To ask for the most inappropriate unsolicited advice you received from a random person about your child?

[Adviceagains]

I’m feeling sensitive today. Stood in a queue and dd asleep in her pram. Women behind me starts talking to her husband/partner saying that baby looks too hot, how ridiculous she is in a hat indoors in this weather… obviously I could hear. I didn’t say anything. She then taps me on the shoulder and shows me an NHS page on clothing/temperatures for babies and said I might need it. What the fuck? I am a new mum and already stressing over making the right decisions. Am I alone in this? I actually cried when I got in the car.

No.... but once a diagnosis is given it is a gateway to support.

as some one who home educates and has 2 kids with complex disabilities that follows a alternative life style(google radical unschooling) ive had millions of comments and have got in to many rows

if you dont follow the text book of uk parenting style and school/childcare route and are not a sheep to the conventional norm your wrong and weird

ive been fighting comments since 04 when son 1 was born

The woman at school who I didn’t know, told me I should have given DD an older sibling. That way I could have passed down school uniform. No idea why she thought we couldn’t afford school uniform, when we could afford school fees 🤔

I might have taken some delight in pointing out DD was my second pregnancy, shame I miscarried her sister or I could have done exactly that! She never spoke to me again 😂😂

This thread is about inappropriate things said by other people to the posters, and I took it to mean that someone made this crass comment to @jacckandsalllly

When DD was 12 weeks old MiL told me that I should soft boil an egg every day and feed her the yolk.
And that I should take her nappy off and hold her over a potty so that she'd be potty trained by 16 weeks like her dad.

Oh and I forgot the cracker from MIL who told me to start weaning DD at 10 days! She told me to pop some baby rice into DD’s formula that way she’d fill up and sleep. A newborn…FFS!

I have 2 sons who are autistic and non verbal. I was told that my youngest "can speak but is just choosing not to". This was by a tutor who apparently specialises in teaching autistic children.

I've been in a similar situation. An expert told me my son didn't speak because he didn't have any space to speak and the rest of the family didn't give him the opportunity

My middle child was in crisis once. I had him in a safe hold, on the concourse of the local bus station. He and I were as safe as possible in the situation, but in full public view. Most people just went around us, one bloke decided to stand and berate me. He ended his rant with “that child needs a good hiding!” to which I replied “so do you, but I’m a bit busy right now.”

The absolute best was that DD should be wearing gloves at an indoor ice skating arena. Tons of other kids without gloves too. But this old guy picked me out to tell me that?

Unfortunately I didn't tell him to go fuck himself

its normally compulsory for safety reasons. My brother works in A and E and insists, for everyone in the family. Maybe it was my brother you met!! 😂It may have been unsolicited, but I wouldn't call that "inappropriate" .

It is the difference between losing your fingers and saving them if someone skates over your hand

A family member told me my ds is autistic, adhd and agoraphobic because I never took him.to the park enough, and when my dd was diagnosed with autism they said I must be doing something wrong in pregnancy to have two "like it". Same family member says they will grow out of it, she knows as she's worked with children for years ( she's a dinner lady 2 lunch times a week)

My son is visually impaired. Sitting in doctor's waiting room when he was about 9 months old. An elderly man comes over from the other side of the room to look in the pram at him...and then says, "oh...he's a bit boss eyed...what a shame". One of those moment when you are a totally overwhelmed and sleep deprived new mum and you think of all the responses you could have given after the event. It's stuck with me though.

A few snippets:

At 4 weeks old: 'Is he good? Is he sleeping through the night?'

By a receptionist at the dentist (note, baby was in pram at time): 'There's a reason teeth come at 6 months, that's when you should stop breastfeeding.' - baby was 4 months old... Breastfed until just over 2.

Many, many random people saying he either needed more/ less layers utterly unbidden. Often with conflicting unasked for opinions on the same day in the same weather...

'SIDs is just scaremongering, all my children were fine and we didn't have that advice in the 80s and 90s,'

'Why are they rear facing still (for a 7 month old)? Aren't they uncomfortable?'

'You should put rice in their milk or they will never sleep,' - about an at the time very much asleep 3 month old.

'I had mine on solids from 10 weeks,'

Oh gosh... There's just millions. And all unsolicited!

Breastfeeding my fifth baby, on the maternity ward
Midwife came in to tell me that I was “doing it wrong” 😂

After her round, I ended up speaking to several women who were on the verge of giving up after the way she spoke them. Helped some of them to relax and get more comfortable, and they decided they were happy to continue with it. And supported another woman in her decision to go onto bottle feeding.

Ott to cry about it but yeah you can’t really give unsolicited advice about other people’s babies unless it’s some kind of emergency.

That said, the NHS does recommend taking hats off babies indoors as they can overheat rapidly if they can’t expel body heat through their head, so the advice was probably actually sound.

Some old lady stopped me and told my my baby shouldn’t be sat up in her pram. My baby was 6 months old but looked younger as she was small for her age. BUT she had really bad reflux and could never be laid down flat and was kept up alot of the time. At 6 months she was sitting up unaided out of her pram.

@orangeleavesinautumn I never understand this- how is a pair of stretchy magic gloves going to protect your fingers from the weight of a person slicing over them with ice skates on?

The silence though... People should stand up for other people if they hear inappropriate comments. I'm just mad I don't hear them.

I dont understand it either, tbh, but my brother assures me it makes a difference. How much difference, I dont know, but he has told me of cases where he thinks fingers were saved by what seems to me to by a modicum of protection.

Still, if you have ever seen a cyclist come off their bike, there is a clear demarkation in their cuts and grazes where their clothing ends - I am amazed how much even a teeshirt protects the skin. Different forces though, I agree

@Tinkietot 😂 this reminds me of the time I took my son and his best friend to the cinema when they were about 6 - the woman serving said ‘oh your twins are so beautiful’- I said thanks, they are pretty but they aren’t twins- this one isn’t actually mine… and she wouldn’t have it! It was all ‘are you sure?’ ‘But they look so alike’ ‘they have the same hair’ ‘they must at least be siblings’.

The advice I get most (and get tutted at about most about) is my son not wearing shoes. He is autistic and he hates them. He has them, he takes them off.

I don't wear shoes a lot of the time. At work I'm known so much for it, that when I broke my toe and was wearing sandals, more people commented that I was wearing shoes than that i was limping badly!

I'll admit I was judgy pre children when I saw kids underdressed and shoeless in cold weather. Then I had DD, I haven't been able to keep a coat or shoes on her since she was 6 months old.

There’s always someone ready to offer you some sort of bullshit when you have a baby, I nipped in a shop for one item with my 2 year old who was in a foul mood kicking me when I was carrying him and then screaming if I put him down, I had been in the shop for 5 seconds when a woman said ‘he’s tired of walking he’s too young to be expected to walk so far’ he had literally taken 2 steps, I had carried him from the car and just put him down…..I just told her to fuck off and mind her own business

Every wo(man) & their dog will have advice to give - wanted or not! Just know that you’re doing a great job - smile & wave, smile & wave :-)