Am I overreacting at my boyfriend giving my 4 month old yogurt?

[Peaches92]

Hi everyone
my boyfriend and I do not live together and I got pregnant early into the relationship so it has been a struggle at times
He is 49 and has 2 older kids in their 20s and I am 30 and this is my first baby girl who is 4 months old.
I have a lot of the time been looking after our baby alone with us only seeing him maybe once or twice a week sometimes less but in the past week or 2 he has stepped up a little bit and helped out a bit more.
So yesterday I woke up with a fever and a bad cough and cold so he said he would take the baby for a few hours so I could rest as he didn’t want to catch my bug. When I asked him how she was he said she had been good and he had given her some yogurts and she liked them. My problem with this is we had spoken about giving her solids recently and I said I wanted to wait until she was 6 months so not to give her any yet. He didn’t agree but he didn’t buy the food at the time but I’d asked him not to give her any. When he told me he’d given her some I said he shouldn’t have because I’d told him not to and that because she’s a bigger baby my health visitor said to wait as long as possible to give her solids to avoid her putting on too much weight etc. He is now not talking to me after I asked him not to feed her anything except milk next time he looks after her. Am I being unreasonable ?

He looked after his own child for a few hours while the OP was ill with a fever. That isn't 'playing pass the baby'. It's being a parent.

So cute to totally miss the point by telling (another?) woman she just has to suck up the male domination. 👌

What he did was tell you that any attempt by you to have him take responsibility for his own child will result in possible harm to the child, that he will disregard nutrition guidelines and possibly safety guidelines just enough to keep her safe but just enough to cause you to stop asking for his assistance in parenting.

Dump him. He's telling you that he has no interest in the baby and absolutely no respect for you.

Stop expecting his involvement or asking for him to co-parent.

Make sure he pays every penny your child is entitled to in support.

This ^

He said, "Go away please"...

Lol.

What he wants is to go away. To go away and live in a lala land where men can do as they please and a real man doesn't stoop to cooperate with a woman.

He's pissed off that you're still expecting him to step up and parent his child responsibly even though he made it clear to you that he doesn't want to (by means of doing a cack handed job) and that he resents any expectation you have of him where your relationship or his relationship with the baby are concerned.

Pick your self-esteem up off the floor and stop trying to salvage this relationship.

When you recover from the flu, take his older daughter out to lunch and ask her for every single detail of his parenting and relationship style.

If you don't have your eyes well and truly opened by that, I recommend you find a therapist.

When I had my first baby back in 1995 the advice was to begin weaning and 3 months, which I did. By the time DD2 was born in 1998 it had changed to 4 months. It was still 4 months when DD3 was born in 2002 as far as I can remember.

I began weaning them all at 3 months. Baby rice, rusk etc. All have survived unharmed.

Not saying he shouldn't have listened to you, but I wouldn't get het up over it.

He was very unreasonable to go against your wishes when he is barely a parent to your baby, and unreasonable to take away that milestone of first foods from you - that's something that you should have both experienced together.

But I wouldn't worry about the actual fact of the yoghurt, NHS advice is outdated and you're actually supposed to wean between 4 and 6 months and introduce allergens like dairy early in that sweet spot of time between 4 and 6 months. Moving on I'd not rely on him for any childcare and think about whether you are really getting anything out of this relationship.

Was it natural yogurt or sweetened with a load of sugary fruit flavouring? Not that it makes much difference. He was totally wrong. Babies don't start solids until minimum 6 months regardless if they did 20 years ago.

Of course I do, and I 100% think you would too! But this guy? He "parents" his current child a few days a week! That's a total joke! I don't believe for one second he was so hands on with his first lot that he's remembered this.

it is yoghurt!! not poison! as for advice from HV they only tell you what the government currently advises and when was the last time you believed what the government said?????

On the other hand he may well have been hands on the first time around but, 20 years on, is really thinking "OMG another baby! I thought I was done with all that." Hence his initial reluctance to get involved.

If course that is not OK. He fathered the child so he should roll his sleeves up and do his bit. But when he does do that it is not totally surprising if he falls back on some of the experience he had with his first batch.

On the other hand he may well have been hands on the first time around but, 20 years on, is really thinking "OMG another baby! I thought I was done with all that." Hence his initial reluctance to get involved

Well considering his own daughter joked with the OP to 'enjoy being a single parent', doesn't exactly scream 'brilliant dad'.

He sounds like an absolute loser on the parent front. Is he actually your boyfriend/partner?

He sounds fucking useless. I do hope he is contributing financially as a bear minimum seeming he hardly visits.

Thanks again everyone for your input.
Since this post he messaged me this morning and asked how DD was and I said she was getting better. Since then things have gone downhill. We have broken up which I think was on the cards for a while. To cut a long story short on the living situation boyfriend didn’t want to live with me and has a small apartment not suitable for me, him and baby. Never considered renting somewhere together as he liked ‘doing his own thing’ (I did ask him). I was living with my parents because I couldn’t afford to rent on my own and due to circumstances out of my control with family I then was made homeless and am in temporary accommodation currently. The local council have found me somewhere and I had asked him if he could help me move next week and he said he was going abroad. This is when I realised he doesn’t really care and we ended up ending things not in a nice way at all. I did want to make it work because although I know things aren’t right I do love him but I need to look out for me and my daughter now. I appreciate everyone’s advice and taking the time to respond to me

Good luck OP, you're better off without him.

As others have said, make sure you make a CMS claim

Sorry to hear that op. I hope you and your daughter enjoy a future life with people in it who appreciate and care for you.

He's also her parent, and he's already had 2. Either you trust him to look after her and make decisions or you don't. If you leave her with him you need to accept he'll parent his way 🤷‍♀️

Ah c'mon now the guy is not much beyond the sperm donor.

This young woman needs to get a really good support system in place and brow beating her into thinking that an absent father who she's not in a proper relationship with anyhow is the equal parent is frankly gaslighting and abusive.

Jeez I'm all for equality but this situation isn't leaning towards it one bit.

IMO the OP needs to have full legal charge over her child and not a situation where this guy can mess around with her baby just so as to be provocative or dominant.

I'm pleased to hear you've got a place to move into.

You keep your home a sacred safe space and make a 'nest' for you and the baby. I hope you can find some decent people around you to help. If I knew you in real life, or knew you were near me, I'd be helping you move. It might be worth putting a shout out on one of those 'neighbour next door' type sites - there's good people in this world.

Sounds like the man has made his position clear. You don't need this loser messing with your head.

Being a young single mum is a vulnerable situation and now you've got the added stress of moving and getting settled, although hopefully that will be a wonderful fresh start. I hope you can reach out for every bit of support from any appropriate services, charities, community organisations as well as your local social services or mental health team. Don't be afraid to directly ask. You and your little one deserve a happy and healthy life.

I'm glad you split up with him OP, he sounds like an absolute shit "partner". Make sure he pays child maintenance and hope you can find some help to move.

I know it’s deeply frustrating, hurtful and worrying when your dp doesn’t listen to you about your dc, especially when you’re trying to follow advice from medical professionals, but I would try not to worry about the yogurt. It was a one off and it won’t have done any long lasting harm. I would be more concerned about the way your dp treats you.

Congratulations on your new home op. If he would let you and his own child live in temporary accommodation and be homeless rather than staying with him, he's totally selfish and you are right to end the relationship.

You and your baby are so much better off without him weighing you down. You don’t need to stop his pitiful contact, but you clearly can’t rely on him. What a pathetic loser.

YANBU but the health visitor’s advice is nonsense. In the time I had my 3 DCs weaning advice went from 3 to 4 to 6 months and every time the HVs insisted that it was vital at this particular stage. I ignored them as was breastfeeding and DCs not interested in solids initially anyway.