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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To deliver a lesson in table manners?

310 replies

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 07:18

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! 😂

OP posts:
Wavescrashingonthebeach · 09/11/2023 12:20

Shadowsindarkplaces · 09/11/2023 07:41

Pick up plate, put on floor, saying eat properly or on the floor like an animal. At 12 ,no additional needs. She is aware and making a choice. probably for attention

You do realise plenty of other cultures sit and eat on the floor with their hands and there is nothing wrong with that?! Shocking post.

SugaredCookie · 09/11/2023 12:21

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 12:17

Im not determined to brush off - there could well be discussions I’m not party to but nothing has been said to me and I have two asd children so not an expert but fairly clued up.

Having two ASD children doesn’t make you an expert or ‘fairly clued up’ on autism. ASD is a massive spectrum and all neurodivergent children are different. Several people on here have explained they work with/specialise in children with ASD, and you’ve continuously brushed off any suggestion of it.

SherbetDips · 09/11/2023 12:24

I’m left handed and I hold my fork in my left hand

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 12:25

SugaredCookie · 09/11/2023 12:21

Having two ASD children doesn’t make you an expert or ‘fairly clued up’ on autism. ASD is a massive spectrum and all neurodivergent children are different. Several people on here have explained they work with/specialise in children with ASD, and you’ve continuously brushed off any suggestion of it.

Did I not just say “I am Not an expert”?

I have not continuously brushed off any suggestion.

i have two diagnosed asd adult children - I am perfectly qualified to say I am fairly clued up but not an expert.

my AIBU was shall I refuse to eat out? I am
not prepared to wildly speculate on her potential
sen.

I won’t engage anymore on that.

OP posts:
SugaredCookie · 09/11/2023 12:37

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 12:25

Did I not just say “I am Not an expert”?

I have not continuously brushed off any suggestion.

i have two diagnosed asd adult children - I am perfectly qualified to say I am fairly clued up but not an expert.

my AIBU was shall I refuse to eat out? I am
not prepared to wildly speculate on her potential
sen.

I won’t engage anymore on that.

Yes I was agreeing with what you said about not being an expert, but also informing you that having two ASD children doesn’t make you ‘fairly clued up’ on all signs/symptoms of ASD in children.

I wouldn’t say any posters suggesting ND are ‘wildly speculating’, but simply trying to offer you some food for thought/advice based on their knowledge or experience.

Gowlett · 09/11/2023 12:42

Sounds like she has unresolved issues.
what age was she when her parents split?

Interesting article by Kate Spicer (DM).
About the effect of divorce on children.

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 12:42

Gowlett · 09/11/2023 12:42

Sounds like she has unresolved issues.
what age was she when her parents split?

Interesting article by Kate Spicer (DM).
About the effect of divorce on children.

I’ll look at that, thank you.

OP posts:
HoppingPavlova · 09/11/2023 12:45

@sashh Have you ever been to a formal dinner where someone using the wrong hands causes elbows to bump with other people? Where the glasses are always set to the right?

So, you are saying, that at formal dinners lefties must swap over for the duration? Or, are you saying lefties must always eat with forks in left/knives in right as they manage driving and other tasks similar?

CruCru · 09/11/2023 13:08

This is an interesting thread. By partner, I’ve taken this to mean a man who lives with the OP but they are not married.

It’s interesting that the OP has only just realised that the daughter can’t use cutlery. It implies that she hasn’t known the daughter long.

The use of misuse of cutlery is a bit of a red herring. The twelve year old lies down at the table and uses a baby voice. She is either hopelessly indulged by her father or is playing up because she is uncomfortable - neither are good.

It isn’t the OP’s job to teach her boyfriend’s daughter how to dine. I’m tempted to say that he should move out if the daughter is so uncomfortable (or plays up because she can).

Dweetfidilove · 09/11/2023 13:25

I don’t believe you are being unreasonable.

Given some of the responses however, it may be that her parents have not seen fit to teach her otherwise as table manners are… well, all the words you’ve been called.

Maybe you’ll just have to limit your relationship to eating indoors and possibly at different times.

crosstalk · 09/11/2023 14:12

If after reading the book you still need to address the 12 year old's problems I would go via the father and discuss it with him. Unless he eats in the same way too which I think you would have mentioned, it would be worth approaching him along the lines that table manners like hers are liable to hinder her social acceptance. It may however be her way of making you uncomfortable since she doesn't appreciate another woman in her father's life.

BogRollBOGOF · 09/11/2023 15:01

My 12 yo with dyspraxia, hyper mobility and autism really struggles with cutlery and table skills. It's a tough combination as fine motor control is tiring and often painful to him. The autism element makes him resistant to change and criticism, especially when he's hungry, but he has no interest in practicing skills when he isn't. Rather than triggering a meltdown every meal over the finer points of dining, I focus on the easy wins; sit, use cutlery, no knees, feet out of sight, close mouth when chewing. Generally no phones, although if we are out, occasionally it's to the greater good to let him zone out if there's a risk of a meltdown. We tend to avoid places with prolonged waiting around different stages of a meal, so for us, a carvery tends to be a nice meal out.

The key bit is that despite appearances, he's been taught, and eats at a table at pretty much every meal. For a start, I like my living room too much to risk soft furnishings with gravity-defying food.

Most manners originate with some kind of purpose, and generally have a right-handed bias. Knifes often are serrated to the favour of use in the right hand. In cultures where hands are used, there's ettiquette like "eat with the right, wipe with the left" originating in hygiene again favouring right-handed people. There's ettiquette in where to hold your chopsticks (I thought I was doing well but apparently I hold them too low and am low-class) It's good that diversity like being left handed is no longer being spanked out of people in the UK over the last few decades but we're not in a cultural vacuum either. I don't mind if people swap their cutlery/ glasses over for comfort, but knowing how a table is laid is useful because it stops people taking the wrong items at a group meal and leaving others sourcing the spare items from around the table.

Letting a child grow up with no culturally relevant manners is a social neglect. Not being prompted to use cutlery either means that parents haven't put much effort into developing a child's skills, or their diet is pretty limited if it can usually be done with finger foods. OP is limited in what she can introduce successfully if the girl's parents haven't been paying much attention. Setting an example may help if OP has a healthy relationship, but much more than that is likely to meet resistance in an older child, and the cost of that is high.

It is possible that a condition like dyspraxia has been overlooked, but there would normally be other signs such as poor hand writing, slow writing speed, difficulty with tasks like shoe laces, maybe gross motor control such as throwing/ catching, being one-sided with movement (DS can only scoot single sided) difficulty with skills like swimming or cycling. Diagnosis can be tricky to get- ours emerged during private dyslexia assessment, there is no public assessment in my area so only families with spare £££ can be diagnosed if they know enough to recognise traits.

Neurodivergence needs accommodating, but parents are responsible for teaching table skills in the first place and are letting their children down if they never even attempt to appropriately develop them in the first place. Schools often don't pick these things up, and are often limited in what they will be preapred to see and do even in diagnosed children.

Goneroundthetwist · 09/11/2023 15:05

Your work in education….and you haven’t questioned the reasons why??

Sounds like dyspraxia ….

You don’t sound very caring

Willyoujustbequiet · 09/11/2023 15:09

sashh · 09/11/2023 11:50

I'm quite well educated thank you.

There are lots of things that involve two hands that you have one thing to do with your left and another with your right.

Driving. Most people in the UK manage to change gear with their left hand regardless of whether they are left or right handed.

Riding a motorbike.

Intubating someone, a laryngoscope is used in the left hand and the airway in the right - for everyone.

Have you ever been to a formal dinner where someone using the wrong hands causes elbows to bump with other people? Where the glasses are always set to the right?

Have you ever used a steak or fish knife, they are designed to be used in the right hand.

As for a developmental impact, who are you kidding?

You are certainly not giving the impression that you are educated I'm afraid.

Approximately 90% of the global population is right handed. Therefore it shouldn't come as any surprise that society is geared up to catering to the majority - conventions, utensils, inventions etc...

This does not mean that being left handed is wrong or in anyway incorrect. Its a perfectly normal variant. It simply means we are a minority. Our brains are wired differently. Some people adapt, some right handed people choose the 'left handed way' too. There is no right or wrong - Americans eat the other way round as do many other countries. Its laughable to suggest all these millions of people are somehow wrong.

In the same way the majority of the population is heterosexual and people used to be forced to deny their sexuality, you cannot force a left handed person to go against their natural instinct Its damaging.

Who am I kidding that forced right handedness can impact development? Could you not have at least googled before making that statement?

I'll save you a job - forced right handedness has been proven to cause learning disorders, dyslexia and speech disorders amongst other things.

Due to growing awareness of neurological development thankfully the discrimination and bias left handers faced is for the most part a thing of the past but sadly pockets of ignorance remain.

Brokenmiata · 09/11/2023 17:34

Tbh as long as she's not shoveling food in I would just let her be with what hands she holds them in.

Sunandsea26 · 09/11/2023 17:35

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 07:38

It is widely accepted that if you’re right handed you hold your knife in your right hand and fork in left. If you’re left handed then you would swap around.

I am right handed and happily hold my fork in my right hand, as does my mum. I won’t be changing for anyone and it does not mean I do not have table manners!

ClaireMillar · 09/11/2023 17:37

Yes they’re wrong. Americans don’t have proper table manners. Eating with a fork with your elbow on the table is slobs

BowlOfNoodles · 09/11/2023 17:37

If you don't live with your partner and you've never even cooked for the child you are most definitely over stepping

ClaireMillar · 09/11/2023 17:43

No , she sounds very clued up. There is such a thing as table manners. Regardless of being left or right handed (one of my children is left handed), your fork goes on your left hand and your knife goes in your right hand. I have numerous close friends who are neurodivergent and guess what, they know how to behave at the meal table as well. Teaching table manners is hard work and it sounds like her parents couldn’t be bothered. The poor child sounds feral. They probably need to go back to square one and start teaching proper table manners at home so that she can behave in a way which is acceptable in public

fingerguns · 09/11/2023 17:47

My ex used to hold his cutlery like a small child and I found it embarrassing at home let alone when we went out to eat or ate at my parents' house.

Talk to your partner about it if you don't want to overstep. I've not RTFT but if you don't know her well then ask DP to take the reins on the matter of table manners.

Gloriously · 09/11/2023 17:47

I think it’s interesting that the OP has swerved every Q regarding her BF - why is he not picking up on his child’s ‘acting out’ and/or ‘distress’ and/or ‘poor behaviour’

Why isn’t he parenting? And why is the OP stepping in repeatedly (what does he say / do then?) and having zero impact?

This has everything to do with the adults surrounding this child.

TheBirdintheCave · 09/11/2023 17:56

ClaireMillar · 09/11/2023 17:43

No , she sounds very clued up. There is such a thing as table manners. Regardless of being left or right handed (one of my children is left handed), your fork goes on your left hand and your knife goes in your right hand. I have numerous close friends who are neurodivergent and guess what, they know how to behave at the meal table as well. Teaching table manners is hard work and it sounds like her parents couldn’t be bothered. The poor child sounds feral. They probably need to go back to square one and start teaching proper table manners at home so that she can behave in a way which is acceptable in public

My knife and fork go in the hand they feel most comfortable in. It doesn't affect you in the slightest.

Why is this such a huge problem for some people? 🤦🏻‍♀️😂

vernatheraven · 09/11/2023 18:08

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 07:38

It is widely accepted that if you’re right handed you hold your knife in your right hand and fork in left. If you’re left handed then you would swap around.

I am left handed and use my fork in my left.

nickelbabe · 09/11/2023 18:09

Mannersdomatter · 09/11/2023 07:38

It is widely accepted that if you’re right handed you hold your knife in your right hand and fork in left. If you’re left handed then you would swap around.

No.
No it isn't.
It's common for lefties to swap. It's not common knowledge od obligatory.
And some righties might eat the other way round, too.
And it's not obligatory to hold your knife and fork a specific way or whatever "not like a pen" is. Also you are allowed to hold your fork scoop side up.
The only important way to hold a knife and fork is the way that's most comfortable aand efficient for the eater.

The rest is snobbery.

ClaireMillar · 09/11/2023 18:12

It’s not a huge problem if you don’t care about decent table manners. At least you’re using cutlery. You just haven’t been taught how to use it properly. Eating food with your fingers, using your phone at the table, eating with your mouth open etc as per the OP is disgusting. Clearly the child in question hasn’t been taught by her parents how to behave like a civilised human at the meal table.

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