.