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AIBU?

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Original poster

In laws and baby's first steps

364 replies

Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 12:27

First of all, there is a huge back story anyway.

But my question is, if you were a mil/fil, would you have done this?

Baby close to taking his first steps but hadn't done it yet. Mil and fil had been banging on for ages about how we needed to get him walking, he should be walking by now bla bla bla. Doing the arm dangling thing every time we saw them.

Baby was 13 months and standing independently so well on track with his development.

On a visit they decided to stand him between them, coaxing him between them (while I was gone to the toilet) then when I and back announced proudly that he'd taken his first steps.

OP posts:
PeonyBlushSuede · 08/04/2024 14:05

Missmarplesknittingbuddy · 08/04/2024 12:45

I am a GP . My first GC took their first steps with us while we had them for childcare . When we took them home I must have "forgotten" to mention it as later that eve I got a little video sent to me of GC walking " for the first time " . . It's not about them being in laws, ( i am a MIL too ), it's about them actively trying to take experiences away from you .

Honestly this is so lovely.

Im pretty sure my son took his first steps at nursery but they just keep quiet and say oh I think he's close!

I know over their lifetime it doesn't matter but in that moment it really does to have their firsts with you

KoolKookaburra · 08/04/2024 14:16

Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 13:12

I get that it wouldn't bother some people. I also get that sometimes a baby will take their first steps at nursery, or with someone looking after them.

If it was me I'd have kept quiet.

Like I say they kept constantly saying he should be walking/we need to get him walking and they'd been going on and on since he was 9 months.

Part of a much bigger picture so perhaps on its own it doesn't seem significant.

No. It's significant

HoppingPavlova · 08/04/2024 14:22

Surely it had to happen some time though? DH and I had ours full-time pretty much without ever crossing over during kids waking hours (literally tag team in/out door) by working full time opposite shifts and days over the week. They have to walk sometime. Obviously you encourage them though. It wasn’t as though I didn’t encourage them to avoid ‘robbing’ DH of the experience and he didn’t do so either. We also didn’t go down a path of not telling the other parent, pretending it didn’t happen so we could each ‘experience it’ - weird. Although a few kids in and that wouldn’t even work anyway as an older sibling would no doubt greet the other parent with ‘x walked today’ (saved the parent having to write it on the changeover board🤣). We even missed it for one as they did it with siblings while parent wasn’t watching, was cooking dinner or something with kids in the next (childproof) room. Kids seem to think it’s so much more fun to walk in pursuit of their older siblings rather than via parent encouragement 🤣🤣🤣.

tara66 · 08/04/2024 14:36

Oh no! That's bad! Very bad!

W0tnow · 08/04/2024 14:42

I think being at work and having your child take their first steps at nursery is different to popping to the loo for 5 minutes and having your in-laws actively encourage the first steps. You’d have to be either a bit spiteful, or absolutely clueless.

Original poster
Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 14:45

I'm not even sure what I wanted from this thread to be honest. I had a good relationship with my pil but after I had ds, although we haven't fallen out they have drove me slowly insane. It's not really my mil as much as fil who is an extremely overbearing man.

He has taken every opportunity to criticise and undermine. Weaning, walking, talking, sleeping, toilet training, mocking us for having stajrgates telling us we are making the house a prison. Mocking me over an allergy and questioning medical advice.

OP posts:
Original poster
Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 14:48

W0tnow · 08/04/2024 14:42

I think being at work and having your child take their first steps at nursery is different to popping to the loo for 5 minutes and having your in-laws actively encourage the first steps. You’d have to be either a bit spiteful, or absolutely clueless.

Thanks that's exactly it really.

I'm not deluded I know that you can't plan a babies first steps for the parents convenience. Some of my friends worked in nurseries and etiquette was not to tell the parents unless they asked.

This was my oil showing me how it's done because in fils opinion we weren't doing it right.

OP posts:
SilkFloss · 08/04/2024 14:52

First steps don't count unless the parent is there to witness them!

(I'd have been fucking livid in your shoes, OP!)

piglet81 · 08/04/2024 14:54

Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 14:45

I'm not even sure what I wanted from this thread to be honest. I had a good relationship with my pil but after I had ds, although we haven't fallen out they have drove me slowly insane. It's not really my mil as much as fil who is an extremely overbearing man.

He has taken every opportunity to criticise and undermine. Weaning, walking, talking, sleeping, toilet training, mocking us for having stajrgates telling us we are making the house a prison. Mocking me over an allergy and questioning medical advice.

Can you spend less time with them? They (well, FIL) sound horrible :(

piglet81 · 08/04/2024 14:55

Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 14:45

I'm not even sure what I wanted from this thread to be honest. I had a good relationship with my pil but after I had ds, although we haven't fallen out they have drove me slowly insane. It's not really my mil as much as fil who is an extremely overbearing man.

He has taken every opportunity to criticise and undermine. Weaning, walking, talking, sleeping, toilet training, mocking us for having stajrgates telling us we are making the house a prison. Mocking me over an allergy and questioning medical advice.

Can you spend less time with them? They (well, FIL) sound horrible :(

LesserSpottedAlligator · 08/04/2024 14:55

Bloody horrible thing to do. I was a childminder, never told a parent if a child did anything first at my setting. Waited for the parent to tell me they had done it. Why would I want to take that joy from them?

piglet81 · 08/04/2024 14:55

Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 14:45

I'm not even sure what I wanted from this thread to be honest. I had a good relationship with my pil but after I had ds, although we haven't fallen out they have drove me slowly insane. It's not really my mil as much as fil who is an extremely overbearing man.

He has taken every opportunity to criticise and undermine. Weaning, walking, talking, sleeping, toilet training, mocking us for having stajrgates telling us we are making the house a prison. Mocking me over an allergy and questioning medical advice.

Can you spend less time with them? They (well, FIL) sound horrible :(

DappledThings · 08/04/2024 14:56

This reply has been deleted

This has been deleted by MNHQ for breaking our Talk Guidelines.

I don't get this at all. I'd heard nurseries don't tell parents if a child takes their first steps there. I told ours I wanted no part of that and if they walked I wanted to know about it. I'd find it really patronising to be lied to about it.

And GPs encouraging a child to walk is totally normal. They've not done anything wrong.

imforeverblowingbuttons · 08/04/2024 15:01

DrJoanAllenby · 08/04/2024 12:47

It's the fact they did it when you went to the bathroom which shows it was deliberately done to undermine you.

This. It's not like it happened while they were babysitting. They did it while she was in the toilet!! Of course it was deliberate

Moveoverdarlin · 08/04/2024 15:03

I’d say ‘Yay! Well done’ and move on. Couldn’t get worked up. He probably did three steps then fell. Do it with him tonight and film it and pretend that’s the first time if you’re bothered.

I remember saying to my parents that my DS had his 2 year check with the health visitor and the only thing on their list that he couldn’t do was to jump up with both feet off the floor. When I picked him up from theirs one day they say ‘we’ve got him jumping!, he knows all his colours, he’s eaten cous cous for us blah blah blah’. I rolled my eyes but laughed. It’s sweet that they care.

FlyingHighFlyingLow · 08/04/2024 15:04

Timeforsomecoffee · 08/04/2024 14:48

Thanks that's exactly it really.

I'm not deluded I know that you can't plan a babies first steps for the parents convenience. Some of my friends worked in nurseries and etiquette was not to tell the parents unless they asked.

This was my oil showing me how it's done because in fils opinion we weren't doing it right.

Show quote history

Ok, so they're getting on your nerves. Where was your DH? Did he not stop his parents? Was he going along with it? If he was at work stop inviting them when he isn't there!

Mummame2222 · 08/04/2024 15:05

tortiecat · 08/04/2024 12:41

What absolute peaches. My MIL tried to claim similar something similar (except DS had walked a few days previously, so she looked daft).

My Mum claims this shit all the time. Somehow all of my kids magically done all of their ‘firsts’ in one of the rare occasions they were being babysat by her. Idiot.

pinkpale · 08/04/2024 15:07

My GC did his first steps with me. I never said a word so his parents had that joy.

DappledThings · 08/04/2024 15:18

pinkpale · 08/04/2024 15:07

My GC did his first steps with me. I never said a word so his parents had that joy.

I'd have felt really stupid if my parents had seen that happen and felt they had to lie to me about it.

BrownFewHighlights · 08/04/2024 15:20

Missmarplesknittingbuddy · 08/04/2024 12:45

I am a GP . My first GC took their first steps with us while we had them for childcare . When we took them home I must have "forgotten" to mention it as later that eve I got a little video sent to me of GC walking " for the first time " . . It's not about them being in laws, ( i am a MIL too ), it's about them actively trying to take experiences away from you .

That’s so nice, and the kind of thing my Mum would do too.
Quite lovely ❤️🌸

EndlessTreadmill · 08/04/2024 15:28

They are unpleasant and stupid. But don't sweat it. As someone said, a small stagger is nothing, it's not a first step.
The real 'first steps' are when they do a proper couple of steps and know what they are doing, and their face lights up in excitement. Not what happened here.
And to be honest, don't overthink it. These tiny firsts are really nothing in the grand scheme of things. My kids are 12 and 10 and i don't remember either of their specific 'first' steps.(just rough ages and their approach to them). It's not that important, really.

Potentialscroogeincognito · 08/04/2024 15:30

I would be very clear how spiteful you thought it was that they would actively try and get him to do it knowing you had just popped to the loo. And then huge step back. “Unfortunately, your overbearing behaviours have overstepped and as a result I will be stepping back” and repeat. My LO did his first steps at nursery, must have done. They said on pick up “he’s definitely going to walk this weekend!”… “Can’t wait to hear all about it etc” and you guessed it … I was really touched they left it for me as I felt so guilty about not being there every day anyway more. Don’t put up with it.

Librarybooker · 08/04/2024 15:32

Too much emphasis is based on first steps these days, but yes that’s a really irritating thing to have done.

I’m never a fan of over encouragement for a baby to perform. I especially hate to see parents placing a toy on the floor to encourage a baby to crawl to it and then picking it up and moving it further away just as they get to it.

Technically, my Mum missed my first steps. Her story was that I toddled into the kitchen one day. Technically, the DSs first independent steps were running. He’d been cruising forever, but would not let go of the furniture. My parents were over and my father went back outside to fetch something from the car. The DS was so perturbed that grandad might be going home that he finally let go of the sofa and ran towards the window. Realising he’d let go, he grabbed the coffee table 🤣 Made us wait 2 more weeks before he let go again 😂

Sugargliderwombat · 08/04/2024 15:35

Fair enough encourage the baby, but they shouldn't have told you or anyone else.

Drearydiedre · 08/04/2024 15:46

Mine videoed my ds walking and sent it to me at work. As you can imagine, it made my day... They too had been fixated on making him walk and wanted everyone to know it had happened in their house.

I don't know why some grandparents have no emotional intelligence. Presumably they'd have been a bit irked if an inlaw had done it to them 30 years ago? I'd like to think that if someone's baby had achieved a huge milestone in front of me and not the parents I'd have the sense not to share it.