To deliver a lesson in table manners?

[Mannersdomatter]

My partners child is 12 and just started high school (year 7).

I realised last week that she doesn’t know how to use cutlery. We went to a very nice expensive restaurant and she ate her entire meal, including broccoli, with her fingers. She was holding broccoli in her fist like a banana/lollipop and biting it.

later on I asked her to use her cutlery and she had it in the wrong hands and was totally
clueless how to hold it.

in addition to this she lies down at the table, sits on her phone, spills food down herself, chews with her mouth open and is generally lacking in table manners.

I work in education and have children myself and I am astonished at how immature she is. She behaves more like a 6/7 year old. She is clearly bright, but speaks in a very baby voice and asks the most silly questions for her age. I worry she’ll be targeted at school by bullies.

WIBU to say to my partner I won’t eat out with them again until he teaches her how to use cutlery? I don’t feel it’s my place to pull her up on her table manners (although I have done several times).

I just realised I sound like my mother! 😂

The OP is not describing “ Victorian bigotry” or “ableist bullshit”, Christ on a bicycle. She’s describing a 12yo who can’t use a fork and eats broccoli with a fist like a 6mo old. My kids stopped doing that before their first birthday…

Thankyou!

I was being fairly light-hearted about giving her a lesson.

I mean there are table manners of “OMG she uses the fish knife wrong” and table manners of “makes other people at lunch lose their appetite” kind.

This is why words like bigotry lose all meaning. Come on now. Bigotry over a child unable to use cutlery. If you want to disagree that there should be a right and wrong way to hold cutlery that's fine. But bigotry?? Come on now.

There’s not a right hands for cutlery though, you can eat perfectly well with the cutlery either way round.

The rest I agree with.

of course it is bigotry. I bet you are someone able to conform to the pointless, meaningless "expected" way of holding your cutlery, and dont have to let it trouble you if people you cant are scolded, critisised, intimidated, put down, sneered at and told they are "wrong"

I would definitely discuss this with you partner, as it seems very strange that a 12 year old would still eat like that. There's really no excuse. Also, she or your partner may not be bothered, but what about the other people at the table or at a restaurant?

Also, why does everyone automatically assume that SEN would be an excuse for that? Which SEN would that be then? I have several friends with children who have SEN, even combined SEN and they are perfectly capable of eating with their mouth closed and using cutlery.

All these new partners/step parents on MN having to come in and sort out the awful behaviour of the step children due to failed parenting of the actual parents, well usually the fault The Useless Ex, almost always the Mum…

It’s worrying really, makes you wonder how most kids actually go on to live functioning lives if they don’t have that fresh pair of eyes/new broom descend into their lives to Sort Everyone Out 🤔

YABU

You are being petty to say she’s holding it in the wrong hands.

You also included that she is immature for her age and that you’re worried she’ll be bullied, which is irrelevant when talking about table manners and makes you sound more petty.

She’s not going to be bullied for holding her knife and fork in the wrong hand.

If she acts much younger then there are obviously other issues at play.
Theres acting immature for your age and then there’s acting half your age.

I can’t help feeling you don’t like this girl very much.

How long have you been with your partner?

I don’t like bad table manners (not including which hand to hold the knife and fork) but I’m not sure it’s your place to tell your partner how to parent his child.

Perhaps mention it in a round about way but be prepared for him to not listen as him and her mum obviously don’t seem to have an issue with it.

Nah, I’m right handed and use my cutlery technically the left handed way - nobody since primary school has ever mentioned it.

It’s not ‘wrong’ and nothing to do with the rest of the issue.

She’s not using cutlery at all, she’s gnawing at a fistful of broccoli like a toddler.

Do people feel its ignorant bigotry to expect people to use chopsticks correctly? Or to tie a tie correctly? Surely it's just a physical skill that sure, some might find harder than others but it makes cutting food easier and more hygienic than using fingers. Suspect people who think it's outdated just don't know how to use them. Americans get a pass because it's not their culture.

My brother, dad and best friend are all lefties- they use a knife and fork same as me?

I can't understand how you can bare to have this man near you, how can you have any respect for a parent who doesn't even notice that his child can't use cutlery! Has he tried, or looked into additional needs?

My first question given the list of grievances you have against her is if there is neurodivergence.

I hope her mother is aware of this and getting support for her (which is not easy) as your partner is clueless.

It's not really your place though it's up to the parents.

If you had an iota of empathy I'd make some suggestions but whatever the root of the problem she needs support to change not judgement so as you clearly don't like the kid best keep your beak out

Not for me. I'm left-handed as are both my parents and none of us hold our cutlery the wrong way round.

My children are both right-handed and keep trying to hold their cutlery the wrong way round. We are focusing on getting them to hold them properly, i.e. not with a fist grip more than the wrong hand thing but we do switch them too.

Yes

Goodness me some of the responses on here….

😂🙄

That's just a ridiculous rule.

as I said I am dyspraxic, it is nothing to do with how you are taught, and it most certainly is not just a physical skill you can learn. I am in my 60s and have never been able to learn the "conventional way" of using scissors and cutlery. And I am a teacher, so know many children cant.

This is so ignorant. Just because you may vaguely know some children with SEN, really doesn’t mean you know everyone’s capabilities and every type of disability.

Dyspraxia for example, could make it very difficult to use cutlery.

@Mannersdomatter def raise with your partner, the issues for me are not using cutlery and eating with mouth open. I don't care which hand knives and forks are held, though, but can't believe how much greater you're getting about it though! 🤷‍♀️

And just because no diagnosis doesn't mean no neurodiversity. 🤔

Using a baby voice is very odd and needs correcting. Maybe even through speech therapy. https://www.todaysparent.com/kids/regress-baby-talk/

Why are posters focusing in the left/right issue rather than the fact she was “totally clueless as to how to use it”? She’s “holding her broccoli in her fist”!

If this is true, and there isn’t any undiagnosed additional needs, I think it says a lot about the man you’re dating. He is her father, why has he not addressed these issues? Why are you happy to be with a man that hasn’t/doesn’t parent his child.

The ‘wrong hands’ thing is stupid. If she could use cutlery well, it really doesn’t matter.

It does seem like it’s a thread that will cause a lot of frothing. 🧐

Because this always happens on any thread about cutlery.